Source: People's Daily Overseas Edition
National Ski Jumping Center Summit Club. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Xu Yanan
The research team of the wind tunnel laboratory of Beijing Jiaotong University communicates the experimental plan with the test team before the experiment. Xinhua News Agency reporter Ren Chao photographed
To build a sports power, we must achieve a high level of sports science and technology self-reliance and self-reliance - General Secretary Xi Jinping recently inspected the preparations for the Winter Olympic games and the Winter Paralympic Games in Beijing, which made people have a deeper understanding of the important role of sports science and technology.
In today's world, the role of science and technology in competitive sports is becoming more and more prominent. In recent years, multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary forces have coordinated the promotion of technology research and development and technology transformation, helping Chinese athletes to improve their competitive level and providing strong support for China's competitive sports to achieve greater breakthroughs.
Wind tunnel technology simulates real-world scenarios
At the training base of the ice and snow project in Beijing Erqi Factory, the first professional wind tunnel laboratory for sports in China was built. Since its completion in October 2020, this internationally leading wind tunnel laboratory has provided scientific and technological support to more than 2,000 athletes.
Wind tunnels are the most widely used tool in aerodynamic research and testing. Previously, wind tunnels were mainly used to simulate the flow of air around an aircraft or object to verify the effect of airflow resistance on the aircraft or object.
At present, many countries have applied wind tunnels to sports training, simulating real air and water flow conditions to help athletes improve their performance. Using wind tunnel technology, in addition to helping athletes scientifically adjust the posture during sports, they can also test the drag coefficient of sports clothing and equipment, providing data support for the design and development of high-performance sports equipment.
Snow and ice projects have strong seasonality, and simulation training is a means of improving efficiency. To this end, the research team designed a winter project wind tunnel simulation training method using skateboards, treadmills, and six degrees of freedom system to simulate the scenes of high-speed sports such as short-track speed skating and bobsleigh, and assist athletes to carry out simulation training.
For example, in the steel frame bobsleigh event, details such as the height of the shoulders and body position after the athlete's skiing will affect the performance in the race. To do this, research teams need to provide scientific answers through precise measurements.
At the National Ski Jumping Training and Scientific Research Base in Laiyuan, Hebei Province, the world's largest and most complete ski jumping wind tunnel laboratory is welcomed by athletes. In the laboratory, ski jumpers can perform simulation training such as ski jumping, jumping, leaping and lifting.
Song Qiwu, a Chinese ski jumper, said that the fault tolerance rate of wind tunnel training is high, and if the jump is wrong, you can improve the action faster and learn some better flying movements.
According to experts, in the preparation for the Beijing Winter Olympics, wind tunnel technology carries out scientific and technological services around three aspects: man, machine and ring. "Man" is a simulated training represented by a wind tunnel; "machine" is a wind tunnel technology to test the wind resistance performance of athletes' clothing, helmets and other equipment to assist in equipment research and development; "ring" refers to the field system including field monitoring and environmental prediction and the simulation field system including wind tunnel training.
In fact, at the Tokyo Olympics, wind tunnel training also contributed to the good results of Chinese athletes. In the four-person rowing event, the low-speed wind tunnel laboratory of the Aerospace Eleventh Academy successfully developed a three-dimensional force measurement platform based on air flotation device by simulating the aerodynamic magnitude of different action postures of athletes such as grasping water, driving, water outlet, and returning paddle, and testing the effect of different formation combinations of four athletes on aerodynamic resistance.
"Training Artifact" optimizes movement performance
The technology that used to be used for aviation simulation training has now been introduced into the field of sports. The ice and snow project training base of Beijing Erqi Factory is equipped with a six-degree-of-freedom electric simulation sports training system. This training system can establish a three-dimensional virtual scene environment consistent with the real arena of sledding, steel frame snowmobiles, snowmobiles, cross-country skiing, alpine skiing and other sports, using six degrees of freedom platform technology, VR virtual technology and sports digital modeling technology to make athletes prepare for the game in an immersive way. At the same time, the six-degree-of-freedom steel frame snowmobile training system and cross-country ski training system can collect athlete training data in real time through high-precision encoders to improve the training effect and field performance of athletes in a targeted manner.
