Hello, and welcome to the Physics World Stories
podcast.
I'm Andrew Lester
On the euro 20 24, the Fort Football
soccer tournament taking place in Germany at the
moment, and the Olympics to come, sport is
certainly in the news. And as something of
an avid sports found myself, and make no
apology for this episode
concentrates on Physics and sport.
Later in the podcast will hear from a
harvard professor of physics who recently set the
record for the fastest woman to cross America
odd fault. But first,
John Eric Ga is the author of 2
books on the physics of sport,
including
gold Medal physics and the physics of P.
I'm professor of Physics, at the University of
Lynch
in Virginia in the United States.
And,
though I was trained as a condensed matter
theorist. I've made my career
researching the world of sports.
My first book was Gold Medal Physics,
which focused on a lot of Olympic sports.
And my second book,
developed out of a love I head of
K.
My family got into Martial arts and we
were doing Karate, and then I started doing
Crop
Thought this is really cool and wanted to
honor my instructor by writing a book on
it, and that's what I did. So Cr
Mag in Israeli, Martial Arts system. It was
developed in the thirties
by Lich field to
combat what was happening during some of the
programs against Jews in Brat,
and
the
fighting is much more up close.
Doesn't rely on the elegant caught that you
might be practicing in Karate,
a lot of knife gun, terrorist
situations, you know, things like that.
But it was just... It was something fun
to do at night and try to stay
in shape a little bit.
When you're doing here, are you're thinking about
the physics of it yourself?
Absolutely.
When I was
in Martial arts class, my instructor who has
a great intuitive physics, and I think people
in general have a good to of physics,
would be talking about the effectiveness of some
move, and I... Of course, my mind's is
going to, well, of course, the torque gonna
be enhanced by this added lever arm and
we're gonna get this greater rotation speed. And,
I mean, all these thoughts are going through
my head, and then I would ask my
instructor
about some of these ideas and and keep
the jargon at a minimum, and and it
was a good partnership, it was a really
good way to
and make the
practice of Cro Guy even more fun just
by doing the the science part of it?
It's more fun, but do you think it
makes you a better marshall after As well,
that's that's the tough question to answer because
I can't hop in the parallel universe and
go through this without a physics knowledge.
But I I mean, certainly knowledge is power,
and and I'm, you know, only the billionth
person to utter that phrase probably.
But the
idea that you have some
intuitive
understanding of the physics behind a given technique.
I think
pushes your mind into when you're practicing,
you know, I need to get my arm
a certain way or my stance in a
certain way
based on this physics idea. And if you're
thinking along those lines, it doesn't seem as
random.
That you know, if you don't have the
science background. You know, if the instructor says
stand this way or turn your body a
certain way. That might seem a little more
random than actually understand why that's effective.
Is that the sort of the idea behind
your gold medal physics? Are you're hoping that
athletes will read it and become better or...
Well,
certainly, if athletes or trainers
could read it who helped the athletes,
anybody who wants to read it and have
an eye on what's going on in the
Olympics or really any sport
and
have that added little bit of physics
inside the head, it might help them
appreciate what's going on in the sport.
And frankly, they'll start seeing some of these
physics ideas in
everyday life. It's not just the sports road
We're all constrained by the laws of physics.
It's not just the athletes.
So, you know, the next time you have
to change a tire and you've got a
big old lug wrench out. You think, well,
gosh. There's this big lever arm here. I
need a lot of torque. I mean, That's
why you're not using a screwdriver to get
the
they get the bolts off your tire there.
Yeah. Absolutely. Okay. So I I wanna delve
into the... Some of the physics. Have some
of the sports, but I'm a massive football
firm. Right? Mh. Soccer Sure.
But the euros have... Are starting today is
we're recording this. Euro 20 24, which is
AAA tournament of... Or European countries is competing
in football for those who don't know. Soccer,
for those who really don't know and
tell me about the physics of curving a
football. Sure. I mean, 1 of my main
research areas is the aerodynamic of those world
cup
football and also
other,
balls used in tournaments.
But the idea is
if you can get some
if you're back and you're going out for
a, you know, a long
free kick, let's say, and you
kick the ball off center a little bit.
You can get the ball to have a
lot of spin and perhaps a lot of
side spin.
And
that side's bin whips the air
off the back of the ball in an
asymmetric way. It doesn't come off straight off
the back of the ball. It whips it
off to the back and the side,
and
Newton third law tells us if the ball's
go whip the air in 1 direction, well
the air gotta be pushing the ball in
the opposite direction, and that's what gives it
this lateral
force to cause it to start curving.
So if you watch
a lot of football matches, and you see
these great corner kicks,
you know, they will sometimes
pick the ball with a lot of sides
spin and bring the ball curving in toward
the goal plane.
And hopefully, a teammate can get up and
out jump the competitors
and get a nice header into the goal
or something like that.
But it's much like if you look out
the back of a boat, and
the rudder turns
sideways to make the boat turn, that causes
the wake of the water behind the boat
to shift in 1 direction.
