Tsukahara's Vault and Fosbury's Flop: A

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International Journal of Innovation Management Vol. 12, No. 1 (March 2008) pp. 21–39 © Imperial College Press

TSUKAHARA’S VAULT AND FOSBURY’S FLOP: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF TWO GREAT INVENTIONS

MICHAEL BAR-ELI∗,§, ODED LOWENGART∗, MITSUO TSUKAHARA† and RICHARD DOUGLAS FOSBURY‡ ∗Department of Business Administration School of Management, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Beer-Sheva 84105, Israel §[email protected] †Tsukara Gymnastics Center, 5-8-12 Kitakarasuyama Setagaya-Ku, Tokyo 157-0061, Japan ‡Galena Engineering, Inc., 680 Second Avenue North P.O. B. 425, Ketchum, Idaho, USA

Studies on innovation and creativity have been quite rare, thus far in the sport management literature. In this study, a comparative analysis was conducted between two great inventions — Tsukahara’s Vault and Fosbury’s Flop. Mitsuo Tsukahara and Dick Fosbury responded to open-ended questions designed to capture various dimensions in the development of their innovations. A content analysis was conducted on the data obtained through this semi-structured interview technique. The comparison between these two cases revealed an amazingly similar pattern in the structure of the innovative process. The major conclusion drawn from this analysis is that the principles of optimisation and creativity-enhancement should be conceived as being complimentary, in the promotion of innovative processes in various areas.

Keywords: Innovation; creativity; evolution; incremental process.

Introduction

In the management science literature, “innovation” has been deﬁned as a new idea applied to initiating or improving a product, process, or service (Kanter, 1988; Van de Ven, 1986). Novel ideas and innovative decisions are sometimes required as part of a well-functioning organisational culture (Schein, 1999; Schneider, 1990) in order to cope with organisational situations that have no precedent, or when no “off- the-shelf” solutions are available (Buchanan and Huczynski, 2004). Organisational

