《经济学人》双语：有助于打破奥运记录的体育器材存在吗？
文/Irene-自由英语之路
【本篇内容简述】
【Para1】引入：跳台运动鞋，粗脚跟运动鞋在体育运动在流行起来，批评者将其形容为“技术兴奋剂”。
【Para2】生物力学专家的观察：跑鞋制造商长期以来一直在努力研究如何提高运动成绩。
【Para3】破纪录例子：6月两名选手先后破了女子10000米比赛记录。2019年，一名肯尼亚人在非官方的项目破了马拉松记录。另一位肯尼亚选手打破了16年来的女子马拉松纪录。
【Para4】鞋是如何起作用的：通过缓冲跑步者的骨骼、肌肉和韧带，使其免受反复冲击，训练强度高。
【Para5&6】评论与总结：这对耐克等运动鞋制造商来说是好消息，但是不同的运动项目对技术援助的容忍度不同。2020年1月国际运动协会制定了新规则。最后一句话，冲刺阶段也可能会出现烟火。
阅读指南：边听边阅读
标题：
Sports equipment
Getting a leg up
New running shoes could help smash a string of Olympic records
体育器材
助力
新的跑鞋有助于打破一连串奥运会记录
原文日期：2021年7月17日
Paragraph 1：
Platform shoes are back in fashion, at least in athletics. Many of the long-distance runners at the Tokyo Olympics, which begin on July 23rd, will arrive at the starting line sporting footwear with a distinctive chunky-looking heel.
跳台鞋又流行起来了，至少在田径运动中流行起来了。7月23日开幕的东京奥运会上，许多长跑选手将穿上一种独特的粗脚跟运动鞋出现在起跑线上。
It will be more than just a fashion statement. The new shoes offer such a big performance advantage that critics have described them as “technological doping”.
这不仅仅是时尚。这种新鞋的性能优势如此之大，以至于批评者将其形容为“技术兴奋剂”。
Paragraph 2:
Running-shoe makers have long tried to boost athletic performance, observes GeoffBurns, a biomechanics expert at the University of Michigan.
密歇根大学生物力学专家Geoff Burns观察到，跑鞋制造商长期以来一直在努力研究如何提高运动成绩。
In olden days, a 1% improvement in “running economy”—the energy taken to travel a given distance—would have impressed. But in 2016 Nike released the first version of its “Vaporfly” model, which improved running economy by 4%.
在过去，“跑步经济性”提高1%——行驶一定距离所消耗的能量——会给人留下深刻印象。但2016年，耐克发布了其“Vaporfly蒸汽”型的第一个版本，它将跑步经济性提高了4%。
Paragraph 3:
If that percentage were to translate directly into performance, it would knock about five minutes off an elite male’s marathon time. In practice, as DrBurns observes, it wouldn’t quite do that.
如果这一比例直接转化为表现，一名优秀男子的马拉松时间将减少5分钟左右。实际上，正如伯恩斯博士所观察到的，这并不是很好的。
A marathon improvement of around 90 seconds would be a more realistic expectation. But Vaporfly and its successors have helped athletes smash a string of records.
马拉松比赛90秒左右的进步将是一个更现实的期望。但Vaporfly及其后续产品帮助运动员打破了一系列纪录。
On June 6th Sifan Hassan, a Dutch runner, completed a women’s 10,000 metres race in 29 minutes and 6.82 seconds, beating a record set in 2016. Two days later she was overtaken by Letesenbet Gidey, an Ethiopian, who clocked 29 minutes and 1.03 seconds.
6月6日，荷兰选手西凡·哈桑以29分6秒82的成绩完成了女子10000米比赛，打破了2016年创下的纪录。两天后，她被埃塞俄比亚选手莱特森贝特·吉迪以29分1秒03的成绩超越。
In 2019 Eliod Kipchoge, a Kenyan, became the first to run, albeit in an unofficial event, a marathon’s distance of 42.195km in under two hours. The same weekend Brigid Kosgei, another Kenyan, broke a women’s marathon record that had stood for 16 years.
2019年，尽管是在一个非官方的项目中，肯尼亚人Eliod Kipchoge成为第一个在不到两小时的时间里跑了42.195公里的马拉松的人。同一个周末，另一位肯尼亚选手Brigid Kosgei打破了16年来的女子马拉松纪录。
Paragraph 4:
Scientists are still puzzling over exactly how the shoes work. The soles are made of a new type of foam that offers an unprecedented mix of resilience and squidginess, according to Dr Burns.
