Is it true that prosthetic limbs make you faster and if so why isnt the world record for events like the 100 meter faster than the regular?

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Is it true that prosthetic limbs make you faster and if so why isnt the world record for events like the 100 meter faster than the regular?

In: Engineering

5 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

I just want to add a warning not to conflate a prosthesis with an orthotic. The former replaces a missing limb, the later augments an existing limb. You may have seen those crazy boots that prop a runner on spring-steel leg extensions, granting a person the ability to run upwards of 25 mph with no particular athletic training. That is an orthotic.

And why there isn’t a world record, well, you’ll have to ask Guinness or other certifying bodies. This part of your question is too broad. There’s all sorts of 100m records, you just have to define this one in a way that makes sense. What kind of prosthetic or orthotic? How about one with jet engines? See the problem? How do you define and constrain record categories so that they make sense without an utter proliferation of definitions?

Anonymous 0 Comments

The technology for artificial limbs is advancing greatly. They used to say that one day prosthetics will be able to surpass human limbs is speed in the future, since there’s not much changeable about legs but there’s a lot changeable a our prostheses. We have reached that time, since runners like Oscar Pistorious have been able to surpass humans. As prostheses get better, they should be able to more reliably be faster. So just wait, faster prostheses are being developed. They might even already have some, but they’ve been disqualified from competition, like if they’re superhumanly long.

Anonymous 0 Comments

To have the 100 m record broken due to a prosthesis, you’d need to have one of the fastest men in the world (like Bolt) *also* need a very specific type of prosthetic… a pretty unlikely event.

The argument against Oscar Pistorius was that he would have been a borderline Olympian without the prosthesis, but that the ‘blade’ made him a little faster than he would have been otherwise.

Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s true for very specific types of limbs and specific types of races.

If you got whole prosthetic leg, then you can’t run at all nevermind fast.

Anonymous 0 Comments

The answer would be that the world record for the 100m dash is not the fastest time ever for the 100m.

Instead it is based on an arbitrary set of rules. In this case it is the fastest a person can run, under their own power, 100m without assistance. Which would include any prosthetics that give the person an advantage.