The pivotal events occur in these tiny windows, testing umpires' reflexes. Now it can. Luge is one of the events for which Olympic rules now allow a victory by mere milliseconds. Canoeing and bicycling are others. Millisecond-sensitivity breeds further dependence on technology.
Swimmers clothe themselves in Teflon-coated microfibre suits.
Bicyclists ride machines whose aerodynamic properties were honed in wind tunnels. For the sake of fairness, when the world's fastest sprinters line up for the 100-metre dash, the sound of the gun comes to them electronically, to protect against millisecond differences in the time of its arrival through the open breeze. Lasers shine on their backs to provide a continuous Doppler measurement of speed, acceleration, deceleration. And the finish line is monitored by filmless, computer-enhanced, digital cameras, splitting time with a precision beyond the reach of human senses. Carl Lewis, at his peak, occasionally lost 100-metre races that he had run faster than his competitors.