This page was originally added to just contain the remarks on Noah Lyles. Chances are that it will grow at some point in the future—to incorporate past writings on Wordpress, if nothing else.
As an executive summary, however: There are risk groups that include the very old and those already of weak health. In these risk groups, COVID can be a real danger; outside them, problems are quite rare. For children and teenagers, COVID is exceptionally unlikely to be a problem (outside, again, those of already weak health). (Note the difference to what many panic-mongers have claimed—and continued to claim, even once data to the contrary became overwhelming.)
As a general caveat: Different strains can have different characteristics. While no strain known to me, as of 2024-08-09, has been very dangerous outside of risk groups, I make no guarantee that top-level athletic accomplishments (as below) would be possible with all strains—but the same applies to many other non-critical illnesses.
(Moreover, I do not endorse intense physical activity when ill. That the illness, per se, is no major issue does not rule out the combination of exertion and illness is.)
On 2024-08-08, Noah Lyles won an Olympic bronze in the 200 meters with a time of 19.70 seconds—a time that would have outright won most Olympics. After the race, it was revealed that he had COVID.
Moreover, since he had (so news sources) been diagnosed two days earlier, he is bound to have already had COVID for his 2024-08-07 20.08s semi-final. He might also have had it for his 2024-08-05 20.19s heat.
How much he lost relative his normal standard is hard to tell, but I note that he came in third (same place) with a time of 19.74s (slightly slower!) and trailing the winner by 0.12s (0.24s, this time) last time, for the 2020/2021 Olympics. He has improved since then, which would have made a better time likely, but even to his personal best (19.31), we only have a drop of 0.39s. To his best-of-the-year, 19.53s, the drop is 0.17s. To his winning time at last year’s world championships, 19.52, the drop is 0.18s.
Now, if we were to discuss e.g. whether COVID cost him a gold medal, these numbers are large enough that the answer might well be “yes”, but even here there is no guarantee, as the winning 19.46s (Letsile Tebogo) was truly good. The actual question is how dangerous COVID is—and an illness that cuts so little of a performance on such a high level is highly unlikely to be dangerous.
To boot, according to some claim, he lost around a tenth of a second through a slow reaction at the start. If correct, this might still have been COVID-related, but it would reduce the loss during the period of actual physical exertion further, which is the more interesting in this context.
For sources, I draw on a hodgepodge of Wikipedia pages. As a general caveat, comparisons between different races, with different tracks, weather conditions, and whatnots, must always be taken with a grain of salt.
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