Allen Gillman was good enough to send along a pdf copy of the reaction
time report. The report itself is copyrighted, but I'll copy the
abstract. That answers some questions and may increase your interest in
seeking out a copy of the June issue of Medicine & Science In Sports
and Exercise. RR
Physical Fitness and Performance
‘‘Go’’ Signal Intensity Influences the Sprint Start
ALEXANDER M. BROWN 1, ZOLTAN R. KENWELL 1, BRIAN K.V. MARAJ 1,2, and
DAVID F. COLLINS 1,2
Human Neurophysiology Laboratory, 1 Faculty of Physical Education and
Recreation, 2 Centre for Neuroscience, University of Alberta, Edmonton,
Alberta, CANADA
ABSTRACT
BROWN, A. M., Z. R. KENWELL, B. K. V. MARAJ, and D. F. COLLINS. ‘‘Go’’
Signal Intensity Influences the Sprint Start. Med. Sci. Sports Exerc.,
Vol. 40, No. 6, pp. 1142–1148, 2008.
Introduction: Loud sounds can decrease reaction time (RT) and increase
force generated during voluntary contractions. Accordingly, we
hypothesized that the loud starter’s pistol at the Olympic Games allows
runners closer to the starter to react sooner and stronger than runners
farther away. Methods: RT for the 100/110 m athletics events at the
2004 Olympics were obtained from International Association of Athletics
Federations archives and binned by lane. Additionally, 12
untrained participants and four trained sprinters performed sprint
starts from starting blocks modified to measure horizontal force. The
‘‘go’’ signal, a recorded gunshot, was randomly presented at 80–100–120
dB. Results: Runners closest to the starter at the Olympics
had significantly lower RT than those further away. Mean RT for lane 1
(160 ms) was significantly lower than for lanes 2–8 (175 +/- 5ms), and
RT for lane 2 was significantly lower than that for lane 7.
Experimentally, increasing ‘‘go’’ signal intensity from 80–100–120dB
significantly decreased RT from 138 +/- 30 to 128 +/- 25 to 120 +/- 20
ms, respectively. Peak force was not influenced by sound intensity.
However, time to peak force was significantly lower for the 120 dB
compared to the 80-dB ‘‘go’’ signal for untrained but not trained
participants. When a startle response was evoked, RT was 18 ms lower
than for starts with no startle. Startle did not alter peak force or
time to peak force. Conclusion: Graded decreases in RT may reflect a
summation-mediated reduction in audiomotor transmission time, whereas
step-like decreases associated with startle may reflect a bypassing of
specific cortical circuits. We suggest that procedures presently used
to start the Olympic sprint events afford runners closer to the starter
the advantage of hearing the ‘‘go’’
signal louder; consequently, they react sooner but not more strongly
than their competitors.
