Athletics at the 2002 South American Games

Athletics at the VII South American Games
Estádio Olímpico do Pará
Dates	August 1–3
Host city	Belém, Brazil
Venue	Estádio Olímpico do Pará
Level	Junior
Events	44 (22 men, 22 women)
← 1998 Cuenca 2006 Buenos Aires → 2002 South American Games

Athletics events at the 2002 South American Games were held at the Estádio Olímpico do Pará in Belém, Brazil, between August 1–3, 2002.^[1] For the first time, the tournament was restricted to junior athletes (U-20). The results were used to determine the medals awarded for this year's South American Junior Championships.

A total of 44 events were contested, 22 by men and 22 by women.

Medal winners were published in a book written by Argentinian journalist Ernesto Rodríguez III with support of the Argentine Olympic Committee (Spanish: Comité Olímpico Argentino) under the auspices of the Ministry of Education (Spanish: Ministerio de Educación de la Nación) in collaboration with the Office of Sports (Spanish: Secretaría de Deporte de la Nación).^[2] Eduardo Biscayart supplied the list of winners and their results.^[3] Further results are published for the South American Junior Championships (Netherlands Antilles unregarded).^[4] Churandy Martina's results are collected elsewhere.^[5][6]

Results that are identical to the South American Junior Championships are shown elsewhere. Here, only those results are displayed that are different.

Further events with low participation (only 4 athletes from 3 countries) are men's High jump and Javelin throw, and women's 3000 metres steeplechase, Shot put, and Heptathlon.^[4] However, there is no indication for awarding a reduced number of medals.

Other results of the men's events are shown elsewhere.

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
100 metres	Churandy Martina  Netherlands Antilles	10.42	Bruno Pacheco  Brazil	10.50	Eliezer De Almeida  Brazil	10.60
200 metres	Bruno Pacheco  Brazil	20.54	Churandy Martina  Netherlands Antilles	20.81	Jorge Sena  Brazil	21.18
3000 metres steeplechase	Fernando Fernandes  Brazil	8:59.76	Diego Moreno  Peru	9:08.34	Rodolfo Hass†  Brazil	9:20.70

^†: No medal because of lack of minimum participation.^[2]

Other results of the women's events are shown elsewhere.

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
Discus Throw	Roberta De Oliveira  Brazil	41.85	Jennifer Dahlgren  Argentina	41.41	Roberta Campos†  Brazil	40.70
Javelin Throw	María Do Carmo Alves  Brazil	45.31	María Aparecida Cruz†  Brazil	44.31	Adriana Benavente  Venezuela	32.78

^†: No medal because of lack of minimum participation.^[2]

Doping offences during the athletics events of the games are documented elsewhere.

An unofficial medal count for the athletics events at South American Games is shown below. This medal table differs from the medal table published for the South American Under-23 Championships because of different number of nations, and the minimum participation necessary to award a full set of medals as introduced by ODESUR. Affected are the medal counts for Brazil, Chile, and the Netherlands Antilles.

  *   Host nation (Brazil)

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Brazil*	32	12	16	60
2	Argentina	5	5	5	15
3	Venezuela	4	11	8	23
4	Chile	1	5	7	13
5	Ecuador	1	5	2	8
6	Netherlands Antilles	1	1	0	2
7	Peru	0	2	2	4
8	Guyana	0	1	2	3
9	Uruguay	0	1	1	2
Totals (9 entries)		44	43	43	130