This video is one of a series of free public lectures on Maths in Sport given for Gresham College by Professor John D Barrow FRS, Director of the Millennium Mathematics Project and Gresham Professor of Geometry.
Citius, Altius, Fortius: Records, Medals and Drug Taking
We examine the striking patterns between world record performances in different sports and ask what events an ambitious nation should target as the ‘easiest’ in which to win Olympic medals. How does Olympic success correlate with a nation’s GNP? How does the location of the Olympics affect the chance of record breaking? And how can simple statistics help us understand the likelihood of winning streaks and the chance that an innocent athlete will fail a drugs test?
You can download John Barrow's PowerPoint slides for this lecture, as well as a copy of this video, or the audio file, from the Gresham College website.
