Shooda Noed Beter Wr Throw Video Breakdown

we'll start by watching the world record throw at normal speed okay that was cool now let's back it up slow it down and watch it again alright we've seen it at live speed, and we've seen it slowed down, now let's do a little work we'll start with measurements and give you a better idea of the size of Shooda Noed Beter then we'll take a look at the path the pumpin travels during the throw, figure out the launch velocity and launch angle and look for any improvements we can make. The arm we used in 2012 and 2013 is 20 feet long and the sling we used on this throw is twenty feet long as well I know they don't look the same length but that's due to the fish eye lense we used for this video if we back it up a little you can see that the sling now looks longer than the arm it's not. they're still the same length. The tower is about 25 feet tall and in this image it's sitting about three feet off the ground which puts the fulcrum 28 feet up. that's it for the measurements so let's take a look at the path the pumpkin takes we'll back it up to the start point and then mark and connect each point where we can see the pumpkin frame by frame there are a couple things worth noting here first we can't really see the pumpkin when it's under the tower. second the length of that red line is the distance over which we can accelerate the pumpkin. the fact that it's so long is why we don't pie. so how long is it? well the pumpkin starts about 23 feet below and 23 feet in front of the fulcrum. unfortunately that's the last known point we have and arc of the pumpkin changes throughout the throw So we'll just estimate the distance by using some educated guesses on a couple of points and calculating the straight line distances. The pumpkin moves to a point 14 feet behind about 19 feet below the fulcrum. that represents a movement of about thirty seven feet next the pumpkin moves to point that is basically 31 feet directly behind the fulcrum That's another 25 feet. just before release based on the angles of the arm and sling the pumpkin appears to be about 36 feet above and 10 feet behind the fulcrum and that's another 41 feet. after adding all those up, remembering that that the pumpkin went quite a bit farther than the path we took it looks like 'our barrel' is well over 100 feet long. on to launch velocity this video was shot at 30 frames per second so if we can calculate the distance traveled between two frames we can approximate the speed per second by multiplying by 30 we're gonna use the frame just before release and the one right after. This is the last frame the pumpkin is still in the sling. we know the arm and sling are 22 feet long and thje sling looks to be 40 degree shy of parallel with the arm. using sine and cosine magic we can say the pumpkin is about 41 feet out and looks to be at an angle of about 116 degrees however the fish eye lense is affecting us here. Those angles don't match up. Our arm appears to be about 8 degrees off of verticle and in order for the angle between our arm and the sling to be 140 degrees with the adjacent sides having the same length, our 2 angles need to be 20 degrees so when we consider the effects of the fish eye lense, our pumpkin is probably probably about 41 feet out at around 118 degrees here. Now let's take a look at the next frame. I'll spare you the poorly drawn lines and giant floating protractors this time. it works out to the pumpkin being about 43 feet out at an angle 99 degrees so projectile is moving from 118 to 99 degrees which is 19 degrees worth of arc somewhere between 41 and 43 feet out from the fulcrum, so we're gonna use 42 feet as our radius. that 19 degrees of movement along the arc of a circle with a radius of 42 feet would equal 13.9277 feet which would work out to about for 417 feet per second or 127 meters per second or 294 miles per hour so what about the launch angle? well, it turns out that while dealing with the fisheye lens we inadvertently found the information we need. remember that the pumpkin was released just after the sling passed 118 degrees if the pumpkin had released at that point, the launch angle would have been 28 degrees above horizontal since it released a little later, the angle was probably in the 24-26 degree range if you put those numbers in our favorite projectile motion simulator you'll see that it estimates the distance to be shorter than we actually threw. a few possible source of error that could explain the differences are my math, methodology, the assumed drag value in the simulator and not accounting for back spin So, after all that, what would we change? well, first i'd prefer the arm be past 12 when we fire with the sling a little closer to perpendicular with the arm, like so. however all our best throws have come with the arm and sling similar to what happened on this throw so I know what I'm talking about. second, i'd like to launch the pumpkin at a little bit higher angle But without seeing how the pumpkin landed, I can't say for sure whether this angle was too low or not are not third and finally I would like the pumpkin to go farther but hey wouldn't we all. I hope this has been informative. if you have any questions or corrections let me know in comments or you can email us at shoodanoedbeter@gmail.com. don't forget to check out our web site www.shoodanoedbeter.com and follow us on Twitter thanks for watching and, as always, go hamster go.