Berlin Marathon 2013: Live splits and analysis

World Record! 2:03:23 Wilson Kipsang
Live Splits and Analysis

Wilson Kipsang has broken the Marathon World Record!  2:03:23 in Berlin.

Here is how he did it, splits and analysis from the race!  I'll post more later!

Overall splits Men

5km:  14:34.  2:55 per km, projecting 2:02:56
10km:  29:16.  14:42 for the last 5km, pace of 2:56/km. Projected time now 2:03:29
15km:  43:45.  14:29 for the last 5km, pace of 2:54/km, the fastest so far. Projecting 2:03:04.
20km:  58:19.  14:34 for the last 5km, pace of 2:55/km.  Projecting 2:03:02
Halfway:  61:32. Easy calculation, it projects 2:03:04, a WR by 34 seconds
25km:  1:13:13. 14:54 for last 5km, pace of 2:59/km, so slowest segment. Projecting 2:03:35
30km:  1:28:01.  14:48 for the last 5km, pace of 2:58/km.  Projection of 2:03:48
35km:  1:42:36.  14:35 for the last 5km, pace of 2:55/km. Projecting 2:03:41
40km:  1:57:12.  14:36 last 5km, projecting 2:03:38. Epic finish coming up!
Finish: 2:03:21.  The World Record is gone!

40km

It's on. Final 2.195km at 2:54/km will get the WR.  By 1 second!  As you can see above, that's what they've done since 30km, and so the record is a real possibility.  Kipsang leads Kipchoge by about 10 seconds, so it is a one-man race for the WR.  Silence now until the end, I'll fill in the blanks later.  This will be a "sprint" through the Brandenburg Gates for the World Record.

Kipsang has slowed slightly in the last 2km, so he needs a pick up.  But it's so close now, if he can just dig in and find 5 minutes of effort, he'll get this.

35km

The pace has now picked up, with the pacemaker having dropped off.  Wilson Kipsang has led the upturn in pace, which has seen the last 5km covered in 14:35 .  That included a 2:52 34th kilometer, very fast.

Wilson Kipsang is the aggressor, leading the race, but with company from Geoffrey Kipsang and Eliud Kipchoge.  Kipsang, as the senior, pedigreed man, obviously has the pressure and obligation to keep the record viable.

With 10km to go, the TV graphic suggests that a 29:30 10km will be needed.  That is definitely feasible.

The pacmaker fought to about 31 km then dropped off, leaving the big three.  It's the Kipsangs, Wilson and Geoffrey, along with Kipchoge.  So as expected, those three fight for the win.  Whether their fight produces a record, that's the intrigue.

30km

They've remained slightly slower than WR pace.  2:58/km gives 14:48 for the last 5km, and a projection of 2:03:48.

So, having been well under WR pace at halfway, it's now going to take a real aggressive final 10km to get the WR.  Whether anyone will take the 'risk' in the company of other men is going to determine how close they get.  That will depend on how they each feel, of course.

At this stage, it's a good time to consider who the viable candidates are.  Wilson Kipsang, Geoffrey Kipsang and Eliud Kipchoge are all there, as is one pacemaker, and Kirwa and Kipchirchir.  An all Kenyan front five, plus the pacemaker Rono.  Five men is good in the sense that 'company' helps in the latter part of the race, but it will be interesting to see how the racing affects the pacing, as it were.

It was this segment where Patrick Makau made the surge that would drop Gebrselassie on route to the current WR in Berlin.  He ran a 5:30 2km segment then, which certainly helped his race, but probably cost him some time.  So the comparison with Makau, which up to now has seen 2013 ahead, will probably look different at 30km, but that's still OK - there are 12km to go from that point, much can happen.

25km

The last 5km were run in 14:54, which is 2:59/km, the slowest segment of the race.  You can tell the pace had slowed because the front group at halfway was thinning out, and it has now expanded again, as runners who had dropped off have come back on.  That's always a sign.  The projection now is 2:03:35, and so it has suddenly come back from being a big WR projection, to a touch and go race.

There is some talk that the runners were benefiting from a tailwind between 10 and 20km, which is now gone.  These are the subtleties that affect WR potential...

At this stage of the race, patience really counts for a lot, so the slowing is not necessarily a bad thing.  The temptation, as the field thins out, is to get aggressive, because you're on the way "home", as it were.  We've seen in London and other big city races how aggression at 25km often blows the race open, but it comes at the cost of the fast time.  So it's important here to be patient, and avoid a 5:35 surge for 2km that can easily derail the WR.  Kipsang of course did that in the Olympics, not off a WR pace, but may have learned from that.  They do have a buffer of around 30 seconds for this second half - a 62:00 still gives a WR.

Halfway

61:32, so a WR projection by 34 seconds.  It promises to be an intriguing second half.  For one thing, the pacemakers will drop at around 30km, and then it will be up to the big three, assuming they're all there, to decide how best to push the pace to keep the WR in view, while still racing and not pulling a colleague to the WR.  That will be perhaps the race's decisive moment.

