Calculating Time Lost by Bolt’s Celebration

[Ryan]

As GTF would say, seems like a bit of mental masturbation but here it is:

OSLO, Norway (AP) — A physicist has done the math and says Usain Bolt could have run the 100-meter final at the Beijing Olympics in 9.55 seconds if he had not slowed down to showboat.

“We estimate that he could have finished the race in a time between 9.55 and 9.61,” the Norwegian physicist Hans Eriksen said Friday in a telephone interview.

Bolt won the final at the Olympics last month in 9.69 seconds, shaving 0.03 seconds off the record he set in May.

Eriksen, a physicist at the Institute of Theoretical Astrophysics at the University of Oslo, said he got the idea to examine how fast Bolt could have gone after hearing his coach say that Bolt could have run 9.52 seconds.

NY Times article

[GTF]

Am I that predictable?  That is EXACTLY what I thought when I saw the subject line in the index, well except that I would sub "the epitome" for "a bit."

[Ed]

I really needed that laugh - thanks guys.