RESEARCH ARTICLE


Modelling Swimming Hydrodynamics to Enhance Performance



Daniel A. Marinho1, 2, Abel I. Rouboa3, Tiago M. Barbosa2, 4, Antonio J. Silva2, 5, *
1 University of Beira Interior, Department of Sport Sciences (UBI, Covilhã, Portugal)
2 Research Centre in Sports, Health and Human Development (CIDESD, Vila Real, Portugal)
3 University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro. Department of Engineering (UTAD, Vila Real, Portugal)
4 Polytechnic Institute of Bragança. Department of Sport Sciences (IPB, Bragança, Portugal)
5 University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro. Department of Sport, Health and Exercise (UTAD, Vila Real, Portugal)


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Creative Commons License
© 2010 Marinho et al.

open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

* Address correspondence to this author at the Department of Sport Sciences, University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro, Vila Real, Portugal, Rua Dr. Manuel Cardona, 5000 Vila Real Portugal; Tel: +351 259350000; E-mail: Ajsilva@utad.pt


Abstract

Swimming assessment is one of the most complex but outstanding and fascinating topics in biomechanics. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) methodology is one of the different methods that have been applied in swimming research to observe and understand water movements around the human body and its application to improve swimming performance. CFD has been applied attempting to understand deeply the biomechanical basis of swimming. Several studies have been conducted willing to analyze the propulsive forces produced by the propelling segments and the drag force resisting forward motion. CFD technique can be considered as an interesting new approach for evaluation of swimming hydrodynamic forces, according to recent evidences. In the near future, as in the present, CFD will provide valorous arguments for defining new swimming techniques or equipments.

Keywords: CFD, swimming, evaluation.