This year's Olympic Games saw a number of world records go up in flames, including those for 100 and 200 meter sprints, both knocked down by Usain Bolt. This made Mark Denny, a researcher at Stanford University, wonder how much more humans could gain in speed over the years. He was curious especially about whether or not our capacity to exceed new records had leveled off, or if, on the contrary, we still have a long way to go before reaching a plateau.

The researcher thus compared speed record files on archives, and traced dog and thoroughbred horse speeds as far back as he could. He found data detailing dog speeds that were as early as the 1920s, and horse records that went back to the 19^th century. A simple analysis revealed that both species exhibited a leveling in their performances around the mid 1970s, meaning that greater speeds than those recorded at the time were never repeated.

 

But Denny knew that humans are different, in terms of running, from the two other species, because they have had a huge rise in population, translating into the fact that more people necessarily yield better specializations. That means that more and more children will try to become athletes, and this competition will most likely encourage performance.

 

After having analyzed data gathered from feminine tournaments, for both sprints and marathons, he concluded that women already achieved the peak of their performing capabilities somewhere around the 1970s-1980s, though admittedly they still can achieve higher performances in marathons. The researcher estimates that some 3 to 4 minutes could be cut back from the current world records.

 

In men's competitions, he estimated that they still hadn't reached their full potential, in that better times are still possible. Denny even ventured to say that the 100 meter-sprint times currently set by Usain Bolt could be improved, lowering the world record to as few as 9.48 seconds.

 

Only time will tell if his predictions are correct, but Denny says that, most likely, women times in marathons will reach their lowest during his lifetime, so this will be the best method to test his beliefs. If females manage to get times lower than 2h 12 min 41s on the 42,195m race, it would mean that the researcher was incorrect. The current world record for this race is held by Paula Radcliffe, who finished the marathon in 2 h 15 min 25s.

 

Mark Denny's work can be further explored here.