Winter sports offer a unique blend of adrenaline, skill, and precision. Among these, supine winter sports like luge and skeleton stand out for their thrilling speeds and the intense focus they demand. This article delves into the world of these sports, exploring their origins, techniques, and the science behind identifying and developing elite athletes.
Luge: The Art of Precision at Breakneck Speed
Luge is a winter racing sport that involves riding sleds down artificial tracks built with steep banks and inclines. Luge made its very first appearance at the Olympics back in 1964, and has remained ever-present since. Germany is the leading Nation in Olympic Luge in all events, including Men’s Singles, Doubles and Women’s Singles.
In Luge, athletes ride down an ice track on a sled, sliding down the course feet first, flat on their backs, after an initial start where they propel themselves forward from a seated position by pushing their hands against the ice. Luge involves individual races and two-man team races, with athletes required to use their shoulders, abdominal and thigh muscles to control the pace and direction of the sled.
A luge is a small one- or two-person sled on which one sleds supine (face-up) and feet-first. A luger begins seated, propelling themselves initially from handles on either side of the start ramp, then steers by using the calf muscles to flex the sled's runners or by exerting opposite shoulder pressure to the pod.
Lugers can reach speeds of over 140 km/h (87 mph; 39 m/s), and is the fastest of the three 'sliding' sports. The practical use of sleds is ancient and widespread.
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The main piece of equipment involved in a Luge race includes the racing sled. Athletes and their coaching teams have to keep their sleds in the best possible condition in order to stand a chance of winning a Luge competition. This includes making regular alterations to make the sled as aerodynamic as possible.
Protective clothing is required to run a Luge race, with all competitors wearing a helmet and visor in order to keep their head safe when racing around the track. A skin-tight rubber suit is also worn to improve aerodynamics, whilst spiked gloves are used so athletes can position themselves on the track at the starting line.
Professionals Luge athletes often train for over a decade in order to master the skills and techniques required in order to compete at the very top level (such as at the Olympics).
Scoring in Luge is calculated by counting the total time it takes for an athlete or team to complete a pre-determined number of “runs” (a “run” means completing the track from start to finish). All races are timed to a thousandth of a second. In Luge, the overall winner is determined over a series of runs. The number of runs permitted varies depending on the nature of the event.
Each athlete/team has their runs added together and the total time is calculated. In singles tournaments, all competing athletes are allowed to take four separate runs down the track. At the beginning of each run, the Luge sleds are weighed and examined by officials.
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This is to determine whether the sled falls line with rules and regulations. If the sled fails to meet these requirements, athletes riding will be disqualified.
A final check known as “sled control” is also conducted after all four runs have been completed to ensure no alterations have been made by teams or athletes.
Physical measurements of the sled are taken, and the temperature of the sled's steel blades is checked and may not be more than 5 °C (9 °F) above that of a previously established control temperature. Additionally, for artificial track races, the athlete must first be weighed.
Once an athlete is on their sled, they are audibly notified that the track is clear. At this point, a tone sounds and the athlete has thirty seconds to begin their run. A run becomes official when an athlete and their sled, in contact with each other, crosses the finish line.
Disqualifications may also take place for any violation of rules and regulations. The sport of luge requires an athlete to balance mental and physical fitness.
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The discipline then spread to northern Europe and Switzerland, and in 1883 Davos held the first official race, in which 21 athletes took part. When we talk about lugeing, we immediately think of what is played on the artificial slope, also called a run.
Speed is what makes the difference in lugeing competitions that are nothing more than races against the chronometer: in fact, those who drive the track in the shortest possible time win. In individual competitions, athletes start from a sitting position on top of a ramp.
It is interesting to note that the temperature of the blades is also precisely regulated: the skates cannot be heated because this reduces the friction of the blades on the ice. The sledding also features two handles that keep athletes tightened during the descent.
Luge at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics
Skeleton: Headfirst into the Abyss
The Skeletal System | Sport Science Hub: Physiology Fundamentals | No Music
Skeleton is an extreme Winter Olympic sport where drivers navigate a frozen track travelling head-first on a carbon-fibre sled, using only minor adjustments of their upper torso and toes to steer. These runs typically last for 50-70 seconds with drivers achieving velocities of up to 130 km/h and experiencing anywhere between 5g-8g during turns. Everything about the sport is individualised to maximise the velocity at which the athlete-sled system can travel down the track.
It’s one of the most exhilarating sports in the world and one of the most fascinating with respect to finding champions. Since it’s re-introduction as an Olympic discipline in 2002 five countries have emerged as dominant in the sport, accounting for 90% of the total medal tally. Of particular interest is the performance of Team GB. How does a country with no snow and no ice-track have so much success? How have they grown and sustained such excellence in a sport that does not lend itself to the geography and topography of the nation?
Skeleton at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics
Skeleton is a fast winter sliding sport in which an individual person rides a small sled down a frozen track while lying face down, during which athletes experience forces up to 5g. Skeleton sleds are steered using torque provided by the head and shoulders.
