Effect Of New False Start Rule On Start Reaction Time

Introduction
IAAF changed the false start rule from March 2003 that the
athlete is disqualified at his 2nd false start. The effects of this
change on the starting reaction time are studied here by
comparing the past three IAAF world athletic championship
games.

Methods
The analysis used start reaction times recorded of the world
athletic championship games of 1999 Seville, 2001 Edmonton
and 2003 Paris. Significant differences among the start
reaction times were compared using one-way analysis of
variance(ANOVA). In all evaluations, significant differences
were accepted at p<0.05. The square of the correlation
coefficient R2 is calculated to check its distribution.

Results
The frequency of the reaction times of the Final apparently
shows the sequentially delayed starts between the three
championship games as shown in Fig. 1. , and there were
significant differences in reaction times among 3
groups(p<0.0001). The average delay in Paris (after rule
change) is about 10 msec from that in Edmonton (before rule
change). As shown in Fig. 2, the square of the correlation
coefficient R2 is close upon 0.9 in the Paris game, independent
of the events, while it scatters in the other games. The
results
indicate the intrinsic distribution of the reaction time after the
rule change and entire decreases of the false athlete.

Conclusion
The rule change made the start reaction time delay by about 10
msec, but entirely improved the fair starting for individual
athletes.

Reference
[1] T. Nozaki, et al. (2003). Difference of start reaction time between two false start apparatuses, The Fourth
ICHPER.SD Congress proceedings march 2003 pp.246-250

NOTA: O texto com a iconografia está no anexo

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