The Engineering Behind Sports

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“The New High-definition Video Scoreboard” by Scott Ableman is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

By: Henry Hung, Journalist

Sports are one of the most liked activities in the world. Some people play sports, some people watch sports. In the United States, over 154 million people watch sports. One in four adults play a sport, in their free time or professionally. All the people watching and playing sports use engineering in their lives every day.

In basketball, engineering can be as simple as the shot-clock, or as complex as the scoreboard. The scoreboard has a clock, with many simple machines inside. It also uses LED-lights, which can last longer than the normal lightbulb.

In hockey, the ice resurfacing machine that cleans and smoothens the ice, also uses engineering. First, the machine picks up the ice by scrapping the edge of the ice. It cleans ice by putting down water on the ice, which can clean any dirt or debris.

In baseball, the scoreboard is very similar to the basketball scoreboard. Instead, many ballparks still use old-school score boards that are ran by people. There are cards with different numbers that can be quickly changed.

Overall, many sports use engineering and simple machines to help make their sport easier and safer.

 

RELATED STORIES:

https://www.electro-mech.com/team-sports/category/scoreboards-technology/ 

https://www.exploratorium.edu/hockey/ice3.html#:~:text=The%20Zamboni%20is%20a%20mechanical,and%20dirt%20is%20then%20collected.

https://science.howstuffworks.com/zamboni2.htm

https://www.electro-mech.com/team-sports/basketball/digital-basketball-scoreboard-bringing-the-game-into-the-21st-century/