It may not be scientific but people DO try to compare distance performances. Compare Lopes' dismantling of the best runners of the world in the heat and humidity of LA to the rabbited WR Rotterdam performances with perfect weather. I don't need a slide rule to tell me what was more impressive. Some truths are self-evident. Regards, Martin
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > Richard wrote; > > >As another post said, we don't try to make similar > >comparisons between distance races where varying conditions have > >substantial influence. > > Well, for a correlation to be meaningful, it needs to be relatively > universal. The nice thing about physical forces such as wind and air > density is that they can be modelled using basic aerodynamic principles. > > >For example, I have not ever seen a correction > >factor for humidity in distance races, but that effect might be just as > >strong as altitude up to 5000 feet. > > But your correction factor for humidity, or even altitude, aren't really > modelled - they're correlations based on observation of different data > sets. > > Thus, a "model" of altitude effects on distance runners would require an > evaluation of the difference in blood-oxygen transport as a function of > differing O2 partial pressure in the air, and the limitations on workload > due to lactate threshold in the face of reduced oxygen availability to the > muscles. > > Problem is, different athletes have wildly different VO2 maxes, different > lactate threshold levels, different efficiencies. Thus, your models' > utility will be shot to hell, unless you can also lab test all the athletes > and gather a range of cardiovascular and kinesthetic data on them. > > As for humidity - that's even worse. Individual runners responses to heat > and humidity are enormous - you could start playing with factors like > cooling response and muscle debilitation due to heat stress and such - but > body fat and dermal vascularization and temporary heat acclimation all play > huge roles. > > >I think adding corrections is going the wrong way. I think we need to > >expand the acceptable conditions to recognize that we can't accurately > >measure the differences, and we can't precisely estimate the effects. > > Awww, hell. Corrections are fun to play with. And for those who compare > T&F to other sports and angst that track nurds are trying to read too much > into things, note that in baseball Jeff Kent was elected MVP of the > National League back in 2000 while hitting .334 with 33 HR and 125 RBI, > while Todd Helton was way back in 5th in the voting while hitting .372, 42 > HR, and 147 RBI. Some of that is positional - Kent plays 2B and Helton 1B > - but much of it was because MVP voters understand that someone who plays > half their games in Colorado has a huge advantage. > > Interest and understanding of the effects that different conditions have on > performance are part and parcel of enjoying sports that are statistically > based. Baseball "sabremetricians" construct models of "park effects" so > they can compare performances at Pac Bell and Wrigley and Fenway. That's > the type of things that sports fanatics do, and the type of things they > argue about. (Incidentally, fwiw, those are really correlations, since what > they're doing is taking the large amount of data generated in each park > each year and churning it....) > > Phil
