ChrisThibaudeau
08/12/04
01:56 PM
Quebec, CAN

This supposed study was quoted by Dr. Fred Hatfield numerous times but I am yet to find a true scientific reference for it. Well, to be fair it was not a study per se, but rather a generalized physical testing of the athletes of the 1968 Mexico olympics. It stood out (supposedly) that olympic lifters had the best performance of all classes of athletes (on average) on a 25 yards sprint and a vertical jump test.

Let's assume that this testing really did occur (I have no reason for doubting the honestly of Dr. Hatfield, whom I deeply respect). These results would be interesting, but consider that:


- Dr. Hatfield mention that the date was taken at the 1964 Mexico olympics, the Mexico olympics were held in 1968. Which one is it???


- In 1968 very few classes of athletes were involved in any significant strength and power training protocols outside of event-specific training and some low-intensity jump training. "Modern" plyometric work (depth jumps) was developped in the early 1960's by Verkhoshansky but was not used widely by athletes before 1968. Strength training for athletes wasn't accepted, or at least widespread in the US and was still in its infancy in Eastern block countries

- On the other hand, olympic lifters were doing a lot of cleans, snatches and squats on top of jumps and sprints. Back in the 1950-1960s olympic lifters did a lot of jumps and sprints for overall consitioning. So it's not suprising that they were good jumpers and sprinters too, plus they were generally more stronger and powerful than other classes of athletes because of their strength training.

- Some athletes were indeed involved in some basic form of strength training, but it wasn't as structured, sport-specific or advanced as what the olympic lifters were doing.

- When it comes to muscle fiber makeup and contractile capacities, olympic lifters are very similar to sprinters. Both are fast-twitch dominant.

- Understand that there were few "heavy" olympic lifters back in 1964. The heavies were 198lbs+ and, for example, at the 1964 US championships only 3 men competed in the "over 198lbs" class (Norbert Schemansky, Sid Henry and Tommy Suggs) while 44 men competed between 123lbs and 198lbs. Granted, by 1968 ore big men were competing (Zhabotinsky, Reding, Dube, etc.), but there were still much more "smaller" men competing. Now, take a 181lbs olympic lifter with little body fat, a lot of power and lower body strength, a wide experience of sprinting and jumping and of course it is quite possible that their results in tests such as the 25yards dash and vertical jump were quite high.

- Chances are that the 25yards sprint was on a FAT start, not at the sound of a gun. The researchers wanted to evaluated strictly the physical capacities of the athletes. Starting at the sound of a gun would thus taint the results as reaction time would be factored in and would obviously give a false advantage to sprinters who are trained to reac to a gun. So the clock probably started on the first movement of the athlete. 25 yards isn't very long ... we're talking around 2.8-3.2 seconds, maybe a bit more. On such distances it's quite possible that lighter olympic lifters did very well because of their high power output. But I doubt that any difference was significant.

- High jumpers use a specific technique and part of it is the transfer of horizontal velocity and momentum (provided by the initial running start_ to the actual jump. And let's not forget the Foxbury flop which is a very technical move which can significantly enhance HJ results. Basically, what high jumpers do has little to do with a regular vertical jump. On the other hand, the pulling phase and jerk drive of the olympic lifts are much more similar to a vertical jump. So better results for weightlifters in that test is nothing to be surprised about.