HAS THE HUMAN RACE PEAKED?

Fewer world records likely to fall: study

Olympic athletes compete under the motto “Faster, Higher, Stronger,” but a new study examining athletic performance, height and life expectancy during the past 120 years concludes the motto has become a pipe dream.

The human race has peaked, and the days of regularly smashed world records have ended, the researchers say; a more reasonable, if less inspiring, goal for 21st century athletes would be “No Slower, No Lower, No Weaker.”

The research team from France used historical records to conclude that humans appear to have reached maximum biological limits for height, age and physical ability.

“These traits no longer increase, despite further continuous nutritional, medical, and scientific progress,” co-author Jean-François Toussaint of Paris Descartes University said in a news release. “This suggests that modern societies have allowed our species to reach its limits. We are the first generation to become aware of this.”

The study, published this week in the journal Frontiers in Physiology, documents the remarkable advances made by Olympic athletes in a variety of sports. In running, swimming, jumping, cycling, weightlifting, skiing and skating, top performances “considerably progressed, until the end of the 20th century,” the authors write.

But more recent data suggest “a trend toward a plateau during the last three decades for both sexes,” they say. They predict that increasingly fewer world records will be broken in the coming years.

In order to create the impression of progress craved by humans, they say, event organizers may need to create new categories of records or change event rules, as was done in Italy last May in an unsuccessful attempt to break the two-hour marathon barrier.

The paper suggests the plateau may have been reached earlier than thought, but doping and technological improvements allowed artificial improvement.

Over the course of the 20th century, life expectancy at birth increased by roughly 30 years in the majority of high-income countries, mostly because of reduced child mortality through nutrition, hygiene, vaccination, and other medical improvements.

The authors suggest that the main medical improvements capable of extending life expectancy have been achieved, and predictions of some scientists that it will continue to increase are unfounded.

They note that the oldest human ever recorded was Jeanne Calment of France, who died at 122 in 1997. Since then, nobody has lived beyond 120 years.

“Raising false hopes without taking into account that human beings are already extremely ‘optimized’ for lifespan seems inappropriate,” the authors write.

Rather than striving to live longer and run faster, the human race may have to shift efforts to maintaining current levels — treading water rather than breaking a new freestyle record.

“The utmost challenge is now to maintain theses indices at high levels,” the authors write.

They say climate change could be a factor in limiting both athletic performances and human health. Already, some African countries have seen average height decline over the last decade, suggesting they are unable to sufficiently nourish their children.

“The current declines in human capacities we can see today are a sign that environmental changes, including climate, are already contributing to the increasing constraints we now have to consider,” Toussaint said.

RAISING FALSE HOPES (AMID AN ALREADY OPTIMIZED LIFE SPAN) SEEMS INAPPROPRIATE.