IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0003653.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

From Oxford to Hawaii Ecophysiological Barriers Limit Human Progression in Ten Sport Monuments

Author

Listed:
  • François-Denis Desgorces
  • Geoffroy Berthelot
  • Nour El Helou
  • Valérie Thibault
  • Marion Guillaume
  • Muriel Tafflet
  • Olivier Hermine
  • Jean-François Toussaint

Abstract

In order to understand the determinants and trends of human performance evolution, we analyzed ten outdoor events among the oldest and most popular in sports history. Best performances of the Oxford-Cambridge boat race (since 1836), the channel crossing in swimming (1875), the hour cycling record (1893), the Elfstedentocht speed skating race (1909), the cross country ski Vasaloppet (1922), the speed ski record (1930), the Streif down-hill in Kitzbühel (1947), the eastward and westward sailing transatlantic records (1960) and the triathlon Hawaii ironman (1978) all follow a similar evolutive pattern, best described through a piecewise exponential decaying model (r2 = 0.95±0.07). The oldest events present highest progression curvature during their early phase. Performance asymptotic limits predicted from the model may be achieved in fourty years (2049±32 y). Prolonged progression may be anticipated in disciplines which further rely on technology such as sailing and cycling. Human progression in outdoor sports tends to asymptotic limits depending on physiological and environmental parameters and may temporarily benefit from further technological progresses.

Suggested Citation

  • François-Denis Desgorces & Geoffroy Berthelot & Nour El Helou & Valérie Thibault & Marion Guillaume & Muriel Tafflet & Olivier Hermine & Jean-François Toussaint, 2008. "From Oxford to Hawaii Ecophysiological Barriers Limit Human Progression in Ten Sport Monuments," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 3(11), pages 1-6, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0003653
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0003653
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0003653
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0003653&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0003653?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0003653. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.