Computational Modelling Group

Seminar  23rd February 2012 noon  Room 2001, Ship Science Building (28)

Factors Involved in Performance Enhancement for Elite Swimming

Angus Webb and Joe Banks
Ship Science

Web page
http://www.soton.ac.uk/engineering/research/groups/fsi.page
Categories
CFD, OpenFOAM
Submitter
Marcus Erridge

An FSI Sports Engineering Seminar presented by final year PhD research students Angus Webb and Joe Banks

Refreshments, tea and coffee are available

Abstract

With the requirement to seek ever smaller gains in elite sport, modern engineering techniques typical to the aerospace, automotive and marine industries are being utilised. In October 2009, British Swimming and UK Sport initiated the SwimSIM project with the University of Southampton to increase swimming performance prior to the London 2012 Olympic Games. This project involves three PhD students, with each focusing on a specific area.

Joe Banks is working on CFD simulations in OpenFOAM to incorporate both the resistive and propulsive forces in swimming. This research is made up of two main areas, the passive (naked hull) resistance of a swimmer’s body and a blade element momentum approach to simulate the effect the arms have as a propulsor. Chris Phillips is developing bespoke musculoskeletal (MS) simulations of human swimming, focusing predominantly on underwater undulatory dolphin kick. An athlete’s kinematics are used to determine the associated fluid forces which are then applied to the MS model. Angus Webb is working on swimming race simulation to enable race time prediction. This involves investigation of resistance and propulsion during the individual phases of a swimming race. These are obtained through combining experimental measurement of force components with CFD predictions and human capabilities identified through MS modelling.

In addition to the PhD research a comprehensive testing program is underway with the World Class Performance team in British Swimming. This program involves both acquisition of data for research purposes and providing coaching information for athlete performance enhancement. In total over 40 elite athletes have been tested in 45 testing sessions, comprising over 600 measurement runs.

Biographies

Joe completed his undergraduate ship science degree at Southampton University and focused his studies on Naval Architecture and Computational Fluid Dynamics. He is currently a PhD student in FSI research group focusing on performance sport engineering, utilising novel self-propelled CFD simulations to improve sport performance.

Angus completed his undergraduate ship science degree at Southampton University and focused his studies on Naval Architecture and experimental techniques. He is currently a PhD student in FSI research group focusing on performance sport engineering, applying naval architecture knowledge and experimental methods to inform a race simulation tool to improve sport performance.

Image: http://blogs.bettor.com/Swimming-Across-the-English-Channel-in-the-Name-of-Science-a18015