This page contains an overview of the year 1980 in athletics . The major athletics event of the year was the 1980 Moscow Olympics. A boycott of this competition meant many of world's leading athletes did not face each other, with many of the boycotting athletes taking part in the rival Liberty Bell Classic competition.
Athletics at the 1980 Summer Olympics was represented by 38 events. They were held in the Grand Arena of the Central Lenin Stadium at Luzhniki between July 24 and August 1. There were a total number of 959 participating athletes from 70 countries.
The Liberty Bell Classic was a 1980 track and field athletics event organized by The Athletics Congress as part of the 1980 Olympic boycott and held at Franklin Field in Philadelphia on July 16 and 17, 1980. It was named after Philadelphia's Liberty Bell.
Contents
- Major events
- World
- Regional
- World records
- Men
- Women
- Season's bests
- Marathon winners
- Awards
- Births
- Deaths
- References
A further global event, the 1980 World Championships in Athletics, was held specifically for women athletes in the 400 metres hurdles and 3000 metres disciplines, as neither event featured on the Olympic programme in spite of IAAF approval.
The 1980 World Championships in Athletics was the second global, international athletics competition organised by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). Hosted from 14 to 16 August 1980 at the De Baandert in Sittard, Netherlands, it featured two events: the women's 400 metres hurdles and the women's 3000 metres run. West Germany's Birgit Friedmann took the first women's world title in the 3000 m, while her East German counterpart Bärbel Broschat became the first women's 400 m hurdles world champion.
The 400 metres hurdles is a track and field hurdling event. The event has been on the Olympic athletics programme since 1900 for men and since 1984 for women.
The 3000 metres or 3000-metre run is a track running event, also commonly known as the 3K or 3K run, where 7.5 laps are completed around an outdoor 400 m track or 15 laps around a 200 m indoor track.
