De Konig, J. J., Seiler, S., & Foster, C. (2005). Projected sprint performances are biologically unreasonable. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 37(5), Supplement abstract 2105.

This paper was a reaction to an article in Nature (431, September 2004) that predicted women's 100 m times in Olympic Games would pass men's in the middle of the 22nd century with a time of 8.09 s. That prediction was based on the trends of current and past times. These authors constructed a simulation model including expressions for power production and losses (anaerobic work, overcoming friction, acceleration and deceleration of body segments, etc.).

The relation between 100 m sprint time and power output is not linear. Women would need to double their power output to run 8.08 s while men would have to increase theirs by >50%. The increase in active muscle mass in both genders of that magnitude to produce that power is not feasible.

Implication. The prediction of women's 100 m times being better than male 100 m times is in error because of the assumptions in the original article.

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