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In the singles discipline of figure skating, performing complex jumps is an important aspect of each skater's program. Over the last ten years, the complexity of jumps performed by skaters has increased dramatically. For a skater to progress from a single, to a double, to a triple, and now even to a quadruple jump, he or she must either jump higher, rotate faster, or do some combination of the both. Typically as skaters progress from a single to triple jump, they jump higher and rotate faster in the air. The increase in jump height gives the skater more time to complete the required number of revolutions. |
In addition to the minimal height and rotation speed requirements to complete the jumps, the skaters must also be concerned with their horizontal speed. It is important that a skater have enough speed to glide out of the jump into his or her next trick without a break in the fluidity of the program. Moreover, jumps performed at fast speeds with great heights and jump distances tend to leave a better impression with the judges, resulting in better marks for the skater.
Understanding the concept of projectile motion can help coaches and athletes most successfully master these complex athletic skills. Additionally, figure skating jumps can be great resources for demonstrating the concepts of projectile motion to physics students. In this unit, we have used several different jumps to illustrate projectile motion. Before proceeding, you need to be familiar with some basic physics principles and definitions. For example, it is important to understand the concepts of gravity, velocity, force, and displacement to fully comprehend the analysis of the figure skating jumps. If you need refreshing on the definitions of these terms, go to the glossary before continuing this unit.
The objective of this unit is to use example from figure skating to become familiar with the laws of physics governing projectile motion, to be able to solve basic projectile motion problems, and to learn great examples from figure skating for teaching projectile motion to your students.
Projectile motion is used to describe the path of any object going through the air under it's own influence. By that, we mean that the object does not have any sort of propulsion system. Typical examples would be a person jumping (figure skaters, ski jumpers, aerial specialists) or a thrown object (javelin, shot put, baseball).
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© April, 1998, Montana State University-Bozeman |
