According to the article on the IAAF site, Gardener ran 6.51 today with a .409 reaction time. If that number is correct he is ready to run 6.30! Hard to believe though. Did anyone see the race? I’m seeing in other forums that he indeed had a horrible reaction. It’s just hard to believe such numbers.
Gardener tunes up nicely for Karlsruhe
Another high-level athlete in national colours today was Britain’s Jason Gardener, who used a 6.51 performance today in the Men’s 60 Metres - a time only he has surpassed this season - as a warmup for his showdown in Karlsruhe tomorrow against the world’s second fastest man, Konstantin Rurak of Ukraine.
Despite a rather sluggish reaction time (0.409), Gardener could have fooled everyone into thinking the start was fabulous, based on his lead after twenty metres. Following him into the tape was another of this season’s top sprinters, Simone Collio of Italy (6.63), with Lukasz Chyla of Poland third (6.65).
I have the race on video, and there doesn’t seem to be anything unusual about the start. There was however complaints about the gun not sounding loud enough.
In slow-motion (at least) it is obvious that Gardener slows long before the line.
Make the .409 reaction time .199, that’s .21 less. Anyway, this is all probably fantasy. But it does seem like he’ll be running around 6.40 by Budapest.
I agree with a possible 6.40, he’s doing incredibly well this year, the equipment at that meet was obviously flawed as on runner had a registered reaction time of.508! That’s just not possible unless he literally fell asleep in the blocks. Check out the results w/reaction:
2nd European Indoor Cup 2004, Leipzig / GER
Results - 60m Men
World indoor record 6.39 GREENE Maurice USA Madrid 03.02.1998
European indoor record 6.46 GARDENER Jason GBR Maebashi 07.03.1999
Rank Athlete Nat Result React.time
1 GARDENER, Jason GBR 6.51 0.409
2 COLLIO, Simone ITA 6.63 0.172
3 CHYLA, Lukasz POL 6.65 0.178
4 KOSENKOW, Alexander GER 6.68 0.392
5 POGNON, Ronald FRA 6.71 0.475
6 SMIRNOV, Aleksandr RUS 6.74 0.508
7 LÖVGREN, Patrik SWE 6.78 0.456
8 HEISEN, Maarten NED 6.83 0.184