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innovation processes sum up to two major aspects, namely — invention (i.e., the act of discovery) and application (i.e., the act of use) (see Wood et al., 2004). The first aspect is closely related to the process by which novel and useful ideas are generated and produced (i.e., creativity), whereas the second refers mainly to the successful implementation of innovative, new, and creative ideas, products, or processes within an organisation (Rank et al., 2004). Creativity and innovation are important requirements for achievement, with many of the world’s most successful companies (e.g., General Electric, IBM, and Westinghouse) also being the most innovative (Greenberg and Baron, 2003). From a philosophical perspective, a critically thinking rationalist is a person who is also committed to the notion of evaluating behaviour in a critical and reflective man- ner, hoping to find ways of behaving that are well-justified and based on good and coherent reasons. According to this conception, a rational person is often one who breaks with tradition and invents new ways of meeting old challenges; he or she is creative and non-dogmatic in his or her thinking (Bar-Eli et al., 1999). There are two schools of thought regarding the process of radical invention, where a creative and superior technology is introduced unexpectedly (Goldenberg et al., 2004). The first one posits a sudden stroke of ingenuity that follows an extraordinary style of thought, which in turn is regarded as a necessary condition for such performances. The second approach views extraordinarily creative and surprising developments as a “day-to-day” process, whereby even concepts that introduce substantial discontinuities are regarded as the outcome of a continuous and rigorous developmental process. In essence, these two contradictory views also reflect a controversy which is related to the term “creativity”. Some researchers hold that creative thinking is a process which is qualitatively different from ordinary day-to-day thinking, and involves a leap — a “creative spark” — which cannot be adequately formulated, analysed, or reconstructed (e.g., Guilford, 1950; Koestler, 1964; MacKinnon, 1970). In contrast, others maintain that creative products are the outcome of ordinary thinking, only quantitatively different from everyday thinking (e.g., Perkins, 1988; Weisberg, 1992). In fact, the second approach conceives creative problem solving as kind of an “exact science” (Altschuller, 1985), e.g. as a relatively structured thought process (e.g., “constrained stochastic behaviour”; see Simonton, 2003) which is quite systematically reproducible, and therefore is also learnable (Dasgupta, 1994; Maymon and Horowitz, 1999). In sport, creativity is considered a prerequisite for enhanced performance (Bar- Eli et al., 1999; Morris, 2000). However, research in this area has been primarily descriptive, without being closely linked theoretically and/or empirically to the large body of the general and/or sport-specific literature. For example, whereas early researchers (e.g., Loy, 1981) investigated the personality characteristics of sport innovators, others have proposed various techniques for enhancing athletes’ March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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creativity (e.g., Bar-Eli, 1991; Mirvis, 1998; Piirto, 1998; Ringrose, 1993; Schmole, 2000), or have examined the effects of such techniques on athletes’ performance (e.g., Everhart et al., 1999; Hanin et al., 2002). A common practice among creativity researchers (see, for review, Simonton, 2003) is to conduct biographical studies of great innovators and discoverers (e.g., Runco and Pritzker, 1999; Schaffer, 1996). This practice reflects the fact that whereas historians of science frequently use significant discoveries as benchmarks of progress, psychologists interested in creativity often use such biographical information to investigate the process of discovery itself. When the scarcity of research on innovation and creativity in sport is taken into account, the lack of interest in great sport-inventors’ biographies is quite amazing. Recently, Bar-Eli, Goldenberg, and their associates (Bar-Eli et al., 2006; Goldenberg et al., 2004, In Press) intensively investigated the invention of the “Fosbury Flop.” In the 1968 Mexico Olympics, Dick Fosbury — at that time, a relatively unknown high jumper — was victorious in the high jump competition because he broke with tradition and invented an innovative, radically new approach to the high jump which, as a result, utterly revolutionised its style (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2006). Instead of approaching the bar face first as all the other jumpers did, Fosbury — without any advance notice — approached the bar with his back, literally jumping backwards (when compared to the style of all other jumpers). He not only won the gold medal, but also set an Olympic record (official web site of the Olympic Movement, 2006). In less than 10years, all high jumpers adopted this innovative style, with the old technique being rendered passé and the new technique being dubbed “the Fosbury Flop,” after its inventor. Goldenberg et al. (2004, In Press) elaborated on the case of the Fosbury flop, and attempted to demonstrate that radical innovation is not necessarily an outcome of a “creative spark” but rather of a combination of converging abilities and the occurrence of a quite complex, continuous development process. For this purpose, they used an extensively detailed introspective report provided by Fosbury, which