A sliver of hope

First came the cancellation of the Indoor World Championships. That somehow made sense since the championships were programmed for March in China. Then people started talking about a possible cancellation of the Olympics and after some hum and haw those also were cancelled. Well, to be honest neither competition was really cancelled: they were postponed, to be held in 2021. The real cancellation was that of the European Championships which were scheduled for the end of August in Paris. When the Europeans were cancelled I started fearing that 2020 was going to be a year without athletics' competitions. 

To be fair, World Athletics had from the outset announced that they were going to try to organise competitions in autumn so as to give the opportunity to athletes to shape up for the coming olympic year. But then they went on to freeze the qualification period for the Olympics from April 6 (and till November 30). And on top of this, the June meetings of the Wanda Diamond League (Eugene and Paris) were 'postponed'. Mind you, the organisers of the Oslo Diamond League meeting (June 11) made public their plans to to host an alternative competition, an exhibition event which they named 'The Impossible Games', on the same date. (with K. Warholm making an attempt at a world record over 300 m hurdles). But even this competition was (and still is) highly hypothetical.

Then, all of a sudden, a sliver of hope appeared. World athletics, Wanda (and the meeting organisers) proposed an alternative calendar in order to save the 2020 season. The idea is to have the meetings start by mid-August and go on till October. Some of the meetings will be exhibition events, while others will be staged as adapted Diamond League meetings. Here is the provisional schedule:

14/8  Monaco
16/8  Gateshead
23/8  Stockholm
2/9   Lausanne
4/9   Brussels
6/9   Paris (?)
17/9  Rome/Naples
19/9  Shanghai
4/10  Eugene
9/10  Doha
17/10 China (venue ?)

The meetings in Rabat, London and Zürich are cancelled. The latter venue would have hosted the DL final, but under the current circumstances there will be no point system and no final. 

Apparently the Diamond League meetings will not be the only ones. Most (8 out of 10) Continental Tour Gold meetings will (hopefully) take place as well. They will start with the Turku meeting on August 11 and go on till September 26 with the meeting in Nairobi. Moreover, on October 17 the World Athletics Half Marathon Championships will take place as scheduled, in Poland.

In the words of Sir Sebastian,

"... it now looks like we will be able to offer [our professional athletes] a solid international season between August and October where they can earn prize money and assess their training progress in preparation for next year’s Olympic Games, although we know this will not be easy for everyone".

Let's cross our fingers.

Collateral damages

The pandemic scourging the world is making more victims than just the ones listed among the deceased. Speaking in abstract terms, the biggest victim of the epidemic is the world economy due, in good part, to the unpreparedness of the various governments, accustomed to short-term, just-in-time, management. This blog does not have any political velleities and  while the global situation is utterly worrisome, this is not a question that I am willing to address (be it only due to my complete incompetence in the politico-economic domain).

This article is about a particular class of victims of the pandemic: african athletes. Everyone is suffering, from the very best to the "also-ran" ones. The cancellation of all major competitions in 2020 is wreaking havoc upon the preparation (and the morale) of the athletes, but also puts them in financial dire straits.

TaLou, Elemba, Zango, Ahouanwanou

The four athletes in the photo above do not need a special introduction. Ivorian sprinter M.-J TaLou is world vice-champion, congolese shot putter F. Elemba was 4th in the previous Olympics, burkinabé triple jumper H.-F. Jango is world bronze medalist. All of them are African champions. Beninese heptathlete O. Ahouanwanou is african vice-champion and 8th at the 2019 World's. All of them agree that postponing the Olympics was a good decision, but as Zango, points out: "we have been waiting for the Games for four years". And TaLou does not hesitate to mention the financial consequences of the disruption of the calendar. "I live only on my results, meeting bonuses and sponsor money. If there isn't all that, we have nothing", she said. And she is not among the underprivileged ones.

