cover image Faster, Higher, Stronger: How Sports Science Is Creating a New Generation of Superathletes—and What We Can Learn from Them

Faster, Higher, Stronger: How Sports Science Is Creating a New Generation of Superathletes—and What We Can Learn from Them

Mark McClusky. Hudson Street, $25.95 (288p) ISBN 978-1-59463-153-5

Whenever American media mentions the triumph of super athletes, it usually involves cheaters using performance enhancing drugs. However, McClusky, the editor of Wired.com, tells the other side of the story. An increasingly commercial blend of science and sports training gives the elite athlete a winning margin over other competitors. Old training regimens such as weight lifting and resistance workouts are passé and have been replaced by biomechanists, physiologists, nutritionists, strength coaches, recovery experts, and statistical analysts, leading to the creation of such superstars as LeBron James, Lindsey Vonn, Mike Trout, and Serena Williams. McClusky addresses the notion of superior genetics, pills and substances that supposedly enhance performance, the identification of potential elite athletes, and ways to tailor tools and techniques that enhance specific skills for athletic superiority. With clear-cut analysis and detail, he tackles the new innovations in sports gear such as lighter track shoes and drag-cutting swimsuits; he also discusses the scientific discoveries concerning fatigue and endurance. McCluskey’s eye-opening account of sports science shatters outmoded training myths and heralds a revolutionary new terrain, in which the combination of high-tech methods and scientific breakthroughs designed will give the sports fan something wondrous to watch. (Oct.)