And that asymmetric shifting
is what causes the boat to move in
the other direction. Football or soccer fans who
remember the 20 10 world cup, will be
aware of the Jab ball made by Ada
adidas at the time. It caused much controversy
among the football community and even made enough
gl on the Physics World website
about the physics of the ball, When hit
with any kind of force the ball dipped
and moved in a way that seemed to
defy the laws of physics. Of course, it
didn't and we'll come to that shortly. But
famously, Brazil's goalkeeper at the time, Julio essays
are, described the ball as horrible and like
the sort of ball that you buy. From
a supermarket. Starting in 20 10,
I partnered with a couple of colleagues in
Japan,
and we
we're studying the aerodynamics of the Jab ball,
and we were actually the group that figured
out why that was a bad ball.
It turned out the
so called drag crisis as it's called when
you look in the wind tunnels and you
get these,
coefficient of drag associated with the increasing win
speed. And what happens is is the speed
goes up, the
drag coefficient actually starts to drop.
And this is up
coefficient that appears in the drag force.
The force itself goes up, but there's a
little dip in this coefficient. Well, the 1
for the Jab Was at too high speed.
And this
drag crisis is where the transition of airflow
over the ball changes from a high speed,
which we call turbulent flow, to a low
speed, we call lam flow, and the separation
of the air off the back of the
ball changes.
And
that's... Was it at too high speed in
the
20 10 ball by a 20 14 when
Brazil came along for Brazil that got fixed.
And all the balls that have been used
since
have been fixed.
How have they been fixed? What what's actually
happened to them to make? So it turns
out
when you make a ball rough, you can
actually make it more aerodynamic,
and that may seem counterintuitive
to many people.
The rough ness actually helps delay the separation
of this so called boundary layer off the
ball. And if you're trying to understand a
boundary layer, if anybody's ever had fan,
it's like a ceiling fan or a box
fan,
you know if it's real dusty, you're not
gonna get it clean by turning the fan
on very high.
Because the air that's flowing over the fin
does not actually penetrate in where that dust
is. It won't get your fan clean. You
actually have to do a little labor there.
And the air that's going around the ball.
There's a little cushion of air that very
low speed air next to the ball.
And the air will separate off the back
of the ball.
And, of course, if it's spinning, it could
do this in in a sideways fashion,
But if you make the ball a little
bit rough, you can change where this transition
from lam to turbulent
takes place.
And
this
rough comes about from the seams
and the text on the panels
and the number of panels that you have
with Jab, you had 8 panels,
and this was a drop from the team
guy that was used in Germany in 2006
where you had 14 panels.
And when you keep producing the number of
panels, you're getting close to something like a
beach ball, and you don't want it too
smooth, so then you have start putting these
artificial textures on there.
The balls that are being used now, like,
for the recent world cups,
they're using for the euros. They now use
these,
d or these so called dimples and and
pimple structures, you know, they'll have little indentation
in ball on the panels,
and the different shapes. And the idea is
as crazy looking as some of the panels
are and the text
you're trying to get it effectively the same
level of rough that players have used with
other balls
so that the aerodynamic
profiles look the same as what they've used
the past. I've tickets for the Olympics, The
the the tickets that I have are for
the final of the women's
football, which I'm very excited to. Fantastic. I'll
be watching the ball with with great interest,
but there are plenty of other sports. I
love the track and field events.
You know, I certainly love the high jump.
I love the long jump.
You know, I wrote about Bob Be famous
jump in night 18 68 in Mexico city.
But
the the idea that
the same laws of physics
apply to everything.
No 1...
You know, when you hear
sports caster, will sometimes say, you know,
defied gravity or, you know, did something to
violate the laws of physics.
We know what that means. But, of course,
gravity wasn't really defied and the laws weren't
really broken.
What's happening is human beings are getting to
a point where they're just pushing that envelope
right up to the edge,
of what a human can do within the
constrain laws of physics.
So
take the hijack, for example, somebody that's gonna
go up
and jump over a bar.
Course Dick Fa showed us the right way
to do this in in also in 68.
To turn the body in such a way
that actually the center mass of the body
when it's con t over that bar is
actually slightly below the bar.
It's kinda like, you know, you think about
a doughnut being,
round with a hole in the middle and
the center mass of the doughnut is actually
in that empty space in the hole.
You cut the doughnut in half, the center
mass moves up a little bit, but it's
still in the empty space. So
you put the body over the bar and
you get the center mass moving below the
bar. Well the reason you're doing that is
when the person is done all this training
and dieting and all this exercise and all
these
technologies that might be helping in the training,
takes that run toward the bar and jumps.
Once that person leaves
that,
you know, terra firm. Once the person's off
the ground,
the laws of physics are gonna say that
person center mass is only gonna go so
high.
And the question is what can the person
do with his or her body
to make that in such a way that
well, let's get center mass under the bar,
but maybe our body can go over the
bar.
