Are we getting faster, better, and stronger?

Most people would probably agree with the title of this blog post.  It's easy to believe that over time we have gotten faster, better, and stronger.  This may be the case but its not as easy you may think it was.  Watch this TED Talk to learn more about the advances we have made.
In this TED Talk, David Epstein starts out with explaining what the Olympic motto is.  The Olympic motto is Citius, Altius, and Fortius.  In other words, faster, higher, and stronger.  We seem to have gotten faster, higher, and stronger in the past 100 years.  Have we actually though?  What's the real reason behind it?  David Epstein poses that its not that we progressed as a human species or evolved in a hundred years, but technology has changed.  Circumstances and training have made people more effective at athletics in a hundred years.  One of the first comparisons is between marathon runners.  The marathon runner that won the Olympic marathon in 2012 finished in 2 hours and 8 minutes.  Whereas, the marathon runner that won in 1904 finished in 3 hours and 28 minutes.  That's a big difference in time.  David Epstein breaks it down to explain why there is such a gap.  They ran on different material.  The runner from 1904 ran on cinder which is ash from burnt wood.  This required his legs to use much more energy to run compared to new surfaces.  That combined with new training styles compensate for the large gap of time.  Another point that David brings up is we have a new gene pool now.  People are training to become athletes now with much better techniques and technology.

I believe in David Epstein's explanation because we have come so far when it comes to technology.  We have made our athletes better and more successful.  Whether it be with better running surfaces or more advanced swimming suits, athletics have become easier for people than it used to be.  We have better understandings of the body and training is more focused.  It may seem like we did just get faster or stronger, but we only made it this far with advancements in other areas that have given us this new edge.

I hope the video is interesting to some of you and helps explain some things.  It really opened my eyes when it compared running from a hundred years ago to today.  Hopefully you find it as interesting as I did!