Back when I was a young lad, I attended a private Christian school. Like most reasonable schools, there was a dress code in place. Unlike most reasonable schools, our rules were a little more strict. I’m sure there were plenty, but the only dress code rule I remember was “no short shorts”. I personally didn’t care about the rule, you certainly wouldn’t be catching me dead in shorts that even bordered on short (Jams anyone?).

But what exactly meets the criteria for too short shorts? The rule was, with your arms flat against your sides, the end of the tips of your fingers determined the minimum length that your shorts could be. I have no idea if this rule applied to all genders, but you’d definitely be at a short short disadvantage if you had unusually long arms or fingers. If you happened to be bestowed with longer legs and shorter arms, you could get away with oh so much more. Aside from the obvious inconsistencies in measurement, I’m also extremely curious how this rule applied to the school’s cross country team 🤔, for which I was not a part of back then.

Speaking of running and short shorts, I thought I’d never wear them. For many years, I wore longer shorts when I ran. I’ve never liked the way my legs look and still don’t. Revealing more than just the bottom half of my legs seemed a little more than I could bare (😏 pun most certainly intended). I recently got over my self-consciousness and purchased a few pairs of 5 inch length shorts. Besides the additional 2+ inches of blinding white emanating from my legs, I noticed that my legs felt so much more free and fast. Could I have just reached running enlightenment?

If reducing my shorts by 2 inches made a huge difference for me, what about reducing them another 2 inches by purchasing a 3 inch length short 😮? Aside from knowing that I’d be delivering a glorious 4 inches of blinding white light to all passersby, I’m not sure what kind of difference 3 inch shorts would make for me. I have not yet brought myself to relinquish precious cash for even less fabric on my body. Maybe I’ll get there, but for now I can only imagine and imagining conjures up visions that I’m not sure I want to envision.

But envision I must, with a single word, Greece, the ancestors of athletic pursuits. History tells us that runners, thousands of years ago, were experimenting with the “how short is too short” question. It seems to be common knowledge that naked running existed, but apparently before naked running, there was loin-cloth running. In the world of loin-cloth running, it seems that a clever fellow felt his loin-cloth was holding him back, and he won a race by stripping down to his birthday suit. As is common with many fads, athletes in Greece didn’t want to be left out, so they quickly started ditching their loin-cloths to keep up with their fellow runner’s loin-clothless competitive advantage. But, as with all fads, someone decided that running naked wasn’t as competitively advantageous as it might seem and the fad faded.

What I’m trying to say is that there is a limit to how short a short short can be before those short shorts are too short. Put another way, the law of diminishing returns seem to apply to the length of shorts. Somewhere between 5 inches and nothing at all lies the sweet spot. I’m just not sure I am brave enough to find out, with empirical evidence, where that sweet spot is. For now I’ll enjoy my 5 inch competitive advantage.