intended to provide answers to three basic questions, namely — (a) Could it be that the perception of a revolution is the effect of hindsight, while the real process of creation is a continuous, day-to-day, evolutionary and slow process? (b) Is it possible that a revolutionary concept is a consequence of an evolutionary process of ideation? (c) Do revolutions exist only in the eyes of the adopters rather than in the inventors? Goldenberg et al. (2004, In Press) conducted a qualitative content analysis of Fosbury’s report, in an attempt to examine the possibility that a revolutionary and discontinuous invention is, in fact, an evolutionary and continuous process. Bar-Eli et al. (2006), subsequently used this material to draw some important conclusions related to the issue of the application of the optimisation principle in developing peak sport performance versus the promotion of creativity in such processes. March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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The first step in Goldenberg et al.’s (2004, In Press) study was to explore — using sports experts — whether the Fosbury flop is indeed considered a revolutionary phenomenon, that is, the extent to which it constituted an innovation in comparison to other events. From this exploratory step, it emerged that the Fosbury flop was indeed considered one of the most innovative events in sports history across fields. In order to assess the relative importance of the various innovations identified, Goldenberg et al. (In Press) used a questionnaire, which included a variety of questions aimed at measuring the degree of innovation, long-term effect, importance to the specific area, and effect on the field in general. Each of the nine innovations identified in the above-mentioned exploratory step of the study (i.e., Fosbury flop, Tsukahara twist, swimming techniques, fibreglass pole, synthetic track, running shoes, game of soccer, Olympic movement, and women’s participation) was assessed by the respondents (sports experts) in terms of the impact it had on sports, its usefulness, its evolutionary process, its level of originality, its revolutionary impact, how simple it is, how surprising it is, and its level of innovativeness. A striking similarity emerged from the data analysis between the Fosbury flop and the Tsukahara twist. Mitsuo Tsukahara is a Japanese gymnast and Olympic Gold Medalist, who is well known for having invented a vaulting technique called the “Tsukahara vault,” or “twist”, which has been in constant use ever since its creation. According to Wikipedia (2007), it was the “Tsukahara” element (a new vault he created in 1970 as well as the 1972 horizontal bar dismount he also developed) which brought him fame the world over. His vault in 1970 became universally recognised and used by both women and men, and “this feat changed the future direction of vaulting forever” (Federation International de Gymnastique, 2007). Moreover, Tsukahara also invented a technique called the “Moon Somersault” (or “Moon Salto”) in the high bar; it received this name because Tsukahara first performed it on July 20, 1969, the day Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. This move consisted of a cartwheel with a quarter-turn followed by a backward somersault while vaulting; Tsukahara used it to win an individual gold medal, one of six medals he won in the Olympic Games in Munich in 1972 (The Ancient Olympics, 2006). All in all, Tsukahara won five gold medals, one silver medal, and three bronze medals, and he was an important factor in the Japanese Men’s Gymnastics Team winning the team competition in three consecutive Olympic Games (1968, 1972, and 1976). Besides the fact that the Tsukahara twist and Fosbury’s flop were the only great sports innovations named after their inventors, these two inventions were rated — at the aggregate level — substantially higher than all others in terms being original and surprising; they were rated also as the most innovative (together with the fibreglass pole). Furthermore, only the computed overall ratings for these two inventions were dominated by the “originality” and “surprising” dimensions; this indicated that respondents evaluated these dimensions to be of significant importance with March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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regard to these two innovations, which were also rated low on their simplicity. It should be noted that both the Tsukahara twist and the Fosbury flop are innovations made by a specific athlete to improve self-performance (see below), whereas the other innovations are focused on external aspects of performance or regulations of games. The striking similarity between these two great inventions is fascinating not only because they took place in a similar time period (i.e., mid- to end-1960s), but also because they occurred in two entirely different cultures (the United States and Japan). Accordingly — and in line with recent efforts to place more emphasis on exploring cross-cultural differences in research on creativity and innovation (e.g., Rank et al., 2004) — we undertook the challenge of conducting a comparative analysis of these two great inventions, which is the purpose of the present investigation. Specially, we compared the similarities and differences in the evolution of these two inventions, with respect to their stages of development, the inventors’ motivation, the environmental conditions in which the invention took place, and the effect each invention had on the inventor’s own performance as well as on the entire field.

