Our Sports Engineers will be on hand to answer your questions

The Beautiful Games exhibition (which is also a Centre for Sports Engineering Research project) contains a box for visitors to post their questions to us. These questions will be collected and answered on these pages. Unfortunately we won’t be able to respond to every single question, but we’ll do our best to find themes and ‘hot topics’ as the subject of some interesting articles.

For the project we’ll be recruiting our best young and enthusiastic researchers to answer your questions and there should be two new articles every week (at least). We’re looking forward to hearing some really interesting questions, I hope you enjoy reading our answers.

Simon Choppin

Moffett Field and NASA Ames Research Centre.  The wind tunnel inlet is clearly seen towards the bottom of the picture.  Hanger One is towards the top of the picture.

Flying inside a wind tunnel

One minute I was marvelling at a wind tunnel so big you can see it by eye from 15 miles away and the next, the family had dragged me away to fly in one.  You might have seen them from the motorway: there is a fashion for indoor skydiving where you fly inside a vertical windtunnel tube around 4 m across and 20m high.  It is driven by four 80 kW motors and the upwards force of the 160 mph wind on your body cancels out your body weight so that you hover in a similar fashion to free-falling at terminal velocity (i.e. at 160 mph) from a plane.  Subtle adjustments to your hands and feet cause you to rotate or even tumble.

The instructor inside the working section, Brandon, and his pal outside in the control booth skillfully controlled the power of the loud fans to shoot you high into the vertical tube and then let you drop gently back down onto the floor of the safety cage.   I noticed that the larger ones amongst us needed the fans on high and Brandon was pretty relaxed, letting us control our own ‘flight’.  The kids, however, were gripped tightly as they almost rattled from side to side. The instructor showed off at the end doing fantastical loop-the-loops in the tight confines of the tube.

The sportsman in me thought, why isn’t this in the Olympics? And then the science geek in me thought – what’s the physics of this?  And what are the key influencing factors for a good performance?

The physics of indoor skydiving

If you are floating stationary so that the upward wind force and your downwards weight cancel out then the forces are in equilibrium.  The ratio of these two forces reduce to cross-sectional-area/mass (see equations at end) and gives a merit index of how well you will float for a given wind speed; a high number means that it is easy for you to float and only a low wind speed is needed and vica versa.  Working out your cross-sectional area is not the easiest thing to do but one way to guess if you know your height and weight is to use an equation create by Bassett et al. (1999) for cyclists (see equations and reference at end).  In fact, I am beginning to think that there is only one or two equations in sport of which the one for drag force is the key (see the earlier blog on cycling for instance).

Once you’ve worked out how to calculate cross-sectional-area/mass, you find some interesting things. Let’s take a kid in our group – he was about 1.2 m (4 ft) tall and about 45 kg (100 1b) in mass – and compare him to me (1.93 m tall and 79 kg in mass).  His merit index is 5.1 compared to my 4.6 so that he floats more easily and needs a lower wind speed to stay in the air.

The subtleties of flight are controlled by stretching your arms out and pulling them in: a bigger cross-sectional area makes you go up while a smaller one makes you drop.  The graph below shows that the merit index drops when you pull your arms in so you float less easily.  What is interesting about the difference between the kid and me, is that my merit index has both a lower value and also a lower gradient – this means that I am less susceptible to minute changes in my body posture and surface area. For the kid, however, not only is he likely shoot up into the wind tunnel if the wind speed is too high, but he is also less stable.

Skydiving in the Olympics?

So, is indoor skydiving a sport?  Could it be in the Olympics? Of course, any physical skill soon leads to someone setting up a competition and certainly there seem to be plenty around, including one at the tunnel I used.  And indoor skydiving is no more bizarre than some of our commonly accepted Olympic sports – fencing, diving, polevault, javelin, snowboard, bobsleigh…I could go on.  In fact, the more I work in sport, the more bizarre it becomes since the challenges we set our Olympians are completely arbitrary.  Let’s try indoor skydiving as a demonstration sport and see what happens (although you won’t see me winning anything on the performance I gave the other day).

