The Women's Discus Throw

Discus throw

The discus throw is an event in track and field athletics competition, in which an athlete throws a heavy disc—called a discus—in an attempt to mark a farther distance than his or her competitors. It is an ancient sport, as evidenced by the 5th century BC Myron statue, Discobolus...

event at the 2004 Summer Olympics

2004 Summer Olympics

The 2004 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad, was a premier international multi-sport event held in Athens, Greece from August 13 to August 29, 2004 with the motto Welcome Home. 10,625 athletes competed, some 600 more than expected, accompanied by 5,501 team...

as part of the athletics program

Athletics at the 2004 Summer Olympics

At the 2004 Summer Olympics, the athletics events were held at the Athens Olympic Stadium from August 18 to August 29, except for the marathons , the race walks , and the shot put...

 was held at the Athens Olympic Stadium. It was originally planned to hold the discus throw at the Ancient Olympia Stadium, but it was discovered that the field was not large enough to accommodate the range of modern discus throwers, and would have posed a danger to spectators. As such, it was decided to move the discus throw and to hold the shot put

Shot put

The shot put is a track and field event involving "putting" a heavy metal ball—the shot—as far as possible. It is common to use the term "shot put" to refer to both the shot itself and to the putting action....

 at the ancient stadium, despite the fact that the shot put was not contested at the Ancient Olympic Games.

The competitors were split into two groups and given three attempts at reaching the automatic qualification distance of 62.50 metres. As twelve athletes did not achieve this the seven that did were joined in the final by the five throwers who achieved the longest non-qualifying throws.

For the final, the qualifying distances were ignored and the competitors were given three throws. The top eight after these throws were then given a further three and the furthest distance thrown from their six throws gave us the winner.

Russian Natalya Sadova

Natalya Sadova

Natalya Ivanovna Sadova , née Koptyukh is a Russian discus thrower who has competed in many Olympiads.She won the gold medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics held in Athens, Greece in 2004, as well as a silver medal at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, and placed fourth in 2000 Summer...

 was in her third Olympics, having won a silver medal in 1996 and placed fourth in 2000. In both 1998 and 2002 she had placed second at the European Championships. The home crowd favorite was Greek Anastasia Kelesidou

Anastasia Kelesidou

Anastasia Kelesidou is a retired Greek discus thrower best known for winning silver medals at the 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics. During her career she set seven Greek records in discus throw, the best being 67.70 metres....

, silver medalist from 2000 in Sydney and runner-up at the 1999 and 2003 World Championships.

Sadova opened with 64.78 metres in the first round to take the lead, only to be surpassed in round two by Czech Věra Cechlová. Kelesidou then moved ahead with 66.68 metres (218-9¼) in the third round. With her penultimate attempt, Sadova recorded 67.02 metres (219-10¾) to cement the gold medal, Kelesidou’s third round mark holding up for another silver medal. Belarussian Iryna Yatchenko won bronze, as she had in 2000. In 2006, Sadova was banned from competition for two years after testing positive for methandienone, an anabolic steroid.

Medalists

Schedule

• All times are Eastern European Time
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  Eastern European Time is one of the names of UTC+02:00 time zone, 2 hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time. It is used in some European countries that also use Eastern European Summer Time as a summer daylight saving time.- Usage :...
  
   (UTC+2
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  )

  Qualification Round
  Group A	Group B
  20.08.2004 – 21:30h	20.08.2004 – 23:15h
  Final Round
  21.08.2004 – 21:10h

Abbreviations

Q	automatic qualification
q	qualification by rank
DNS	did not start
NM	no mark
WR	world record
AR	area record
NR	national record
PB	personal best
SB	season best

Records

Standing records prior to the 2004 Summer Olympics
World Record		76.80 m	July 9, 1988	Neubrandenburg Neubrandenburg Neubrandenburg is a city in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. It is located in the southeastern part of the state, on the shore of a lake called the Tollensesee .... , East Germany
Olympic Record		72.30 m	September 29, 1988	Seoul, South Korea

Group A

Rank	Overall	Athlete	Attempts			Distance	Note
			1	2	3
1	1		64.48	—	—	64.48 m
2	2		64.33	—	—	64.33 m
3	5		64.07	—	—	64.07 m
4	6		63.39	—	—	63.39 m
5	8		59.87	60.89	61.91	61.91 m
6	11		61.48	56.11	58.43	61.48 m
7	13		60.82	59.20	59.95	60.82 m
8	15		60.35	X	60.63	60.63 m
9	18		57.30	58.83	X	58.83 m
10	21		58.64	58.19	58.55	58.64 m
11	22		X	58.54	X	58.54 m
12	24		58.28	56.84	55.64	58.28 m
13	26		X	58.13	X	58.13 m
14	27		X	57.57	58.12	58.12 m
15	29		X	54.80	57.31	57.31 m
16	31		56.70	X	56.53	56.70 m
17	32		56.53	X	55.06	56.53 m
18	35		54.04	55.49	51.24	55.49 m
19	39		52.52	50.85	X	52.52 m
20	40		47.59	48.12	X	48.12 m
21	41		43.25	X	X	43.25 m

Group B

Rank	Overall	Athlete	Attempts			Distance	Note
			1	2	3
1	3		62.15	64.20	—	64.20 m
2	4		64.13	—	—	64.13 m
3	7		62.15	63.04	—	63.04 m
4	9		61.72	60.17	60.67	61.72 m
5	10		X	56.46	61.54	61.54 m
6	12		61.19	61.35	61.24	61.35 m
7	14		59.93	60.64	58.41	60.64 m
8	16		60.50	X	57.99	60.50 m
9	17		60.26	57.25	60.10	60.26 m
10	19		52.93	58.82	X	58.82 m
11	20		58.74	58.26	58.32	58.74 m
12	23		58.47	57.00	57.65	58.47 m
13	25		58.19	58.03	X	58.19 m
14	28		54.49	57.43	X	57.43 m
15	30		X	57.27	57.18	57.27 m
16	33		X	54.04	56.04	56.04 m
17	34		55.82	X	55.36	55.82 m
18	36		54.15	X	55.37	55.37 m
19	37		54.28	X	54.82	54.82 m
20	38		51.71	X	54.44	54.44 m
—	—		X	X	X	NM

Final

Rank	Athlete	Attempts						Distance	Extra
		1	2	3	4	5	6
		64.78	64.81	X	65.33	67.02	66.68	67.02 m
		62.77	X	66.68	63.71	66.09	61.59	66.68 m
		59.98	61.67	66.17	65.46	63.08	65.54	66.17 m
4		63.02	66.08	X	62.81	63.21	64.84	66.08 m
5		59.88	64.11	X	63.61	60.37	65.75	65.75 m
6		62.01	62.21	63.48	61.58	61.93	64.92	64.92 m	SB
7		X	62.45	X	63.45	62.99	X	63.45 m
8		60.66	61.44	X	62.37	62.32	61.84	62.37 m
9		60.67	57.36	61.05				61.05 m
10		58.33	60.74	59.95				60.74 m
11		59.48	57.76	X				59.48 m
—		X	X	X				NM