Methods

Both Fosbury and Tsukahara responded by e-mail to the same ﬁve questions (with minor adaptations required to match each respondent; see below). These open- ended questions were designed to capture the various dimensions along which these two innovators developed their inventions. As such, they included elements of the initial stage of the development process in the form of the initial motivation for the development of the invention, the development of the innovation itself in the spirit of the dimensions presented earlier, the role of the inventor, and the spread, or diffusion, of the innovation.

1. Please describe the various stages — if any — in the development of your invention [when and how did you start to think about the problem, decide to jump backward, lift a shoulder (for Fosbury)/twist (for Tsukahara), etc.]. Did you play with the idea, exploring the matter (i.e., spontaneous), or did you use a structured approach in developing this invention? 2. What motivated your invention? For example, did you strive to become an elite athlete such as an Olympic/world record holder (for Fosbury)/Olympic/world gold medal winner (for Tsukahara)? What was your commitment level to the invention from the ﬁrst time you thought about it? What was your emotional disposition at that time (before the invention): were you frustrated about being unsuccessful, and/or did you have feelings of inferiority when comparing your- self with other athletes? Were you happy? Sad? Etc. March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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3. Contextual conditions during the invention: Did you know of other jumping styles (for Fosbury)/gymnastic styles (for Tsukahara) that were developed or examined that failed? Was there any change in the technology at that time (for Fosbury — improved shoes, landing pits, bars, standards, etc.; for Tsukahara — improved equipment, bars, standards, etc.)? What exactly did you change with your invention compared to the existing style at that time? Were you aware of other persons who were in the process of developing similar inventions (or were you the only one)? 4. What was the influence of the invention on your performance? For example, what was your record (for Fosbury)/best achievement (for Tsukahara) before you started the invention and how did it evolve afterwards? Did you have instant success with the invention or did your jump (for Fosbury)/performance (for Tsuka- hara) temporarily decline? If that was the case (i.e., decreased performance), did you still believe that there was “something” in it (i.e., had faith in it)? 5. What was the influence of your invention on the entire high-jumping (for Fos- bury)/gymnastics (for Tsukahara) field? For example, how many jumpers (for Fosbury)/gymnasts (for Tsukahara) adopted the invention after you invented it (i.e., at what rate)? Who adopted the invention first (e.g., elite athletes or novices? coaches? scientists?, etc.) How many of the jumpers (for Fosbury)/gymnasts (for Tsukahara) in the Olympic games that followed 1968 (for Fosbury)/your invention (for Tsukahara) adopted the invention and what were their results? When did the Fosbury flop/Tsukahara manoeuvre become the dominant style?