Talent Identification in Skeleton
One of the most important roles that we as sports scientists and elite sport support specialists fulfil, is that of identifying and developing athletic potential. The sport of skeleton has benefited greatly from the finding and fostering of talent from other sports. In fact many Olympic level athletes have migrated from other sporting domains through national talent identification pathways, transitioning from novice to elite competitors in as little as 14 months.
This poses the question: how is this possible? Well the sport of skeleton is quite deterministic, meaning; we can largely predict what will result in high-level performance. In the case of skeleton, that includes: a fast push-start, lightning fast reactions, and someone who handles pressure excellently.
As such, national bodies of sport have invested in talent identification that generally align to the performance cycles of Olympiads or World Games. The aim is to search for athletes who already possess several of the key determinants of performance, and then build a world-class performer from this advantaged position.
The main component for a successful skeleton athlete is an exceptionally fast push-start. The push-start is where the athlete sprints in a semi-upright position and then positions themselves prone on the sled at the start of the race. This has a high correlation with maximal velocity achieved and subsequent performance and placing.
Colyer and colleagues [3] identified the key physical determinants of elite skeleton start performance as:
- Sprint ability
- Lower-limb power
- Strength-power characteristics
So for the talent identification programme, essentially, you need to find someone who is fast, powerful and agile.
Objective Assessment - Skeleton
These key determinants were included in a wider comprehensive testing battery in 2014 which included:
- Psychological Testing: Used to ensure the right mindset and approach to training, along with problem solving, team-work, and self-discipline skills among others.
- Sport Specific Memory Assessments: To test athletes innate ability for task-specific recall, they were provided with point of view videos of the track and were quizzed on their recall of particular turns and sections after one viewing.
- Anthropometric Assessment: An athlete’s physical dimensions and weight distribution is a key factor in the sport of skeleton. From two main perspectives, the ‘right shape’ optimises both aerodynamics (minimise air resistance) and weight distribution on the sled. When we consider the body and sled as a single system, the balancing of these two bodies is crucial to success.
- Sprint Ability: As velocity is probably the most crucial factor for sprint start success, a 40m sprint test with intermittent markers at 5m, 10m and 20m was used to assess performance. This was assessed using an infrared timing gates system and athletes were required to start in a three-point stance which mirrors the conditions of the skeleton one-handed start.
- Strength-Power Characteristics: As with any sprint activity, sustaining maximal power at as high a running cadence as possible is another key factor for the skeleton start. This was assessed using a 10 Second Wingate Test (cycle ergometer) using maximum wattage, the decline in wattage, and average rpm as key criteria.
- Lower-limb Power: Maximal power is a predictor of sprint ability. When we consider the added challenge in the sport of skeleton i.e. pushing the sled during the sprint, being as powerful as possible is paramount to performance. Using integrated force platforms the countermovement jump test (jump height) was used to assess lower limb power.
- Mobility: As athletes are required to sprint in a forward leaning position, posterior-related injuries are common. The supine straight leg raise test was used to identify athletes with good range of motion at the hip and as such with potential to engage in adapted sprint positions.
Challenges in Talent Identification
These types of national talent identification campaigns can yield great success but require a great deal of effort. Although we had access to some of the best emerging sport scientists in the UK, there were several issues experienced with delivering such a large testing battery to so many athletes in varying locations.
All of the above tests required access to a range of cumbersome and expensive technologies including: timing gates, cycle ergometers, force platforms, and goniometers among others. Each of these systems requires various levels of user-expertise and the resultant data was in different formats. As such, we were required to manually input the results into an online document that synchronised data at timed intervals throughout the day. Performance coaches and selectors had access to this information via UK Sport tablets. This was an inefficient process and given the task demands of athlete testing, data was usually updated retrospectively to the online sharing document at the end of the testing day.
Talent ID - The Process and the Future
Traditionally, lack of access to facility and testing equipment has meant that this process of talent identification has been exclusive to large sporting organisations such as NGOs or professional sports teams. From the “Power to Podium” programme to the NFL combine, performance testing batteries have become synonymous with best practice for athlete selection across a multitude of sports.
For the first time, every practitioner in every sport has the ability to use a ubiquitous research-grade system for objective talent identification and performance assessment.
Output provides many of the most translational assessments for athletic potential assessment. What’s important is to remember the key steps in the process:
- Consult the evidence: Understand what determines optimal performance in your sport, use an evidence based-approach and your own experience to make decisions.
- Misplaced Diamonds: Consider what other types of athlete may already possess several of these key factors.
- Cast a wide net: If you can, recruit generally and then hone in on your target group. Making the right choices at step one can mean the difference between Olympic Gold or non-competitor.
- Trust the data and your gut: Deliver objective assessments in a valid and reliable manner that best reflect the performance demands of your sport, but also apply your expertise as a practitioner. It’s a balanced decision making process.
- Find and Develop: Identifying the potential is only Step 1.