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Old 5 Apr 2014, 09:15 (Ref:3388947)   #1
JasonZBell
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Are Racing Drivers Athletes? Let's Show The Proof...

For us involved in the world of motorsports, it seems ridiculous to even question whether or not a racing driver is an athlete or not. However, even some professional athletes seem to think "driving" is not a sport, ***cough*** Donovan McNabb.

During IndyCar's recent official test at Barber Motorsports Park, we were able to work with the folks at Zephyr Technology and Yellowcog to obtain real-time biometric data from driver Josef Newgarden. For the purposes of this first test, we simply monitored his heart rate and respiratory rate - both resting and while on a hot lap.

So, in an attempt to prove to any doubters that a racing driver is not an athlete, here is a one lap on-board video with Josef, which provides over lays for both his heart rate and respiratory rate at each section of the track.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMqVmilOwU4

Please feel free to share with your Followers on Twitter, Fans on Facebook, etc.

Thank you, enjoy and if you have any questions or comments, feel free to shoot them over. We are working on quite a few things with this technology and hope to have some amazing real-time data for fans watching the Indy 500.

Jason Bell
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Old 5 Apr 2014, 11:22 (Ref:3388966)   #2
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Jason,
First you have to define "athlete". For Donovan McNabb that definition includes physical contact between competitors. Others would choose the definition out of a dictionary where the word origin includes Latin and Greek. Your definition in this example is based on heart and respitory rate. I believe further explanation as to why Newgarden's heart and respitory rates are high is needed to further your argument along.

The reason for the elevated heart rate could be explained by increased levels of adrenaline which needs no exertion to happen, just being excited about being behind the wheel could explain it (don't worry I agree with you). I can tell you that Navy pilots landing on an aircraft carrier have a higher heart rate than during combat missions. The explanation for this is mostly due to the excitement factor of the activity the pilot is engage in.

So in order to better persuade your readers I would choose to dig deeper in to the why Newgarden's heart and respitory rate are higher or you risk your opponents notion that a person who experiences anxiety attacks could be considered an athlete in your definition. Lastly you also need to include what activities the driver is engaged in to better compare athletic events and thus furthering your argument along.

Keith Kimberly

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Old 8 Apr 2014, 14:50 (Ref:3390235)   #3
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To me, an athlete is a competitor in athletics (or track and field if you prefer).

What is very clear is that racing an IndyCar demands a very strong body excercise.

I remember a Racer article where they published the torque required to turn the steering wheel, which fortunately is unassisted, and the force to press the brake pedal.

I also loved some training videos by Will Power and Josef Newgarden.
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Old 8 Apr 2014, 19:32 (Ref:3390314)   #4
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International race car drivers are fitter than Joe Public but we're delusional if we believe they're comparable to those at the top of more demanding sports. I'm heavily involved in elite swimming and I can tell you no racing driver would come near the level of aerobic or anaerobic fitness of an international swimmer.

... but then why would they need to.
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Old 8 Apr 2014, 20:43 (Ref:3390337)   #5
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International race car drivers are fitter than Joe Public but we're delusional if we believe they're comparable to those at the top of more demanding sports. I'm heavily involved in elite swimming and I can tell you no racing driver would come near the level of aerobic or anaerobic fitness of an international swimmer.

... but then why would they need to.
not so sure; wasn't there a TV competition about 10 or more years ago - was it sporting superstars or summat? - and didn't a driver win it? Was it Jenson? Sorry, my memory is pretty fuzzy these days!
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Old 9 Apr 2014, 03:14 (Ref:3390395)   #6
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An Australian TV series pitted elite atheletes from a number of sports in a series of physical challenges. The racing drivers did very well in most of the challenges and only struggled in a couple of events which required brute force. Those were dominated by Rugby League and Union players.
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Old 9 Apr 2014, 08:17 (Ref:3390454)   #7
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not so sure; wasn't there a TV competition about 10 or more years ago - was it sporting superstars or summat? - and didn't a driver win it? Was it Jenson? Sorry, my memory is pretty fuzzy these days!
Do you mean Jody Scheckter winning Superstars in 1981 ? To be fair that was a different era and wasn't a pure aerobic/anerobic challenge... rather something set up for TV.

I suppose to benchmark an F1 star today against an elite athlete we could probably use Jenson Button's triathlon performances. Jenson's around the 2h15 mark while the Brownlee's are around 1h45. It's very good, but still 29% off... which is a lot when doing athlete to athlete comparison.
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Old 9 Apr 2014, 09:53 (Ref:3390471)   #8
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Do you mean Jody Scheckter winning Superstars in 1981 ? To be fair that was a different era and wasn't a pure aerobic/anerobic challenge... rather something set up for TV.

I suppose to benchmark an F1 star today against an elite athlete we could probably use Jenson Button's triathlon performances. Jenson's around the 2h15 mark while the Brownlee's are around 1h45. It's very good, but still 29% off... which is a lot when doing athlete to athlete comparison.
None of our present drivers would come close to Jody in physicality, Jody was a pretty solidly built, strong man.
Jenson would probably be able to outrun him over a marathon, but very little else I'd guess.

Be interesting to see how Jenson Mk 2014 performs after he has been starving himself!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...ight-loss.html

After the above - probably not at all athletic!

Like comparing Lindsay Vonn and Twiggy!

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Old 9 Apr 2014, 10:02 (Ref:3390473)   #9
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Todays drivers are more like jockeys.
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Old 9 Apr 2014, 10:51 (Ref:3390489)   #10
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The other thing to bear in mind is that elite athletes in other sports devote almost all of their time to training, while drivers have other commitments - commercial and otherwise that preclude them from that.

Speaking from a swimming perspective, a national elite level swimmer will be in the pool at 4:30am/5:00am for a 3 hour session and would be back in the pool around 6:00pm for another 3 hour session. In between the day is filled with cardio, aerobic and anaerobic weight work... with breaks for hydration/food only. That's 7 days a week !
Even my 10 year old is swimming eight 2 hour sessions [three of which start at 5:00am] and each of which encompasses 7,000m [that's around 300 lengths !] together with four land training sessions.

As I mentioned, there's no way an F1 driver, let alone anyone in the lower categories could come close to this level of fitness. But then why would they need to ? They're involved in a different type of competition where the extreme level of fitness of an elite athlete wouldn't make a difference. Drivers are as fit as they need to be and nothing more than that.
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Old 10 Apr 2014, 14:41 (Ref:3390803)   #11
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None of our present drivers would come close to Jody in physicality, Jody was a pretty solidly built, strong man.
Tony Kanaan?
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Old 10 Apr 2014, 15:19 (Ref:3390810)   #12
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Tony Kanaan?
... at 1.65m tall and weighing in at 66Kg ?
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Old 11 Apr 2014, 12:45 (Ref:3391063)   #13
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He doesn't look quite thin:

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