Like many another track fan, Dr. R. W. Parnell, physician in charge of Oxford's student health service, has often wondered what makes one athlete better than another. The obvious generalities didn't satisfy him. Hefty, well-muscled specimens usually make better shot-putters than the long, lanky types that might be high jumpers. Good runners usually have large hearts and slow pulses. But are there certain inborn physical characteristics that make one athlete a miler and another a dash man, one athlete a champion—and another an also-ran?
Last week in Edinburgh, Dr. Parnell told the British Association for the Advancement of Science that he thought he had the answer. After testing 583 Oxford students, he had found some striking differences between athletes and nonathletes, and between athletes in different events, had reduced his findings to a mathematical formula. The formula: using the metric system, divide a man's height by the cube root of his weight; multiply the result by the diameter of his heart (measured by X ray), and multiply again by his leg length. Middle and long-distance runners ought to score over 15,500; sprinters ought to score less. The highest man scored 18,869. "I predict," announced the doctor boldly, "that this student will break the mile record at Helsinki." A good many nonscientists were ready to agree.
The high scorer: Britain's standout miler, Roger Bannister, who ran away from the best distance men in the U.S. at the Penn Relays last spring (TIME, May 7).
