At a meet in Massachusetts on Thursday, my initial intention was to capture some high speed track video. Particularly with races under 60 seconds. The following video snippet was basically a curiosity of sorts. How important is mass specific vertical force in endurance events? https://vimeo.com/164847421 (PW: Raiders)
From this data, it was determined that the young man from B-R had a higher run velocity in this segment of the race: 5.86 m/s to the 4th athlete shown @ 5.66. Step frequency was also higher with 3.07 to 2.86. However, as shown in the video (using a universal video scale of measurement), the latter runner had the greater step length as well as a better vertical force component relative to body weight with 1.82 to 1.70. The 5th runner was slightly better with 1.85. Though in the end, contact length (not to be confused with stride length) was better with the B-R athlete @ 1.119 (+/- 9%) than with either athlete at 1.08 and 1.01, respectively. This parameter, along with frequency, does allow for some higher performances. However, there are so many other considerations to take into account; such as aerobic metabolism, which unlike anaerobic metabolism, is a measurable indice. Good thing my MEC qualification isn't in endurance events! It turned out that this was the only high speed video captured that day. C'est la vie.