Sports engineering is a sub-discipline of engineering that applies mathematics and science to develop technology, equipment, and other resources for sport. The terms sports engineering and sports technology are sometimes used interchangeably, although sports technology is often understood as the more general concept. This interdisciplinary approach further integrates knowledge from engineering, biomechanics, and physics to improve athletic performance, safety, and the scientific understanding of human movement. Engineers of this field create and analyse a wide range of products and systems, such as sporting goods, protective gear, clothing, footwear, and wearable sensors. It also covers sporting facilities, officiating and regulatory technologies, performance monitoring and training tools. Together, these technologies form an ecosystem that supports athlete participation, competition, performance, and safety.
Sports engineering was first introduced by Isaac Newton’s observation of a tennis ball. In the mid-twentieth century, Howard Head became one of the first inventors to apply engineering principles to improve sports equipment. Dedicated to showing the innovations in this field, the International conference for sports engineering and the journal Sports Engineering were introduced.
This discipline requires an understanding of a variety of engineering topics, including physics, mechanical engineering, biomechanics, materials science, and computational engineering. Many practitioners hold degrees in those topics rather than in sports engineering specifically. Specific study programs in sports engineering and technology are becoming more common at the undergraduate and graduate level in the USA, central Europe and the Asia-Pacific area.
In terms of materials, the discipline replicates the broad variety of products and facilities. From "pure" metals and polymers to composites and natural materials, a wide range can be found. Sports engineers are therefore trained to adapt to the distinctive requirements in the particular field. This allows not only to incorporate suitable technology in different applications, but also to improve the material selection and processes to optimize the athlete-equipment interaction, safety, and performance.
History One of the earliest instances of the use of scientific principles in sports context occurred in 1671 when English mathematician Isaac Newton wrote a letter to German theologian and natural philosopher Henry Oldenburg regarding a tennis ball’s flight mechanics. In the following centuries, German scientist Heinrich Gustav Magnus further examined Newton’s analysis and applied Newtonian theories to the spinning properties of balls. Around 1760, in the midst of the Industrial Revolution, sports engineering was further explored with the acceleration of the manufacturing of sports equipment. During this stage, the manufacturers recognized an increase in sales being directly related to better quality of equipment. As a result, experimentation started to explore new designs and materials for greater athletic performance.
In modern times, sports engineers, such as Howard Head, applied engineering principles to sports equipment. After finding traditional snow skis to be too heavy, Head developed lighter, more flexible skis in 1947. He used his knowledge from the aircraft industry to create skis with a metal-sandwich construction. After 40 iterations and 3 years, he released his skis commercially, and they soon set the standard for skis. Today, his skis are widely known and recognized under the brand Head, with Head Sportswear International, and the Head Ski Company. Head also developed the Prince Classic tennis racquet. He created a much lighter design, with a bigger frame supporting off-center hits, and a grip that did not twist in players' hands. As with his skis, Head's oversized racquets were embraced by top athletes in the sport.
In 1998, the International Sports Engineering Association (ISEA) was established and the journal Sports Engineering was published. In 1999, the first international sports engineering conference was organized by Steve Haake called The International Conference on the Engineering of Sports in Sheffield, England. The conference brings world-leading researchers, sports professionals, and industry organizations together to celebrate the profession, showcasing innovations in both research and industry.
Sports engineering has become an important sub-discipline in modern engineering. The optimization of athlete-equipment interaction and the importance of technology for safety and performance, and therefore success have grown ever since. The Speedo LZR Racer, as a very prominent example, is a swimsuit developed in collaboration with NASA researchers and engineers and launched 2015. Sports engineers tested different materials and coatings in a wind tunnel to reduce drag and optimized stability and mobility by using layering and joining techniques specific to particular body parts. The LZR Racer was able to reduce skin friction drag by 24% compared to Speedo’s previously most advanced suit, resulting in several new world records. Inventions like this present sports engineering as a field of potential and have popularized it as a discipline of very tangible developments.
Discipline Associated fields Sports engineering synthesizes content from both engineering and sports science. Consequently, programs in sports engineering encompass on one hand engineering-oriented classes such as physics, engineering mechanics, aerodynamics, and materials engineering, and on the other hand sports science-based courses such as physiology, anatomy or training theory. In between, there are some interdisciplinary courses like biomechanics or smart devices in sports, which cannot strictly be classified as one or the other.
