This past Friday, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruled that Oscar Pistorius, a 21-year old double amputee sprinter from South Africa, would be allowed to compete against able-bodied athletes in the Olympics.  This ruling overturned a previos decision from the International Association of Athletics Information (IAAF).

When Pistorius was 11 months old, he had both legs amputated below the knee because of a birth defect.   He's perservered through his disability to become the premier paralympic athlete in the world.  He currently holds the world records in the 100, 200, and 400 meter dashes for disabled athletes, utilizing artificial legs that are better known as "cheetah blades).  Currently, his season's best 400 time of 46.56 is just one second below the Olympic standard for the event. 

Now, it's never fun to take a position that deviates from the politically correct opinion, especially in a situation such as this, where it looks as though you're coming down against someone with a disability or handicap.  However, I'm just going to say it (and I'm not making up a position just to be controversial): this was a bad, bad decision.

The basis for the IAAF decision was a study performed by professor Peter Bruggeman from the German Sports University of Cologne (Deutsche Sporthochschule).  Since I don't read German, I can't read the study, but Runners World magazine found someone that could, and summarized the results of the study - in English.

What Prof. Bruggeman found was that the cheetah blades were energy efficient - basically, the blades provided Pistorius with a benefit that able-bodied runners did not have.  Without boring with too much detail, the basic findings were that the blades:

• reduced the amount of energy lost when both feet were on the ground in a stride.  The blades conserved over four times more energy than an able-bodied runner's legs would.
• pushed a runner forward far more than normal legs would.
• reduced a runner's oxygen consumption by as much as 25%, which is a tremendous advantage in the later stages of a race.

The CAS, however, determined that the Bruggeman study was flawed, mostly on the basis of a study performed by MIT professor Howard Herr.  Herr's study has not been made public.  The CAS arbitration board was composed of three non-scientists, which probably was not a good move given the importance of this decision.  As Technology Review noted, the issue here should not have just been Pistorius, but also the use of technological devices in sporting competition.

Look, I'm not blind to the fact that, if Pistorius is able to achieve an Olympic qualifying time in the 400, it would undoubtedly be the greatest human interest story in the history of the modern Olympics.  Hell, Bob Costas might end up having the first ever on-air orgasm on network television doing the intro to a piece about Pistorius (take a minute and let that visual marinate).  And I'm sure many are going to point to the very real disadvantages that he has being a double amputee.  But the cold hard facts are, an athlete's disadvantages shouldn't be factored into a decision like this.  Sometimes, life is just life, and it's hard to say that to someone in his situation, but it has to be done.

What the CAS has now said is that using prosthetics in competition is ok by them.  And down the road, an amputee athlete will come along better than Pistorius with an even better set of blades, and we'll have to go through this again, and eventually everything is just going to become a battle of scientists in an arbitration hearing.

Again, no one likes to be the grinch; sometimes its just got to be done.