–

Equations:

where A is area, rho is density, Cd is drag coefficient and v is air speed.

where H is height in metres, m is mass in kg and A is cross-sectional-area in m squared

The merit index M for the ease of flying in the windtunnel is given by the drag force divided by the weight mg where m is the mass:

Reference:

Bassett, D. R. J., Kyle, C. R., Passfield, L., Broker, J. P. and Burke, E. R. (1999). Comparing cycling world hour records, 1967-1996: modelling with empirical data. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 31(11), 1665-1676.)

]]> http://engineeringsport.co.uk/2012/05/10/indoor-skydiving-as-an-olympic-sport/feed/ 0 stevehaake skydiving Drag Area merit index http://engineeringsport.co.uk/2012/04/19/gold-fever-predicting-the-number-of-medals-for-team-gb-at-london-2012/ http://engineeringsport.co.uk/2012/04/19/gold-fever-predicting-the-number-of-medals-for-team-gb-at-london-2012/#comments Thu, 19 Apr 2012 10:19:36 +0000 stevehaake http://engineeringsport.co.uk/?p=2711 Read More →]]> The great physicist Niels Bohr was responsible for the famous quote “prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future”.  Of course that doesn’t stop us trying – especially when it comes to sport and doubly so if you are hosting the next Olympics in London. Some of my colleagues (Simon Shibli and Chris Gratton) have been making predictions on the number of medals the host nations will get at the Olympics and I thought that I would give it a go too.  As a scientist, I like to amass as much evidence as possible before sticking my finger in the air to make my prediction.

What does history tell us about how many medals we can expect, and what exactly is the ‘host effect’?

Home advantage

According to Shibli and Gratton (and others), it appears that the number of medals a host-country gets before they host the Olympics increases quite dramatically and during their host year, there is an additional home effect.  The bid to host the Games is made 7 years before the event (in our case in Singapore in 2005) – by this point we had already had two decent Olympics under our belts (2000 and 2004) coming 10th in both cases.  By Beijing in 2008 preparations for own Olympics were well under way. It was our best placing since 1924, with 47 medals and 4th place.

This trend mimics what has happened to other host countries in recent times: Figure 1 below shows what happened to Australia’s medal count before, during and after the Sydney 2000 Olympics: the total medal count and the gold medal count went up, peaking at Sydney 2000 with a drop in Athens 4 years later.  The Great Britain trend is following a similar pattern.

Figure 1. Medals won by Australia and GB between 1988 and 2008.

Market share

Unfortunately, the number of medals available at an Olympics isn’t constant, having gone up from 739 to 958 between 1988 and 2008. You can’t use the number of medals to make future predictions. Any sensible analysis should normalise the data or use what my economics colleagues call ‘market share’. This is calculated by dividing the number of medals won by a country by the total number available. Figure 2 shows both Australia’s and Great Britain’s market share with respect to their host year which has been set to zero.  Australia’s share of the total rose to 6.3% in their host year (2000), dropping back again to about 5.5% four years later in Athens.  It appears that GB is following a similar pattern and is on course to equal the Australians (always a bone of contention with my Australian inlaws).

Here is my first prediction – Team GB will get 6.3% of all medals handed out.  If the number of medals available is the same as in 2008 (i.e. 958), then GB will get around 60.

Figure 2. Share of all medals for Australia and GB with respect to their host year (the host year is set at zero).

Of these medals, how many will be gold? Analysis of all countries at the last 6 Olympic Games shows that, on average, the percentage gold medal share is 1.124 times that of total medal share (Figure 3 below). This points towards GB getting around 7% of the 302 gold medals on offer i.e. about 21.  In Beijing 4th place was 6.3% of golds (GB with 19) while 3rd place was 7.6% (Russia with 23): to get any chance of coming 3rd in London, GB has to get two more golds than last time, and Russia has to do worse.

