A friend of mine, who is an avid track, fan casually said that he thinks the whole bit about off years - no WC or Olympics - producing the fastest times is baloney.
So, I stripped the dates from the 100 fastest all time performances for multiple running events (see below). The source I where I found these dates is
http://www.apulanta.fi/matti/yu/alltime/
.
Next, I wrote a program that determined whether the date of performance fell in an off year, i.e. 2014, 2010, 2006, and so on.
I summed the total number that occurred in an off year which you'll find below. What would be more interesting is whether this signifies anything significant which I'll leave to you guys...
Men's:
100m - 27
200m - 19
400m - 20
800m - 26
1500m - 34
Mile - 24
3000m - 32
3000m SC -12
5000m - 30
10000m -24
Women's:
800m - 19
1500m - 29
Mile - 31
3000m - 34
3000m SC - 30
5000m - 21
10000m -17
If you check the data and find that it is not correct please let me know.