So
in the old days when you tried to
jump you know, kind of a scissors style
or, you know, certainly if you try to
jump over something with your feet
going over the bar,
your center mass will be way above the
bar. That would have required a lot more
launch speed, a lot more energy at the
jump
and,
you know, a human maybe just can't do
that.
Go to the,
hundred meters. You know, we talk about the
hundred meters is the fastest human race
when... Certainly when the men do it.
The 200 meters
the world record time is less than twice
the time for the hundred meters. So the
average speeds is faster in the 200 meters.
But, of course, they're running the full hundred
meters the second time after they've done the
first hundred meters. I mean, they're not starting
in a block for the second time.
But the the hundred meters Sprint,
when you imagine the,
you know, the top athletes who've done this
like you saying bolt, same bolt was 6
foot 5.
And when he set the record in 20
12, he only needed 41 steps,
the person who got the silver needed 45.
I mean, and and was 5 foot 11.
So
the longer strides, the fewer number of steps,
the less energy needed by having to execute
so many steps.
The 1 disadvantage someone tall has
comes from this lovely law of biometric scaling.
We call it.
So think of the animals that can move
really, really fast with top speeds.
They're big animals, You know, they're big, you
know, the c is and and, you know,
other big game cats or something, the greyhound,
these big animals, big dogs, big cats that
can hit a very large top speed, but
they're not very good on acceleration. Because there's
a lot of mass to move who's really
good on acceleration or the small animals, You
know, a little Chihuahua moving back and forth
can change its direction in motion very quickly.
Bugs, you know, you look at bugs they
can... They meant... You know, an ants not
gonna move very fast across, you know, the
concrete, but it's gonna turn very quickly and
accelerate quickly.
Look at the smaller athletes when they're coming
out of the blocks in the hundred meter
sprint.
They often get ahead first.
And then it's the taller athletes
that will eventually catch up. So there's this
lovely
interplay by who's gonna optimize
one's given advantage. Does the smaller athlete with
the better acceleration at the beginning, get enough
of a head start to win
or does the taller athletes greater top speed
overcome the
acceleration disadvantage and get to the finish line?
So it's a lovely thing for for me
to watch, you know, to see the different...
I mean, I pay attention to their heights.
I wanna know, you know, who's likely to
come out of the blocks first.
That's, Brilliant. I I mean, I love that
race anyway, but that's I, you know, something
else to it for me. Because they're in
a similar kind of advantage disadvantage thing with
long distance run? Well, certainly,
when you look at the long distance runners,
I mean, they're thin.
When you've gotta go 5000 meters, 10000 meters,
you know, whatever the length of the races,
you do not wanna have to haul a
lot of mass
on a lot of
distance.
You know, 1 of my other big research
areas is tour d France modeling, and I
love to model the cyclists
and
you're never gonna see 1 of the big
sprinter
winning the Tour France.
Because they they can't survive in the mountains.
It's the little guys that will, you know,
win by going up mountains, they don't have
as much mass to haul up and tell
the, you know, the alps and p.
It it's the same way with long distance
running. I mean, you're not gonna seize some
big muscle bound athlete
who's got a whole a lot of mass
winning any kind of long distance race. It's
gonna be the smaller athletes, the the slider
athletes.
And the techniques are really good. You know,
and we've now developed technologies the to help
train athletes
that use virtual reality
that use as artificial intelligence
that can build entire
you know, sporting arenas inside of what they
see in a virtual reality helmet
that we can scan athletes when they're running,
we can put kind of these various markers
on them and actually do some wonderful analysis
to help them
prevent injuries when they're running to make sure
the technique is right. They've got the right
hip rock rocking
motion back and forth.
And by putting in the laws of physics
with a whole lot of data,
it can help tell them what optimal way
of running
reduces the amount of energy that they need
to use,
keeps them fresher toward the end of the
race,
maybe helps reduce air resistance a tiny bit.
All of these little things can be done
now with the help of of scientific training
and and engineers and other, you know,
science minded people that could help with the
training. Just to go back to the high
jump and things. Is that is that a
similar idea with the dive and the diving
discipline?
Well, certainly, when the body is above the
ground,
the center mass of the body is essentially
following a fairly smooth curve.
And what the body does around that curve
is the fun part.
So when you're looking at diving,
there's a law and the dive that you
can't initiate the spin
off the board.
So
try to imagine you jump off a diving
board platform. And
now you gotta start turning.
And how are you gonna do this when
you've only got, you know, a couple of
seconds, max
depending on the height of the dive
above the water.
Well, first of all, you're you wanna enter
the water with your head down. Your head's
not gonna be down when you're leaving the
board.
So you're at least gonna have to turn
that much. And if you wanna turn a
lot,
you gotta get into a little tight ball.
So they will you will sometimes see the
diver will put an arm up over the
head,
and that rotational motion
to conserve angular momentum. This beautiful law of
physics that we used to study atoms and
in quantum mechanics class, and we go study
galaxies when we're doing astro physics to in
between that is the, you know, the diver,
let's say.