20km

58:19 at 20km, the projection is for a 2:03:02.  The last 5km was 14:34, so 2:55/km, but there were reports that the 18th kilometer was 2:52, which is very fast and suggests a little bit of oscillation.  Again, the athletes can see their pace and the projected time continuously in Berlin, so when the pace is faster, it's not an accident caused by lack of information, it's a conscious decision to ramp the pace.  They are being incredibly aggressive, and that makes for an interesting second half.  They should hit halfway in about 61:30, and so the second half is guaranteed to be attritional.  The question now is whether it is attritional enough to cost them the WR, or whether they hang on?

15km

The pace has actually increased - 14:29 for the last 5km, and the projected time is now down again, to 2:03:04.  This is quick, and maybe cause for concern.  If you're 15 to 20 seconds up on WR pace through halfway, then that's bordering on reckless.  So it will be interesting to see how the section 25 to 35 km goes.  That's often where the "interest" payments are made.

A TV graphic is showing that they're currently 36 seconds faster than Makau was at the same stage - the coverage is good so far.  Remember that Makau had a race with Gebrselassie that really jacked the pace up after halfway, so that gap may come down later.  The optimal way to run is even pace, so the Makau comparison is less informative, but interesting.  Also, in Berlin, runners have access to the car in front of them, which gives all the information required to manage the pace.  It even gives a projected time, so if they're running under 2:03-pace, then it's because they have chosen to, not because they're making a mistake in the absence of information, which is important to consider.

Florence Kiplagat has gone through 15km in 49:27, which projects a 2:19:06, so she has slowed very slightly, but still on course for a big PB and significant performance under 2:20.

10km

The pace has been maintained, 14:42 for the last 5km.  That's very steady.  The biggest challenge is consistency, so it would be good to see splits by kilometer, rather than 5km, because that would tell you exactly how the pace is fluctuating.  Physiologically, there's a big difference between going 2:52-3:00-2:52-3:00, and running 2:56 every kilometer, even though overall it's the same pace.

So far, that seems to not be the case.  A TV graphic showed a sequence of kilometer splits and the range seems to be narrow - 2:54 to 2:58, so it's a good pacing job so far.  If that continues, then the record is on, and the only determinant is the condition of the atheltes.

No splits from the leading woman, who is Florence Kiplagat.  They're saying her timing chip is not working, so the only splits coming through are for the women in the group behind her.  Will get a split as soon as possible.  She's just gone through 12km in around 39:30, which is 2:18:50 pace, so Kiplagat is going fast too.

5km

14:34, which projects 2:02:56.  The target was apparently 14:40, so they're inside it.  For now, not too damaging (though of course there may have been a 2:40 km in there, I'm not sure), but that is quick.  There's more risk of losing the record by going too fast at this stage.  Not surprisingly, the big three are in the group, along with perhaps 7 or 8 others.  That should thin out at this pace.

Start

As we wait for the first split. a prediction.  I don't think the WR will fall.  Too many things have to be absolutely perfect.  Weather, conditioning of the athlete, the pacing, the intent, and the presence and support of other runners when it counts.  If any of those factors are even 5% below optimal, the price is stiff and the record is gone.

I don't think that the three big names in this race have the necessary ability, so my call is a time just outside 2:04.  Let's call it 2:04:15.  5km split next.

Waist-to-weight ratios in pictures: The John Stone transformation

John Stone is a bodybuilder and founder of a bodybuilding and fitness web site (). There he has provided pictures and stats of his remarkable transformation, which were used to prepare the montage below.



John’s height is reported as 5' 11.5". Below the photos are the months in which they were taken, the waist circumferences in inches, the weights in lbs, and the waist-to-weight ratios (WWRs). Abhi was kind enough to provide a more detailed plot of John Stone’s WWRs ().

Assuming that minimizing one’s WWR is healthy, an idea whose rationale was explained here before (), we could say that John was at his most unhealthy in the photo on the left.

The second photo from the left shows a slightly more healthy state, at a reported 8 percent body fat (his lowest). The two photos on the right represent states in which John’s WWR is at its lowest, namely 0.1544. That is, in these two photos John minimized his WWR; at a reported 14 and 13.8 percent body fat, respectively.

When we look at the WWRs in these photos, it seems that he is only marginally healthier in the second photo from the left than in the leftmost photo. In the two photos on the right, the WWRs are much lower (they are the same), suggesting that he was significantly healthier in those photos.

Interestingly, in both photos on the right John reported to have been at the end of bulking periods. Whenever he entered a cutting period his WWR started going up. This suggests that his ratio of lean body mass to total mass started decreasing just as soon as he started cutting. I suspect the same would happen if he continued gaining weight.

Which of the two photos on the right represents the best state? Assuming that both states are sustainable, over the long run I would argue that the best state is the one where the WWR was minimized with the lowest weight. There whole-day joint stress is lower. This corresponds to the photo at the far right.

By sustainable states I mean states that are not reached through approaches that are unhealthy in the long term; e.g., approaches that place organs under such an abnormal stress that they are damaged over time. This kind of damage is essentially what happens when we become obese – i.e., too fat. One can also become too muscular for his or her own good.

Could we have evolved traits that are detrimental to our survival?

Let us assume that we collected data on the presence or absence of a trait (e.g., propensity toward risky behavior) in a population of individuals, as well as on intermediate effects of the trait, downstream effects on mating and survival success, and ultimately on reproductive success (a.k.a. “fitness”, in evolutionary biology).

