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. A total of 46 events were contested, of which 24 by male and 22 by female athletes.
Viktoriya Anatoliïvna Pavlysh is a former Ukrainian track and field athlete who specialized in the shot put.
Svetlana Vladimirovna Krivelyova is a former Russian track and field athlete who specialised in the shot put.
The 4 × 400 metres relay or long relay is an athletics track event in which teams consist of four runners who each complete 400 metres or one lap. It is traditionally the final event of a track meet. At top class events, the first leg and the first bend of the second leg are run in lanes. Start lines are thus staggered over a greater distance than in an individual 400 metres race; the runners then typically move to the inside of the track. The slightly longer 4 × 440 yards relay was a formerly run British and American event, until metrication was completed in the 1970s.
The 9th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics were held in the National Indoor Arena in Birmingham, UK from 14 to 16 March 2003. It was the first time the Championships had been held in the UK. There were a total number of 589 participating athletes from 133 countries.
The 6th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics were held at the Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy in Paris, France from March 7 to March 9, 1997. It was the first athletic championships to introduce women's pole vault. There were a total number of 712 participating athletes from 118 countries.
The 5th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics were held at the Palau Sant Jordi in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain from 10 March to 12 March 1995. Almost 600 athletes from 131 nations participated in 27 events.
The 4th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics were held at the Skydome in Toronto, Ontario, Canada from March 12 to March 14, 1993. It was the last Indoor Championships to feature the 5,000 and 3,000 metres race walk events. In addition, it was the first Indoor Championships to include heptathlon and pentathlon, albeit as non-championship events. There were a total number of 537 athletes participated from 93 countries.
Rostislav Dimitrov is a former triple jumper from Bulgaria, best known for his silver medal at the 1999 World Championships. He originally won the silver medal at the World Indoor Championships the same year, but was disqualified for ephedrin use. His personal best was 17.49 metres.
Tatyana Vladimirovna Kotova is a track and field athlete who competed for Russia in the long jump. Her personal best jump of 7.42 m at Annecy in 2002, is the best distance achieved by a female long jumper in the 21st century.
Nadzeya Astapchuk is a Belarusian shot putter. She briefly was designated the Olympic Champion in 2012, but was subsequently stripped of the title for failing a drug test and the gold medal was awarded to New Zealand shot putter Valerie Adams. She was World Champion in 2005, but in March 2013, the IAAF reported that her drug test sample from that event had been retested and found to be positive.
Andrei Anatolyevich Mikhnevich is a Belarusian shot putter with a personal best of 21.69 metres, set in 2003. In 2013 he was banned from sports for life due to his second doping positive.
Irina Nikolayevna Korzhanenko is a former Russian shot putter. She gained international recognition when she won a bronze medal at the 1997 IAAF World Indoor Championships. In the following years she became European Indoor champion, European champion and World Indoor champion.
Athletics at the 2008 Summer Olympics were held during the last ten days of the games, from August 15 to August 24, 2008, at the Beijing National Stadium. The Olympic sport of athletics is split into four distinct sets of events: track and field events, road running events, and racewalking events.
The 2010 European Athletics Championships were the 20th edition of the European Athletics Championships, organised under the supervision of the European Athletic Association. They were held at the Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain from 27 July to 1 August 2010. Barcelona was the first Spanish city to host the European Championships.
The women's shot put at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens was held on 18 August 2004 at the Ancient Olympia Stadium. It was originally planned to hold the discus throw at this venue, 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 instead to hold the shot put at the site, despite the fact that the shot put was not contested at the Ancient Olympic Games. There were 38 competitors from 28 nations. After a series of doping-related disqualifications, the event was won by Koji Murofushi of Japan, the nation's first medal in the event. All distances are given in metres.
The women's shot put event at the 1999 IAAF World Indoor Championships was held on March 6.
The 2014 IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics was the fifteenth edition of the international indoor track and field competition, organised by the IAAF. The event was held between 7–9 March 2014 at the Ergo Arena in Sopot, Poland.
The 4×100 metres relay at the World Championships in Athletics has been contested by both men and women since the inaugural edition in 1983. It is the second most prestigious title in the discipline after the 4×100 metres relay at the Olympics. The competition format typically has one qualifying round leading to a final between eight teams. As of 2015, nations can qualify for the competition through a top eight finish at the previous IAAF World Relays event, with the remaining teams coming through the more traditional route of ranking highly on time in the seasonal lists.