Paris Marathon

Runners can make money in three ways: through sponsors (for the ones who manage to have them), prize money from races (and sometimes bonuses for performance) and appearance fees.  Many african athletes do not have sponsors and travel to Europe in order to compete and make some money. But if there are no races there is no chance for prizes or appearance fees. And when we are talking about money you should keep in mind that athletics is not really lucrative. We are talking here about peanuts compared to other professional sports. A continental Tour winner of an event can make 6000 $ while the 8th finisher makes just 800 $. Road-racing money is slightly better: an "ordinary" good marathon runner can make as little as 1000 $ in a race (of course the top-class ones are making more than 100000 $). Shoe contracts can help, the smaller ones being as low as 5000 $ per year (again with the top ones exceeding 100000 $). But not everyone has shoe contracts. If an athlete does not compete his income is severely amputated. (I have already written about the unacceptable treatment of pregnant athletes). 

Nobody knows what will the future be made of. In the mean time some federations are financially helping their athletes. World Athletics has launched a fund of half a million dollars for the support of professional athletes who have lost most of their income. So (professional) athletes who are experiencing financial hardship due to the pandemic can obtain a (one-off) welfare grant. The fund is meant for athletes who have met the Tokyo Olympic Games entry standard and who are unable to maintain their basic standard of living. Moreover they must have never had an anti-doping rule violation. It goes without saying that athletes of the world elite who are making money form other sources are not eligible.

The federation of Kenya, with the help of Marathon legend E. Kipchoge who was appointed ambassador of the relief project by the Ministry of Sports, came to the aid of less fortunate athletes: they constitute the majority of those who have lost potential income due to the cancellation of races. For the athletes, the training  and competition programme of whose has been perturbed, meeting Kipchoge in person was also a morale boost. And, speaking about  Kipchoge, it is clear that his programme has also been seriously disrupted, with the London Marathon postponed till October and the Olympic one pushed to next year.

A BBC article (which was the inspiration of this post) presents the photo above with the caption "African athletes have been grounded by the widespread suspension of the sport". Nothing could be more true. The T&F athletes of Africa are indeed among the collateral victims of the pandemic.

Comparing men and women performances as a function of age

In a previous post of mine I presented a summary of my work in collaboration with Y. Charon which was published in New Studies in Athletics and which aimed at a comparison of the performances of men and women at the highest level.

After having published that post I ran across a reference to the work of I. Hammerman who set out to perform the same comparison essentially for locomotion sports but not restricting himself to running. His conclusion is that there is a constant ratio of the performances of men and women over a very large range of distances and for all the sport examined: men locomotion records are shorter than those of women by a factor of 0.89. The graphic he presents for running events covering three orders of magnitude in distances is really telling. (Moreover he is working with velocities instead of times which is an indication that he has a grasp of the underlying physics). In our work with Y. Charon, we have found that the ratio of women to men velocities was varying between 0.88 and 0.91, in excellent agreement with the findings of Hammerman.

Hammerman's comparison of running velocities

Having established this I asked the question whether the "magic" ratio was typical of the world-record class athletes at the height of their career or whether it persisted throughout their whole life. I performed thus the same analysis a Hammerman for the masters' world records. In the two graphics that follow I show the results for the 100 m and the 10000 m where I have plotted the men's records velocities multiplied by the factor of 0.89 of Hammerman. The agreement is striking but for the 100 m we observe what we already have identified with Y. Charon in our analysis: for young runners, say less than 50 years old, the ratio of women/men velocities appears to be larger than 0.89. (We had found a ratio of 0.91 for elite runners). Past 80 years old there is a more pronounced dip in women's performances, something I would have the tendency to attribute to the fact that there are fewer women practicing high level sports at those ages as compared to men. The same dip is present also in the 10000 m and in fact it starts even earlier.

Men (blue)-Women (red) comparison over 100 m

Men (blue)-Women (red) comparison over 10000 m

Having established the validity of the Hammerman result for running events it was natural to ask the question whether the same situation occurs in the case of jumps and throws. In the graphic below I compare men's and women's masters records where I have multiplied the former by a factor of 0.83, which is the factor obtained by Y. Charon and myself in our NSA study. Again the agreement is spectacular: what is valid for young elite is valid for the elite at every age. 
  