My foolish prediction

Analysis of what has gone before – especially with Australia – says that we are likely to get 60 medals with 21 of them being gold, putting us 4th in the table.  Now I’m going to ruin all that good work and go with my gut instinct and say that our gold medal share appears to be rising faster than the average – in Beijing we already had over 6% of them and a simple linear fit (Figure 5) predicts that we ought to get around 7.6% of the share of the golds (equivalent to 23).  Perhaps I am also being pulled by the peer pressure of Shibli and Gratton who predict 27 Gold medals.  My modified prediction, therefore, is this:

GB will get 60 medals and 23 of them will be gold.  However, this won’t be enough for 3rd and we’ll come 4th.

So there it is, you can shoot me down now if you wish, but I think you should wait for the final medal table on 12th August.

Steve Haake

Graphs

Figure 3. The relationship between gold medal share and total medal share for the 6 Olympic Games between 1988 and 2008.

Figure 4. The relationship between rank and the share of gold medals for the last 6 Olympic Games between 1988 and 2008.

Figure 5. Share of Gold medals for for all host nations between 1988 and 2008 with respect to their host year (the host year is set at zero). The dotted line is a best fit through the 4 points prior to 2012 and predicts 7.6% of golds.

As most runners are probably aware, minimalist shoes are currently all the rage. Proponents of these shoes believe that they are beneficial for both performance and health. Opponents, on the other hand, contend that these shoes only encourage runners to train without the proper injury support that they need. Where does the truth lie in this debate?

A minimalist running shoe (photo by Keegan Mullaney)

The short answer appears to be a wash: minimalist shoes can improve form and performance, but they also can lead to a greater risk of impact injuries. It really depends on the individual runner.

How can this conclusion be reached? Let’s briefly examine the minimalist running craze. For a shoe to be classified as ‘minimalist’ the heel-toe drop should be no greater than 7 millimetres.  This resulting lack of cushioning has a couple of key consequences: first, it insures that the shoe is light and lithe, making it more like a covered sandal than a piece of athletic wear. Second, the absence of heel cushioning discourages runners from  landing on their heels. Instead, runners must aim to land on their forefoot, ensuring a smoother and more anatomically-efficient running form. The movement towards minimalist shoes began in the past decade and then gained steam after 2009, when the publication of Christopher McDougall’s Born to Run put new emphasis on the benefits of barefoot, natural running.

The main physiological argument for minimalist shoes is that landing on the forefoot is a natural way to absorb the impact of running. To test this, one could practice jumping up into the air and then landing in various places on their foot. If you land on your forefoot, your landing will likely be a soft one. Fall repeatedly on your heel, however, and you may find yourself wearing soccer braces after taking impact to the ankles and the knees.

The video below, originally published by nature has a nice description of the mechanics of barefoot running, including a study exploring the force profiles of a shod and barefoot runner.

The results of several studies have backed up these reasons. Runners who are heel-strikers are, indeed, more likely to get injured than are comparable runners who land on their forefeet. But the shoe itself plays little role in the equation. Many people who have made the transition from padded shoes to minimalist ones have reported an inability to adapt their role and a resulting jump in injuries now that their heel-striking tendencies have less cushioning and support. Meanwhile, runners who naturally land on their forefeet are likely to be healthier no matter what type of shoe they use.

So if you use a heavy, padded shoe and have spent most of your running career injury-free, you may see some small performance benefits from switching to a minimalist brand. But if you’re injury-prone, a strong heel striker, or a forefoot striker who doesn’t run short distance races, the possible benefits of a minimalist shoe are likely outweighed by the risks.

Ultimately, the best running shoe is the one that works best for the individual. Sometimes this may be a minimalist model. Other times, however, it may not.

“Jenna is a student by day and a blogger by night. Her favorite topics to write about online include business, finance, and Eco friendly writing. Some of her favorite activities include soccer and jogging. She hopes to someday write for a major publication and provide content to the masses.”

Funny, then, that I should return to it more than a decade later to model a vibrating diving board for an Olympic coach based in Sheffield.  The idea was to use the model in conjunction with high-speed video to get an understanding of the physics of the board and to use it to enhance the coaching.  It was surprising to see how far you could get with simple 1^st year mechanics once you understand what is going on.

The key moments of a 3m dive from a springboard at Sheffield's Ponds Forge International Sports Centre.