Simulated sports training has greatly improved the training efficiency of athletes. For example, in the steel frame snowmobile race, the runners have to take the equipment back to the starting point by cable car after the end of the ski, which takes a long time. With the help of the six-degree-of-freedom electric simulation sports training system, athletes only need to press the reset button at the end of each slide to immediately enter the next simulation training. While gliding, the system also records the speed and time of the athletes in each corner, aiding in technical analysis.
There are many such "training artifacts". Anti-vertigo trainers for pilot training are also present in sports training bases to help athletes exercise their core strength, balance and neuromuscular control and improve their orientation in the air.
At the National Ski Jumping Training and Research Base, the scientific research team set up 4 cameras during the athlete training to collect the athlete training footage in real time. In high-speed environments, it is very difficult to shoot the action with a normal camera. To this end, researchers use a biomechanical rapid feedback system composed of AI non-interference three-dimensional motion capture, ultra-wideband precision positioning speed measurement, high-speed motion automatic follow-up robot and other technologies to finely follow every subtle movement of athletes. At the same time, with the help of the biomechanical rapid feedback system, the athlete's motion data is scientifically analyzed, which provides an effective reference for optimizing the athlete's training program.
Chinese athletes who performed well at the Tokyo Olympics also applied a lot of "black technology" in training. In the swimming project, the research team has developed an intelligent measurement and digital training system for swimming sports, which can obtain sports information such as athletes' posture, speed, position, angular velocity, acceleration and so on during training, helping the coaching team determine the training plan, optimize technical movements, and improve sports performance.
The Chinese diving team, known as the "Dream Team", used the "3D+AI" diving auxiliary training system in training. A series of image acquisition devices such as high-speed cameras upload information to the intelligent cloud, and through visual technology and deep neural network estimation, they can reconstruct the diving attitude of athletes in three dimensions, realize accurate quantitative evaluation of diving actions, and formulate targeted training programs.
Behind the medal is full of technology
The competition of modern sports is also a competition for scientific and technological strength. Nowadays, the scientific and technological content of an Olympic medal is increasing.
As an associate professor at the School of Physical Education of Jinan University, Su Bingtian, a Chinese 100-meter flyer, once mentioned in a paper on "studying himself" that foreign teachers such as Randy Huntington of the track and field team used the "champion model" as the guide to monitor the athletes' physical fitness, technology, recovery and other aspects through high-tech instruments and equipment. According to this, problems are found, gaps are found, personalized training programs are formulated for athletes, shortcomings are made up for, and competitive ability is comprehensively improved. When Analyzing the reasons why China's men's 100 meters are among the world's first-class, Su Bingtian put "practicing the concept of scientific training" in the first place. He said that the help of science and technology is the main experience that competitive sports can learn from.
The Chinese sailing and windsurfing team played well at the Tokyo Olympics. In order to provide a more accurate report on the hydrological situation of the stadium, the scientists of the research team went to the Olympic stadium a year in advance to survey. The research team adopted multi-band multi-satellite joint positioning high-precision measurement technology, including Beidou, to monitor and collect data on the wind speed, wind direction change and the difference in seawater flow rate and flow direction distribution at different locations on the same field, providing scientific and technological support for athletes' route and tactical choice.
Beidou navigation not only provides "pathfinding" for athletes, but also provides assistance for auxiliary training in ice and snow projects. Based on beidou's accurate time and space, the snow sports intelligent service system can collect real-time data such as the speed and trajectory of each node of the athletes in the gliding process, conduct posture analysis, human body dynamic analysis, etc., and give real-time feedback to coaches. Through the measurement of athletes' movement trajectory, movement speed and acceleration analysis, the purpose of assisting athletes in training and improving sports performance is achieved.