The data would have been collected over several generations. Let us also assume that we conducted a multivariate analysis on this data, of the same type as the analyses employing WarpPLS that were discussed here in previous posts (). The results are summarized through the graph below.



Each of the numbers next to the arrows in the graph below represents the strength of a cause-effect relationship. The number .244 linking “a” and “y” means that a one standard deviation variation in “a” causes a .244 standard deviation increase in “y”. It also means that a one standard deviation variation in “a” causes a 24.4 percent increase in “y” considering the average “y” as the baseline.

This type of mathematical view of evolution may look simplistic. This is an illusion. It is very general, and encompasses evolution in all living organisms, including humans. It also applies to theoretical organisms where multiple (e.g., 5, 6 etc.) sexes could exist. It even applies to non-biological organisms, as long as these organisms replicate - e.g., replicating robots.

So the trait measured by “a” has a positive effect on the intermediate effect “y”. This variable, “y” in turn has a negative effect on survival success (“s”), and a strong one at that: -.518. Examples: “a” = propensity toward risky behavior, measured as 0 (low) and 1 (high); and “y” = hunting success, measured in the same way. (That is, “a” and “y” are correlated, but “a”=1 does not always mean “y”=1.) Here the trait “a” has a negative effect on survival via its intermediate effect on “y”. If I calculate the total effect of “a” on “w” via the 9 paths that connect these two variables, I will find that it is .161.

The total effect on reproductive success is positive, which means that the trait will tend to spread in the population. In other words, the trait will evolve in the population, even though it has a negative effect on survival. This type of trait is what has been referred to as a “costly” trait ().

Say what? Do you mean to say that we have evolved traits that are unhealthy for us? Yes, I mean exactly that. Is this a “death to paleo” post? No, it is not. I discussed this topic here before, several years ago (). But the existence of costly traits is one of the main reasons why I don’t think that mimicking our evolutionary past is necessarily healthy. For example, many of our male ancestors were warriors, and they died early because of that.

What type of trait will present this evolutionary pattern – i.e., be a costly trait? One answer is: a trait that is found to be attractive by members of the other sex, and that is not very healthy. For example, a behavior that is perceived as “sexy”, but that is also associated with increased mortality. This would likely be a behavior prominently displayed by males, since in most species, including humans, sexual selection pressure is much more strongly applied by females than by males.

Examples would be aggressiveness and propensity toward risky behavior, especially in high-stress situations such as hunting and intergroup conflict (e.g., a war between two tribes) where being aggressive is likely to benefit an individual’s group. In warrior societies, both aggressiveness and propensity toward risky behavior are associated with higher social status and a greater ability to procure mates. These traits are usually seen as male traits in these societies.

Here is something interesting. Judging from our knowledge of various warrior societies, including American plains Indians societies, the main currency of warrior societies were counts of risky acts, not battle effectiveness. Slapping a fierce enemy warrior on the face and living to tell the story would be more valuable, in terms of “counting coup”, than killing a few inexperienced enemy warriors in an ambush.

Greater propensity toward risky behavior among men is widespread and well documented, and is very likely the result of evolutionary forces, operating on costly traits. Genetic traits evolved primarily by pressure on one sex are often present in the other (e.g., men have nipples). There are different grades of risky behavior today. At the high end of the scale would be things that can kill suddenly like race car driving and free solo climbing (, ). (If you'd like to know the source of the awesome background song of the second video linked, here it is: Radical Face's "Welcome Home".)

One interesting link between risky behavior and diet refers to the consumption of omega-6 and omega-3 fats. Risky behavior may be connected with aggressive behavior, which may in turn be encouraged by greater consumption of foods rich in omega-6 fats and avoidance of foods rich in omega-3 fats (, ). This may be behind our apparent preference for foods rich in omega-6 fats, even though tipping the balance toward more foods rich in omega-3 fats would be beneficial for survival. We would be "calmer" though - not a high priority among most men, particularly young men.

This evolved preference may also be behind the appeal of industrial foods that are very rich in omega-6 fats. These foods seem to be particularly bad for us in the long term. But when the sources of omega-6 fats are unprocessed foods, the negative effects seem to become "invisible" to statistical tests.

We share an ancestor who probably lived no more than 640 years ago

This post is a revised version of a previous post. The original post has been or will be deleted, with the comments preserved. Typically this is done with posts that attract many visits at the time they are published, and whose topics become particularly relevant or need to be re-addressed at a later date.

***

We all evolved from one single-celled organism that lived billions of years ago. I don’t see why this is so hard for some people to believe, given that all of us also developed from a single fertilized cell in just 9 months.

However, our most recent common ancestor is not that first single-celled organism, nor is it the first Homo sapiens, or even the first Cro-Magnon.

The majority of the people who read this blog probably share a common ancestor who lived no more than 640 years ago. Genealogical records often reveal interesting connections - the figure below has been cropped from a larger one from Pinterest.

You and I, whoever you are, have each two parents. Each of our parents have (or had) two parents, who themselves had two parents. And so on.

If we keep going back in time, and assume that you and I do not share a common ancestor, there will be a point where the theoretical world population would have to be impossibly large.