Let’s take a typical male diver and an example dive with two and a half turns and one and a half twists.  What you see by eye is a blur of diver and speedos running to the end of the board, bouncing up in the air once, then slamming down on the tip of the board before being propelled high into the air.  During his free flight, he rotates faster than my eyes can take in before ‘plopping’ into the water leaving only a dome of boiling water and the gentle decaying bounce of the board.

The first thing to understand is the boundary conditions of the board i.e. how it is held in place.  Effectively it is a pin jointed cantilever with a pivot near its middle so that the board deflects downwards from the pivot when the diver stands at its tip.  The position of the pivot along the length of the board is the only thing that can be adjusted and is done so using a large wheel.

The dive is a beautiful example of the exchange of energy from one form to another and the first jump of this particular dive – officially called a hurdle step – is used to give the diver potential energy (i.e. height). The diver has the maximum potential energy at the top of the jump, which is converted to kinetic energy as they fall back towards the board. The diver has the maximum kinetic energy on impact with the tip of the board, which is then converted to strain energy of the board as it deflects to its maximum position.  The strain energy is released to propel the diver high into the air to allow him to carry out his gymnastic manoeuvres.

The easiest way to understand what the board does is to listen to the noise;  this tells you that there are vibrations interspersed with bounces of the board on the pivot (try it next time you watch diving).  Between the hurdle step and first impact, while the diver is in the air, the board rotates up about the pin and bounces down onto the pivot twice.

The motion of the springboard tip during a dive: the circles represent data from high speed video while the red line is from a simple beam model.

When it’s on the pivot, the board vibrates as a short beam with a relatively high frequency (about 22 Hz).  Conversely, when it’s not on the pivot it vibrates as a long beam with a relatively low frequency of about 8 Hz.  After the 2^nd bounce  of the board on the pivot, the diver is on the way back down and coordinates his feet to impact with the board – and this is where it gets interesting.  The board is slightly raised off the pivot, rotating slightly first up and then back down.  Superimposed on top of this is the 8 Hz oscillation which at the tip appears to cancel out rotations so that the end of the board – where the diver is about to land – appears almost stationary in the air.

Getting the board to do this seems to be a combination of setting the pivot in the right place,  and jumping the right height during the hurdle step to get the landing time right.  A successful dive depends upon having enough time in the air to execute the rotations and twists before hitting the water.  This can be done by bouncing really high off the springboard, which in turn is a function of the strain energy stored in the board.  The diver intuitively sets the deflection of the board by altering the stiffness of the board using the pivot (which also affects timing).

The tip of the board was modeled using simple beam theory and damped harmonic motion – something a 1^st year in engineering could put together – and gives a pretty good description of reality.  So, when you watch the diving at the Olympics this summer, listen to the noise of the board and think about the rudimentary mechanics involved – it may just be appearing as an exam question.

–

This blog was based on an original for The Engineer which can be read here.

Line calling has so far been left to human judgement in football. That may be about to change. (Photo Courtesy of flickr user: Diego’s sideburns)

Technological line judging is already used in tennis (Hawk-eye), although there are significant differences in its use compared to what is being proposed in football. In tennis, a player is able to appeal the umpire’s decision after a line call which they don’t agree with. An attractive, computer generated recreation of the ball’s flight path then informs the players, audience and match official’s whether the (effectively) infallible computer agrees with the decision. The whole process takes several seconds and some commentators now believe players query a line call to give themselves valuable respite during particularly long, arduous games. This is an interesting point, whenever new rules or methods are introduced to a sport, the nature of competition will inevitably produce unforeseen behaviour from players seeking an advantage. This may explain FIFA’s reluctance to introduce technology before now, and why they have made clear stipulations for a technology to be deemed suitable.

The words ‘infallible’ and ‘instant’ have been mentioned when discussing FIFA’s requirements for goal line technology. What is clear, is that any system that is chosen must be seen to be highly accurate, and able to deliver a decision to the referee very quickly (in less than a second according to various news sources). From an original line-up of eight competing systems, two have managed to meet FIFA’s exacting standards on accuracy and speed (and I’m sure there are many other criteria). One of the systems has been developed by Hawk-eye who already have experience in cricket, tennis and snooker. The other is a system called Goalref and uses a radio transmitter situated within the ball, as opposed to the cameras of Hawk-eye. What is interesting is that both systems use quite different technologies.

