Did Usain Bolt really run a 4.22 40-yard dash at the Super Bowl?? It wasn't anywhere close to that on my stopwatch

A few points:

First again correcting initial quick video post above, its 4s+22/30 frames/sec =4.73 (not 4.22)

This starts after his hand is off ground, and ends before he has stepped down across line.

At 4.22 (4 + 7/30) he is a distant 2+ "bolt" strides from the line (just past lights on turf).

4.73-4.22 = 0.51s

(4.73-4.22)/4.22 = 12.1%

12.1% is a big difference -- while frames can get dropped in video, 1 in 10 seems like quite a lot of 1 way error to accumulate. Getting 4x1 splits with this approach I've seen a missing 0.1 or 0.2s out of 45s, not 4s (albeit without youtube and twitter in the loop in between).

There are no two frames without Bolt having moved between them, so it is not a matter of duplicated frames.

This is probably not a conspiracy, but someone very slow in reacting to seeing him fully up and in motion.

I don't know what you're trying to do but I just timed his 40 like 25 times & never got a time higher than 4.30... So I know you definitely don't know what you're talking about & I call bullshit on you buddy...

lol track people and their zapruder film arguments. HE RAN 4.22. Stop ruining it.

Amateur scientist wrote:

rojo, do you really not understand the theory (Einstein) of relativity?

First, everything is local to a reference frame. Light (signals) don't travel instantaneously. This is the theory of special relativity.

But there's also the theory of general relativity and gravitational time dilation. So just because you time it at 4.75s on your YouTube video, doesn't mean it wasn't 4.22s where the boots were on the ground. You are assuming your local coordinates (and timing mechanism) would transpose to Atlanta.

The higher the gravitational potential (the farther the clock is from the source of gravitation), the faster time passes. Clocks close to massive bodies run more slowly.

Clearly, Atlanta had many more people there (creating mass) than your video replay. So how can you be surprised that their clocks were slower?

^ Science Troll ... none of this is remotely relevant

new here wrote:

ok, i'm new here but are you saying you don't think Bolt could run a 40 yard dash that fast?

isn't bolt like the fastest man in the world and wouldn't we expect bolt to be faster than the fastest NFL player?

i could agree with your premise that he didn't want to break the record so everyone wins and they might have adjusted his time (speed of video) so he exactly hits that time.

i would assume though bolt is faster than a football player, even a fast one.

thanks

I agree. You are new here.

amateurish set-up wrote:

How can you complain about the timing (from video), when the distance wasn't certified either?

Maybe both were wrong...

Agree. That may not be 40 yards.

Here's my analysis looking at the video frame by frame:

0.00 - first movement, like at all

0.20 - right hand leaves ground

0.50 - right/rear foot leaves ground

0.78 - body appears to be 'upright'

0.82 - first forward step

4.90 - body may have or is about to break finish plane, assuming the finish is aligned with the white line on the turf

4.94 - foot is on the ground past the line and body has certainly broken the finish plane

This website has some great statistics on the human visual reaction time:

https://www.humanbenchmark.com/tests/reactiontime/statistics

So subtracting off the mean reaction time of 0.28 seconds leaves 4.62 seconds. However looking at the distribution of reaction times, its not uncommon to see slower reaction times around 0.4 seconds.

The other unknown is when the timer actually determined first movement. The first movement I tagged in the video would've been much harder for a timer to react to vs Usain lifting his hand or lifting his foot. Assuming the average reaction time of 0.28 with a net time of 4.62, a clock time of 4.22 would mean the timer began reacting around 0.4 which seems reasonable based on Usain's movement at that time.

tldr:

Did Usain run 40yd in 4.22sec? No.

However given the human reaction delay and what defines 'movement' it is entirely possible he was properly timed running a 4.22.

Moral? Football 40yd times are ineffective and irrelevant.

Trying to assert that this was some form of conspiracy with a rigged clock is asinine. Imagine he slipped or fell and the clock still magically stopped at 4.22. Oops everyone just saw the NFL's attempt at deception. The minor reward is not worth the effort or risk of being exposed.

Thanks

You make me laugh with these videos of conspiracy.

NSP wrote:

A few points:

First again correcting initial quick video post above, its 4s+22/30 frames/sec =4.73 (not 4.22)

This starts after his hand is off ground, and ends before he has stepped down across line.

At 4.22 (4 + 7/30) he is a distant 2+ "bolt" strides from the line (just past lights on turf).

4.73-4.22 = 0.51s

(4.73-4.22)/4.22 = 12.1%

12.1% is a big difference -- while frames can get dropped in video, 1 in 10 seems like quite a lot of 1 way error to accumulate. Getting 4x1 splits with this approach I've seen a missing 0.1 or 0.2s out of 45s, not 4s (albeit without youtube and twitter in the loop in between).

There are no two frames without Bolt having moved between them, so it is not a matter of duplicated frames.

This is probably not a conspiracy, but someone very slow in reacting to seeing him fully up and in motion.

Here is a time stamped video at 10% speed. Again note the count is in 1/30ths not 1/100ths.

Star wrote:

Thanks

You make me laugh with these videos of conspiracy.

I just saw it too for first time. I don't think he ran 4.22, but don't think it's a conspiracy. Or I should say there is no proof of a conspiracy but people love conspiracy theories.

The video is 30fps h.264. It's bad quality as there are three duplicate frames when he crosses the line. So it's impossible to be accurate to within +/- 1 frame.

The last frame where he is still (no counting where he twitches a few frames earlier) before starting running is frame 17 of the first second. He crosses the finish on either frame 18 or 19 of the fifth second, neither of which was recorded accurately by the crappy camera.

That's, at best, 4 + 21/30 = 4.7.

wejo wrote:

I don't think he ran 4.22, but don't think it's a conspiracy.

Huh? Please explain... either he did run 4.22 or it's a hoax, I don't see what your alternative explanation is

Nice, I think a split screen video of this plus someone running an actual 40 at the NFL combine would be convincing proof

It feel like rojos timing is off in this video tho. Someone should use editing software to check fr tho.

Rojo's dream is to be the Alex Jones of running. Pathetic.

NSP do John Ross please

Trying to time a guy on a computer screen with an old stopwatch ??! Haha

I don't know what to think but thanks for posting this. Interesting...more interesting anyway than the work I have to do this morning.

Seriously. Look at the video where you can see the clock above the finish line.

It doesn't make sense how it's changing over. It appears to be clicking at regular intervals at first, but as Bolt gets closer to the end it seems to speed up.

I could see the clock being rigged somehow to stop at 4.22 as he approaches. As far as a publicity stunt, they definitely got their money's worth even if they spend $10,000+ to have some small tech firm rig up the software.

I was initially skeptical, rojo, but after watching that "official" clock on the video over and over, and not being able to replicate the hand time either, I think I'm convinced.

It was a stunt.