Breaking down U.S.'s 4x100 win, by the numbers
Posted: Monday, August 11, 2008 4:34 AM
To the naked eye, the finish of the greatest relay ever swum looked like a dead heat. To the electronic touch pads on the pool wall, it was an easy call: Jason Lezak touched first for the United States in the 4x100 freestyle.
The margin in time was .08 of a second. To me, it begged the question: How much was that in inches?
I figured it would be a fraction of an inch and that the French anchor, Alain Bernard, would be kicking himself forever for trimming his fingernails before the race.
I dusted off what’s left of my high-school math skills to satisfy my curiosity. I figured each swimmer’s average speed for the race in meters per second, multiplied by .08 seconds, did the metric conversion and was surprised to find that Lezak had won by a huge margin — a whole seven inches. That’s an inch longer than a dollar bill.
The actual margin might have been a tad less given that both swimmers were slowing down at the end of the race, but it remains about a half-foot.
The significance of the American win in the 4x100 was that it kept alive Michael Phelps’ quest for eight gold medals — one more than Mark Spitz won in 1972, when the competition wasn’t nearly as fierce as it is these days. But what made it an instant legend was Lezak’s anchor leg, which he swam in 46.06 seconds — the fastest 100 meters ever swum.
The numbers say the United States was a bit more than 4 feet behind the French when Cullen Jones, who swam the third leg, touched the wall and Lezak catapulted himself into his appointment with history.
It turns out that Lezak won the race right there — on the block.
Thanks to electronic timing, race stats now tell us the time gap between when one swimmer touches the wall and the next swimmer leaves the starting block for his leg of the race. Lezak had the quickest reaction time of any of the eight swimmers on the two relays, needing just .04 seconds to leave the block after Jones touched. That’s all but simultaneous.
Bernard was fast off the blocks, too, but not fast enough. His reaction time was .19 seconds. That means he gave Lezak .15 seconds before either even hit the water — that’s nearly twice the final victory margin of .08 seconds.
What made Lezak’s swim so incredible is that even with that near-perfect start, he was still slower than Bernard on the first 50-meter lap. The Frenchman did that first 50 in 21.27 seconds; the American did it in 21.5.
The 4-foot deficit had grown by a few inches when they turned for home, and Lezak made it all up plus that extra 6 or 7 inches. He did it by slowing down less than Bernard did.
The first 50 meters of a 100-meter swim are always faster than the second 50 for two reasons. The first is that the swimmers start the race in the air, which has far less resistance than water. The second is that they’re exhausted by the final 25 meters and are just trying to hang on.
Lezak swam the second 50 in 24.56 seconds, while Bernard slowed to 25.46. That’s what finished him off.
My final question was: “So, how fast were these guys going?”
The short answer: Faster than anyone has ever swum before.
The longer answer is that for the first 50 meters, Bernard averaged 5.26 mph — the fastest speed ever in a pool — and Lezak did 5.20 mph. In the second half, Lezak averaged 4.55 mph and Bernard slowed to 4.39. For the 100 meters, Lezak’s average speed was 4.85 mph.
Just for fun, I looked up how fast Mark Spitz swam when he won the 100 meters in the 1972 Munich games. His speed was a record at the time. It was 4.37 mph., .48 mph slower than Lezak.