Hawk-eye, as a camera based system, is entirely passive. Once the cameras are installed around the stadium no changes need to be made to the ball or the goal itself. It is the job of highly powerful image processing algorithms which will identify the ball and its position within each cameras viewpoint and calculate its 3D position within the goal mouth. Precise camera positions and fastidious calibration will ensure that the system can reliably gauge when the ball crosses the line. The difficulties arise when you have to consider the effect of differing weather conditions, lighting levels and potentially, a maelstrom of players also being present in the goalmouth (a more complex and unpredictable scenario than tennis). An automatic computer system must track the position of the ball (even if obstructed) and signal the referee within a second of it passing the line. The fact that Hawk-eye is still being considered suggests that it hasn’t failed yet.

Goalref operates quite differently and is an active sensor system. A radio transmitter situated in the ball generates a signal which is picked up by antenna attached to the goalposts (see this patent document for more details). There are some distinct advantages to this technology, the signal transmitted by the ball shouldn’t be significantly affected by weather, lighting or the presence of players. As long as the antenna receive the radio waves, a computer system can theoretically calculate the ball’s position. A disadvantage, is the necessity of placing a radio transmitter within the football. Firstly, the exact point from which the signal is transmitted will determine the position of the ball. This seems obvious, but if the transmitter moves within the ball, the system will deem the ball to be moving, even if it isn’t. This has significant implications when millimetre accuracy is demanded and the ball deforms significantly when struck. Secondly, the perception of players can have a big role on the acceptance of technology. New football designs already face extended criticism without electronics in the middle of them. If a significant number of influential players think the ball is behaving strangely because of the addition of electronics it may be hard convincing them otherwise, even if no scientific evidence arises. In addition, this type of system will obviously only work with a ball which contains a sensor. So, Goalref may need to collaborate with individual ball manufacturers and accuracy may become dependent on the make and model of the ball.

I think the addition of technological line calling in football is a good thing. While no technology is infallible or instant, deferring to a system which uses radio antenna or multiple high-speed cameras gives a very high level of reliability compared to human judgement. A lot of prestige and money rides on the outcome of football matches, a lot of pressure is put on a referee to make decisions in difficult circumstances. These technologies will help ensure that the score line at the end of the match is the right one.

With regards to which system may come through on top? I don’t have a strong opinion, my judgement sways me towards the passive Hawk-eye system but time will tell for sure.

Simon Choppin

Chrissie Wellington after her VO2max test (Alan Ruddock, chief technician is behind).

The main affair for us was a VO2max test on Chrissie and a ‘Mrs Normal’ (BBC Producer Pam Rutherford) about 30 minutes into the show.   The test requires a breath analyser (the one we nearly didn’t get working) to measure the gases breathed in and then expired.  The difference between the two can be used to work out how much oxygen is being used by the body: push the body to the limit and you get a measure of the maximum amount of oxygen the body can consume.

To create the intensity of exercise needed to push Chrissie to the max, she ran on a treadmill at 16 km/h and we increased the gradient 1% after every minute (starting at 1%).  The graph below shows a typical oxygen uptake curve (mine) for the same protocol.  VO2 is the rate of oxygen uptake in litres per minute, normalised by body mass (to give units of ml/min/kg).  You can see that VO2 rises pretty sharply to 2% and then continues increasing until a plateau is reached.  At 7% your legs are burning, the blood is pumping in your ears and you feel like your eyes are going to pop (well, that’s how I felt anyway).

My VO2max profile (at 14 km/h with 1% increases in gradient every 1 minute)

The value at the plateau is taken as your “VO2max” and in the units shown can be used to compare you to other athletes.  On air we shouted out Chrissie’s value as around 60 ml/min/kg and our Mrs Normal as around 30 ml/min/kg. The chaotic nature of the show means that I wouldn’t put too much faith in Chrissie’s value as she didn’t actually reached maximum in the time we had available.

