Why Personal Bests Matter So Much in Athletics

In team sports, the scoreboard tells you who won. In athletics, the personal best is the measure that matters most to every individual athlete, from an under-11 running their first 75 metres to a senior athlete chasing a county standard. Personal bests drive motivation, inform training programmes, determine competition eligibility, and provide the benchmarks that coaches use to track long-term development.

Yet many athletics clubs track PBs poorly, if at all. Coaches carry performance data in their heads or in personal notebooks. Athletes remember their times inaccurately. Results from different competitions are recorded inconsistently. The consequence is that athletes miss out on recognition, coaches lack the data to make informed training decisions, and the club cannot demonstrate the development pathways that attract and retain members.

Building a reliable PB tracking system is not complicated, but it does require understanding the rules that govern what counts as a legitimate performance in athletics.

What Counts as a Valid Performance

Not all times and distances are created equal. Athletics has specific rules about what constitutes a ratifiable performance, and your tracking system needs to distinguish between different categories of result.

Wind-Legal Results in Sprints and Jumps

For sprints up to and including 200 metres, and for the long jump and triple jump, performances are only considered legal if the wind reading at the time of the performance is 2.0 metres per second or less (a tailwind). This is measured by an anemometer positioned at the side of the track or runway. A time of 11.50 seconds for 100 metres with a wind reading of +2.1 m/s is wind-assisted and cannot be used as a qualifying performance for championships, nor does it count as an official personal best under UK Athletics rules.

Your PB records should capture the wind reading alongside every sprint and horizontal jump performance. Display both legal and assisted PBs if you wish, but clearly distinguish between them. This matters because an athlete who runs 11.50 wind-legal has a fundamentally different performance from one who runs 11.50 with a +4.0 tailwind.

Timing Methods

Athletics uses two timing standards: hand timing and electronic (fully automatic) timing, commonly abbreviated as FAT. Hand timing involves a person starting and stopping a stopwatch. FAT uses transponder systems triggered by the starting gun and finish-line photo cells.

The difference matters because hand timing is systematically faster than FAT due to human reaction time in starting the watch. The accepted conversion is to add 0.24 seconds to hand times for distances up to and including 400 metres. So a hand-timed 12.0 seconds for 100 metres is equivalent to approximately 12.24 FAT.

When recording PBs, always note the timing method. Power of 10 distinguishes between hand and electronic times, and competition organisers require FAT times for qualifying standards at national level. If your club runs internal time trials using hand timing, record them as hand times and apply the conversion when comparing against electronic standards.

Altitude and Indoor Performances

Indoor performances are tracked separately from outdoor ones because indoor tracks are typically 200 metres with tighter bends, which affects times. An indoor 60 metres PB is a different record from an outdoor 60 metres PB. Similarly, performances at altitude (above 1,000 metres) receive special notation, though this is rarely relevant for UK-based clubs.

Multi-Event Scoring and Points Tables

Combined events such as pentathlon, heptathlon, and decathlon use the IAAF (now World Athletics) scoring tables to convert individual event performances into points. An athlete's total score is the sum of points across all component events. Tracking multi-event athletes requires storing individual event performances and computing the combined score.

Age-Group Scoring Tables

For junior athletes, England Athletics publishes age-appropriate combined event formats. Under-13 athletes compete in sportshall-style mini combined events. Under-15 athletes compete in pentathlon. Under-17 and older athletes progress to heptathlon (women) and decathlon (men). Each age group uses age-appropriate implement weights and hurdle heights, and the scoring tables are adjusted accordingly.

How to Use Points Tables

The World Athletics scoring tables are published annually and are available as downloadable calculators. For each event, you enter the performance (time, distance, or height) and the table returns a points score. These points allow you to compare performances across events. A score of 800 points in the 100 metres represents a similar level of achievement to 800 points in the shot put, regardless of the raw numbers. This is enormously useful for coaches working with multi-event athletes because it reveals which events offer the most room for improvement.

Age-Graded Comparisons

Age grading applies statistical factors to performances based on the athlete's age and sex, producing a percentage that represents how the performance compares to the world record for that age and sex. An age-graded score of 70 percent for a 14-year-old girl and a 45-year-old man represent equivalent levels of achievement relative to their age-group potential.

This is valuable for clubs with broad age ranges because it allows meaningful comparison and recognition across the entire membership. A veterans' athlete running 70 percent age-graded deserves the same recognition as a junior achieving the same percentage. Many clubs use age-graded performances for annual awards, which is more equitable than raw times that inevitably favour athletes in their physical prime.

Where to Find Age-Grading Calculators

The World Athletics age-grading tables are maintained and updated regularly. Several websites offer free calculators, and the Power of 10 website provides age-graded percentages alongside competition results. If you are building age-grading into your club's PB system, use the most recent tables and update them when new versions are published.

Power of 10 and External Verification

Power of 10 is the UK's comprehensive athletics rankings and results database. It aggregates results from licensed competitions across the country and provides rankings by event, age group, and year. For most athletics clubs, Power of 10 serves as the authoritative external record of athlete performances.

How Results Reach Power of 10

Competition organisers are responsible for uploading results to Power of 10 after each meeting. This process is usually completed within a few days. However, results can be delayed or missing if the organiser does not upload promptly, if an athlete's England Athletics registration number was incorrect on the entry, or if the athlete competed unattached. Your club should routinely check Power of 10 after competitions and report any missing or incorrect results to the meeting organiser.

Using Power of 10 for Club Records

Power of 10 profiles provide a complete competition history for every registered athlete. This is invaluable for verifying PBs, tracking progression over seasons, and identifying athletes who are approaching qualifying standards. Some clubs link directly to athlete Power of 10 profiles from their own websites, providing transparency and external validation of performance claims.

A personal best only means something if it is accurately recorded. Wind readings, timing methods, and event conditions all matter. The effort invested in getting tracking right pays dividends in athlete motivation, coach planning, and competition eligibility.

Key Takeaways

Record wind readings alongside every sprint and horizontal jump performance, and clearly distinguish wind-legal from wind-assisted PBs.
Note the timing method for every performance and apply the 0.24-second conversion when comparing hand times to FAT standards.
Use World Athletics scoring tables to track multi-event athletes and identify which component events offer the most improvement potential.
Implement age-graded comparisons for club awards and recognition to create equity across your entire membership age range.
Cross-reference your club records against Power of 10 after every competition to ensure accuracy and catch missing results early.