This video is one of a series of free public lectures on Maths in Sport given for Gresham College by Professor John D Barrow FRS, Director of the Millennium Mathematics Project and Gresham Professor of Geometry.


David and Goliath: Strength and Power in Sport

Top athletes seem to get bigger and bigger. How does size affect performance? Why do some sports have weight categories while others don’t? What types of lever are employed in sports events like gymnastics and wrestling and how much force does a karate blow need to exert to break a brick? John Barrow explores how simple maths can give us the answers.



You can download John Barrow's PowerPoint slides for this lecture, as well as a copy of this video, or the audio file, from the Gresham College website.