Assuming a new generation coming up every 20 years, and going backwards in time, we get a theoretical population chart like the one below. The theoretical population grows in an exponential, or geometric, fashion.

As we move back in time the bars go up in size. Beyond a certain point their sizes go up so fast that you have to segment the chart. Otherwise the bars on the left side of the chart disappear in comparison to the ones on the right side (as several did on the chart above). Below is the section of the chart going back to the year 1371.

The year 1371 is a mere 640 years ago. And what is the theoretical population in that year if we assume that you and I have no common ancestors? The answer is: more than 8.5 billion people. We know that is not true.

Admittedly this is a somewhat simplistic view of this phenomenon, used here primarily to make a point. For example, it is possible that a population of humans became isolated 15 thousand years ago, remained isolated to the present day, and that one of their descendants just happened to be around reading this blog today.

Perhaps the most widely cited article discussing this idea is this one by Joseph T. Chang, published in the journal Advances in Applied Probability. For a more accessible introduction to the idea, see this article by Joe Kissell.

Estimates vary based on the portion of the population considered. There are also assumptions that have to be made based on migration and mating patterns, as well as the time for each generation to emerge and the stability of that number over time.

Still, most people alive today share a common ancestor who lived a lot more recently than they think. In most cases that common ancestor probably lived less than 640 years ago.

And who was that common ancestor? That person was probably a man who, due to a high perceived social status, had many consorts, who gave birth to many children. Someone like Genghis Khan.

Bolt vs Farah at 600m. The extremes meet, who wins?

Bolt vs Farah over 600m: The extremes meet in the middle (kind of, physiologically...)

For athletics fans, the prospect of Usain Bolt vs Mo Farah over 600m offers an enthralling spectacle where the most dominant athletes at the extremes of track running test themselves with one foot in the other’s domain.  I suspect it is highly unlikely to happen, but it's a great platform for some debate around performance physiology.

Predicting the winner is a fun exercise in stats, performance analysis and physiology (performance analysis - it's not an exact science, remember!).  

The fascinating question for this one is where do the physiologies of these two “extreme” athletes cross?  Of course, bear in mind that there are athletes in the middle who would arguably beat both Farah and Bolt over 600m, and by a long way.  When David Rudisha broke the 800m WR in London last year, his 600m split time was 1:14.3, and that's about as fast as I suspect Farah or Bolt could run in a straight 600m.  

Rudisha's 1:40.91 predicts something under 1:12 for 600m (the world record is 1:12.81, and that's from Johnny Gray, who was 1.6 seconds slower than Rudisha at his best), so he would certainly win a 600m were he in it.  In fact, so would just about the entire men's 800m Olympic final field, and a good few 400m, 400m hurdlers and 1500m runners (the 800m/1500m combo guys) too - this 600m is not about finding the best athlete, but about some fun and publicity!

Physiology at the 'extremes'

Physiologically, making the prediction invites some discussion over the origin and capacity of the energy pathways used by each, and what it means for fatigue. 

It boils down to different questions for each man.  For Bolt, it’s whether he can withstand the fatigue of going three times further than his normal race distance, and how much he would need to slow down to avoid complete failure to even finish the distance?

For Farah, it’s whether his top speed is high enough to pressurize Bolt into that premature fatigue? 

A quick physiological lesson will explain:  When you see athletes tying up and slowing down dramatically at the end of a sprint race, what you are witnessing is the combination of a "failure" of energy production (the supply can't meet the demand), a build up of metabolic by-products in the muscle and the central and peripheral responses to these changes.  Nobody knows the full explanation for this, and it’s likely more complex than any current theory can explain, but the result is a reduction in muscle contractility with sub-maximal muscle recruitment.  

Studies have shown, for instance, that at the end of a 400m race, drop-jump performance declines by 39% and that muscle activation increases, which shows the cumulative effects of fatigue on muscle function - more recruitment needed for less force/power.  Other studies show that this happens despite pacing, and the presence of some muscle unit reserve, which implies that fatigue occurs partly in the brain, partly in the muscle.

The source of energy is crucial to both fatigue processes, because it affects the biochemical changes occurring in the muscle.  Bolt and Farah rely on different pathways for their energy.  Bolt has a highly developed pathway that produces the energy needed for muscle contraction very rapidly, but not for very long.  His energy comes primarily from what are known as oxygen independent (or anaerobic, though this word is avoided by many) pathways.  They are all about the speed of energy supply, and the consequence – a build up of metabolites, is an accepted downside because he doesn’t need more than 20 seconds of explosive power. 

Farah, on the other hand, can produce energy for hours, but more slowly, using primarily oxygen dependent, or aerobic pathways.  The upside is less peripheral accumulation (though glycogen depletion is, eventually, a theoretical 'limit'), the downside is the rate of supply.  This difference accounts for the clear differences in the optimal pacing strategy between short duration and long-duration events, something I summarized in this review article for BJSM.

There is always an overlap, with some contribution from both pathways, no matter the distance, but for shorter, high intensity exercise like sprinting, the oxygen-independent pathways are more heavily relied upon (in the 200m event, for instance, the split is around 70%-30% in favor of energy production without oxygen.  By 1500m, it is reversed to 30%-70%). 

