How Fast Will Athletes Get?

How Fast Will Athletes Get?

By Larry Kelley 

Hearing about the most recent fastest human at 100 meters, albeit wind aided,

makes my mind wander back to those thrilling days of yesteryear.

Time had a different unit of measure then.

You ran the 100-yard dash, not the 100-meter dash.

Growing up a budding sprinter, I thought, I saw visions of sugarplums dance in my head while watching guys a few years older blaze the 100-yard dash in 10.2 seconds.

Under ten seconds for 100 yards was something few did but many dreamed.

The 220-yard dash was equally exciting, when anything under 22 seconds put you in elite company.

Then, of course, there was the 440-yard run.  Yes, Virginia, it used to be called the 440-yard RUN.  Check it out.

Those were the days.  Back before the Beatles.   Before man walked on the moon.

I am still amused every time I hear the latest 400-meter dash time.  Back then it was a run, now it’s a dash, one time around the oval either way.

What changed?

We’ve become a ‘quick’ society, and an even ‘quicker’ sports society.

There’s an urge to make everything quicker and faster.

Metric is the measure now, although I’m still an old-fashioned inches and feet guy, speaking strictly for myself. 

And when the world-class sprinters now buzz 100 meters in something less than 10 seconds, well, it still seems a bit surreal. 

But they do it in bunches.  Ask Tyson Gay, our most recent ‘fastest human.’

Like when Roger Bannister became the first to crack the previously mythical 4-minute mile, others quickly followed in his footsteps into the sub-4 stratosphere.

The gauntlet had been thrown down.

Records are made to be broken.  But how low, or how fast, or how quick can we go?

Faster runners, longer golf ball distances, metal replacing wooden bats, among many, many changes.  It permeates all sports.

Needless to say, state-of-the-art advances in health and wellness are a contributing factor.  What would we do now without Red Bull?

And better equipment has produced better results – from a plethora of running shoes of multiple varieties and space-age metals being integrated into sports, etc.

Years ago after dropping out of golf for a while, I took my son to a close-by local golf course for a round.  Mind you I hadn’t been playing in 3-4 years, so when I innocently asked the course marshal how many people played with metal woods, I was shocked at his reply. 

“Nobody plays with woods anymore,” he replied.  “Everybody plays with metal.”

I had a Big Bertha driver, won in a drawing several years earlier, but still had my trusty and beloved persimmon woods – my favorite club, a neat stiff-shafted 3-wood I could drill every time I hit it, a classy 4-wood and a slick 5-wood. 

Wake up, Larry, and join society.  That was years ago.

We are now in the midst of a ‘quick’ society.  Sports included.

The adage “If you’re not quick, you’re dead” bears revisiting.

Don’t think so?  Just walk inside your nearest McDonald’s or Burger King and look at the timer beside the drive-through window.  Those hourly workers have only a few short minutes to deliver your order.

Worse yet, I sometimes find myself getting a bit peeved if they don’t do it fast enough, like within 180 seconds or so for my cheeseburger and fries, as if 4-5 minutes would kill me.

A wise man once told me that sometimes you have to go slow to go fast.

I guess it goes back to the saga about the thrill of the chase is half the fun of the race, figuratively speaking.

We must charge ahead.  We must continue to strive for quicker and faster in sports. 

Otherwise, why compete? 

There is only one problem.

It’s when ‘artificial’ gets in the way.  When people think ‘quicker’ needs ‘artificial’, and they succumb to that.

One example, sadly, may be the situation with Barry Bonds.

Here’s Bonds, a true American prodigy, a classic home run slugger who has somehow morphed into a monster right in front of our eyes. 

He’s persona non grata to most of the teams in major league baseball, probably now as much because of his age as the stigma attached to him. 

His trainer found it so important to protect Bonds that the truth wasn’t good enough.  Rather than tell what he knew, he decided to sit silently in jail for a year.

Why shroud the true in all this mystery?  Just because a guy wasn’t content to excel with the body God gave him?  Did he get obsessed with wanting to get more home runs ‘quicker’ than anyone else in baseball? 

Who knows.

Bonds is just emblematic of the situation.  Whatever additives he used or was naively given to enhance his body, if any, may have changed his performance and maybe his legacy.

Why couldn’t Bonds have been content to do what he did the way he did it originally when he was labeled ‘great’ doing it?  So his trainer could unabashedly tell us today what he did and didn’t do, or take or didn't take?

What is it about sports today that demands and demands and demands?

Somehow our society has put peer pressure on our athletes to do better, do more, do it faster, do it quicker, and do it now.

Endorsements?  I’m sure they’ve played a part in all of this.  Do better, go ‘quicker’ and you’ll get better endorsement money.

Enhancements in equipment?  Definitely a factor.

Additives in one’s body?  The proof is unfortunately out there that this has happened, too, causing some athletes to be stripped of their awards, trophies and accomplishments under these conditions.

Call me old-fashioned. 

I would rather take Babe Ruth any day, with his belly full of hot dogs and beer from the night before, than one of today’s ripped athletes seeking to go ‘quicker’ at any costs.

It’s OK to want to go ‘quicker’ and faster.  That’s the American way.

Just obey the rules when doing it.