Using Median Polish to Investigate the Change of Elite Swimmers' Performance 2006--2010

• Activity Number: 195
• Type: Contributed
• Date/Time: Monday, July 30, 2012 : 10:30 AM to 12:20 PM
• Sponsor: Section on Statistics in Sports
• Author(s): Hao Guo*+ and Karen Kafadar and Joel Stager
• Companies: Indiana University and Indiana University and Indiana University
• Keywords: median polish ; swimming ; fast suit ; speed

Abstract

The appearance of the fast swimming suit in 2007 and its prohibition in 2009 have been believed to impact swimmers' performance greatly. We extracted data from FINA World Swimming Rank Data which includes the top 100 swimming times for men's freestyle in 50m, 100m, 200m, 400m and 1500m events in each year from 2006 to 2010. We investigated the change of freestyle swimming performance (speed) of elite swimmers from 2006 to 2010 using median polish. The results suggest that the elite swimmers' speed increased continuously from 2006 to 2009and then dropped greatly in 2010, which accorded with the appearance and prohibition of the fast swimming suits. We propose possible designs for future studies to assess the effects of the fast swimming suits. Investigating the swimming rank data before 2006 could help us to better understand the trend of the elite swimmers' performance. Data on athletes' performance of other sports (e.g. track and field) from 2006 to 2010 would provide us evidence that whether the change of elite swimmers' performance was unique.