Description
Competitive Swimming is not only a sport, but also an invaluable life skill. As long as it has existed, people have wondered how to swim faster. There are a multitude of variables that go into any race and shockingly not much research around to scientifically approach the question. This study aims to investigate the drag forces behind a Swimmer’s race to give better insight as to what will slow a Swimmer down through simulations in ANSYS Fluent. Simple 2D simulations were made with a Swimmer in different positions and a flow of water moved over them. What was found was that different positions, or techniques, yield vastly different results. When following typical good technique, a Swimmer can expect to be approximately 136% less drag forces compared to a typical bad technique. Additionally, small errors such as not being perfectly horizontal can lead to a difference of around 100 Newtons of drag force between perfectly horizontal and a 5-degree angle of attack. Another observation made was that errors are exacerbated by being near a wall, so Swimming in an end lane next to the pool wall leads to about 57% more drag forces that any other lane. Still, there are many more observations to be made as there is so much more to research in swimming.
Details
Title
- Numerical Analysis of the Resistive Drag Force in Competitive Swimming
Contributors
- Benavidez, Kevin A (Author)
- Murthy, Dr. Raghavendra (Thesis director)
- Huang, Dr. Huei-Ping (Committee member)
- Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Program (Contributor, Contributor)
- Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Date Created
The date the item was original created (prior to any relationship with the ASU Digital Repositories.)
2020-05
Resource Type
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