HOW much time is there in a second, how long is it? This sounds like an absurd question, but really it isn't.
Some athletes can squeeze more out of a second than others, not just moving faster but making time move slower. They don't look rushed, as if despite the clock showing one second left, they seem to have time to spare. This is called not just being fast but cool.
Or at least that's what I thought when I saw a clip of LeBron James, running away from the basket, catching an inbounds pass, half-turning and sinking a three-pointer that won game two for Cleveland against Orlando.
There was one challenging second left on the clock, yet LeBron was so composed under pressure that he made his darting run, change of direction and throw look unhurried.
Later, LeBron articulated this, saying: "For me, a second is a long time. For others, it’s very short."
Sport moves at stunning speed (a F1 car travelling at 250kmph can cover almost 70 metres in one second), this we know. But with the help of my niece in Melbourne (I failed maths, she didn't), I made these calculations.
In tennis, on a court 78 feet long, a receiver has .43 of a second to react to a 200 kmph serve. In cricket, a batsman has .52 of a second before a ball travelling at 140kmph covers the 22 yards to him. This is fast. But it's what players do in that fraction of time which is astonishing.
I once asked Indian tennis player Leander Paes (who was not a big server) to serve at me. I was around 30 then, and played almost every day, yet I could barely get racket on ball. Yet in less than half a second, players will respond to an Andy Roddick serve by taking a quick step, angling their body, adjusting their racket and creating a winner.
Great players do this more often and it's a combination of many things. It is reflex, it is anticipation, it is an ability (as great returners like Agassi and Hewitt had) to pick the ball early, read its direction, judge where it's going to land and react all at once. In boxing, for instance, Muhammad Ali would weave out of the way of punches that seemed a blur to viewers sitting outside the ring.
But like LeBron, great players also don't panic, nor do they hesitate. If they are composed it is because they have practiced sinking baskets, and returning serves, every day, all year, till they do it almost without thinking.
But it's even more than that. When athletes enter the zone, their mind absent of doubt, their concentration pure, everything looks clearer to them. The ball looks bigger and it moves slower. They have very little time, yet they feel they have enough time.
The Indian cricketing genius Sachin Tendulkar once spoke to me about this zone, and the idea of time, in an interview in late 2003. This is what he said:
"At times, you end up playing two balls at a time, not one. Because you're expecting an outswinger, you're ready for it, and when the ball is bowled you play the ball that you are expecting." (Then, suddenly, he realises it is not an outswinger, and then he starts reading the next ball, the real ball.)
"The first ball you have prepared for, you've kind of played it in your mind, you've figured it's not an outswinger, so (you say) let me concentrate on this ball (the real one), which has hit the seam and coming back to me. Often a fraction (of time) is wasted and that fraction is more than enough to cause damage."
"But in that zone your mind is blank, you are not expecting anything and so you have plenty of time to play it."
Perhaps LeBron was in the zone that night. Perhaps like great players he lives for this deciding moment, aware of what he has to do and that he has sufficient time to do it. That day LeBron knew exactly how long a second was. And he knew it was more than enough for him.