Re: How does tennis relate to physics?

Date: Sun Nov 21 09:41:04 1999
Posted By: Tom Cull, Staff, Clinical Sciences MR Division, Picker International
Area of science: Physics
ID: 942281097.Ph

Message:

Hi,

The physics of tennis is very broad subject. In fact, the physics of just about any sport has several categories like that physics of the player performing, the physics of the ball (if there is one) interacting with anything during the game, and the physics of any other equipment used during the game.

The Physics of Sports edited by Angelo Armenti, Jr. has 6 articles about investigations into the tennis racket, tennis ball, and the bounce and flight of the ball during play. Here are citations of the original articles from which the reprints for the Physics of Sports were borrowed. Professor Howdy Brody wrote 5 of these.

H. Brody, "Physics of the tennis racket", American Journal of Physics 47, 482-487 (1979)
H. Brody, "Physics of the tennis racket II: The "sweet spot", American Journal of Physics 49, 816-819 (1981)
H. Brody, "The moment of inertia of a tennis racket", The Physics Teacher 23, 213-216 (1985)
H. Brody, "That's how the ball bounces", The Physics Teacher 22, 494-497 (1984)
Antonin Stepanek, "The aerodynamics of tennis balls - The topspin lob", American Journal of Physics 56, 138-142 (1988)
H. Brody, "The Tennis-Ball Bounce Test", The Physics Teacher 28, 407-409 (1990)

Several answers have been posted to the MadSci Network (Search) on many aspects of the physics of tennis. I also included a few others for the flight of the ball. Some of these responses are mine so I apologize for the self-referencing.

Another nice online site for a few topics in sports aerodynamics is:
http://wings.u cdavis.edu/Book/Sports/instructor/index.html

Sincerely,

Tom "On the Baseline with a Lawn Chair" Cull

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