MEDIA GUIDE - European Athletics

22nd European Athletics Junior
Championships
Rieti, Raul Guidobaldi Stadium
11. OMEGA provides world-class timekeeping for Europe’s best young athletes
OMEGA looks forward to bringing its unparalleled sports timekeeping expertise
to Rieti for the European Athletics Junior Championships.
OMEGA has been involved in athletics timekeeping for more than 80 years.
In 1932, its pocket watch chronographs were already considered the most
reliable instruments available for measuring world-class performance at sporting
events and OMEGA’s reputation was such that the International Olympic
Committee (IOC) asked the firm to supply all sports timing devices for use at the
Olympic Games to be held that year in Los Angeles.
The company was happy to oblige, and delivered 30 OMEGA chronographs,
accompanied by an expert watchmaker, to ensure precise timekeeping and
reliable results from all the competitions. OMEGA has continued to develop and
deliver state-of-the-art sports timing and measurement systems ever since, and
at the London 2012 Olympic Games, it assumed the Official Timekeeper role
for the 25th time. Preparations are well underway for the Sochi 2014 Olympic
Winter Games and the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.
Every year, OMEGA’s experts deploy teams of timekeeping professionals to
sporting events around the world, armed with a veritable arsenal of advanced
sports timekeeping and measurement equipment. Their innovative systems
include starting blocks and false-start detection systems and
the latest photo-finish cameras for the sprints and middle-distance events, as
well as height and distance measurement devices for field disciplines.
OMEGA records and displays the results with the world’s best equipment
OMEGA’s official timekeepers ensure timely delivery of the official results to everyone
involvedin the competitions they support. At the events it serves, OMEGA
is also responsible for the competitor displays for the athletes and their support
teams along with the public displays to spectators at each venue. The official
results are also delivered in real time to broadcast, network
and print media who in turn relay results and commentary to remote audiences
around the world.
Though each event requires a specific configuration of precisely tuned devices
and systems, perhaps the most famous of OMEGA’s timekeeping inventions is
the photo-finish camera. First developed for use at the London 1948 Olympic
Games, these cameras solved the problem of grouped finishes by enabling
judges to separate the winners from the runners-up. The OMEGA
Scan’O’Vision cameras have evolved continuously over the years and the
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