01.23.10
new study - how fast can we go?
Human running speeds top out near 28 mph, if the record-breaking feats of Jamaican speed demon Usain Bolt prove anything. But scientists say that the biological limits of human running could theoretically reach 35 or even 40 mph — assuming that human muscle fibers could contract faster and allow people to pick up their pace.
The new study titled “The biological limits to running speed are imposed from the ground up” appears in the Journal of Applied Physiology. It involves testing runners on a treadmill at top speed while they run forward and backward and hop on one leg.
This provides a new twist on the old school of thought that speed limits depended on how much force a runner could exert against the ground. Past studies showed that sprinters can apply up to 1,000 pounds of force with a single limb during each sprinting step, and so researchers thought that humans simply could not push beyond that point.