How does this compare to others?  Paula Radcliffe has been reported to have a VO2max of around 70 ml/min/kg while Espen Harald Bjerke, a Finnish cross-country skier was reported to have a value of over 90 ml/min/kg.  The magnitude of VO2max is not the only thing to be aware of, however.  What I didn’t mention above was that our Mrs Normal was running at only 13 km/h so not only did Chrissie have a higher value, but it occurred at a higher running speed.

So, what did I learn from the experience?  Well, doing experiments live on air is scary and no matter how many times you practice, technology always goes wrong when you are desperate for it to go right.  How the space shuttle ever got off the ground I’ll never know.  I was interested to hear that Chrissie had never done a VO2max test and had never worn a heart rate monitor: she didn’t see the need, she said, as Ironman was really all about mental toughness.  And, I might just have to go and buy her book A Life Without Limits.

–

Thanks to Helena Selby and Fiona, the Producers of the show.  If you are interested, it can be heard here.

And there is also a live video stream here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/programmes/2012/02/120228_live_stream_80_anniversary.shtml

Rafa fighting hard in Doha, Jan 2012

The problems arose for Nadal with the start of a shoulder injury which has reduced his ability to serve at top speed. He had been struggling to out-muscle top players in baseline rallies like he had previously, relying more on wearing them down. Not content with a season producing a French Open title and two major semi-finals, Nadal and his team decided to make changes for 2012 and the change they opted for was to add weight to the racket, as Nadal explained after being knocked out of the Doha ATP Tour event earlier in January:

“We thought about [changing the weighting] after Wimbledon, but I, you know, I was injured,” Nadal said. “I played all Wimbledon, injury. You are remember in my fourth against Del Potro? I had problems, so I finished the tournament playing with infiltrations every day. So after Wimbledon I had to stop for three weeks. I only was able to practice five days before Montreal, Cincinnati. So I did not have the chance to do it. We wanted to do it after US Open, and we put it a little bit too much weight on the racquet.”

Nadal, after losing to Gael Monfils in Doha this January.

Eventually in the close season over winter Nadal’s team settled on adding a small 3 gram mass to the end of his Babolat Aeropro Drive GT racket. This might seem like a miniscule change to make, especially on a racket that already has a mass of 300g. However, as we can see below it has the potential to allow Nadal to play with more comfort and produce more powerful shots if needed.

While the mass of a racket can be important to a player, it is more important to get the right swing weight, or Moment of Inertia (I). The swing weight of a racket describes it’s resistance to rotational acceleration (when swung). Nadal’s old racket has a moment of inertia of 0.0963kgm² about the end of the handle, which is quite high compared to a lot of rackets anyway. The change due to the additional mass can be calculated using the following moment of inertia equation, which sums the mass of additional particles multiplied by the distance from the axis of rotation squared,

     (1)

where Io is the moment of inertia, m is the mass of a particle and r is the distance of the particle from the axis of rotation, in this case being treated as the handle end. Using equation 1 it can be calculated that the addition of a 3g mass to the racket tip (685mm from the butt end) increases the swing weight by 1.46%.

If we consider the change this makes for a serve we can see the maximum effect of the added mass, in a serve the ball will hit the racket close to the top, where the added mass will be most influential. It has to be assumed for these calculations that Rafa’s technique isn’t affected by the added mass and he is able to swing in the same manner. We also assume that the racket behaves rigidly and the coefficient of restitution (COR – measure of collision elasticity) of the ball on the string bed is 0.85, which is the known value taken from literature.

If we assume that the impact occurs at the racket’s dead spot (the sweet spot most likely to be struck in a serve), we can then use equation 2  to see what effect any change in racket speed has upon the ball speed (which is the important part). Equation two describes the relationship between the ball speed (v‘) and the racket speed (V), which are proportional but the ball speed is also dependant upon racket mass (M), ball mass (m) and COR (e).

v’ = (MV(1+e))/(M+m)     (2)

We can see from the equation that if the masses and COR are constants then an increase in racket head speed will produce an increase in ball speed and a faster serve.