And
you got the arm going up, initiating a
certain rotation. Well, the body has to compensate
with a rotation in another direction.
And all the various ways in which the
arms are moving can induce these various twists.
And when the torso comes down,
this is just exactly what's happening with a
long jumper.
When the long jumper jumps,
center mass might be a meter off the
ground,
but what you'll notice when they land, the
center mass is much lower.
Well, that means they've extended their time in
the air. So how do you do that?
You want the legs to go up. The
way you make the legs go up is
you pull the torso
forward, which causes the legs to go up,
the rotations are in opposite directions.
It's a... Takes an enormous amount of core
strength. I mean, it's not just you know,
hey, you know, move your torso down. An
enormous amount of core strength to do this,
we'll pull the legs up. And diving,
The same thing happens when you pull the
torso down, the legs will come up, and
you can get in that tight ball, that
nice tight tuck position.
And if you've ever seen ice skater, you
know in the final spin,
they'll have both arms out, They'll have 1
leg off the ice.
Fully out as much mass as you can
away from that center spin axis. And when
they're ready to spin fast,
They bring all this mass close to the
spin axis, they reduce what's called their moment
of inertia, and their angular rotation rate skyrocket.
Same thing with the diver. Once all the
mask comes in,
they start spinning faster,
and they can get a few
spins in before,
Now they need to get ready to enter
the water, they need to slow that spin
down. Well the way they do it is,
they elon, they get their mass. Way away
from the rotation axis. That slows them down,
and now they can enter the water
with very little splash hopefully.
They're doing these things
because that's the way you move like that,
But it's it's just so happens that it's
also aesthetically useful for them to do those
things. And that's where they get the most.
That's exactly right. And, you know, of course,
if you're doing the hundred meter
Sprint,
there's no
subject
involved. I mean... There's no judge. You're just...
Who can go from point a to point
b in the fastest time.
When you're talking about diving,
and some of the other events where there
are judges,
I like to think of it as the
best command of the physics is gonna get
the best score.
So
when you see someone with a really tight
tuck and a good spiral. And now all
that's coming from a lot of training and
strength conditioning flexibility and all the right things
that are going into the training.
But whenever they enter the water,
and they've got that low cross sectional area
going into the water, reducing the amount of
splash.
I mean, I'm just thinking physics physics physics
the whole time. And it really at least
for me enhances the beauty of what I'm
seeing. Now I have to admit the first
time I watch the event, I'm in all
of what the athletes are doing. But when
I replay it in my head, it it
really is the physics that's coming in. I
mean, I I think like everybody else I'm
amazed at when the athletes are doing.
I mean, they're performing at the pinnacle or
their Met, and I am just
a guy watching it who
could only dream of doing what they're doing.
I mean, just, you know, to be in
that kind of excellent physical condition
And the mental condition too to be able
to focus,
have the task in in at hand to
be able to acute what's needed, you know,
to kinda go through that middle checklist of
what's coming up. I mean, you think about
the Gym,
who's headed toward the Pom horse or any
kind routine or, you know, getting ready to
get up on the balance being?
There's a routine in mind. How am I
gonna do the first thing? How many, you
know,
I've practiced this a thousand times, you know,
just kinda going through that mental checklist,
tuning out the crowd, tuning out what other
events might be going on.
Getting that laser focus for the event. I
mean there's a lot of mental as well
as physical,
and then putting it all together, you know,
it's just dazzling to watch. You have your
physics insight, but you have the martial arts
insight as well? Do you watch the martial
arts in the Olympics particularly? III have.
You know, it's it's
funny when the 20 12
Olympics in London, when when bolt won his
race,
if you pay attention, there was a
a green bottle that got thrown
behind the athletes right as the gun was
going off to start the final.
And Edith Bosch
was the Bronze medal in J.
And she kinda
laid into the guy who threw the bottle
and and they arrested him and, you know,
yank him out of the stands, but I
like to see the J come into play
during the sprint.
But, absolutely, when you're, you know, watching the
J or the Tae,
I mean Judah is about leverage, and where
is your center mass? And if you're gonna
do a throw,
do you, you know,
your your goal is to disrupt the balance
of your opponent. You know, you wanna get
your opponents. I mean, we all learn this
before we learn to walk.
You know, you know if you take a
step, your center mass is moving forward and
you're about ready to rotate and fall. And
you may not be thinking center mass and
place the laws of physics when you're a
year old. But this intuit
intuition gets
in and instilled in us at a very
early age,
And when it comes to Martial Arts with
something like J,
you're gonna start grappling at the uniform, you're
gonna be pulling, you're gonna do something to
try to maybe kick out a leg, do
something to disrupt that balance
and get the opponent on the mask. You've
got more time when you're watching the the
the the martial arts things. Are you thinking
more about the physics in the moment there
when you're watching? Probably in the time when...
You don't see, like, a lot of action
happening. Like,
you... You you see the 2 combat trying
to...