So, as much as Bolt and Farah lie at the opposite ends of the performance spectrum, they are also extremes of biochemistry.  Muscle histology and function also differ – Bolt’s are more contractile, able to contract rapidly and forcefully, but they also fatigue more rapidly.  

The prediction

Over the nominated distance of 600m, Farah would be forced to find a force and speed of muscle contraction and energy production that he is unfamiliar with, while Bolt will be asking his biochemistry to withstand an accumulation of metabolites and resultant fatigue that he is also unaccustomed to.

As for a prediction, the biochemical odds are slightly tilted in Farah’s favor at 600m.  A number of people have attempted to model where the perfect distance is, and using the above-mentioned energy pathway models, have estimated that the perfect distance, with equal performances, lies somewhere between 500m and 550m.   

Those additional 50m, seemingly trivial, probably just give Farah the edge and represent 50m too far for Bolt’s physiology.  Farah’s famous finishing kick, as well as his recent 1500m performance, a European record of 3:28, have shown that he has extra-ordinary sustained speed for a distance runner, so the biochemical “jump” to a 600m may not be as large as the step up from 200m to 600m for Bolt. 

On that performance note, Farah's 600m performance is easier to predict and is more familiar to him - it's something he'd do regularly in training, whereas Bolt would very rarely approach even sub-maximal efforts for this duration.  

Performance-wise, Farah's 3:28 suggests that his 800m performance would be in the range of 1:45 to 1:46.  That would optimally be achieved with a 51-52s first lap, and a 53-54s second lap.  That in turn suggests that a very fast 400m of 49s would be possible.  Then it becomes a question of limiting the slow down, and finishing with a time around 1:14-1:15.  It's about starting fast enough to take advantage of sustainable speed and attenuated slowing down at the end.

Bolt, on the other hand, has to worry about the opposite problem - not starting too fast.  He has run 400m in under 46s almost every year since 2007, including a PB of 45.28s six years ago, and a 45.35s at the age of only 17.  So he may have the natural ability, if he judges the pace well, to edge Farah.  However, six years is a long time, and those low 45s are probably less relevant now, particularly since he has probably gained mass since 2007.  Mass hurts over longer distances, so Bolt has this to deal with as well.  If Bolt does go out in 48s, gaining an advantage of around a second over Farah, he'd need to hold on to around 27s for the final 200m, and I suspect that would be a little too much to ask.

With a month of dedicated training for the 600m distance, my money would be split.  In my opinion, it would be a coin toss - Bolt would be able to change the training enough to adapt just enough to make it incredibly close.  But, if the race were to happen straight after their specialized seasons, Farah has the edge.  I'd pick Farah by about half a second to a second.  Over 550m, maybe it comes down to the lean.  It would be a fascinating meeting of two extremes.  It would sure be fun to watch, and discuss - that happens over on Twitter and Facebook!

Ross

Could grain-fed beef liver be particularly nutritious?

There is a pervasive belief today that grain-fed beef is unhealthy, a belief that I addressed before in this blog () and that I think is exaggerated. This general belief seems to also apply to a related meat, one that is widely acknowledged as a major micronutrient “powerhouse”, namely grain-fed beef liver.

Regarding grain-fed beef liver, the idea is that cattle that are grain-fed tend to develop a mild form of fatty liver disease. This I am inclined to agree with.

However, I am not convinced that this is such a bad thing for those who eat grain-fed beef liver.

In most animals, including Homo sapiens, fatty liver disease seems to be associated with extra load being put on the liver. Possible reasons for this are accelerated growth, abnormally high levels of body fat, and ingestion of toxins beyond a certain hormetic threshold (e.g., alcohol).

In these cases, what would one expect to see as a body response? The extra load is associated with high oxidative stress and rate of metabolic work. In response, the body should shuttle more antioxidants and metabolism catalysts to the organ being overloaded. Fat-soluble vitamins can act as antioxidants and catalysts in various metabolic processes, among other important functions. They require fat to be stored, and can then be released over time, which is a major advantage over water-soluble vitamins; fat-soluble vitamins are longer-acting.

So you would expect an overloaded liver to have more fat in it, and also a greater concentration of fat-soluble vitamins. This would include vitamin A, which would give the liver an unnatural color, toward the orange-yellow range of the spectrum.

Grain-fed beef liver, like the muscle meat of grain-fed cattle, tends to have more fat than that of grass-fed animals. One function of this extra fat could be to store fat-soluble vitamins. This extra fat appears to have a higher omega-6 fat content as well. Still, beef liver is a fairly lean meat; with about 5 g of fat per 100 g of weight, and only 20 mg or so of omega-6 fat. Clearly consumption of beef liver in moderation is unlikely to lead to a significant increase in omega-6 fat content in one’s diet (). By consumption in moderation I mean approximately once a week.

The photo below, from Wikipedia, is of a dish prepared with foie gras. That is essentially the liver of a duck or goose that has been fattened through force-feeding, until the animal develops fatty liver disease. This “diseased” liver is particularly rich in fat-soluble vitamins; e.g., it is the best known source of the all-important vitamin K2.



Could the same happen, although to a lesser extent, with grain-fed beef liver? I don’t think it is unreasonable to speculate that it could.