In essence, the respondents were investigated using a semi-structured interview technique (Bernard, 1988), not in person but through e-mail. Content analysis was conducted on the data, which encompassed qualitative analysis (Seidman, 1991) from an historical perspective. Their original responses are included in the Appendix.

Results

An analysis of Fosbury’s responses revealed that Fosbury was not a super athlete at the beginning of his career. He used an old-fashioned style, refusing to adopt the dominant method due to various personal preferences; instead of adopting the widespread style, he looked for a safe and familiar style. Frustrated by his performances with the existing technique, Fosbury reverted to his high-jump roots, but tried to modify it in order to solve his personal problem; exploration, imagination, and persistence were essential components of this process. Fosbury and his coach were open-minded and tried to experiment with the new form and compare it to other familiar techniques; at this stage there was no new style or development, but March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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rather attempts to develop a hybrid technique. Two years of incremental changes indicate an evolutionary process; the scene of development was at the competitions, again suggesting an incremental development rather than a giant leap. A combination of external developments with unique timing created a critical mass through a synergetic effect: the new technique suddenly became mature and superior over the existing one. In essence, Tsukahara’s innovation is similar to, and, at the same time, different from that of Fosbury in several respects. More specifically, both of them were in fact users, who attempted to solve their own problems (as happens quite often; see Von Hippel, 1989), in order to improve their performances. However, whereas Fosbury made a “second order” change (Bar-Eli, 1991; Stacey, 2003) in his thoughts by going back to the old, supposedly less efficient (scissors) technique, Tsukahara did it by using an element from one domain — trampoline — and introducing it into another (gymnastics); in other words, Tsukahara was creative in that he connected two things which were not originally related. After adopting the new idea (i.e., Fosbury — of reverting to scissors; Tsukahara — of introducing an element from the trampoline into gymnastics), both of them needed quite a long, continuous, and relatively slow evolutionary process in order to fully develop their new, innovative technique. Whereas Tsukahara — as should have been expected intuitively — trained hard to incrementally improve his invention, Fosbury argued that the incremental development of the new style — rather than a giant leap — was a spontaneous reaction during competition: the fact that he was highly intense and focused during competition did not make him stick to a well-learned behavior or habit (as would be predicted, for example, from classical learning theories, such as the Hull–Spence model; e.g., Spence and Spence, 1966), but rather, to seek changes and innovations. This seems to be a serious violation of a major basic learning and/or training principle, namely, “in competition, stick to a well-learned behavior/habit” (Bar-Eli et al., 2006), but it does not change the fact that neither innovation was a result of a “sudden stroke of ingenuity” that followed an extraordinary style of thought, but was rather incremental in the sense of reflecting a continuous, quite rigorous development process. In a series of articles, Goldenberg Mazursky, and Solomon (1999a,b,c,d) argued that there is an intrinsic product-based scheme underlying the evolution of successful products. They identified a few major templates of change defining regularities that can be inferred from product-based trends. Their main thesis was that certain regularities are identifiable, objectively verifiable, and generally observable, and that these templates can facilitate productive and focused ideation. For example, they discovered that such creativity templates underlie successful advertisements, and used this approach to identify templates in “creative sparks”. March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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In this approach, the templates that were identified can be loosely described as follows: (1) Component Control refers to the case where a link between one internal product attribute to another internal attribute and this link controls the latter attribute; (2) Replacement refers to the case where an important internal attribute is removed but stays connected to the whole product in a different way than before; (3) Displacement refers to the case where an important internal attribute is removed and ceases to be connected to the whole product (unlike the replacement template); (4) Division refers to the case where one attribute is divided into several components; and (5) Attribute Dependency refers to the case where a dependency is created between two unrelated product attributes. When analysing Fosbury’s and Tsukahara’s innovations in terms of the templates approach, a surprising observation can be made: A special case of the attribute dependency template can characterise both innovations. Specifically, the innovation is based on the location of the jumper. In the case of the Fosbury flop the combination of the angle in which the jumper approaches the bar and the direction of the face of the jumper toward the bar (facing the bar in the Straddle style and switching to the back in the Flop), resulted in the new style. In the Tsukahara case, a combination of rotating and twisting in one element was created in order to develop the Tsukahara twist. This innovation was based on existing rotating and twisting elements that were performed separately (two different elements) by gymnastic athletes. With regard to the invention aspect of innovation (i.e., the act of discovery; see Wood et al., 2004), both innovations discussed here seem to be quite similar, because at least on the micro-level, they reflect an evolutionary and continuous (rather than a revolutionary and discontinuous) process. However, when the application (i.e., the act of use; see Wood et al., 2004) aspect of these innovations is considered, a significant difference can be observed on the macro-level: whereas Fosbury’s invention was adopted and diffused “bottom-up,” the adoption and diffusion of Tsukahara’s invention was “top-down”. Despite Fosbury’s medal-winning performance at the 1968 Olympics, other elite-level jumpers were not quick to change to the new style; they had too many hours invested in practising their own techniques to simply abandon them for something new. Most of the early and/or first adopters were jumpers from novice and/or secondary-levels who could risk learning a new style. Nevertheless, by the next Olympic Games in 1972, nearly all the high jumpers had adopted the Fosbury flop, and within 10years it had become the standard approach to high jumping. In contrast, top gymnasts were the first ones who adopted Tsukahara’s new manoeuvre, making it their dominant style almost immediately after it was invented. This substantial difference between Fosbury and Tsukahara on the macro-level probably has to do with the fact that at the time Fosbury won the Olympic high jumping event March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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with his innovative flop, he was a relatively unknown high jumper, whereas when Tsukahara came up with his innovative vault, he was already a relatively well-known gymnast. Another important difference between the two inventions is in the level of rev- olutionality and type of early adopters of the inventions. The Fosbury flop was a complete change in the way high jumpers were jumping at that time. In a sense, it was a completely new jump. As a result, it was difficult for established high jumpers — especially males — to adopt the new style, as it required a high investment in adopting the new style, as well as taking the risk of an initial decrease in performance. The Fosbury flop, therefore, was first adopted by women, new jumpers, and novices. The Tsukahara vault, on the contrary, was an addition to the existing performance and style. Adopting it posed fewer complications than the Fosbury flop, and it was rapidly adopted by other gymnasts.

