Transcription:
By Jesse Squire @tracksuperfan · 1h
If I did my math right, those starting block speakers made a difference last night.
Without them, Lyles would have been at a disadvantage of 0.008 sec — how long the sound of the pistol takes to travel from lane 4 (Thompson) to lane 7 (Lylesh).
He won by 0.005.
[A picture showing starting blocks on the track with runners' feet in them. Behind each starter block is a purple loudspeaker connected to wires leading out of frame.]
Does this assume the speakers are in series? (If that's the right word.) Somehow I think someone's thought of that.
Nah, electricity operates at near the speed of light, so its difference even across an entire stadium is negligible.
But if it were significant, you'd want them wired in parallel with equal wire length to each speaker, even though the closer ones don't need that much wire.
You'd also want your transmitter to be physically on equal distance from the speakers. You always get a bit of current via the electromagnetic field, and it spreads throughout anything, not just wires.
Well, it also depends on whether that little current is enough to make a sound that the runner would be able to hear.