Polymers in Sport and Leisure

Polymers in Sport and Leisure
For the more active, canvas tents are now a rarity with
some types also using fibre reinforced poles. The
reduction in weight, and hence convenience, is
considerable and the same is true for hikers’ rucksacks.
Gardening is not a sport but a very popular pastime which
uses vast quantities of polymers in pots, trays, netting,
sheeting, etc. Taking a leaf from the sports surface design
manual, rubber shred has been incorporated into lawns
and grass paths to reduce the effect of wear.
In-line skates use nylon in the chassis and hard
polyurethane wheels. One innovation replaces the
wheels with pneumatic rubber tyres for ‘off-road’ use.
Another design has a dual purpose with the wheels
being replacable by an ice skating blade (73).
Fishing rods are made from wound composites, and
polymers are also important for components of reels
and the line.
Going to the gymnasium to exercise rather than actually
taking part in a sport will not escape polymers as they
find application in covers, housings and other non
mechanical parts of treadmills and the like.
Sport is not only for completely able-bodied people.
The world record for the 100 m sprint by an amputee
athlete is only about 1 second behind the fastest
Olympic sprinters. This is made possible by prosthetic
limb technology involving carbon fibre composites.
There are also the supporting facilities that go with
sports. Flood lighting is essential at many sporting
events and incorporates polymers in lenses, cases, seals
and cables. Sports stadiums will use a considerable
volume of plastics in seating and even in the fabric of
the building. Last, and probably least, the security
passes at the Sydney Olympics made certain that no
athlete can be polymer-free.
11 Standards
The prime standards in sport are the rules laid down
by the international and national governing bodies.
Originally, these were almost invariably
unsophisticated and often little more than lists of
requirements, not always unambiguous. Human nature
driving athletes to find ways round the rules to achieve
better performances ensured that the rules would be
periodically revised and usually made more
complicated. The need for many changes can be directly
or indirectly attributed to polymers allowing new and
superior equipment to be produced. Increasingly, the
rules of sports have tended to more resemble the
technical specifications which cover the great majority
of domestic and industrial products. In a number of
cases, standards have been produced by the
International Standards Organization or a national
standards body such as the British Standards Institution
which cover sports equipment. Generally, these are
supplementary to the rules of the game and cover the
specification of particular items of equipment together
with necessary test methods. Clearly, rules and
standards are important to the manufacturers of sports
equipment as they have to be sure that their products
will be acceptable. Rules can be obtained from the
relevant governing body of sport and a list of current
ISO and BS standards is given in Appendix 1.
12 Conclusion
This review demonstrates both the variety of ways that
polymers have been applied in sport and also the extent
to which they have come to dominate certain areas. The
range of sports applications is so large that the review is
inevitably far from complete and the shear number of
polymeric products for sport and leisure means that much
of the technical detail has been glossed over.
It is apparent that in a considerable number of
applications polymers have long displaced traditional
materials and are now on the second, or third or more
cycle of one polymer being replaced by another. This
clearly demonstrates that sport does not stand still and
the thirst for improved performance coupled with the
desire and need to reduce costs will ensure that
developments will continue.
Despite the degree of penetration that polymers have
achieved it is possible to see areas where there is scope
for innovation including the cross fertilisation of
practices from one sport to another.
There is every sign that the demand for sport and
leisure facilities and equipment will continue and
probably grow further so that it is an attractive sector
for polymers. What cannot be seen clearly is which
products will have the greatest demand in the next
decade.
Additional References
a.1 M. Jenkins, Materials World, 2000, 8, 9, 9.
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