3, Twenty-six years ago, Schulz and Curnow investigated the age of Olympic gold medal winners in swimming, competing between 1896 and 1980 [ 1 ]. The average age in freestyle swimming was ~18 years for women and ~21 years for men [ 1 ]. This age remained stable for almost a century [ 1 ]. Nevertheless, over time humans have undergone changes in body dimensions such as body height, body mass and slenderness, and swimming performance has improved continuously across the years [ 2 4 ].
