By Dan Nosowitz Posted 05.10.2012 at 2:45 pm 9 Comments

Nike TurboSpeed Nike

Nike's TurboSpeed, which sounds like the name of a Hot Wheels playset, is an ultra-lightweight track suit designed to help sprinters reach that extra height. Oddly, it's inspired by the golf ball, which is why it has all those odd little dimples. But we prefer to think of them as speed holes.

It sounds insane to look to the slowest game in existence (like, yes, curling is slow, but at least you could slip on the ice or something) to improve the speeds of the fastest runners on the planet, but it actually makes sense. The dimples on a golf ball aren't there for looks. Here's Wikipedia's explanation for why the dimples are there:

First, the dimples on the surface of a golf ball cause the boundary layer on the upstream side of the ball to transition from laminar to turbulent. The turbulent boundary layer is able to remain attached to the surface of the ball much longer than a laminar boundary and so creates a narrower, low pressure, wake and hence less pressure drag. The reduction in pressure drag causes the ball to travel farther.

Reduction in drag--definitely something you want in a tracksuit. And according to Nike, the dimples work, to the tune of up to 0.23 seconds. Seems like not very much, but considering how fast these runners finish 100 meters--that could be the difference between medals, or the difference between a world record or not.

[via FastCoDesign]

9 Comments

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alias007
05/10/12 at 3:58 pm

La.... l-l-la... la, la, la.....
La.... l-l-la... DUHT! D-DUH!!!

This is a superman article right? Because I'd feel silly humming the Superman theme song if this wasn't a superman article.

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Robot
05/10/12 at 4:10 pm

Holy Sh#t Batman! They are issuing Superman suits to the general public now!!!!

No need to worry Robin, those suits is defective. They are full of holes.

.............................
Science sees no further than what it can sense, i.e. facts.
Religion sees beyond the senses, i.e. faith.
Open your mind and see!

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cmccrane
05/10/12 at 4:54 pm

tweek you training... not your suit.
SuperStrengthSuperFast.com

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HBillyRufus
05/11/12 at 10:44 am

I saw this on Mythbusters, where they put dimples like this all over a CAR to see what it would do to fuel efficiency. I was amazed, and the guys on the show were too, that it really did help in a significant way. But I am still waiting for dimples to appear on all new cars, airplanes, boats, etc.

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aivey
05/11/12 at 4:29 pm

I could see boat and airplane designers playing with this idea, but cars...not so much. People tend to enjoy the way a car looks and I don't think covering it in "speed holes" (though more elegantly than Homer Simpson) would be very attractive to consumers. On the other hand, I don't think people are overly concerned about the exterior of a commercial jet or the hull of a boat.

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tobyanderson
05/13/12 at 11:11 am

@Aivey, they do heavily use this principle in airplanes. They have little agitators on the wing surface so that the boundary layer doesn't separate as quickly and the airplane gains lift.

I actually had to bust out my fluid dynamics book for this article. The dimples should only work if the runners get up to turbulent speeds, and indeed they do. With a 100 meter time of 10 seconds, you get a Reynold's number of about 2.8x10^5, which is way into turbulent flow (above 2000 is turbulent). So fluids theory jives with Nike's experimental data (yay science). The dimples would only stop working if you travel below around 1m/s.

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Arlitto
05/13/12 at 7:21 pm

I'm surprised that NO ONE here has mentioned the fact that this outfit looks like Spiderman's costume. I mean, the red and blue is impeccable! I wouldn't put it past a mega-nerd to go the distance by using this outfit to design their copy-cart spiderman outfit. Just need the gumption to think you're part spider and attempt to jump from building to building.

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Robot
05/19/12 at 10:23 am

@Arlitto,

Holy Sh#t Batman! They are issuing Superman suits to the general public now!!!!

No need to worry Robin, those suits is defective. They are full of holes.

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Wiredchop
05/29/12 at 4:30 am

Hi There,
Your article is out by a factor of ten, the linked source article states 0.023 seconds in 100 m, not 0.23 seconds.

Thanks

Simon C



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