Get an advantage over the other. So, like,
before the big throw happens or Tae, like,
before a big kick to the face happens
or some you know, when they're trying to
set something up, definitely, the the physics is
creeping into my mind that, you know, oh,
it looks like
you know, the 1 on the right is
trying to get the 1 on the left,
you know, it
keeps going after that left leg or something...
You know,
you know, you can see that they picked
out a vulnerable spot and they're trying to
execute a good move on that side or
or whatever.
Because that's where those center mass is gonna
be suffering an imbalance, You know, the the
stance isn't gonna be wide enough or something.
And... Yeah, Definitely the physics is creeping in
there. Just think you some other sports in
the Olympics. I... How about boxing?
The
ability to keep 1 protected
when someone else is is hitting you. Now,
of course, you think about why are they
wearing boxing gloves.
And anybody that has a car or an
automobile knows, there's an airbag.
And
if you ever have an accident, the airbags
going to extend your collision time.
That's the whole goal of it. Because that's
way better than hitting
the steering wheel or a windshield and having
a very tiny collision time. Because that's gonna
require a huge stopping force, perhaps a fatal
1.
When you're looking at something like boxing
with the gloves,
those pads will extend the collision time and
reduce the force on the player.
And I always like to
look at something like boxing and if someone
gets a really good, like a good right
cross in or something and and makes contact
with the head,
Well, I'm always thinking of good old Isaac
Newton from from your country there.
Third law says, you know,
that person's cheek felt the same force that
the person's glove hand felt.
So, you know, they each hit each other
with the same force.
But,
of course, when you're in a glove hand,
you're not gonna feel as much pain as
when it hits your cheek even if you've
got a a pad at helmet on.
So where are they attacking, you know, when
the the arms drop or something like that
or the guard goes down? It's just interesting
to see what the tactics are in the
boxer.
But, of course, you've also got some new
sports.
I mean, the
the new sport braking, you know, the break
dancing
is gonna be 1 of the new ones,
which
you know, obviously, came out of the the
Hip hop culture.
A lot of that was over here too
in the Us. But
you know, you're gonna have a lot of
judging that goes on that. And there's a
lot of great physics in the the break
dancing. I mean, you've got
you know, when they go down, it's much
like an ice skater with the spin. I
mean, when they wanna go and spin,
you know, mass has to move toward the
center.
When you see people doing kicks in Tae.
If you wanna rotate quickly,
Matt, your arms have to come in.
So any kind of
sport where the athletes gotta rotate and rotate
quickly. You're gonna see, you know, mass moving
inward to make the rotation speed go up.
So, I mean,
I'd be curious to see what the swimmers
are like when they're in the thin,
you know, hopefully, the weather will allow it.
I know there's been some recent worries about,
you know, swimming in the river there, But
I I hope it will will play out
that they can swim in the sun. The
purpose of the legs
kicking, of course, is to keep the body
somewhat parallel to the surface of the water.
Because you're really wanting to reduce air drag.
I mean, water is, like, 800 times denser
than air.
So there's an enormous amount of drag there
that you may not need to worry about,
if you're a marathon runner, let's say.
But the person who's swimming
is
has a certain number of strokes in mind,
how they do the execute the turn
all these things that come into play lead
to, you know, tents or hundreds of seconds
difference between a metal and not metal and
all. Brilliant. I well, I hope the people
listing will find that, this conversation and, ideally
your books will,
enlighten the
watching the. Well, and as they watch the
Olympics, I mean, there's all kinds of biometric
data they're gonna see. I mean, you know,
it's... You talk about watching football. I mean,
now we can...
See how far they run during the match,
we can... You know, if if they were
wearing certain monitors, maybe their heart rates. You
that the teams actually can monitor these things.
Whenever it comes to the
use of Ai and the recreation of the
kind of worth virtual reality scenes that you
might see.
All these types of things are gonna be
seen much more when people are watching sports
into the future. Virtual So what do you
mean by the Ai
representation representations for? Well, like, whenever you're watching
the euros
and you're... You gotta... Close call on saying
off sides. So on the body, there are
29 points on the... Each 1 of the
football players body that are being monitored,
and then you have these 14 cameras that
are gonna be wide field down onto the
the pitch,
and the players are gonna be
reconstructed in this reality setting where you can
actually see, you know, does the elbow cross
this magic plane? You know, is there an
off sides call, and it's gonna be much
faster.
During the euros now that it's been in
the past. I think the past averages or
something like 70 seconds, and it might be
down to half a minute or something. Now,
But when the fans see a replay of
it, they'll see a kind of a this
virtual reality and with the help of Ai
will be reconstruct kinda of what the 3
dimensional image of the players involved, and the
plane and where it is and where the
ball is,
the goal plane, perhaps if you look and
a goal call.
But a lot of the all sites calls,
they'll actually get to see, you know, these
reconstruct player images you know, where someone's elbow
or knee or whatever puncture that plane and
it leads to a certain all sides call.
