KNOCKING DOWN HURDLES - Banned Hurdle Technique 

I cannot watch this video without being in constant laughter from that dude intentionally running through his hurdles and then running the next guy's hurdles.

Still laughing at the out of control hurdler in the beginning of the video...lol

I was a hurdler in HS...we still had those heavy old-fashioned T-frames instead of the 3 ounce rockers. Visiting teams were somewhat timid when they encountered them. Tremendous home-field advantage.

If you can somehow go under the hurdles faster than jumping over them, that should absolutely count only because of how ridiculous of athletic feat it would represent.

When I was a kid an opposing high school team's hurdlers all deliberately kicked down the hurdles when they raced. Presumably it was legal, but super obnoxious because invariably they'd break one or two of the nicer fiberglass hurdles every meet.

In the hurdles rulebook, from the very beginning, right at the top of the page, it should say: "Rule #1: You gotta jump over the hurdles. Like, seriously, I mean, come on, that's that ONE thing that makes this unique. If we wanted you to just run, we wouldn't have put the hurdles there, would we?"

I remember at school one of the grounds staff putting up one of the hurdles the wrong way round (don't ask me how) and no one noticed. The favourite clipped it with his lead leg and as the hurdle got higher it levered him upwards. Next he caught his trail leg in the hurdle and he hit the track chest first from about six feet in the air. Years later he told me that even though he would check the hurdles himself he was never able to do the event with any confidence so gave it up.

I wasn't a hurdler in school. I never experienced falling while hurdling. I've never done anything remotely related to hurdling.

I remember being incredibly disappointed as a kid watching the Olympics on TV and asking why they hadn't been disqualified for knocking the hurdle over. My mum explained much of what's in this video. I was scandalised. Apparently 4 year old me wanted perfect clearance and nothing less.

I think it's time we return to the spirit of the competition - brick walls. Of course, these would be set up without cement or mortar, just nicely stacked bricks, but if an athlete "accidently" bangs into them it should break a leg. And of course, think of the job creation - you'd have a traveling IAAF qualified bunch of masons moving from meet to meet, setting up hurdles. What fun!

I have absolutely no interest in the subject but your excellent presentation style made it compelling enough to watch and now I know way more than I ever needed to about hurdles. Well done and thanks!

can't go under it, can't go over it OH NO WE'VE GOT TO GO THROUGH IT

One of my most frustrating high school track moments was my senior year running at this random meet in Phoenix. At the time (I am not sure if it has changed since) only like 3 or 4 meets in the entire season actually counted with regards to qualifying you for the state championship meet. So if one of these meets had terrible weather, tough luck have fun high jumping in the rain. But at this particular meet it was beautiful out AND we had what must have been the absolute best legal tail wind I have ever been graced to run with. I felt amazing and I knew I was going to run my fastest 110 in my life. I was in one of the middle lanes and I had to bigger muscular guys on either side of me. During the race, both guys beside me were more aggressively smashing hurdles rather than clearing them. This does not pretty much ever matter to me, but in this raxe they were pretty fast I failed to get ahead of them early to make it not matter. They were so out of control that both guys ran into my lane more and more with every jump. Their arms were pounding me in the chest on every hurdle. I remember physically pushing them with both arms as if I was opening up a double door dramatically, desperately trying to keep them off of me. They eventually they ended up hitting my last couple hurdles with their feet, knocking them over as we all cleared in mid-air (something that seams so ridiculous looking back at). It was the angriest I had ever been in Track, a sport where your competitors are pretty much always your friends. I did not get a time trial, but I did not expect to get one. This is high school, I wasn't qualifying for the olympics of anything, it sucked to me because it was still nearly a PR even dealing with all that crap.

The intro clip was all I needed.

I can't believe I'm watching a video about patch notes and meta shifts in Hurdles.

I love these "banned techiniques" videos. It's always very interesting to see the evolution of strategies and peoples ingenuity

This brings back memories of myself getting disqualified for a fairly related situation. I forgot my spikes at a youth competition and slipped on the damp track. Took a hurdle badly and knocked myself out on the landing. I got up and finished the race, but even though they didn't move me it was deemed I'd had help and was disqualified. It still frustrates me to this day, given the very low turnout at that young age I would have still qualified for a competition I was more suited for had I not been disqualified.

These banned techniques series are great. Informative and concise! Well done

Roger Kingdom used to hit 80% of the high hurdles, but he was so strong it didn't slow him down.

Woah this is actually really interesting - keep the concise, high quality videos up!

I want a new version of the hurdles that pits dwarfs against giants. All you'd need to do is make the hurdles higher so only giants can get over them and allow going through them so dwarves can run straight through.

Great video, thanks for all the info.

"Why did you just plow through all the hurdles?!" "What hurdles?"

Sounds really complicated and opening up for strange judgements. To me it would make much more sense to have something similar to horse jumping, where a knocked down hurdle gives you 4 penalty points and would automatically drop you down below those who cleared more of the hurdles even if they were slower. That would eliminate people just powering through and make things safer since less hurdles would fly around.

