“What’s that?” asked a Granada resident, Francisco Martin Morillas, staring at the screen with wide eyes. He had loved sports since childhood, not just football, and he remembers watching the Mexico Olympics at 13. A leap he saw on TV left him stunned, a memory he would carry for life. The aging Andalusian athlete recalls that moment as the high jump pivot point when Dick Fosbury changed the sport forever.
Athletics: Dick Fosbury, the man who revolutionized the high jump, dies at 76
From the first foam mats to the late leaps of a fearless pioneer, the Fosbury flop reshaped high jumping. Yet the shift would not have happened so quickly without the charisma of an athlete who insisted on leaving the old straddle technique behind. The takeoff story begins with the inside foot and a bold leap forward, marking a turning point in the discipline at a time when the sport relied on straightforward gravity and balance. The Fosbury method becomes a defining reference for the event as Morillas recalls the era, which started to redefine what was possible for young athletes.
“I remember this vividly, a jumper tracing a graceful parabola, eyes on the sky, crossing the bar in one breath,” the Granada native explains, describing the still surprising mechanics. The natural flow between sprinting and takeoff, free of fear, is said to be easier with the Fosbury approach, a technique that began as a bold experimentation and grew into a standard for aspiring jumpers. The first Spanish record holder to adopt the Fosbury flop, Morillas himself would go on to set and break records, chasing a dream with the new style after meeting its essence in the late 1960s.
Morillas rose in Spanish competition with the same fervor that accompanies street legends. By 15 he clocked a national mark for youth, and by 20 he stood as a national champion using the Fosbury technique. The national record soon climbed higher, eventually surpassing the previous best by several centimeters, as other Spanish athletes joined the revolution and embraced the approach that had shaken the Olympic world. Catalan peers and others from Barcelona to the Basque country joined the movement, shaping a generation of jumpers who carried the Fosbury flame forward.
The Fosbury impact was already visible at the 1972 Munich Games, where three jumpers climbed the podium using the new approach that had made Fosbury famous. Since then, nearly all world records have followed that path, with a few exceptions in later years. The modern list of records still bears Fosbury’s influence, with top marks in the men’s and women’s events highlighting the technique’s enduring legacy. The sport keeps evolving, but the Fosbury DNA remains evident in every high jump, every attempt to conquer height with a bold, backward overpass of the bar.
Historical figures from around the world contributed to the era, with record holders and champions illustrating the blend of power and precision that the Fosbury flip embodies. The technique has become a benchmark for skill and courage, and it continues to inspire new generations to dream big and push boundaries in athletics. The sport’s annals remember Fosbury not only as a record setter but as a symbol of brave experimentation and belief in one’s own potential.
“Fosbury inspired us to dream big and to believe in ourselves, no matter how we jump or how we live,” one longtime admirer from Granada notes, reflecting on a jump that reshaped the career of many athletes. The influence of that leap—seen first on a television screen—still echoes in today’s high jump lore and in the ambitions of young runners who grow up watching the bar rise higher and higher.