The genius of the back jump

With the old, pre-Fosbury techniques,the jumper had to apply enough force to lift his center of mass above the bar8 by a few inches in order to clear it.The Fosbury Flopper doesn't have to do that.The genius of the Fosbury Flop is that the jumper can apply the same amount of force,but raise his body much higher than before. That means he can raise the bar so high that even when his center of mass can't go any higher, his arching body can.Fosbury's technique brought the high jump to new heights by splitting the jumper's body away from his center of mass,giving it that much more room to clear higher and higher bars.So the Fosbury Flop may be sports history's only great leap forward,that is also a great leap backward.