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The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin

Newsgroups sci.physics
From Sam Wormley <swormley1@gmail.com>
Subject The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin
Date 2015-09-13 16:48 -0500
Message-ID <ZIOdnUjaFtfZcmjInZ2dnUU7-VmdnZ2d@giganews.com> (permalink)

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The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin
> http://www.wired.com/2015/09/mind-bending-physics-tennis-balls-spin/

> It’s fairly easy to figure out what spin does: It wins tennis
> matches. How it works—or rather, how it’s created—on the other hand,
> is about as complicated a physics question you can set about solving
> without invoking subatomic particles. The variables include squishy
> balls, stiff racquets, taut strings, thrusting knees, twisting hips,
> swinging shoulders, and rotating elbows. But all those mechanics are
> made possible by a pair of equipment innovations.
>
> In order to generate spin, you have to brush your racquet up across
> the ball, rather than strike it dead on. The motion looks kind of
> like you are giving the ball a weird high five. Starting low, with
> the racquet at your waist, you bring it up and forward, twisting with
> your hips and elbow so the racquet’s head finishes high above your
> opposite shoulder.
>
> And that’s not all. “For a good topspin, you have to tilt the racquet
> at a good angle, too,” says Crawford Lindsey, head tester at the
> Tennis Warehouse University, a tennis testing website (with some
> seriously awesome studies). “You don’t present much face to the ball,
> because everything is slanted.”
>

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Thread

The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin Sam Wormley <swormley1@gmail.com> - 2015-09-13 16:48 -0500
  Re: The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin "reber g=emc^2" <herbertglazier0@gmail.com> - 2015-09-13 15:34 -0700
  Re: The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin jimp@specsol.spam.sux.com - 2015-09-13 23:46 +0000
    Re: The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin Sam Wormley <swormley1@gmail.com> - 2015-09-13 18:56 -0500
      Re: The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin jimp@specsol.spam.sux.com - 2015-09-14 00:33 +0000
        Re: The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin Sam Wormley <swormley1@gmail.com> - 2015-09-13 20:02 -0500
          Re: The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin jimp@specsol.spam.sux.com - 2015-09-14 02:20 +0000
  Re: The Mind-Bending Physics of a Tennis Ball's Spin emptypost@hotmail.com - 2015-09-13 21:24 -0700

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