I think a much cleaner way to do it would just be to assign a time penalty for every hurdle you pull... double if it leaves your lane or was knocked down using the hands chest or thigh

It really says something about your presentation skills when you can make a topic that would be boring to most people quite interesting and insightful. great video!

At 3:47, the rule is stated, "An athlete shall be disqualified if their foot or leg is, at the instant of clearance, beside the hurdle (on either side), [or] below the horizontal plane of the top of any hurdle." This rule, read as written, makes contacting a hurdle result in disqualification. If you touch the hurdle rather than passing over it, your body (foot or leg) is below the top edge (that is, top plane) of the hurdle. The only way you can hit the hurdle is if you are still below that plane. Either the rule should be rewritten or hitting a hurdle needs to result in disqualification.

The algorithm has really liked these videos in the past day. Watched the whole series.

I remember being so disappointed that hurdles were being treated as an optional obstacle. I really wish they would just add a time penalty such that you actually have to be good at the hurdling part to compete.

im here from the short and this is a genuinly good informative video. nice!

13 years I ran 110m hurdles, 4 years 300 m hurdles and 400 m hurdles. Only issue I had are other runners that have a nasty arm swing to the side and smack me.

Actually - "'tis-dal" not "tis-dale". My Dad was born in 1931 and he remembers Bob Tisdall well as he was a bit of a national hero in the 1930's. We didn't (don't) get too many Irish Olympic Gold medalists, particularly in Track and Field.

I tend to get uncomfortable watching people violently lose balance or fall like in this video. So easy to heavily twist or break something. I carry the battle scars of my hurdling career. Broke my collar bone, massively sprained my ankle and my career ender: ripping my patella tendon clean off my tibia with a bad landing. Nevertheless, good video, and nice to see some of the guys I used to race.

I think we make a new version of hurdle and its sprlimbo raise the hurdles like 6" and the runner must do a limbo under each one. It would be interesting to watch the meta develop to knee slides.

My boy signed up to sprint, He's gonna sprint..

Interesting that his WR was retrospectively reinstated, as he competed knowing that this is the rule. Is that not the same as competing on performance enhancing drugs, getting DSQ but because those drugs were then made legal the following year, have your time reinstated retrospectively

Great editing. Information dense. Love it. Thanks.

in one meet, my heat was first and somebody on the setting up crew was tipping the weights on the wrong side intentionally, everybody in my heat noticed and one of us went up to her and some others to stop putting them up that way. like... they're designed to fall over so we don't DIE x)

gosh there is a video of me online in highschool failing hurdles just like some of the footage you’ve shown here and for one thing, I now feel better that I can stand in solidarity with other people who have fallen to the hurdle challenge, and secondly, thank god you showed them and not me…

I half expected a fallen hurdle would result in a time penalty. Because if those hurdles were rigid and you clipped it, you're going down for sure resulting in a good 2+ seconds added to your time.

having a beer watching these videos good interesting stuff,well done 🍻

This banned technique series is amazing!

Very interesting vid/info. Thanks!

Can we get some death metal added to that dude popping off hurdles in the beginning?😂

Thanks for the video. ✨

I used to be a pretty decent middle distance runner and I considered myself athletic. When my coach had me try the hurdles I looked exactly like 5:08. I simply cannot jump to save my life. 😂

The runner at the beginning, jesus christ that is funny. But he tried to jump over the last one! :D

I get the appeal, its very athletic but it's such an absurdly dangerous track event. Unreal how many ways there are to get hurt even if it's not you that messes up.

Im glad we got that outta the way, lets go hurdling.

Imagine needing to ban not jumping over a hurdle in a sport that's sole purpose it to jump over hurdles.

I’m still angry about the last race of my senior year of high school when the racer in the lane next to me kicked over my last hurdle and it threw off my timing enough so that I fell. I might have qualified for the next race had it not happened but the judges didn’t catch it so my hurdling career ended boo hoo. Sympathy upvotes accepted lol.

So. On longer hurdle distances where the hurdles aren't placed side by side in the begining. Can I purposely knock down my opponent's (on the inside) hurdles as they come sooner for me due to starting further ahead. That way my opponent can simply run straight through the knocked down hurdles and thus finish with a much faster time due to now only needing to jump over the last hurdles. And seemingly by the rules I would be the only disqualified one

The Chinese guy at the beginning cracks me up every time.

Great video!

I wonder if it's faster to put you hands out like a forklift and pick them all up as you go.😂

Lmfao the clips are so funny

I remember doing the decathlon in high school and there was every type of track athlete there. I remember some throwers running the 110 hurdles, one ran up to each one stopped and stepped over it. Another stopped at each one and pushed them over. The rules were pretty relaxed as all of their times weren't good and just finishing every event gives you some points so no one got DQ'ed. I thought it would be as funny in the polevault with the two throwers in my group then one huge guy beat me.......