科学家们仍然对这种鞋到底是如何起作用的感到困惑。据伯恩斯博士介绍，这种鞋底由一种新型泡沫材料制成，具有前所未有的弹性和柔韧性。
This returns around 80% of the energy from each strike of a runner’s foot. The carbon-fibre plate may help by stiffening the midsole, and possibly by altering a runner’s gait.
这将从跑步者的脚的每次撞击中返回大约80%的能量。碳纤维板可能有助于加强中底，并可能通过改变跑步者的步态。
By cushioning a runner’s bones, muscles and ligaments from repetitive impacts, the shoes may even help athletes train harder than they otherwise could.
通过缓冲跑步者的骨骼、肌肉和韧带，使其免受反复冲击，相比其他训练方式，这种鞋甚至可以帮助运动员更高强度地训练。
Paragraph 5:
All that is great news for Nike, which sells the Vaporfly and its successors for around $250 each. (Rival manufacturers now offer similar shoes of their own.) Whether it is good for the sport is another question.
所有这些对耐克来说都是好消息，它的Vaporfly及其后续产品售价约为250美元(竞争对手的生产商现在也提供类似的鞋子。）这是否有利于这项运动是另一个问题。
Different sports have different tolerances for technological assistance. Running tends towards the conservative end of the spectrum.
不同的运动项目对技术援助的容忍度不同。跑步倾向于保守的一端。
Paragraph 6:
In January 2020 World Athletics, the governing body of international athletics, passed new rules limiting the thickness of a road shoe’s sole to 40mm.
2020年1月，国际田径运动的管理机构世界田径协会通过了新的规定，将公路鞋的鞋底厚度限制在40毫米。
Meanwhile, Nike appears to have shelvedplans to deploy high tech shoes designed for sprinters at the Tokyo games, possibly because they did not comply with regulations either.
与此同时，耐克似乎搁置了在东京奥运会上为短跑运动员设计高科技鞋的计划，可能是因为它们也不符合规定。
But if they, or a rival manufacturer, have worked out a way around that problem, there could be fireworks in the sprints, too.
但如果他们或其竞争对手已经找到了解决问题的方法，那么在冲刺阶段也可能会出现烟火。
【重点词汇】（12个）
doping/dp/
n. 兴奋剂；掺杂(质)；上涂料
squidgy /skwdi/soft and wet, and easily squashed.
adj. 松软湿润的
gait/ɡet/a way of walking.
n. 步法，步态
ligament/lɡmnt/a strong band of tissue in the body that connects bones and supports organs and keeps them in position.
n. 韧带；纽带，系带
spectrum/spektrm/a complete or wide range of related qualities, ideas, etc.
n. 范围；各层次；光谱
shelve/elv/to decide not to continue with a plan, either for a short time or permanently.
v. 将（书等）放置在架子上；搁置，停止
汇总本文表示“破纪录”的词汇词组：
smash a string of records
beat a record
overtake
clock
become the first
break a record
【重点句子】（2个）
They have helped athletes smash a string of records.
这些鞋子帮助运动员打破了一系列纪录。
She broke a women’s marathon record that had stood for 16 years.
她打破了16年来的女子马拉松纪录。
【重点词根】（1+4个）
spectrum=spectr+um
词根spectr- 源自拉丁语 specere "to look, to see"= look, see, 表示“看”，引申为“光谱”，如：
aspect [spekt] n. 外观, 方面, 面貌, 方向
circumspect[skmspekt] adj.细心的, 慎重的
spectacle[spektkl] n. 引人羡慕的东西, 奇观景象
spectrohelioscope [spktrhilskp] n. 太阳单色光观测镜
【本篇读后感】
文章最后一句话，冲刺阶段也可能会出现烟火。一语双关，一方面是指运动鞋制造商之间的竞争可能更加激烈，另一方面指运动员有运动鞋的帮助，在比赛冲刺阶段犹如神助攻，速度飞快。
有科技助力，运动员肯定会毫不犹豫去买这些运动装备的。就类似如果有一块储存所有世间知识的科技芯片，考生一定会去购买的，这种芯片在考试前一定很畅销。
好逸恶劳，趋利避害是人性，也是人性的弱点。