Biomechanics
Biomechanics is the scientific discipline that examines the mechanical principles governing living organisms. The focus lies on the forces acting on the human body and their effects on movement and biological function. Drawing on concepts from mechanics, including kinematics and kinetics, biomechanics attempts to understand how internal and external forces influence motion. To achieve this, the field uses a variety of measurement techniques, such as motion capture, and analytical methods, like inverse dynamics. This helps the engineers to quantify movement, evaluate body alignment, and investigate interactions between the athlete, their equipment and their environment. Biomechanics is associated with numerous disciplines, like medicine, engineering, and sports science, which makes it therefore also particularly relevant within sports engineering. Biomechanical principles provide the basis and support the design and optimization of sports technologies with the aim of improving performance, safety, and injury prevention.
Materials science Materials and material selection for sporting goods involve diligent consideration of the regulations and requirements once a product or facility is in use. Materials are one of the determining factors of performance, and therefore of popularity, success and money. Therefore, the materials and their selection must maintain a balance between optimization of properties and structures and cost effectiveness. Based on materials, revolutionary results were achieved in professional sports and there is still room for improvement in certain fields, such as paralympic sports.
According to the curricula of the universities, courses in this field resemble other engineering programs in terms of structure. The focus, however, lays on the specific requirements for the product examined in the course.
Computational modeling
Computational modeling is commonly employed across many engineering disciplines. It enables engineers to create, simulate and examine the behavior of an object without having to physically produce it or the condition it is operating in. This makes it particularly useful for the application in sports. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) can be used in sports engineering education to model flow in both air and water systems. CFD can be applied to sports such as cycling to examine the aerodynamics of cycles and riders' body positions. This information is useful in understanding how to increase cycling speeds and decrease exertion for riders. Furthermore, it enables engineers, for example, to predict fluid patterns around a skier jumping through the air or a swimmer moving through the water, to reduce the drag acting on the athlete.
Computer-aided design (CAD) and finite element modelling (FEM) or analysis (FEA) allows to design and test sports equipment. FEM is an engineering modeling tool that simulates the physics of applied forces acting in a system. Thus, engineers use FEA to apply different stresses to an object and determine its strengths and weaknesses. For example, FEA analysis can be used to examine the impact of a ball against a tennis racket or the different the deformation resulting from the impact of a football. This contributes not only to the performance of the equipment but also to safety through failure prevention.
Academic career Dissemination Sports engineering in the United States is often part of universities' undergraduate mechanical engineering programs, rather than as stand-alone bachelor's degree programs. On the graduate level, research labs use an interdisciplinary approach to sports engineering such as in the MIT Sports Lab and the Biosports Lab at UC Davis. Some graduate opportunities like the program offered through Purdue include concentrations in sports engineering within the mechanical engineering or materials engineering department.
Sports engineering in academics is more developed in the United Kingdom with programs at the undergraduate and graduate levels. The Sports Engineering Research Group at Sheffield Hallam University - the 'home' of the sports engineering as a discipline, and Loughborough University offer a 1 year, full-time sports engineering postgraduate program. Nottingham Trent University offers a 3 year, full-time undergraduate program that is based on industry-oriented seminars and activities as well as on-campus research experiences like the Sports Engineering lab. Furthermore, this field of studies is offered in various places in central Europe, for example the Universities of Vienna (A), Bayreuth and Magdeburg (DE), as well as Universities in the Netherlands, Sweden and Denmark. Beyond that, it is offered in some places in Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. There is no uniform educational path for becoming a sports engineer: even though the isolated field of sports engineering is offered at the aforementioned universities, most sports engineering students pursue bachelor’s degrees in other areas within engineering. This can include mechanical, electrical, and materials engineering.
List of study programs Undergraduate and graduate level programs in sports engineering are more common in Europe as opposed to the United States. The list below highlights offerings currently available in the field of sports engineering.
Aalborg University (Denmark) Centre for Sports Engineering Research (CSER) - Sheffield Hallam University (UK) Deutsche Sporthochschule Köln (Germany) Griffith University (Australia) Islamic Azad University, Science and Research Branch (Iran) (undergraduate & postgraduate students) Loughborough University (UK) Massachusetts Institute of Technology Mittuniversitetet (Sweden) Nottingham Trent University Purdue University TU Chemnitz (Germany) (undergraduate) TU Chemnitz (Germany) (graduate) TU Delft (Netherlands) University of Adelaide (Australia) University of Applied Sciences Technikum Wien (Austria, undergraduate) University of Applied Sciences Technikum Wien (Austria, graduate) University of California Davis University of Debrecen, Faculty of Engineering (Hungary)