Men (blue)-Women (red) comparison for long jump

Finally comes the question of the throws. In a previous post I have showed how to deal with the fact that various age groups use implements of different masses. Using the formula L=a/(m+f), which should by now be familiar to the readers of this blog, I have converted the throws' records of men and women to ones that would have been obtained if they were realised with the implement of senior weight. Once this was done it was straightforward to compare the records of men and women as a function of age. 

Men (blue)-Women (red) comparison for shot put

In my post, mentioned at the beginning on this article, I had compared the ratio of women to men performances, for elite athletes, converting the performances of the ones to the mass of the implement of the others. I obtained there a value of circa 0.70. This result was corroborated by the fact that the ratio of weightlifting records leads also to a ratio of 0.70. It was thus interesting to remark that in order to have men and women shot put master records follow the same line as function of age (once converted to the same implement mass) a factor of 0.60 must be applied to the men's results (with the exception of the record for 35 years where the ratio is around 0.70 and for 40 years where the ratio is 0.66). 

There are indications that hormonal transformations in women may lead to a relative loss of muscle strength after 45 years of age. The fact that menopause occurs shortly after that age and that leads to a massive reduction of oestrogen (which is the female counterpart of testosterone) could provide an explanation as to why the ratio of performances of master women throwers to those of men is less favourable than the one of the senior elite.

Imperative changes: wind measurements

Wind speed limitation in athletics goes back a long way. In the beginning of the 30s an experimental study showed that the (tail) wind velocity should be below 1 m/s so as not to offer a performance gain greater than 0.1 second. What was the rationale behind this? At that time the races were hand-timed and a new record could be homologated only if it improved upon the previous by 0.1 s. Hence the 1 m/s limit. However in the 1936 decision of the IAAF the maximum acceptable assisting wind velocity was fixed at 2 m/s. Going from 1 m/s to 2 m/s was a compromise decided by the IAAF congress so as not to have to invalidate too many performances. (A glance at the list of the all-time best performances over 100 m shows that roughly half of them were realised with a wind velocity in excess of 1 m/s, but still below the 2 m/s limit). 

Speaking of compromises there is one that I find ridiculous. For combined events it is specified that the wind velocity in any individual event should not exceed 4 m/s. Moreover  the average wind velocity (based on the algebraic sum of the wind velocities, as measured for each individual event, divided by the number of such events) must not exceed 2 m/s. Why on earth did they decide to use a different rule for combined events? Clearly that was a decision taken under pressure from influence groups i.e. elite athletes, their coaches and their federation officials. A most pathetic decision.

King Carl's non-homologated world record

Before going back to to the 2 m/s limit let us summarise the rules for wind velocity measurement. According to the IAAF/WA rules 

-All wind gauge equipment shall be manufactured and calibrated according to international standards. The accuracy of the measuring equipment used in the competition shall have been verified by an appropriate organisation accredited by the national measurement authority.
-Non-mechanical wind gauges shall be used at all major International Competitions and for any performance submitted for ratification as a World Record.
A mechanical wind gauge should have appropriate protection to reduce the impact of any crosswind. Where tubes are used, their length on either side of the measuring device should be at least twice the diameter of the tube.
-The Track Referee shall ensure that the wind gauge for Track Events is placed beside the straight, adjacent to lane 1, 50m from the finish line. The measuring plane shall be positioned 1.22 m ± 0.05 m high and not more than 2 m away from the track.
-The wind gauge may be started and stopped automatically and/or remotely, and the information conveyed directly to the competition computer.
-The periods for which the wind velocity shall be measured from the flash/smoke of the Starter’s gun are as follows:
Seconds 100 m 10, 100 m hurdles 13, 110 m hurdles 13
In the 200 m event, the wind velocity shall normally be measured for a period of 10 seconds commencing when the first athlete enters the straight.
-The wind gauge shall be read in metres per second, rounded to the next higher tenth of a metre per second, unless the second decimal is zero, in the positive direction (that is, a reading of +2.03 metres per second shall be recorded as +2.1; a reading of -2.03 metres per second shall be recorded as -2.0). Gauges that produce digital readings expressed in tenths of metres per second shall be constructed so as to comply with this Rule.
-For horizontal jumps the relevant Field Events Referee shall ensure that the wind gauge is placed 20 m from the take-off line. The measuring plane shall be positioned 1.22 m ± 0.05 m high and not more than 2 m away from the runway.
-The wind velocity shall be measured for a period of 5 seconds from
the time an athlete passes a mark placed alongside the runway, for the Long Jump 4 0m from the take-off line and for the Triple Jump 35 m. If an athlete runs less than 40 m or 35 m, as appropriate, the wind velocity shall be measured from the time he commences his run.