Discussion

The comparison between the cases of Tsukahara and Fosbury reveals a quite similar pattern related to the structure of the innovative process, namely the inventor (a) has a personal problem (i.e., wants to improve his or her own performance) and is looking for a solution to it; (b) has the creative idea of using a new, non-dogmatic way of meeting this challenge; (c) begins to systematically improve his or her idea, and undertakes an evolutionary, incremental optimisation process of his or her invention in order to maximise performance; and finally, (d) the invention is diffused, adopted, and applied by other (potential) users. The major lesson from the comparison between Tsukahara and Fosbury is to take a closer look into innovation and creativity in sport, from both scientific and applied perspectives. As was noted many years ago (e.g., Bar-Eli, 1984), elite sport participants (e.g., athletes, coaches, or managers) tend towards being conservative (i.e., resisting attitudinal revisions), due to human cognitive limitations as well as the socio-cultural pressures placed upon them. It was suggested that sports practitioners use creative, “irrational” psychological interventions in order to cope with these problems. More specifically, it was recommended that in sports organisations, creativity-enhancement methods (see Bar-Eli, 1991; Everhart et al., 1999; Hanin et al., 2002; Schmole, 2000) be integrated into practitioners’ mental (e.g., judgement and decision) models, to increase their effectiveness by promoting the creation of knowledge through second-order change processes (Stacey, 2003). Critical assessment of one’s thoughts and actions is therefore “rational” in that — as both Tsukahara’s and Fosbury’s examples demonstrated — it enables the breaking with tradition and the invention of new, creative, and non-dogmatic ways of meeting old challenges successfully (Bar-Eli et al., 1999). However, by March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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doing so, the idea of “instrumental rationality,” which is very common in sport, should not be abandoned. Essentially, “instrumental rationality” has to do with the effectiveness of one’s application of means towards the accomplishment of a certain goal (i.e., choosing the course of action that most effectively brings about the realisation of a particular goal). According to this idea, an attempt should be made to achieve high performance by “maximisation through optimisation” — a principle that is quite central among the major aspects of human rationality in elite sport (Bar-Eli et al., 1999, 2006). The use of the “maximisation through optimisation” principle should, therefore, be encouraged when it is necessary and appropriate. For example, it is often assumed (e.g., in the literature on expert sport performance; see, for review, Starkes and Ericsson, 2003) that there is only one solution for a particular athletic problem; in other words, one’s expertise is examined in comparison to a normative, supposedly optimal, solution, which should be strived for in order to maximise performance (e.g., through deliberate practice; see Ericsson, 2003). However, in order to increase the probability that extraordinary achievements such as Tsuka- hara’s and Fosbury’s will indeed occur, the critical, innovative, supposedly “irrational” face of the athletic and/or managerial mind in sport, which has thus far been relatively neglected in the science and practice of sport management, should be encouraged. Moreover, in order to effectively develop peak sport performers, we should not consider the principles of optimisation and creativity-enhancement as being controversial, but rather try to integrate them through a complementary implementation of both; in this context, Bar-Eli et al. (2006) suggested that two complementary principles be used, which they labeled “creative optimisation” and “optimised creativity.” Tsukahara’s and Fosbury’s cases reflect — on the one hand — successful attempts to “creatively optimise” gymnastics or high jump tasks, thereby substantially improving the athletes’ performances in these sports. On the other hand, both inventions are special cases of the same template, which reflects “optimised creativity” in the sense that creativity can indeed be systematically reproduced (Goldenberg et al., 1999a,b,c,d). The traditional approach to creativity maintained that one has to overcome mental obstacles and/or barriers in order to reach creative ideas; this view led to the belief that one has to ensure “total freedom” by eliminating directional guidance, constraints, criticism, and thinking within a bounded scope. The elimination of such barriers was expected to increase the accessibility of ideas that can be drawn and contemplated from a typically infinite number of ideas during the creativity process (e.g., Csikszentmihalyi, 1996; Grossman et al., 1988; Parnes, 1992). As a consequence, various methods were suggested (see, for a review, O’Guinn et al., 1998), which rely on the assumption that enhancing randomness, breaking rules March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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and paradigms, and generating “anarchy of thought,” will increase the probability of the emergence of creative ideas. Thus, all these methods share the concepts of withholding judgement and relying on analogies from other members in a group (i.e., “synergetic effect”), or on randomly selected forced analogies, in order to enhance creativity. Opposing views maintain that creativity can be conceived in a more system- atic, structured way; among these we can find the “creative cognition approach” (Finke et al., 1992; Goldenberg and Mazursky, 2001) and the “confluence approach” (Sternberg, 1988; Sternberg and Lubart, 1999). In line with these ideas, attempts to develop enhanced creative expertise, for example, by systematically reproduc- ing it using Ericsson’s (1999) principles of deliberate practice, and/or Goldenberg et al.’s (1999a,b,c,d) templates approach, would reflect “optimised creativity” (Bar- Eli et al., 2006). Such attempts to identify an optimal course of action that will most probably bring about the best solution to a given problem, actually apply the “maximisation through optimisation” principle. During his term as head coach of the Indiana Pacers of the NBA, Larry Bird, one of the most celebrated professional basketball players of all time, was quoted as saying: “I don’t like players who don’t do what I say, and I don’t like players who do exactly what I say” (see Bar-Eli et al., 1999, p. 35). The present comparative analysis of Tsukahara’s and Fosbury’s great inventions seems to demonstrate that Larry Bird is probably right; as these two cases from two entirely different cultures (Rank et al., 2004) reveal, there are substantial commonalities between them which enable us to conclude that in general, the principles of optimisation and creativity-enhancement should not be conceived as being controversial, but rather as complementary, in the sense that we should try to integrate them through the implementation of both “creative optimisation” and “optimised creativity.”

