9.77 seconds

There seems to be adrenaline with the name Powell, and Jamaicans. The world 100m record progression throws some interesting observations. 9.95seconds (1968) to 9.77seconds(2005). The progression shows a downtrend from the normal trendline (a Polynomial function is my assumption , based on some research articles). Though records are broken faster, the difference is a hundredth of a second every occassion. According to the trend line, the worldrecord today, should be 9.75seconds (a crude excel calculation). The advent of new technology helps athletes (from 1983 a record is broken every 2-3 years). But, definitely this is not the sunshine period of 100m sprint. The late 1980's and early 1990's was the era of Carl Lewis and Leroy Burrell. The fast trend started with Carl Lewis(9.92 in 1987) and by 1996, 0.10 seconds had reduced in the record books. This is the era of African athletes, and their dominance will only increase. I predict by 2010, 90 percent of the American athletics team will comprise of athletes of African origin.