Title: An operations research approach to the triple jump

Authors: Jack Brimberg, Bill Hurley, Shaul P. Ladany

Addresses: Department of Business Administration, Royal Military College of Canada. ' Department of Business Administration, Royal Military College of Canada. ' Department of Industrial Engineering and Management, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, PO Box 653, Beer-Sheva 84105, Israel

Abstract: There are wide-ranging views among track and field experts regarding the optimal strategy to use in the triple jump. The controversy pertains to the effort which should be expended in each of the hop, step, and jump phases. In this paper, we develop a dynamic programming approach for finding the optimal strategy. The results of our model support a recent shift in opinion in favour of a jump-dominated technique. However, the improvement is marginal, and hence, the best strategy may in the end be athlete specific.

Keywords: dynamic programming; track and field; triple jump; operations research; sport management.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSMM.2006.008116

International Journal of Sport Management and Marketing, 2006 Vol.1 No.3, pp.208 - 214

Published online: 17 Nov 2005 *

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