Appendix. Original responses by Dick Fosbury and Mitsuo Tsukahara

Responses of Dick Fosbury* *Dick Fosbury responded to the questions by e-mail in February 2002. 1. My Coach, Dean Benson, was pleased for my success and asked me to see him at practice next Monday. He had seen me jump once during the competition. At Monday’s practice he explained that he was not sure exactly what I was doing, but he thought that perhaps we could study some ﬁlms he had of high jump techniques. Perhaps there was some similar successful model that I could adapt. While we did not see anything similar, we had a session or two practising these other techniques which was a fun break for us high jumpers from our routine. March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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The following week we had our District Meet at our School, a much higher level of competition. I used my new style to clear the same height as before. I didn’t place in the Meet because of the better competition, but I made the same height. This convinced me that I was competitive again with this new style and I would continue using this in the future. I was back in the Game! The next two years were a continued evolution in the technique. Using my curved approach to the bar, I intuitively began to turn my inside shoulder away from the bar, to get my head over the bar sooner. So, the following year, pictures show me clearing the bar with my body at a 45 degree angle to the bar, no longer parallel to the bar. By the second year I had fully evolved to clearing the bar with my back to the bar, arching my hips over, then un-arching to kick my heels over and land on my back in the pit. An interesting point was that the entire evolutionary process took place during competition, I never did practice to develop my style. This was mostly due to not having a model to follow. What was I supposed to look like? And internally, for me, I was much more intense during the competition, more focused on getting over the bar (the objective). So, my body was searching for the best way to clear the bar, being driven by my desire, my mind, to not lose against the others. It was a spontaneous reaction in a competitive environment. I had never envisioned being an Olympic athlete, even up until the 1968 Games. I was always more focused on the immediate, local goals for the next competition. And fortunately with my competitive nature, as the competitions improved, so did I. In High School and College, the biggest meets were at the end of the season, when I would reach my prime. 2. & 4.** The Flop technique in the high jump began as a result of first having learned an antiquated, inefficient technique called the “Scissors” style at the age of 10 years old. Back then I was copying some other school kids who were using that style. At the age of 11, in my fifth year of school, my Physical Education (PE) teacher and coach taught all of us kids trying out for Track to jump with the classic style, the Straddle or “Western Roll”. He also allowed us to use the Scissors if we chose, which I did. I used that style until I reached High School when my Coach, after observing me jumping in our first practice session, took me aside. He informed me that if I wanted to continue progressing in this event, I really needed to convert over to using the Straddle style. He taught me that the Scissors style was too inefficient because the body was upright when clearing the bar, raising my centre of gravity too high. So, after switching styles to the Straddle and beginning all over, I fell behind the other jumpers, competitively. In fact, at the first Meet, I was the first jumper out of the competition, failing to clear the opening height of 50–000. After about six meets I had managed to clear 50–400, which was my personal best from the year before, and about 800–1000 March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

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behind the other competitors in our district. I was very frustrated and asked my coach if I could revert back to my old Scissors style to get a better result and maybe boost my confidence a bit. He did not encourage me to quit trying the Straddle technique, but was sympathetic to my frustrations and agreed to let me try it. What did he have to lose? I decided to try my old style on the bus trip to the meet and warmed up with it prior to the competition. It felt awkward but I persisted. I managed to clear my previous best at 50–400, and then, facing a new height, knew I had to adjust something. With the Scissors style, the jumper typically hits the bar off with the butt, sometimes with the movement of the legs. To compensate, I began to try to lift my hips up higher, which also dropped my shoulders simultaneously. I cleared the height. I continued with this raising of my hips until I eventually cleared 600 (15cm) higher for a new personal record, and even placed fourth in the Meet to score points for my team. No one knew what I was doing as I transformed this old technique into something new, as each attempt was a little different. And the opposing Coaches checked the Rule Book for legality since I had beat their jumpers unexpectedly. **Dick Fosbury chose to respond to questions 2 and 4 together. The text referring to question 2 appears in regular letters, whereas the text referring to question 4 appears in italics. 3. In context, the high jump and pole vault landing areas were changing, beginning in 1964. That year our High School changed the landing pits by adding foam rubber chunks (cut up mattresses) under a net, and bordered by straw bales. This was to be an improvement over the wood chips that we had always previously had jumped into. Several years later in University competitions, the schools purchased “Port-a Pits” which were constructed of foam under a fit- ted cover. This was a great improvement between the 1964 and 1968 Olympic Games. This did allow for some improvement in the results, since the jumpers and vaulters were less concerned about the landing, and could focus more on clearing the bar. My high jump shoes improved in high school from regular running spikes to specialised high jump shoes with heel spikes. This was more an evolution due to my parents, seeing my interest and modest success in jumping, paying for better equipment. The high jump shoes are slightly elevated (1 cm) under the ball of the foot and have heel spike to keep contact as the foot rocks from heel to toe during takeoff. The other primary environmental improvement was the development and proliferation of artificial surfaces. Most Universities in the 1960s, into the 1970s, had cinder or clay running surfaces. Synthetic running surfaces (such as “Tartan”) March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

34 M. Bar-Eli et al.

were only in the major stadiums for the elite level competitions. This type surface provided a consistent, smooth, and fast running surface, which promoted record performances. 5. Following my success at the 1968 Olympic Games, where I was the only jumper with this new technique, the revolution began with the kids. They had seen this radical new style and saw that it looked fun to try. The other elite level jumpers were not so fast to change over. They had too many hours invested in practising their technique to simply give it up. So, it seemed that most of the new Floppers came from the secondary level jumpers who could risk learning a new style. Female jumpers also seemed to pick it up faster, I believe partially due to their better ﬂexibility, mostly due to the lack of coaching in those days. As I recall, every male Olympic Champion since 1968 has used the Flop technique, so it did turn out to be a natural, easy technique for the capable high jumper to learn. And the Olympic and World records for men have improved by over 15 cm since this development. It has been amazing to watch. I didn’t set out to change anything, I just wanted to play the Game. And today, I’m proud to have contributed something to my Sport.

