Physical Education · Ch 8 — Fundamentals of Kinesiology and Biomechanics in Sports
Introduction
Introduction
Watch a world-class sprinter such as Usain Bolt and a club runner side by side and, even without any training, you can see that something is different — Bolt's running looks light, relaxed and yet tremendously powerful. Why? Answering that question is exactly what this unit of the CBSE Class 11 Physical Education course is about. Unit 8, Fundamentals of Kinesiology and Biomechanics in Sports, gives you the scientific tools to describe a sporting movement precisely and then explain the forces behind it.
Every action in sport — a drive off the blocks, a smash, a throw, a jump — is at heart a problem of movement and force. Two closely linked sciences let us study it: kinesiology, the study of human movement itself, and biomechanics, the application of the laws of mechanics (forces, motion and levers) to the moving body. When analysts broke down Bolt's 100 m, they found measurable reasons for his speed: an average step length of about 2.44 m, a particular cadence, and a clever use of gravity and body rotation to fall forward into each stride. That is kinesiology and biomechanics at work.
A lifestyle of guesswork makes coaching unreliable. Understanding how the body moves and what makes it move is what turns coaching from guesswork into a science — the central promise of this unit.
What you will be able to do
By the end of this unit you should be able to:
- understand kinesiology and biomechanics and their application in sports;
- explain the biomechanical principles and their use in sports and physical education;
- illustrate the fundamental body movements and their basic patterns; and
- learn about the axes and planes and how they apply to body movements.
How this unit is organised
The unit follows the five topics of the Class 11 syllabus, each taught in its own section below:
- Definition and importance of kinesiology and biomechanics in sports — what the two sciences mean and why they matter (sections 8.1 and 8.2).
- Principles of biomechanics — the nine core biomechanical principles that apply to all human movement (section 8.3).
- Kinetics and kinematics in sports — the difference between describing motion and studying the forces that cause it (section 8.4).
- Types of body movements — flexion, extension, abduction, adduction, rotation, circumduction, supination and pronation (section 8.5).
- Axes and planes — the planes in which the body moves and the axes about which it turns (also section 8.5).