- Fernando Duarte
- BBC International Reporter
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In the 2012 London Olympics men’s 100-meter sprint final, seven of the eight runners ran within 10 seconds, indicating the future development trend.
In the men’s 100-meter sprint final of the 2012 Olympic Games, spectators in the London Olympic Stadium may not have noticed that the peak event on the track and field is gestating an earthquake magnitude shift. This is understandable, because their attention is focused on the moment Usain Bolt (Bott) rushed across the finish line.
The Jamaican sprint superstar once again won a gold medal and set the Olympic record to 9.63 seconds.
“It was one of the greatest sprint races in history,” said Steve Haake, a professor of sports engineering at Sheffield Hallam University in the United Kingdom.
But Huck is not touting Bolt. His comment was about the overall performance of the players: Seven of the eight players in the final crossed the finish line within 10 seconds-an unprecedented event.
The 10-second mark, which was only broken for the first time in 1968, is still a major mark for sprinters-an honorable mark that distinguishes them from other runners.
However, in recent years, the number of “breaking 10” runners has increased rapidly.
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The number of runners who run within 10 seconds in the men’s 100-meter sprint is rapidly increasing
Source: World Athletics Federation
According to data from the World Athletics, in the 40 years from 1968 to 2008, only 67 runners broke this mark, but in the following 10 years, 70 new runners joined the ranks.
In the past two years, until the beginning of July 2021, another 17 male players completed their “Break 10” results for the first time. The same barrier in the women’s event—11 seconds—is being breached more and more frequently.
What exactly is going on?
“Broken 10 clubs” expanded rapidly
Scientists like Hacker believe that there are many factors in this. First, there are more people participating in track events around the world, and then there are better training methods.
“There are now more athletes around the world who can receive elite-level training, as well as the help of sports science and technology to make them run faster,” Huck said.
The evidence is that the “Broken Ten Club” has expanded beyond traditional powerhouses such as the United States and Jamaica, and has gradually included countries such as the United Kingdom and Canada, which have won at least one gold medal in the men’s 100-meter dash.
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In the women’s 100-meter sprint, the 11-second mark was frequently broken.
For example, Nigeria, like the United Kingdom, ranks third in the world in terms of the number of “Break 10” players. In recent years, countries such as Japan, Turkey, China and South Africa that were not outstanding in sprinting in the past have successively joined the “Break 10 Club”.
A similar phenomenon also appeared in the women’s 100-meter event. The 11-second mark was broken for the first time in 1973, when East German runner Renate Stecher first achieved it. As of 2011, 67 other sprinters have done it. After another 10 years, this total reached 115, and included some non-traditional powers of this project.
Shoes, track and sports science
Top track and field coaches tell us how to run 100 meters like a champion
Technology must have played a big role: today’s sprinters wear lighter running shoes-the latest style may weigh less than 150 grams.
The materials used in shoes of this era are also very different. An example of this is a project between the German sports shoe brand Puma and the Formula One team Mercedes. The result is a running shoe with carbon fiber as the sole-the same material is used to design the world Formula One championship The chariot of the driver Lewis Hamilton (Hamilton).
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The old running shoes look like this, and today’s running shoes have indeed changed a lot.
Compared with the time when elite runners raced on mud and grass, the track has also changed a lot.
The synthetic material-paved track was used for the first time in the Mexico City Olympics in 1968, giving athletes more protection for their joints, and also providing a rebound-like effect, making the completion time faster.
It was at the same Olympic Games that American runner Jim Hines became the first human to run 100 meters within 10 seconds (9.95 seconds).
In order to improve the conditions for achieving a “faster” effect on the runway, even the shape of the vulcanized rubber particles on the runway plane will now be a factor to be considered.
In the 2008 Beijing Olympics, five new world records were set in track events. The Italian flooring manufacturer Mondo, which provides the track for the competition, was almost as happy as the record-breaking runners.
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The same is true for the runway.
Science also played a role in nutrition and training. Today’s sprinters can be fully analyzed to adjust technical movements and reaction time.
Research can even find out which muscles are more important for sprint performance.
In October last year, a scientific team from Loughborough University, a leading sports science research institution, discovered that the gluteus maximus is essential for athletes to achieve the fastest speed on the track.
“What we have now is that top sprinters have very specific muscle distribution patterns,” said Sam Allen, an expert in sports biomechanics who participated in the study.
“So, we may see sprinters improve this part in a targeted manner in the near future.”
Psychological barrier?
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In 1968, American runner Hines became the world‘s first “breaking 10” human being.
In an interview published in Japan’s “Asahi Shimbun” on July 9, Japanese sprinter Yamaxian Ryota did not hesitate to attribute the “breaking 10” result a month ago to “cooperation with scientists in the past 20 years.”
Until 2017, no Japanese runner had broken the 10-second mark. But after that, Yamaxian Ryota and his three other compatriots have done it.
The number of “Broken 10 Clubs” has expanded and become more diverse, which seems to make this threshold less terrifying for athletes.
At least this is the view of Chinese runner Su Bingtian. He became the first male athlete born in Asia in 2015 to run 100 meters in less than 10 seconds.
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Chinese runner Su Bingtian believes that 10 seconds is more of a psychological challenge.
“I think this threshold is more psychological than physical,” he said in 2019.
The medal pattern has not changed
Of course, the improvement in these aspects does not mean that it will automatically be guaranteed to break ten.
For example, to this day, many countries including India, and even an entire continent (South America), have not seen any “breaking 10” men’s 100m runners or “breaking 11” women’s runners.
Moreover, the expansion of the “breaking 10 clubs” did not really break the sport’s dominance in the distribution of medals.
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The 100-meter sprint is still dominated by the United States and Jamaica.
In the men’s and women’s events, since the 1980s, in the Olympics and World Championships, runners from the United States and Jamaica still systematically dominate the podium.
For example, in the men’s event, the last time the Olympic gold medal in the 100-meter sprint fell outside these two countries was when Canadian athlete Donovan Bailey won the gold in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
In the women’s event, when Yuilya Nestsiarenka won at the 2004 Athens Olympics, the Belarusian was also taken aback, because the five previous Olympics had been won by Americans. ——The next three sessions are all Jamaicans.
At the Tokyo Olympics, there is little chance that the general situation will change-although this is the first Olympic Games since Bolt retired. In the men’s 100m event in 2021, four of the five fastest times were created by American runners. Among the five fastest women runners on earth this year, there are three Jamaicans and one American. people.