So, there you have it. The wind velocity is measured by one anemometer (wind gauge) and is recorded with a 0.1 m/s precision. All this was OK in the olden times when performances were recorded at 0.1 s. But how about today when records are homologated at a precision of 0.01 s? One can superficially conclude that if the wind velocity is measured with a 0.1 m/s precision the possible uncertainty on the final time is of the order of 5 milliseconds and thus should not have a "visible" effect. (Incidentally this calculation is one more argument against the use of milliseconds in track events). And if you wonder about horizontal jumps a 0.1 m/s uncertainty of the wind velocity would correspond to 0.5 cm for a 7-8 m long jump but already a full cm for triple jump. And as we know one cm suffices in order to improve an existing record.

But what are we talking about when we talk about a 0.1 m/s precision? This is the required precision of the measurement. While this is not unimportant the essential question is "what is the relation of the measured wind velocity to the real one?". And in particular in track events "do all the athletes experience the same assisting wind?". P.N. Linthorne performed as series of measurements placing two anemometers one at the position specified by the rules (next to the track, at 50 m from the finish line) and one in at 10 m, 30 m, 50 m, 70 m, or 90 m from the 100m start line, and on the line between lanes 2 and 3, or on the line between lanes 6 and 7. Due to the configuration of the stadium the wind gauges at the 90 m line were more sheltered for headwinds, and the wind gauges at the 10 m line were more sheltered for tail winds and more exposed for head winds. The figure below shows the relation between the official wind reading and a simultaneous wind reading from a second wind gauge placed at the 30 m line. 

Relation between the two wind readings

Where the two measurements identical, they should lie along the continuous line. The dispersion observed is far larger than the required 0.1 m/s precision. And moreover it does depend on the configuration of the stadium. (The only encouraging point of Linthorne's study is that there does not appear to be a significant difference between the measurements in lanes 2/3 and those in lanes 6/7. Thus all athletes in a given race experience essentially the same wind). 

So, what should be done? The only fair solution would be to install a whole battery of anemometers along the track. Linthorne's choice of 10, 30, 50 70 and 90 m is a reasonable one. Moreover, instead of averaging over 10 s it would be preferable to take an instantaneous wind measurement as the runners pass next to each wind gauge. (For horizontal jumps doubling the number of anemometers, positioned at 30 and 10 m from the take-off board, appears necessary). Also, for major championships, a series of measurements like those of Linthorne would be necessary in order to establish the "wind force profile" of the stadium so as to know exactly how precise are the wind velocity measurements.

This is what should be done, instead of pretending that the single anemometer reading provides enough precision for records to be homologated in fairness.

A few years back I published a post on wind effects. In that article i made one of my "crazy" proposals, crazy meaning that I am aware that it has 0 % chance to be officially adopted one day. What I proposed was a correction for the wind velocity. Namely, based on a detailed biomechanical model, estimate the corrections to be applied to times registered in the presence of wind (be it tail- or head-wind) so as to evaluate the equivalent performances at “zero wind”. This is the only sustainable solution. And, of course, the first step towards its implementation would be to have a most accurate measure of wind velocity.