If they go back to true regular suits and Jammers, we may never see the times of the last 2 years again - well at least not until they change the rules again.... I went back to look at the World Rankings for 10th Place and 25th place for the last 7 Olympic years. The Olympic years have always been the fastest years (except of course for 2009 - thanks to you know what). I used the 10th and 25th spot to avoid the "freak" factor and good a good average rate of improvement. Also - I used Freestyle to avoid the impact of rule changes and the emergence of dlphin kicks.
1984 50.36 50.93
1988 50.13 50.54
1992 49.83 50.43
1996 49.74 50.27
2000 49.15 49.67
2004 49.08 49.45
2008 47.83 48.5
2009 47.77 48.27
A couple of things jump out:
- rate of progress has slowed down to maybe 1 to 2 tenth per Olympic cycle
- Big drop in 2000 with arrival of Fastskin suits - about half a second ! and of course a full second and more in 2008.
- In a 1996 suit, I would guess the current times to be just a little slower than the 2000 times.
They are going to have trials next year for the 2011 Worlds - I am guessing a 49.7 or 49.8 will make the US team in the 100 Free ....
"The verification requires a physical medical evaluation, and includes reports from a gynecologist, endocrinologist, psychologist, an internal medicine specialist and an expert on gender."
Does it really need to be this difficult? It seems like it would be fairly cut and dry. Do a DNA test and if Semenya has a Y chromosome "she" is a man, right? Unfortunately name, too, considering the controversy! :)
Seriously!
More than I wanted to know about gender testing...but it does seem legitimately more complicated than a simple chromosome test:
www.slate.com/.../
One thing that intrigues me is that swimming was able to surpass the world records set by dopers, but women's track hasn't been able to break many of the doping records from the 80s.
I think there are 2 reasons - technique and pure force --- the technique in track is not moving forward. Running technique seems to be very well established and it's not too complicated. Swimming technique still seems to be changing and improving - although most likely at a decreasing rate.
The pure strength and power needed for track is just much bigger - and the impact on the body is much bigger. Obviously more power is really important for a 100 runner carrying their own body weight (where a swimmer gets the "floating assist".
More than I wanted to know about gender testing...but it does seem legitimately more complicated than a simple chromosome test:
www.slate.com/.../
Why are they doing this gender testing? The only thing I can think of is that her blood test results were confusing for a woman.
This is really difficult to explain how someone can compete in the world championships without this issue being resolved prior to the competition - sports.espn.go.com/.../story.
"The verification requires a physical medical evaluation, and includes reports from a gynecologist, endocrinologist, psychologist, an internal medicine specialist and an expert on gender."
Does it really need to be this difficult? It seems like it would be fairly cut and dry. Do a DNA test and if Semenya has a Y chromosome "she" is a man, right? Unfortunately name, too, considering the controversy! :)
I am soooo tired of nobody being to able to stop this kind of stuff from happening ...
Why don't they settle this prior to the meet ?
Why is Jamaica all over sudden the sprint mecca of the world and everybody is celebrating the "head clown"?
Why do we have to look at a women's 400 dash record from an athlete where I can tell you the doping regimen she was under (or 100 or 200 or 800 or Long Jump or ....) ?
One thing that intrigues me is that swimming was able to surpass the world records set by dopers, but women's track hasn't been able to break many of the doping records from the 80s. Why do you think this is so? I know swimming has had a few things like rule changes in *** and back, technique changes and SDKs, and tech suits. Track hasn't had any real changes other than maybe the surface that they run on has gotten better, but so have the pools we swim in. However, I think most of the records of the dopers were broken before many of these apparent differences were used. Would you say that coaching and training has just evolved more in swimming than in track since the 80s? Were the women that doped in track just that much more effective than their swimming counterparts?
Tim
"The verification requires a physical medical evaluation, and includes reports from a gynecologist, endocrinologist, psychologist, an internal medicine specialist and an expert on gender."
Does it really need to be this difficult? It seems like it would be fairly cut and dry. Do a DNA test and if Semenya has a Y chromosome "she" is a man, right? Unfortunately name, too, considering the controversy! :)
I'm not a doctor or anything, but that seems like a reasonable test. Nice name that kind of fits the controversy.
As much as I dislike FINA, I think the IAAF might be worse and IAAF probably has a much longer history of bad decision making. I remember when Carl Lewis was running and track was probably at its peak in the U.S. and you could catch the World Championships on network television every night. Now, I think the swimming world championships get as much air time as track (weekend replays mostly), but I guess that is probably because the U.S. has very few track stars any longer.
Tim
ehoch,
Your 100m free time estimates post rubber suit seem a bit slow. I'm going to roll the dice and predict a 48 mid without the technology. Rowdy set the WR back in 1981 against me in Austin with a 49.3. Certainly there has been a half to three quarter second improvement in raw speed since then.
Although.... track does seem pretty dirty these days..... Some of the Jamaicans are pushing the envelope.
www.universalsports.com/ViewA...CLID=204773074
That woman in the 800m didn't look like a woman. And if she passes the gender test.... what does that mean? How huge and muscular can a woman get before we start outright laughing at the testing?
"If it is the case that "nobody will go under 47" for 10 to 20 years, well, by that time probably nobody will care, because as everyone goes slower the interest in the sport will diminish and diminish. World records create excitement and draw interest. Swimming will no longer be on TV (except for a couple of days once every four years) and as the interest in the sport fades, less kids will be attracted to compete--so times will get even slower."
gshaw,
I will have to disagree with this notion that WR hype is what drives interest and enthusiasm in the sport. Note, Mary T. held the 200m fly WR record for decades, Betsy Mitchell's 200m Back WR stood for years and years..... going back further we see many WR that stood the test of time. Remember Brian Goodell's 1500m free was legendary and lasted for years. These long lasting performances don't diminish interest in the sport. We don't need a fix on a new record every 2 weeks to respect the sport and keep it publicized.