Alan Oliveira runs 10.57s. Leg length or something else? Over to the IPC and IAAF

Alan Oliveira runs 10.57s: Is it leg length, or something else? Over to the IPC/IAAF

Hot on the heels of a 20.66s World Record for double-amputees in Lyon a week ago, Alan Oliveira of Brazil, the fastest double amputee in the world, today destroyed his own 100m World Record with a performance of 10.57s in the London Olympic stadium.

I wrote about his emergence as the heir to Oscar Pistorius last week, describing the implications of his incredible improvements in 2013.  He last week won the 100m, 200m and 400m titles in the IPC World Championships, and is now a staggering 0.44s faster than the next fastest in history at 100m (Pistorius).  The improvement has come within the last two months, because prior to that, Oliveira's best 100m time was 11.33s.

The leg length - in play, but a red herring

Of course, the current debate is all about his legs, and more specifically, their length.  That is a red herring.  While partly true, there are many reasons to suggest that what Oliveira has achieved in 2013 is not the result of excessively long legs, but some other factor, which has already been proven to exist by scientific research.  Unfortunately, the IPC seem intent on pursuing length as the critical one, with new rules controlling length to be announced soon.

It's unclear what this will mean for Oliveira in the short term, but the problem is that they won't solve the larger problem, and the next athlete to come along with once again push the sport into the same dilemma.

Let's look at the leg length issue in a bit more detail.

London 2012 flashback 

When he defeated Pistorius in the London 2012 200m final last year, the accusation made by Pistorius was that he "couldn't compete with Alan's (long) stride length".  An easy explanation to test, because all it took was counting the strides, and it turned out that Oliveira's stride was not all that long.  In fact, Pistorius took fewer strides than Oliveira, and thus had the longer stride - 92 steps vs 98 steps, for a step length of 2.2 m vs 2.0 m for Pistorius and Oliveira, respectively (remember that a stride is two steps - I counted steps, but report strides later in the discussion).  And the final 100m showed the same pattern - Pistorius' average step length was 2.3 m, compared to 2.2 m for Oliveira.

So, stride length, at least at a superficial level, is not where the advantage came from back then, and it's not the sole explanation now either.

That said, it would be incomplete and false to suggest that Oliveira's leg length should not be the subject of some scrutiny.  In the week leading up to that 200m final, Oliveira revealed in an interview that he had recently increased his blade length by 4cm, taking him from a racing height of 1.77m to 1.81m, and he was clearly relatively taller than his rivals.

To understand what all that means, let's consider how the IPC set the maximum allowable leg length for double amputees.  First of all, it's not an easy task to do - there is no such thing as a "normal height", and when someone does not have legs, then trying to be specific about how tall they would have been is a complex exercise in dealing with ranges.  That's because we don't all share the same limb proportions.

There is an average ratio of say, arms to height, and a similarly average ratio of femur length to total leg length, but these averages don't often apply to elite athletes.  One example is Michael Phelps, the world's greatest swimmer, who stands 1.93m tall and remarkably, wears the same length pants as Hicham el Guerrouj, the world record holder in the mile, who stands only 1.75m tall!

That is, a difference of 18cm in height, with the same leg length.  Such are the variations between people.  One is a swimmer, one is a runner, and they are arguably born to excel in their specific events by virtue of completely different leg to total height ratios.  For pages and pages of similarly mind-blowing stats, I would highly recommended David Epstein's book, "The Sports Gene", which is due out this week.

But for now, let's leave it at the fact that the IPC cannot simply say "You should be X cm tall based on your arm length".

Instead, what they have done is establish a maximum allowable height for each double amputee.  The image below, which was released in the aftermath of the London 2012 controversy, shows the height limits for the key players in this debate.  It invites four thoughts:

Thought # 1 - taller is not necessarily better, and that has important implications

First, notice that Oliveira is allowed race at 185.4 cm, whereas Pistorius was able to go to 193.5 cm.  Presumably, that's a limit based on arm length, modified and improved by femur length to give a total height, which is the absolute maximum for someone who has exceptionally long legs relative to their body (like el Guerrouj).  We know that in London, Oliveira was 181cm, so he was 4cm short of the limit.  He was thus perfectly legal, as I'm sure he is now.  The issue is thus not cheating, but perhaps whether the limits are 'fair'.  

To address that, it's interesting to wonder about why he would stop at 181 cm?  If you're going up from 177 cm as he did, and if longer legs mean better performances (as people somewhat simply suggest), then go to the limit of 185.4 cm. More length, more speed?

The answer to that question is that at some point, going longer becomes counter-productive.  That's because the start becomes so severely compromised (as we saw with Oliveira in London), as well as balance around the bend, that the overall performance gets slower.  Top end speed may be greater, but the net result of longer limbs is less balance and therefore slower times.  Thus, there exists a "sweet spot", an optimal length for each athlete, and that's why none of the top double amputees are competing at their maximum allowable height.  Pistorius, for instance, races at 186 cm.

Thought # 2 - athletes discover the sweet spot by testing, so everyone is "optimized"

The implication of Thought # 1 is that the elite athlete have discovered their optimal sweet spot, because if they didn't, they go maximum length to find more top end speed.  We know from the PR around Pistorius that testing on blades is extensive - he traveled to Iceland often, and representatives of these carbon fiber manufacturers visit athletes for field testing regularly.