In these conditions, if Nadal wanted to serve with the same ball velocity he is used to doing with his old racket, he can drop his racket velocity to 96% of what it previously was with the old racket and his serve speed will be matched thanks to the increased swing weight. This difference may be a small change but it has a large impact on the energy involved as kinetic energy and velocity are squarely proportional. A reduction in the energy needed to serve could prove very important for Rafa as it might help to reduce the strain on his shoulder and prevent further injury. However, if we want to look at it from the other side and also assume that Rafa is able to swing his newly weighted racket with the same rotational velocity as his old one, which isn’t too far fetched as he is a strong player, then the ball speed for his serves could be increased by up to 2%, which in the world of elite sport could be a big gain.

Nadal warming up with his new racket in Melbourne

The data shows that the changes Nadal has made have the potential to let him play more comfortably for the majority of the time but also to be able to pull out big, more powerful shots when needed. This is assuming he is strong enough to wield his new racket in the same way his did his previous one, but given he only had a few short weeks preparing with it before the first big championship of the season he hasn’t done too badly. Nadal is now taking February off from competing on the tour in order to train and learn how to use his new racket most effectively, so it will be interesting to see how he fares against his Serbian nemesis at Rolland Garros come June.

Dave Schorah

Editor’s note: This article originally had different figures with regards to velocity reduction (83%, now 96%) and increases in serve speed (10%, now 2%). The errors were noticed after posting but have now been corrected.

Not only did the audience learn something new, we found out what the audience thought of science and sport.

Tyler Saunders shoots a perfect basket in the Faraday Lecture Theatre at the Royal Institution.

So what did the lucky 300 strong audience find out?  Well, for a start, that 25 years ago wheelchair basketball was played with National Health Service chairs – heavy mild-steel monsters which were unstable and probably dangerous.  Colin Price and Tyler Saunders demonstrated the modern day chairs which are made from lightweight aluminium with cambered wheels (see image below) to lower the centre of mass, improve maneuverability and give better hand access to the wheel rims.  Mike Caine, from Loughborough University showed some of the advanced designs emanating from his Sports Technology Institute.

An array of wheelchairs, scientists and athletes the RCUK event at the Royal Institution (L to R: David James (tiered seating; Mike Caine; David Willets; Steve Haake; Maria Kavvusanu; Tyler Saunders; Colin Price).

Maria Kavussanu, a sports psychologist from Birmingham University let us know that ‘sledging’ (the concept of using ‘whitty’ insults to put your opponent off) doesn’t really work since the person doing the sledging becomes distracted and declines in performance.

Audience put to the vote!

After a robust discussion on the rights and wrongs of technology, we turned the tables on the audience by using interactive voting pads. First of all, we found out who they were: two thirds male and 60% younger than 35 – perhaps what might be expected in a basketball audience.  But wait, the majority turned out to be science-lovers (85%) rather than basketball-lovers (27%).  It was no surprise, then, to find out that 9 out of 10 thought that science and technology had benefited sport.  When it came to the use of performance enhancement, around 60% thought that caffeine and climate chambers were Ok.  However, the use of blood doping or a relaxation of anti-doping policy was a definite no-no.

So what about equipment and physical technology?  Well, around half thought that it was Ok for a country to develop sports equipment solely for their own athletes and 70% thought that any technology should be allowed in training. Confusingly, however, 60% thought that athletes should be forced to use the same equipment during a competition.

Our final question found that a majority (62%) thought there was a clear difference between the use of technology and doping.

I’m not sure how reflective of society in general these answers were, but it’s only the first of 6 events and it’ll be interesting to see the difference across the country and with different sports.  Who will like technology more, triathletes or divers?  Will those who don’t like science be indifferent to the use of technology?  And where in the country will we see our highest number of sports lovers?

–

The next event is Cutting Edge 2012: Behind Triathlon in Leeds on the evening of 27th March 2012.  Tickets are free but must be booked in advance. Details of all the events can be found here.

Go ahead and give us your opinion.