I have little interest in track and field sports, but these videos are fascinating. First, I'm like, "Nobody would do this..." then you explain why they did it, and it suddenly makes sense. The best in every category of anything are often the people who figure out how to exploit the rules to their most absurd extremes.

I never would have guessed hurdles were such a technical hurdle for judges and non racers to grasp over the years.

There is a lesson to be learned from straight up busting through a hurdle

Add a time penalty for knocking down a hurdle. Simple fix. Each hurdle you knock down adds a tenth or a quarter (I have no idea what a normal hurdle time is, nor do I know how many hurdles there are so I don't know what a suitable penalty would be).

I'm gonna catch the hurdles and carry them with me. The true power hurdler! 👌

0:03 the second guy from the left was on a life-death mission.

Whats the point of a hurdle if you can just knock it down?

The videos are amazing! lol

I really like this channel. Interesting stuff. And wtf was that hurdler (if you can call him that) doing at the start of this video? Was he deliberately trying to sabotage the other athlete?

WHat about picking them all up and carrying them with you then dropping them in the ground in front of the finish line so you can jump over them all at once?

Back at school at one PE session there was a obstacle course with a 10 second penalty for each one failed. I looked at it then ran around the course skipping every obstacle and won by a healthy margin. Brains over brawn.

Year 2040, finally heavily electrified fence is discovered.

oh boy, another RU-vid rabbit hole to go down!

Not enough injuries in track and field events even with the pole vault? Let's add hurdles.

I've always had a proper fear of hurdles. I'm quite tall and decent at the jumping events, but my brain just won't allow me to take a hurdle properly

Guy in red just said "f it" 😂

Now we can make hurdles that are electronic. We could embed cellphone cameras into the tops that look sideways and measure the passing height. If you're clean, no penalty. If any part would intercept a solid bar (as if it were present) then add a proportional time penalty. You could have some super light weight, breakaway ribbon or other non-impeding structure to give them a target.

That Chinese dude going into another lane is like a Chinese driver 🤣🤣

I find it funny after he fell into the other lane...he just ran in the other lane instead.

Solo time trial is such a nice reprieve if things out of your control happen

I just realized how kinda dangerous this sport is... together with pole vault, is till someone dies?

Most all of the Olympic Field Trails are of Military Nature. Knocking down/displacing a hurdle should ADD One Minute to the running time, Each.

Calling Tisdale's race legal was purely a PR move. Even under the modern rules he should still have been DQd in that race because every hurdle he knocked down was knocked down with the front of his shin, and his foot was both below and behind the hurdle at the point of contact. If one of those things happens it's supposed to be a DQ, and he did all three of them

Can't believe some people saw horses and said "I want to do that too"

Sounds like we need to bring back the old hurdles.

Why am I suddenly watching this...

Sort of defeats the purpose but how to knock down a hurdle safely can be taught. At least with the lead leg. It has to be done with some degree of aggression and not on the "up" part, with the heel not the arch or the ball of the foot. The "safe" part is IF you are going to knock them down do it in such a way that they are DOWN not bouncing around, twisting into other lanes etc., since the real danger is getting tangled up either in the hurdle as it is bouncing/moving/spinning or you getting crossed up. If done correctly the hurdle will stay down, flat and in only your lane and you can keep running.

Great wipe outs in this one.

I think it would be better that they introduced penalty seconds. For each hurdle you knock down 0.1 second penalty. The problem with hurdles though is that they are at the same height. While the people running don't have the same lenght.

That kid in red in the beginning of the video is a menace

I never knew about the “solo re-running” allotment, (if you got interfered with) I just remember during the 1984 Olympics (without Googling it) I remember a runner, I think her name was Mary Decker ,got interfered with, (or vice versa) and I don’t remember the person who got interfered with, being allowed a “solo run” (This wasn’t a hurdles race, it was like at 800 or 1500 meter or longer race)

The only time it should be allowed is on the last hurdle of the 400m hurdles. Sometimes you just don't have another jump in you

3:18 he's back!

I thought this was gonna be the guy with the record running his next race knocking over every hurdle in protest for not getting his record

03:52 looks like he has never seen a hurdle or practiced clearing a hurdle one single time.

So much of this footage maximum struggle bus content

I laugh so hard watching this vid😂😂. No way bro 😂😂😂

Interesting...I don't follow track at all, but just figured there was a 'time penalty' of some sort for knocking over a hurdle

That Chinese dude in second vid nearly kills me everytime, for that level of not giving AF.

Pretty sure we'll one day look back at hurdles and wonder why we even bothered trying to make it look legit.

These banned techniques were far more entertaining to watch. I'd watch nothing but track if they allow them😄

It would simplify the rule book to simply replace the hurdles with a continuous steel wall anchored to the ground.

I like how the hurdler behind the lunatic hurdler keeps jumping over non existing hurdles!