Hand Weights Enhanced Ancient Athletes' Performances

Join Our Community of Science Lovers!

On supporting science journalism

If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.

Most performance-enhancing tricks used by today's Olympic athletes can only be detected using high-tech laboratory tests. But ancient Olympic athletes, it seems, used a more obvious method to improve their results: hand weights. According to a report published today in the journal Nature, standing long jumpers used stone or lead pieces known as halteres to travel farther.

Although it might seem that jumping with lead weights would be a disadvantage, Alberto E. Minetti and Luca P. Ardigo of Manchester Metropolitan University found that holding halteres of a certain size could actually propel a long jumper farther. Using a computer model of a long jumper and observations of jumping volunteers, the researchers studied how the presence of various weights affected performance. They found that a jumper swinging a pair of halteres weighing a total of six kilograms experienced a take-off speed 2 percent greater than his empty-handed counterpart did. In fact, the halteres only became a hindrance when their weight exceeded about 10 kilograms.

The team further found that skilled swinging of the weights--that is, thrusting them forward on take-off and backward just before landing--could add 17 centimeters to what would have been a three meter jump. Because haltere specimens recovered by archaeologists (top image) range in mass from two to nine kilograms and vase paintings (bottom image) depict the optimum form of haltere swinging, Minetti and Ardigo conclude that athletes in ancient times had worked out these advantages for themselves.

It’s Time to Stand Up for Science

If you enjoyed this article, I’d like to ask for your support. Scientific American has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in that two-century history.

I’ve been a Scientific American subscriber since I was 12 years old, and it helped shape the way I look at the world. SciAm always educates and delights me, and inspires a sense of awe for our vast, beautiful universe. I hope it does that for you, too.

If you subscribe to Scientific American, you help ensure that our coverage is centered on meaningful research and discovery; that we have the resources to report on the decisions that threaten labs across the U.S.; and that we support both budding and working scientists at a time when the value of science itself too often goes unrecognized.

In return, you get essential news, captivating podcasts, brilliant infographics, can't-miss newsletters, must-watch videos, challenging games, and the science world's best writing and reporting. You can even gift someone a subscription.

There has never been a more important time for us to stand up and show why science matters. I hope you’ll support us in that mission.

Thank you,

David M. Ewalt, Editor in Chief, Scientific American