Maybe have you read or what ready player
1. I have not.
No. Okay. I just the thought that came
to my head.
And if they can recreate
at what's happening in a football match that
quickly in Ai. It doesn't seem like we're
too many years away from sort of you
know, being in being able to put on
virtual reality goggles and be part of a
football match that's happened.
Well, and that's actually been
suggested that at at home, you could have
the whole virtual reality
pitch in front of you with the players
running around it you know, in 1 of
these what you might think of now is,
like, a sci f f movie watching the
little Hologram Mu. But that's not that far
away.
And
there been suggestions that the referee might even
wear these contacts, these smart contacts that will
allow them to have
information updating on the contact, you know, that
can give them better looks at what's happening
on the plays and stuff.
We have... We're not quite to the point
yet. Where every 1 of the players is
wearing a body cam, but, I mean, you're
gonna be getting views
from players eventually. Is there a particular
game or match of any sport that, you
know, if you could do that and watch
something that's happened in the past in that
way that you would Well, I'm sure anybody
in England would like to go back to
19 86 and look at that hand of
God goal.
Although, I think even the technology back then
was good enough to see the hand on
the ball.
It's just, you know, things happen fast and
the roof we're not in the best spot
on the pitch to see it and things
like that were you know, unable... And of
course, the rules didn't exist to go back
and, you know, look at replay and all
that
But as far as, you know, and Anna
I know that there was some controversy in
66 when England and and was Germany, an
interesting goal called there that I think some
were questioning.
But the,
you know, the past of events would... I
mean it'd be fascinating to go back and
look at, you know, some of the old...
I mean, I grew up as a big
fan of baseball.
And I, you know, would be fascinated to
see, like, did Babe ruth call is shot
in 19 32. And, you know,
when
Thompson hit the home run and fifth 1,
you know, was he getting a signal from
the out field, You know, could technology get
picked up on things like that. Like, you
know, they were able to do recently with
the Houston Astro?
Yeah. I take Just to go back to
Mara. I think... I I've always kind of
understood a little bit how the hand happened
because you know, human error and everything. What
I don't understand is how he managed to
run dr through all of those plays for
the other goal. He was... Yeah. I mean,
when he went through the whole length of
the pitch and just you know, past this.
I mean,
you know, you just wonder where the defense
will.
Yeah Yeah yeah. I'll things... Well, maybe physics
can explain that to me. Maybe Ai and
physics can combine and explain that to me.
But maybe I don't want it to. Maybe
that's just 1 of the magical things about
spoke Well, and, you know, there are the
the P who
don't wanna see all of that on the
screen. I mean, it
I grew up as as I said as
a huge fan of baseball, and it's really
hard for me to watch baseball games now
with that
rectangle
over the plate to show the strike zone.
I would much prefer that not that did
there'd be nothing on the screen because I
grew up wanting to see the little nuance
of where the catcher was sitting and you
know, was there any interplay between the catcher
and the batter where the glove was. And,
you know, when the ball's going over the
plate, I kinda like to look at it
for my own view. I don't wanna see
a little circle appear with a number telling
me the speed and a slider. There's just...
It... It's too much on the screen.
But if you grow up watching it that
way,
you're just used to it, and of course,
you're, you know, the more of the better
or something.
Now physicists don't only get pleasure from analyzing
sport, but by doing it, and it can
play an important role in well being
in a career in physics which can, as
I'm sure many of you know be somewhat
challenging at times. From what John Eric Go
has been telling us you might imagine that
someone with a really good knowledge of physics
might be able to become an even better
athlete.
Without getting into the complications of c coordination
and correlation. Here's Jenny Hoffman. I'm a professor
of Physics at Harvard University.
And I am interested in quantum materials, so
I build microscopes
scanning probe microscopes
to image what's going on inside quantum materials
at the atomic scale to look at how
the electrons are interacting with each other.
And what that means about the microscopic properties
of the materials that could be useful. We're
working with scanning probe microscopes, which is the
sort of a genre that exists and 1
can buy
commercial scanning telling microscopes and and atomic force
microscopes.
But we're was trying to push the limits,
gets the lowest possible temperature, the highest possible
field, the finest possible resolution,
and
go where of commercial entities haven't been able
to go yet. My hope is that by
imaging these materials that the time scale, we
can get a better understanding of how they
work and potentially have better knowledge for creating
new materials that can push the the limits
of utility. What attracted you to this area
of physics? I
really enjoy
imagery, and I think that being a my
is a good way to
blend
an interest in art and imagery with an
interest in science, and I always say that
in another life, I might be an architect.
Where you put the art first, and then
you have to do the science to make
the art stand up.
And in this life, I'm a
where I do the science first, but I
get to look at beautiful images. Under scanning
probe microscopes?
When did those love sort of move in
the direction of being physics rather than the
other 2?
I think I always knew that I wanted
to be a scientist.
I've always enjoyed solving quantitative problems.
It's it's very clean. It's very satisfying.
