Power ranking every single sport at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics

10. Track (Jump Events)

We start the top 10 events with another track and field event. It’s actually “events” because there are four “jump” events in “Athletics” (how the Olympics is describing track and field events in 2024). The breakdown here is the long jump, the high jump, the triple jump, and the pole vault. To start, let’s evaluate the two most straightforward events: the long jump and the high jump.

The long jump is the most legendary of the two. It is said that in the original Olympics in Ancient Greece, the long jump (as part of the pentathlon) was meant to mimic jumping over long rivers and streams. Today, the long jump is so precise. There is so much an athlete has to accomplish to win a medal. They have to perfect their running start, jump at the right time, put their full strength and momentum into their jump, and then they have to land basically folding themselves in half but popping up without touching any other part of the sand. It’s wild. 

The high jump is exactly as it sounds. Jump higher than your opponent, and you win. There is a strategy here, as athletes have to choose where they put the bar they need to jump over. This is similar to the pole vault but without the aid. It’s thrilling, as athletes give themselves literal centimeters of cushion between knocking the pole over and disqualifying themselves and a possible place at the medal table.

The final event is the triple jump. It’s also known as the “hop, skip, and a jump,” based on the way in which the jumps happen. It’s similar to the long jump, as someone hits a line and jumps into an adult sandbox, but the jumps have to be very specific. The first jump has to land on the same foot as the takeoff, the second jump must be on the opposite foot, and then the third jump is in the sand. This is very technical for an event that is pretty similar to other events.