Abstract
The purpose of this study was to develop a methodology that quantifies the contributions of the racket-side upper limb joint
torques and shaft restoring torque to the generation of racket head speed during the badminton smash motion. The racket-side
upper limb was modelled as successive rigid segments, such as upper arm, forearm and hand segments. The racket shaft was
divided into a set of rigid segments connecting to its adjacent segments via virtual joints with rotational spring. The
contributions of the joint torque term, motion-dependent term, gravitational term, and shaft restoring torque term to the
generation of racket head speed were calculated from the equation of motion for the system consisting of racket-side upper limb
and racket. A new algorithm which converts motion dependent term into other terms was proposed to investigate the main
factor of the motion dependent term. The results showed that 1) the motion dependent term was the largest contributor to the
generation of head speed prior to the impact, and 2) the shaft restoring torque term was positive contributor to the generation of
motion dependent term over the forward swing period in the badminton smash motion.
© 2014 Authors. Published by ElsevierBY-NC-ND license.
Selection and peer-review under responsibilityofof the Centreforfor Sports Engineering Research, Sheffield HallamUniversity.
Keywords: Badminton Smash; Shaft Deformation; Dynamics Analysis; Dynamic Contribution