And
I feel very lucky that I stumbled into
a my microscopy lab and graduate school because
I hadn't
really understood how much I would enjoy that
connection. So there was not
not a process of long term planning, oh,
how can I intersect these 2 interests I
just feel very lucky that I stumbled into
the right lab and had a great adviser?
I think we all want to make an
impact, and I think, you know, 1 of
the really tricky things is figuring out where
we can make the impact.
And I
admit I'm still struggling to figure out whether
the greatest impact is in teaching the students
or in discovering new super connector, which is
a
high risk, low probability
event. Or being 1 of the army of
ants all over the world that's searching for
the next super connector that's really gonna have
an impact.
And so I think it's
helpful to have a mix of things. I
think when you work with students,
you know that the time that you put
in is gonna pay off. There's not the
same element of luck. And when you're searching
for a transformative new material, you do the
hard work,
but
not everyone is gonna get lucky, not
we don't know where the the big discovery
is gonna happen. So I try to think
about a balance of
doing things on a daily basis that are
impactful to the people around me and then
still laying the groundwork and having the hope
that I might make the transformative discovery that
changes the world on a larger scale. Jenny
also set a world record.
For the fastest time on foot from 1
coast of the United States of America to
the other. Leaving Los Angeles in the early
hours of September the sixteenth 20 23,
after traversing the whole of the country in
that record time. Jenny finally put her toes
into the Atlantic Ocean at Coney Island, New
York. My first question of course,
was why?
I love running.
I love running because it's a good foil
for physics. It's an area of my life
where I can just turn my brain off.
And
work hard without
the stress of decision making. I know that
all I have to do is put 1
foot in front of the other.
And
I think that in my career as a
physicist,
it's... You know, when you're young and you
look at science, you think, oh, it's all
right and wrong. It's all merit.
It's all just how hard you work. And
then you enter the real world and you
realize, well, there's a anonymous peer reviews and
there's
politics,
and
there's humans making decisions.
And I find this stressful. And
running is a good foil for that because
in running...
Sure there's an element of luck you might
get injured or not.
But
there's also
maybe some more control, but if you run
the fast time, nobody can take that away
from you, no anonymous peer reviewer can take
that away from you.
So I think in that sense running is
a good foil for physics.
I guess another thing is that I'm always
driven, maybe
maybe it's almost a comp to do the
hardest thing in front of me.
And for me, going to graduate school in
physics and being
1 of only 2 women in a class
of 40 graduate students. You know, that was
a hard thing. And,
And and so in many areas of my
life, I'm driven to do the hard thing.
And I've
enjoyed and I'll been driven to run longer
and longer distances, and
I think that running across my country is
the the pinnacle of that. It's something that
I've dreamed about
in some way or another since I was
a child When I was a child I
thought I would bike across the Us. And
and as I
became more of a distance runner,
The idea occurred that I could actually run
across the country, and I've dreamed about that
for years.
And I... I've tried several times actually. I
tried in 20 19, and I made it
almost all the way and suffered a heartbreaking
knee injury.
When I was almost 90 percent of the
way there and well under world record pace
at that time, and then my run just
came to an end.
After 20... Almost 2600 miles. I went home
in a truck.
So...
And and then I drink kept just kept
dreaming about it throughout the pandemic,
and
until I got another spa,
and I was actually all trained and ready
to go in 20 22.
And then, again, got injured right before I
started. So negotiated with my dean who was
very kind and allowed me postpone postponed that
sa vatican
and did on my training again and
started in 20 23. And on the third
try, the luck was with Probably it's a
very silly question about how did you do
it the fastest? 1 of the really important
factors in this all was teamwork that I
certainly could not have done this alone and
as I was running, I was being crude
by,
friends who helps provide my nutrition, my water,
my food, my place to sleep, my map
my communications, my everything.
And in some sense, I was a child
for
48 days. I relied on these friends to
do everything to take care of me so
that all I had to focus on was
putting 1 foot in front of the other,
and that was a real blessing.
That this group of women came together to
help me to do that. No, I really
don't want to draw comparisons that aren't there,
but,
but is there something in that way you
know, physics, science can feel quite solitary at
times, but it is always a team sport
in the same way as... Because you described
your run. Yeah. I... Well, I guess I
would emphasize
how in both cases
the teamwork is so crucial for the success.
And
In both areas of my life right now,
I have achieved some success and visibility,
and, you know, I'm maybe the
the the front,
the the visible
person who's succeeded in both operation of my
lab and in my Trans con run.
But
I I really wanna emphasize how important the
team is and how grateful I am to
my graduate students who work so well together
and kept the lab moving while I was
gone and continue to write and solve problems.
And
and also,
the team who helped me across the country
did so much work behind the scenes,
cleaning things and shopping and
finding their ways around unexpected d chores. And
and so there's some guilt there that, you
know, I get the sort of here I
am talking to you. I get the the
publicity for all of this and really,
I'm so reliant on the team.
