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My mind has been racing all day over this story:

How fast can humans run?

We know that Jamaican Usain Bolt set blistering world records of 9.69 seconds for 100 meters and 19.30 for 200 at the Olympics in Beijing this summer.

Stanford researcher Mark Denny now predicts how much faster it's possible for someone to run.

Of course, we already know that 9.69 is far from the limit for 100 meters.

How? For one thing, Bolt eased up at the end of his race.

More to the point, he already has run faster.

Take his 200 time of 19.30 and divide by 2. He covered each 100 meters in an average time of 9.65 seconds. If you clocked him at peak speed somewhere in the middle of the race, he probably rocketed a hundred in 9.5 or better.

Denny states the obvious when he says there is a limit to how fast a man can run. After all, not even light can get from here to there in no time. Bolt's nickname may be Lightning, naturally, but he's not really that fast.

What Denny adds is that he hasn't figured out what it is exactly that limits how fast a man can run.

He probably never will ... which is why I think it's nonsense to pick a specific time for 100 meters and declare that's it; there, and no faster.

Faster is always possible.

I was never any sprinter, but I can think of plenty of variables that can line up in favor of a faster time.

A quicker reaction time at the start. A better lean at the finish.

A faster running surface. A little more wind at the back, but not quite enough to nullify a time as wind-aided. Racing at higher elevation to reduce air resistance. Shoes that grip better and give more bounce. More aerodynamic clothing.

Then, when one extremely talented, superbly trained and conditioned athlete runs absolutely as fast as he possibly can, along comes another who's just a fraction better.

Or, in Bolt's case, several fractions.

I admit I didn't think I'd see the 100 record pushed down to 9.69 so soon. It took eight years to drop it from 9.79 to 9.74, an improvement of .05. Bolt cut it by an equal amount in less than one year.

But if he can run 9.69, someone else will come along who can run 9.68.

The great Jesse Owens ran a record-smashing 10.2 in 1936. Maybe by the 200th anniversary, someone will beat that by a full second. Another century or two and the 9-second barrier will be history.

Once people thought it was physically impossible to run a mile in less than 4 minutes. Roger Bannister disproved that notion in 1954. Now the record is 3:43, and the 8-minute mark long since has been broken for 2 miles!

Sure, there are limits. But you can be sure of this: You won't see a measurable athletic performance that you can say for an absolute certainty can never possibly be bettered.

Records are made to be broken.