Anyway the wind blows....

Jamaican Asafa Powell has clocked a new world record timing of 9.77 seconds for 100 meters record on 14/06/05. He broke the three-year-old record of Tim Montgomerie (9.78 seconds). It’s really amazing to know the speed of these people for 100 meters. The average speed of Powell is calculated to be 36.84 kmph!

Yesterday I was jogging as usual on the treadmill. I am not claiming that I am a great sprinter; in fact I know I am pathetic when it comes to sprinting. I found it so difficult to clock even 18 kmph, i.e. half of the speed at which Powell ran. The guy is only 22 and he is at the top of the world! Hope he will be able to better his own record.

Speaking of world records, I was wondering about the maximum speed at which a human can run! In 1996, when Donovan Bailley of Canada clocked 9.84 seconds (well that’s the first world record feat I remember), I thought no body would be able to break that record. But in 1999, came “the American Express” Maurice Greene. He bettered the record of Bailley by a mammoth (hmmm.. for sprinting this is a huge margin) 0.05 seconds. I thought this would be the limit…

Again the record was shattered. In comes Montgomerie in 2002 with 9.78. He was on his dream run for the whole year, until the allegations of drugs distracted him. Now he runs as though he is in search of his lost soul :(

I am sure now that Powell has the grit and determination in him to improve his best, hopefully that happens in a couple of years… But the question here is, where is the limit? Is there any limit for the max speed that a man* can achieve. Or will there be some day when he will be running his 100 meters in say 5 seconds? God! I can’t even imagine that situation.

Here what I feel is that, after some years, the time reaches some limit, then we will be forced to go for more accurate measurements. For example, in 2020, the world record for 100 meters can be something like 9.543 seconds, where the previous record might be 9.539 seconds. That’s how I think the records will go. And I strongly believe that these records will be broken as long as there is an event called 100 meters sprint :)

So go ahead Powell… U can do it. \O/

*Man: This is because the women’s 100 m record remains unbroken for the past 15 or so years. Florence Griffith Joyner of USA, clocked the record time in 1988, I think. I really feel that there was some error in the measurement , either the clock or they forgot to calculate the wind speed, as the present women sprinters are nowhere close to that record and with the looks of it, this record is likely to remain forever.

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# posted by Sreejith Narayanan @ 7:37 AM