And I think that some of the lessons
that I've learned in about teamwork and in
the different areas have helped
both areas. I think it's really important to
express get... Gratitude frequently and express praise frequently,
and to
help people feel like a team
and and make it clear that
I'm
also rooting for their future success.
Jenny ran the 3032
miles in 47 days 12 hours and 35
minutes, averaging about a hundred kilometers a day,
shaving around a week off the previous world
record.
That's 47 and a half days of running.
12 states, 27 corn fields,
11 pairs of shoes
and I'm told 300 eggs, countless cookies
and a huge amount of laughter, and perhaps
even more tiers.
Jenny says it's just a case of putting
1 foot in front of the other, but
of course, at times,
the world has other ideas. I did
see a mountain lion in the wee hours
of the morning in the Mountain Roads of
Colorado,
and was quite frightened,
and was lucky that a truck came by
at just the right time and the mountain
Lion s off into the woods. So I
do feel that I was quite lucky.
On a number of instances.
And people who have tried to run across
the country have been hit by cars or
have suffered
worse fates. So I'm... I'm very lucky that
I made it safely. You know, the first
time it didn't feel particularly lucky when I
made it 2600 miles, and then bombed out
with a knee injury on a sidewalk in
Cleveland. But on the other hand, I was
extremely lucky that I was able to have
surgery and rehab and come back and try
again. So you have a goal for the
physics side of your life, and you've achieved
something absolutely
extraordinary
in terms of your running, but what is
next for that side? Well,
on Friday, I'm flying to Wisconsin,
and I will be running for 24 hours
around an indoor track in Wisconsin.
There is
community of ultra runners
who compete at the 24 hour distance. The
idea is how far can you run
in 24 hours. And the clock just goes.
So, you know, if you take a potty
stop, the clock is still ticking. So it's
how how much distance can you cover in
this 24 hours.
And every odd, there's a world championship.
And I have been privileged to compete on
the Us team at 3 previous world championships.
Most recently,
in Taiwan in December 20 23 actually shortly
after I finished the Trans con run,
and it is just an amazing experience to
where your country's uniform and compete for your
country. So I am trying again to qualify
to be on the 20 25
Us team that will compete in the world
championships in A be France. Oh, that must
be amazing. That experience of the coming together
of the world in a celebration of sport
being part of that being part of that
village obviously, We've got the Olympics coming up
with the Olympic village
that must be an incredible experience.
It's phenomenal. And it's it's really phenomenal to
see the cam
between athletes and at in Taiwan, when I
was last competing for the Us. I spent
some time talking to the British athletes.
And the other athletes who spoke English and
you know, 1 of the really heartwarming things
there was we have the opening ceremony and
the teams march in in their uniforms.
And when
Ukraine came in,
the entire
auditor
stood up and gave Ukraine a standing ovation
and, you know, tears were streaming down our
faces. And there's really just something beautiful about
the international community coming together and, you know,
even people who didn't speak the delaying which
could really see and support each other.
And, actually, 2 of the Ukrainian athletes metal
at the world championship,
and
that feeling of
international comrade and support is just wonderful. How
far do you think you're run 24 hours
then? So my personal desk is a hundred
and 45 mile
the
international a standard for qualifying for the world
championships
is
220
kilometers, which translates to about a hundred and
37
miles. So I've met the international A standard
already. I have that qualifier for France. But
the Us is a big country with a
lot of strong women. And so probably
more than the 6
people. There's that each country can send, 6
women and 6 men, and probably, there will
be more than 6 women from the Us
who meet the A standard. So I need
to surpass that performance. So I would like
to set a P
of more than a hundred and 45 miles.
I think I'm fit, but 24 hours is
a really long time and a lot of
things can go wrong from minor injuries to
nutritional
problems to digestive problems. So, you know, every
race you show up and you just do
what you can. I'd like to thank Eric
and Jenny for talking to me for this
episode of the Physics World Stories podcast.
And with the
football or soccer championships of Euro 20 24
underway, and the Olympics to look forward to.
There really has an awful lot for other
sport lovers to enjoy in the coming weeks.
And while I know that not all of
you are physicists,
I wanted to leave you on this episode,
with a final thought from Jenny, which 4
physicists
is certainly true, But I think it will
chime for many of you in whatever walk
of life you're in. As I have spent
so much Time in my life advising students
on how to choose their own paths forward,
I think that having a pursuit outside of
physics or outside of science is really important.
And particularly, because
Science has a lot of ups and downs,
and some of it is based on hard
work and some of it is based on
luck and some of those are based on
the opinions of others. So having something whether
it's choir you in or a sport you
pursue
or a knit club is really important.
For long term well being. We'll be back
soon with something else from this wonderful world
of Physics and don't forget to register for
the first ever Physics World live, an online
panel discussion taking place on Tuesday the second
of July, where we'll be talking the special
guests, Nicole Meteor
and Mark Basin about the many applications of
quantum sensors. You can go to the Physics
World website to find out more and of
course, to sign up for that first ever
Physics World live. And until next month, thank
you very much for listening.