Workshop - Test and Analysis of Materials Performance in Sport Engineering

Loughborough University
May 2012

Chair: Dr Dave Hollis, LaVision UK

We’ve always known the BSSM were good sports ! 

With the culmination of a very successful Olympics here in the UK in 2012, it seems apt to report on a very successful seminar ran by the BSSM in May.  The venue for the event was Loughborough University's extremely well equipped Sports Technology Institute.   The meeting topics spanned a wide range including sports footwear, sensors for assessment of athletes, and yacht sail performance. A highlight of the day was a tour of the facilities within the Sports Technology Institute, and all delegates were very impressed at the range of technology employed.  One of the tools at the facility is a system for monitoring golf ball flight, and this, in combination with a High Speed (kHz) camera system kindly supplied and operated by Photron, was used during the highly entertaining BSSM Corporate Golf event on the day preceding the seminar.

We were extremely fortunate in that the seminar culminated with a primarily non-technical presentation by UK Sport's Dr Naomi Stenhouse.  Naiomi gave an overview of the bigger picture in terms of funding, and where projects had been effective in increasing sports performance.  All agreed that it's nice to see the successful application of our excellent research in real life applications!

This event pushed the boundaries of BSSM’s usual subject areas, and it was particularly rewarding to see how new and old technology can be employed in areas outside those which we are used to.