Part of the process is discovering how far below the limit the athlete should stop.  So for instance, we should be asking how Oliveira knew to stop at 181 cm prior to London, and why Pistorius was at 186 cm in the first place when he could have gone to 193 cm?  Why not 189 cm?  They had room to play with, but decided not to use it.  The answer is that they're optimized at those 'sub-max' heights.

For Oliveira, however, that may have changed since 2012.  It's conceivable that since his breakthrough (remember that he was just 19 in London last year) he has had more time and more technological support, and thus more opportunity to work out his ideal racing height.  

One source at the IPC reported to me earlier this year that Oliveira had in fact gone shorter, and thus discovered a much faster start and bend performance, driving his times down.  Others are saying he is now even longer - perhaps right up to his 185.4 cm limit.  A curve ball in this debate is that between 19 and 20, he may have grown, and so his upper limit of 184.5 cm from London may have increased, allow him more to play with.  

His 100m performance improvements suggest shorter, because his start is so much better, unless he has improved his balance and co-ordination spectacularly in the last 12 months.  However, we don't know what height he has raced at.  The IPC will, unless they have been grossly negligent in getting the blades measured, and that is surely inconceivable given the obvious focus on them.  They'll have to consider this information as they decide what to do next.  Which leads me on to point 3...

Thought # 3 - the IPC have to change the rule, but how effective will it be, and what do they base the change on?

It's clear that if the current progression continues, the IPC and the IAAF will have to reassess the situation of double-amputees racing in the able-bodied events.  Oliveira won the 400m title at the World Champs this weekend, but with a less than stellar time.  He said after that he doesn't train for the longer distance.  With an Olympic Games coming up in his own country, and with 3 years of preparation, maturity and strength to gain, it's almost inconceivable that he won't at least attempt to run in both Olympic and Paralympic competitions, emulating Pistorius.  Perhaps he will focus on the 200m - another half a second improvement on his 20.66s WR puts him into a final there, with possibilities of a medal should three years produce similar improvements to 2013.  Given that he is only 20, and clearly still in a period of rapid improvement, such an improvement is well within the realms of possibility. 

If he does jump up to the 400m, his chances are even better - the time lost at the start can be recovered over the final 350m, and his top-end speed, which must surely be comparable to Usain Bolt's, as well as remarkable sustained speed in the second half, should see him go considerably faster still.

So, what are the IPC and IAAF to do?  Refer again to the table above, and remember that those maximum height allowances are based on data collected from hundreds if not thousands of people to establish a range of human "norms".  If the IAAF and IPC decide to change them to make Oliveira race at a shorter height, they would have to justify it by saying something along the lines of "We are now adopting mean or average height rather than allowing for extreme individuals within the normal population".  That is, they would have to pretend that extremes like Phelps or el Guerrouj don't exist, and I can't see how that is legally or scientifically defendable.  You have to allow for cases at the extreme end of "normal", which is why the answer to that apparently simple question "What is a normal height?" is so very complex.

Alternatively, they could modify the guidelines slightly, perhaps to 1SD above means, and reduce Alan Oliveira's maximum allowable height subtly.  If it meant he was forced to drop to say, 181cm, he'd be at the same height he was at in London, and that means more of the same debate and performances. 

The point is this:  Because none of the athletes are at the maximum allowable height (see Thought #2), any change in the policy will have to be drastic, or it won't affect them anyway.  And drastic changes mean re-writing the understanding of human anthropometry, possibly discriminating against individuals who are normal but 'extreme', and may thus be impossible to implement.  All in all, very sticky for the IPC.

Thought 4: Leg length possibilities for Oliveira

And then finally, as I return to where I began, this discussion of length may be something of a red herring.  Again, there is no doubt that as the legs get longer relative to total height, the person is more likely to be a successful runner.

However, Oliveira has achieved almost a second of improvement in the 100m within one year.  His 200m performance trajectory is similar.  That invites three possibilities:

1. He is still racing on the same length blades as London (height 181cm).  In this case, his improvement is solely due to training, co-ordination and normal development.  One can still say he has an advantage, but his improvement is distinct from it.
   
   
2. He has changed up, and gone to longer legs, then I find it hard to believe that 3 to 4cm (he only has this to play with, it's not as though he can race at 195cm - see table above) can contribute to that kind of performance.  This is particularly true given that any increased length must surely compromise the start and bend, and so the effect is even larger.  Simply put, it cannot be solely due to running "taller" in 2013
   
   
3. He has changed down, and found a better "sweetspot" that gives him a better start and bend performance, faster overall, with some accepted reduction in top speed.  If this is the case, and he's running at say 179cm, then it's even more of a problem for the IPC and IAAF because whatever they plan to change in their guidelines would need to be even more drastic.

What if stride length is not the factor at all?

But what if it is not in the length at all?  What if that simple exercise of counting his strides, and comparing them to Oscar Pistorius' in London 2012 actually hints at the solution?

Remember, that night, Pistorius took 49 steps on the bend and 43 steps in the home straight.  That is a step length of 2.0 and 2.3 m respectively.  Oliveira, on the other hand, had average step lengths of 1.92 m on the bend and 2.2 m on the straight.  In a race of absolute stride lengths, Oliveira is second-best.

