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Ingo Froböse: "The art lies in showing performance at the right time and not arbitrarily at any time."
July 31, 2024
Philip Reichardt
Sports scientist Ingo Froböse in an interview: He talks, among other things, about improving athletic performance, the power of the mind, and that of evolution.
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As a professor of sports science, Ingo Froböse ran the German Sport University Cologne for ten years and taught as a guest lecturer at various universities. To this day, the now 67-year-old is a member of a number of sports medical associations and committees that advocate for health through exercise.
Froböse has recently published a series of guides on fitness and health topics, most recently on the healing power of muscles ( Muscles, the Health Makers, Ullstein Verlag ). Before his career as a scientist, Ingo Froböse was a successful track and field athlete. In the early 1980s, he was one of the best sprinters in Germany, and in 1981 he became the German vice-champion over 100 meters.
Mr. Froböse, your best time over 100 meters is 10.4 seconds. Do you know how fast you are today?
No. Since I ended my career as a track athlete, I have never run against a clock again and am glad not to have to do it anymore.
With the knowledge of today, with today's training methodology: Could you have run faster back then?
I'm pretty sure about that. I had nowhere near the knowledge back then that I have today. I made big mistakes in the training process and in the area of nutrition. The topics of sports and nutrition were by far not as closely linked back then as they are today.
With 10.4 seconds, you would still be in the final of the German championships today. But that's an exception. If you take the development of world records as a benchmark, the performance capability has increased in most disciplines. Or is this impression deceptive?
No, that's correct. Although the records in athletics are more stable than in swimming, for example. We see new world records in swimming every year.
Apart from doping: What are the reasons that athletes can swim, run, or cycle faster today than 30, 40 years ago?
This starts with anthropometric changes. The volume and body size of people have increased in Germany over the last 40 years, meaning people are taller and heavier than 40 years ago. This is evident from data such as those from the Bundeswehr, and can be seen in the shoe sizes of today's 15-year-olds.
In some sports, this is an advantage, in others not. Secondly, diagnostics have developed enormously. We have significantly better ways to listen inside the body, obtain data from the body, and analyze it. This allows us to interpret the reactions of the organism much more accurately.
We were not able to do this in the past, there was only the lactate test. Diagnostics are a very important key to success. This leads to significantly more professional and differentiated training and support concepts. The training of coaches has also improved as a result.
And thirdly: We know much more about biomechanics. This means we can develop products, clothing, and techniques tailored to the individual abilities of people. Racing bikes, skis, or pole vault poles can be individualized to a high degree. This did not exist before.
Thanks to the large amounts of data now available, it is possible to search for very specific information. In addition, the importance of aspects such as sleep, nutrition, and regeneration is now recognized. This also includes planning organizational processes, support, and management of athletes. All these are sidekicks that also contribute to performance.
Which sports particularly benefit from this?
In individual sports, diagnostics are much more important than in team sports. Even though the benches in football are getting longer and coaches with very special skills are taking their places, diagnostics play a much smaller role in team sports like football than assumed.
There are 30- or 40-year-olds playing, even though their individual performance is no longer optimal. But due to other factors like technique or tactics, they can still keep up. In individual sports, however, diagnostics, personalization of training, and what is derived from the data for regeneration, sleep, or nutrition is the key to success. With precise values, a lot can be achieved.
The world record in long jump for men, 8.95 meters, has stood for 33 years now, the world record in high jump, 2.45 meters, is over thirty years old. How can this be explained?
At some point, we will see another high jumper like Javier Sotomayor who has the physical conditions to jump over 2.45 meters. We have also seen this in pole vault: After Sergey Bubka, who dominated from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s and set one record after another, there followed years of stagnation before Armand Duplantis set new world records almost in succession. As I said, people also continue to evolve. To set new world records, new exceptional athletes are needed.
What makes an exceptional athlete?
Take Usain Bolt. According to the teachings and knowledge of the time, Usain Bolt could never have existed. All mechanical calculations were against someone with such long legs running so fast.
When he was seen, it was recognized: If certain physical traits work together, then it is possible. In many disciplines, the performance of athletes – given the conditions people currently have – has been exhausted. Only a combination of special physical traits will lead athletes to break into completely new areas. We have to wait for the next step in evolution for that. But that can happen quickly.
In which disciplines do you still see potential?
Particularly in the power disciplines, where performance depends on talent and physical conditions. In running distances over 200 meters, 400 meters, or 800 meters, there is definitely still potential for improvement.
Also in the jumping sports, which include technical components, I see potential: in the long jump, for example, but especially in the high jump. This also has to do with the flooring in the stadiums. Previously, tartan was on concrete. Today, there is a vibration base underneath, which returns energy.
