The US Swim Team's Secret Weapon, Science 180
Hugh Pickens writes "When American Swimmer Margaret Hoelzer goes for the gold tonight in the 200-meter backstroke, part of her success will be due to a new system developed by Tim Wei, a mechanical and aerospace engineer at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, that uses fluid dynamics to study human movement allowing scientists and coaches to study how fast and hard a swimmer pushes the water as he moves through it. 'Wei uses a tracking technique called digital particle image velocimetry, commonly used to measure the flow of small particles around an airplane or small fish or crustaceans in water.' Wei filtered compressed air in a scuba tank through a porous hose to create bubbles about a tenth of a millimeter in diameter. When an athlete swims through a sheet of bubbles that rises from the pool floor, a camera captures their flow around the swimmer's body and the images show the direction and speed of the bubbles, which Wei then translates into the swimmer's thrust using software that he wrote."
Changing is easier said then done. (Score:5, Interesting)
After doing something for years and years, changing the way you do something, whether it's a swimming stroke or tennis or golf swing, isn't done instantly. It takes quite a bit of concerted effort and attention to change it. I'd be really interested in how and what the coach does to get the swimmers to change.
I've witnessed swimmers in college that have bad habits that they gained as youth and they can't seam to shake them.
Interpretation? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Changing is easier said then done. (Score:5, Interesting)
It is plausible that adaptability is one trait that helped the Olympic swimmers become Olympic swimmers in the first place. Certainly it would be interesting to hear more about it.
Re:Related research on the dolphin kick Phelps use (Score:1, Interesting)
swimming backstroke in high school, I always noticed that my underwater dolphin was faster than my on surface backstroke ...
I could go longer and faster underwater in backstroke than a team mate who would literally wipe the floor with me in backstroke, because his surface speed was much faster.
That and the coach would tell us "do butterfly kick underwater near the surface until you feel that you are slowing down, then come up and do crawl." when training for the front crawl (freestyle) events.
I've also seen Lenny Krayzelburg swim underwater in a 25 yard pool. The lung capacity on the olympic swimmers is something extraordinary.
It's not just American athletes that are faster (Score:5, Interesting)
Everyone is faster in the pool. I watched a race where even the 5th place finisher came in above the old world record time.
Just read this: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/12/sports/olympics/12records.html?_r=1&oref=slogin [nytimes.com]
Over above whatever the swimmers are using, the pool itself is engineered to create faster times. Everything from the lane dividers, to the wall of the pool, to the extra meter of depth are meant to dissipate turbulence in the water and increase times.
China is using science too (Score:4, Interesting)
I went to China for a visit this summer and there was this interesting Chinese Olympic history series playing on the TV.
Apparently after the Atlanta Olympics in 1996, the Chinese considered it to be a disappointing showing because many Chinese favorites did not get a Gold medal. So the Chinese government got some experts together and they came up with a new plan for how the athletes are trained in China. They first listed several sports the Chinese were good at traditionally, like table tennis, badminton, gymnastics, etc. They then established two research facilities for each sport. The purpose of these research facilities were to find more effective methods to train an athlete.
For example, the rowing team was sent to go train in Tibet because there it is at a high altitude. At high altitudes there is less oxygen so it trains the athletes' body to use oxygen more effectively.
While us nerds can't exactly participate in sports competitively we definitely have the skills to improve training and playing methods of a sport =D
Re:The secret science is wrong (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:It's not just technique (Score:5, Interesting)
Everyone has known about this for years and I'm not quite sure why it's suddenly news now. There are plenty of pools out there that have 10+ lanes (in college we had 10+ lanes and we swam in the deep end of the pool for SCY races). It really seems like most of the discussions about the reasons for the WRs falling are more or less just to fill the time that the announcers have between events.
I realize that the general public doesn't understand how pools, suits, and training methods have evolved over the last 15 years but it's seriously not news worthy IMO. US Swimming is just trying to get people to pay attention to how cool swimming is so that they get the most out of the "Olympic Cycle". The "Olympic Cycle" is the phenomenon that occurs following every Olympic year where swim teams see a upswing in the number of youngsters trying out for swim teams because of all the coverage ("ohh, Mommy, I want to be Michael Phelps/Natalie Coughlin/Hall Jr/Krazelburg/Dolan/etc too!")
Another flash in the pan caused by mass media dumbing everything down to a mostly unaware public. Move along.
Re:Related research on the dolphin kick Phelps use (Score:5, Interesting)
In 25 yard pools during backstroke it was easier to dolphin kick and swim 8 yards with the last 2 dedicated to the turn.
As for swimming underwater: Most sprinters in the 50m freestyle don't take a breath during the race. In short course (25m pool) 50m races I maybe took one breath on the way back - depends how much air I released during my turn. If I swam at the right speed I could get about 75m before needing to come up and take another breath. But this was far from racing speed.
Re:Changing is easier said then done. (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe they're just more adaptive (Score:3, Interesting)
Perhaps there's a coaching aspect to it but I think if someone stays at the top of their field for a long time, it says a lot about that person's abilities. I wonder if it's simply that the best swimmers or the best golfers or the best athletes do change, and are simply very good at shaking old habits and adapting to improved techniques when they become apparent. If they don't, they're not the best any more, and are often quickly forgotten as someone else comes through and pushes them out of the way.
Is this for sale? (Score:4, Interesting)
Cause we're in the market [beijing2008.cn] right now.
Re:Maybe they're just more adaptive (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Changing is easier said then done. (Score:5, Interesting)
I've witnessed swimmers in college that have bad habits that they gained as youth and they can't seam to shake them.
About twenty years ago, famous golf swing coach Butch Harmon saw Tiger at a day camp for kids. At the end of the day he knew Tiger would be famous one day but not because of the way he hit the ball. It was because of the way he took direction and coaching advice. Butch said that over the years he had seen quite a few kids hit the ball better than Tiger, but none so eagerly seek advice and apply it on the field as Tiger did.
American strategy (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Chinese Quality control (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:It's not just American athletes that are faster (Score:4, Interesting)
Perhaps more to the point, it's not just US that uses science.
(And yes, I speak from experience. I can't tell you exactly what I do for a living, but let's just say that next Olympics, Australia's rowers are going to have a distinct advantage.)
Re:Changing is easier said then done. (Score:3, Interesting)
In golf, you optimize the golf clubs, in tennis -- it's the rackets, and in swimming -- it's the swimsuits/body-suits. That's how you create the illusion of athletic progress and inject a little bit of excitement at the same time, you don't depend on the athletes for changing/improving their own behaviors -- that's just too hard -- you simply give them better equipment instead.