The key, however, is the stride length relative to body height - someone who has excessively and disproportionately long legs will have a longer stride relative to their height, so you can partially test this 'accusation' by comparing stride length to total length.

So, running that logic for 2012, if Pistorius, at 186 cm, takes 230 cm steps, his step length to height ratio is 1.24.  Oliveira, at 181 cm with 220 cm steps, is at 1.22, and so in fact, Pistorius' steps are actually longer, not only in absolute terms, but also relative to his height.  This is the primary reason that I wasn't convinced that Oliveira's advantage was stride length back in 2012, and I'm not convinced now (though I will allow for the possibility that he has since increased his length - see Thought # 4).

The answer is more likely stride speed, not length. And that closes the loop

The ratio is however significant, because it says that Oliveira's advantage, which is now even greater than it was in London 2012, comes not from stride length, but the other important factor - stride speed.  It is the turnover of his limbs that separates Oliveira from the rest of the world, and which has made him a realistic medal chance in able-bodied competitions.

And why is that important?  Well, it closes the loop, bringing us full circle, because the scientific research on Oscar Pistorius showed that the advantage of double-amputee athletes, as a result of super-lightweight carbon fiber blades, is that his limb repositioning speed was "off the biological charts".  Those words were written by Prof Peter Weyand, who tested Pistorius and suggested a 10-12 seconds advantage because of limb reposition times he had never seen before, even in 100m Olympic champions.

Simply, the double-amputee was able to move his limbs so fast that he could then afford to spend more time on the ground, and generate significantly lower forces than able-bodied runners who were going the same speed as him.  The "athletic limit" to sprinting, according to Weyand, a world leader in sprint mechanics, is the ability to apply huge force to the ground.  Pistorius was able to run world class speeds without that limit existing, because his ultra-lightweight limbs allowed him be break another limit - the speed with which the legs could be moved.

Alan Oliveira has taken that to a new level.  When a man is running a 200m race and his strides are about 10% shorter than his rival's, then the only way to run faster than the rival is to have stride speeds that are 10% or more faster.  That's the Oliveira advantage - extra-ordinary speed of leg movement.  He is able to capitalize on the technology more effectively than any runner before him, and may also be able to generate force more rapidly than his predecessors.  The result is less time on the ground, less time in the air to reposition the limbs, and 20.66s and 10.57s performances.

Oliveria - validating the theory, vindicating the research, with no end in sight

Oliveira is, simply put, the validation of scientific theory, and he vindicates the predictions made about what would happen when the pool of athletes with access to carbon fiber blades expanded to include superior athletes.  This was inevitable - it's a rapidly growing sports category, and this is a great thing.  If only they'd kept them separate based on objective evidence, rather than the emotion of the Pistorius case.

Oliveira will one day be beaten by the next generation of double amputee, who will be even faster, and will then re-ignite the same debate.  The problem for the IPC and IAAF now is that they will have to reassess their guidelines in order to slow the runner down.  In other words, Oliveira is too fast, so we have to rewrite the rules.

Effectively, what they would be doing is setting a bar, at say 20.50 s for a 200m and 45 s for a 400m, and saying 'We welcome your participation, but just don't be too fast, or we'll have to change our rules to make you slower'.  It is analogous to putting weights on the bicycles of the top men of the Tour de France, to make the race more competitive, or make Djokovic and Murray play with wooden rackets to slow their dominance of tennis.

Well, the end is not in sight, because just as Pistorius was not going to be the pinnacle of athleticism on prosthetics, why should Oliveira be?  This is progress.  It's human progress.  A normal progression of ability as better athletes emerge.  The IPC and IAAF are looking at the technology, when they should be looking at how the heck they managed to duff the case against carbon fiber blades in the first place. 

Final word - a lot of the above discussion revolves around the very basic analysis of the London 2012 200m final, where I counted the strides for Pistorius and Oliveira.  What should happen is a similar discussion, in even more detail, now that Oliveira is rewriting the record books.

However, that won't happen, because the powers that be don't seem to recognize the importance of gathering the data to inform this kind of discussion.  I can appreciate that they have bigger issues, and may not have the resources to do it themselves.  Certainly, they are custodians over more than just one category and three of its events.  

However, in the build up to the Lyon IPC World Championships, I tried to approach the IPC for permission to analyse Oliveira's 100m and 200m races.  I wanted split times at 10m intervals, so that we could discover just how much time he lost at the start, when he hit top speed and how that top speed compared to Usain Bolt's (I suspect it is the same, or faster).  However, the IPC were not as enthusiastic, and so the study concept was never approved.

What a pity, because now we have to guess - we don't know his leg length, or the limit, or just how he put those world records together.  In time, maybe this debate will force those facts into the open, and that will be a good thing.  But until the evidence emerges, we talk about average stride lengths and stride speeds, which suggest that it's not solely about longer legs (as the public and even some rivals are still proclaiming), but about stride speed.

The evidence is out there, waiting to be found.  For Pistorius, the evidence was found - it showed clearly what was happening.  Why is it paid no attention?

In time, perhaps it will be.  Today, in 10.57s, Oliveira guaranteed that it would be.  There's much still to learn.

Ross