Why? The Science of Athletics

SOME MATHEMATICS IN ATHLETICS 255 In the foregoing connection, too, we have to consider the question of the load. If the load is so great that rapid muscular movement is impossible, or even if it is too much retarded, the result is unsatisfactory. That is why shot putting became, and remained, unpopular at our Public Schools, so long as the use of the I6 lbs., instead of the I 2 lbs . shot, as now used, was in vogue. An immature schoolboy could not move the load, represented by a I6lbs. shot, quick enough, and there was waste of energy through the muscles being maintained in a state of activity too long. On the other hand, to give a strong lad of r 7 or I8 years of age the shot used in women's competitions (weighing just under 9 lbs.) to put with would be almost as wasteful, because he would be able to make his muscle-movements so rapidly that he would really do but little work at each movement. I once carried out a discus-throwing experiment along those lines and discovered that while the subject of the experiment could throw the youth's discus, weighing 3·3 lbs., a good deal further thaB he could hurl the men's implement, weighing 4·4 lbs., his distance varied greatly, and in no case could he throw as farwith the woman's discus, weighing 2·2 lbs., as he did with the youth's implement. Unfortunately, there are no competitions in field events in which the handicapping is done by adjusting the weight of the missile, instead of allotting start by feet and inches, otherwise some interesting results would materialize through men finding the optimum weight of missile suited to their own physique. Things being as they are, all a man can do is, firstly, to build up his strength in propor– tion to the weight of the missile he will be asked to propel, and secondly, to find the best speed in the turn, glide or approach run which will allow him to apply ·his optimum delivery-speed in overcoming the resistance, outside his body, of that missile. All of which may sound rather c~mplicated, but it is surprising how quickly, through the tr1al and error of experiment, one does, in training, dis– cover these optima and best speeds.