Responses of Mitsuo Tsukahara*** 1. As an up-and-coming National gymnastics athlete in Japan, I realised that my biggest weakness was my lack of ability to know exactly where I was in the air. In gymnastics, we call this “air sense.” Sensing that my lack of “air sense” might be a hindrance to furthering my skill level at the international level, I decided to do something about it. I went to the trampoline team at my university and started to do some training with these athletes. It was at this time that I noticed that the tramp athletes were doing something different from the gymnastics athletes. While double back rotating elements were common in the gymnastics world at this time, no one had added twisting to those elements at the same time. This was the ﬁrst time I thought that this element (twisting and rotating at the same time) could be introduced to gymnastics. 2. As explained earlier, my original motivation of happening upon my invention was just a desire to improve my gymnastics air sense. When I realised that it might be possible to transfer the skills from the tramp to the gym (and in this case, a dismount off the high bar), I became very motivated to complete my “invention.” Prior to happening upon the realisation of doing a double back with a full twist, I was not particularly happy or sad — I was just feeling a little frustrated by my lack of ability to know where I was in the air. From the ﬁrst time I thought that it was possible to complete this move off the high bar, I devised a structured list of progressions to complete the skill, and systematically “worked March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

Tsukahara’s Vault and Fosbury’s Flop: A Comparative Analysis of Two Great Inventions 35

up” to completing the same move on the high bar as I had seen and done on the tramp. Realising that nobody in the entire world was doing this type of training, I became very motivated to be successful at completing this manoeuvre. 3. At this time, as reiterated in my last answer, there was nobody in the entire world attempting to add twisting elements to the already existing rotating elements in the gymnastics arena. There was no change in the existing equipment, not in the present past and, in hindsight, not in the present future either. The high bar on which I developed the new move was at the time, and for a long time afterwards, the same piece of equipment with no improving features. The only change in my invention, compared to the existing style at the time, was to add a full twist to a double back. Other than the sport of trampoline, there were no other individuals in gymnastics at the same time who were trying to complete this skill. 4. By training with the tramp team, and mastering the new dismount, I immediately overcame my “air sense” problem and improved my abilities dramatically in this formerly weak area. This new dismount and new-found ability in the air gave me a confidence that I had not previously had, and fuelled my desire to take these new inventions to other events. I began to explore many new progressions to take the rotating while twisting to other facets of gymnastics as well. In effect, learning this new maneuver opened my eyes to the possibility of taking every move I was doing to a higher level — and not only on the high bar but in other events as well. 5. Because of this new invention that I innovated, I opened other gymnasts’ eyes and opened the door for new ideas by gymnasts all over Japan and all over the world. The combination of adding twisting to rotation in gymnastics spawned a global transformation of the sport. From the introduction of this new element, the face of gymnastics completely changed forever. As far as the question concerning how many athletes adopted the invention of the moves that I discovered, it can be said that these two moves, i.e., the full twisting double back and the Tsukahara vault, have become standard basic moves that every gymnast in every country considers to be compulsory elements that eventually must be mastered at some level. These two moves have become synonymous with the words somersault, cartwheel, and splits. The first people to replicate my invention were the top athletes in the world at that time. They have since been replicated by every level of gymnastics, including elite athletes, novices, coaches, and other technicians. The Tsukahara manoeuvre became a dominant style immediately after it was invented, and was being replicated by most athletes en masse by the next Olympic Games. Thanks to the tramp team and my “mistake” of discovering twisting and rotating....I was blessed with winning five Olympic gold medals and 12 Olympic medals in all, over a span of three Olympic Games. March 8, 2008 10:28 WSPC/150-IJIM 00190

36 M. Bar-Eli et al.

***The connection with Mitsuo Tsukahara was established with the help of Professor Atushi Fujita, former President of the ISSP (International Society of Sport Psychology) and the ASPASP (Asian South-Paciﬁc Association of Sport Psychol- ogy). The text was translated by Mr. Takashi Kobayashi and e-mail communication took place with Ms. Leane Grant, both from the Tsukahara Gymnastics Center in Japan. We are deeply indebted to these persons. Mitsuo Tsukahara’s responses were received by e-mail in February 2004.

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