New technology combined with individual capabilities will lead to new peak performances. In contrast, all sports where success relies on the amount of training are relatively exhausted. For years, marathon runners have been struggling to run the 42 kilometers in under two hours. Even more training doesn't make them faster.
Do you see more potential in women than in men?
The fact that there is currently no woman in Germany who jumps over 1.90m in high jump is actually not normal. Or that in long jump most land at 6.30 m. And despite the hype around Gina Lückenkemper, I think it's fatal that with a time of 11.5 seconds you can make the German national team.
The density of performance has completely disappeared. Basically, the development potential for women is significantly greater. Some disciplines were strongly influenced by athletes from the former Eastern Bloc, who set records to unimaginable heights with the help of doping. It will take a little longer for the level to normalize in some disciplines. But then I see great potential.
There is the rule of thumb that a person reaches the peak of their physical performance at around 25 years old. Does this also apply to top athletes?
In speed-power disciplines, for sprinters and jumpers, this is true because at this age the transmission speed between nerves and muscles is highest. But in strength and endurance sports, strengths develop much later. The world records in discus or hammer throw, for example, were all set by athletes over thirty.
Apart from exceptional athletes: What distinguishes the very good from the best? Those who regularly reach the finals and those who become world champions and Olympic champions?
Mental strength makes the difference. We know that the impact of mental strength on acute performance is about three to five percent, provided it can be called upon. This is a magnitude that is difficult to calculate. This means, in turn, that mental strength is the decisive criterion for who wins and who does not.
How does mental strength manifest itself?
In optimism, in being stress-free, in confidence in one's own performance, and also in relaxed muscles.
A good example of this also seems to be the team of Bayer Leverkusen. They have scored 14 goals in stoppage time this season. Why is that?
Due to their self-understanding of never giving up, their belief in being able to score a goal in the last minute. Unlike other teams that then hope for the football god or for luck to help them, belief in oneself releases the crucial resources and makes the difference.
Andrea Petkovic, the former tennis player, wrote that the difference between good players, like she was, and those who win Grand Slam tournaments is that they regularly manage to get into a flow.
Being in the flow means believing in oneself. It only arises in competition, with oneself or with an opponent. You get into this flow when you have maximum confidence in the situation you are currently in, although you are moving in a borderline area.
That's the crucial point: a moment of danger combined with a moment of performance. Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal were not more successful than others because they have a larger repertoire of strokes. They are mentally stronger, have higher resilience, and their self-belief is more pronounced.
Performance fluctuations in top athletes, such as in football, are often explained by a lack of mentality. If a team of superior players loses to a significantly weaker team, it is often said that it lacked mentality. What does that mean from a sports science perspective?
Behind this formulation is the realization that motivation fluctuates, depending on the form of the day. This happens very often, especially in teams. Because the captain had a go at someone, because a mistake was made, because the crowd booed.
These are things that get under your skin and can lead to a slight mental loss of edge unless you have the necessary self-confidence. This would never have happened to Usain Bolt. If the crowd booed him, he would have been twice as strong.
A frequently used, popular phrase is that he or she "could not deliver their performance."
Anyone who says that is not suited for elite sport. Because that's exactly where the art lies: showing performance at the right time and not arbitrarily at any time. That's precisely what the knowledge and possibilities that coaches have at their disposal aim for, to make athletes fit at the right time so that they know they can deliver the performance. Whoever achieves this becomes an Olympic champion.
The entrepreneur Aron D'Souza plans to host so-called Enhanced Games at the end of this year, a series of competitions in which anything that enhances athletes' performance and is usually prohibited will be allowed. Can you find any merit in this idea?
No, not at all. Anyone who participates in such competitions is a bad role model. We must protect our children from that. Young people should gain lifelong enjoyment of sports. This idea completely perverts that. The medicalization of society must not continue in sports.
He has a point though: Doping is officially forbidden, but not consistently pursued and sanctioned. Wouldn't it be more honest to legalize it?
It would only be more honest if everyone had the same conditions regarding doping. But that's not the case, there are also big differences. I wouldn't legalize it just to prevent children and young people from coming into contact with this system.
Do you have a good definition that says what an allowed aid is and what is not?
Anything that is introduced from outside and interferes with and changes the body's physiology is a doping agent for me.
Are there any insights into how the performance level of amateur athletes has developed?The top amateur athletes have become very, very good, if you consider marathons or the German Cycling Cup series. The level is significantly higher than in the past. At the same time, you also see the excesses in amateur sports that are known from professional sports – in terms of doping, technology, and excessive material battles.
© Sebastian Bahr
Knows from personal experience what he is talking about. Ingo Froböse was one of the best German sprinters. Next sporting goal: 186 kilometers around Lake Garda by racing bike.
