A recent poster wondered whether the fact that heartbeats occur approximately once a second might have been the reason this particular time interval was adopted. Whatever its origin, no one can deny that we runners are slaves to the almighty second and its cursed offspring, the minute and hour. How many of us have known the frustration of being unable to break through some natural time "barrier"? (The 3:00 marathon, the 5:00 mile, the 40 minute 10k, ...) The heartbeat connection got me thinking: why not do away with seconds altogether and measure running performance in heartbeats? At the least, this would open up a whole new playground for those of us who revel in record keeping. What is the "world record" for the fewest heartbeats needed to finish a marathon, for example? I envision entire races, or divisions thereof, scored by having the competitors wear HRMs modified to count beats and radio the data automatically to some central recording device. (Surely the technology for this is nearly upon us.) Since heart rates decline with age, age grading in such events would be implicit. It is also amusing to speculate on matters of strategy and etiquette. Rather than bursting from the starting line in a heart-pounding sprint, might it not be better to shuffle along in a Zen-like state, perhaps intoning some mantra to keep the level of excitement to a minimum? Headsets playing soothing music -- would they be allowed? Would it be permissible for some cad, unable to control his own heartrate, to recite bawdy stories whose only purpose to torpedo the efforts of those within earshot? -- ************************************************************************ Terry R. McConnell Mathematics/304B Carnegie/Syracuse, N.Y. 13244-1150 trmcconn@syr.edu http://barnyard.syr.edu/~tmc Question Authority? ************************************************************************