Chloe Newton-Mann

2nd Sports Engineering Seminar Day – 2nd May 2018 – Manchester Metropolitan University

On Wednesday 2nd May 2018, Manchester Metropolitan University held a Sports Engineering Seminar Day, which was organised and run by PhD students from the university. The ISEA and IET sponsored the event. Our aim was to promote Sports Engineering in an academic environment, raise awareness of the subject and disseminate work in this field within the UK.

The day began with a tour of facilities including the Manchester Fashion Institute, Print City (Additive Manufacturing), engineering workshops and human movement lab. There were four key themed sessions throughout the day including ‘Sports Apparel and Biomechanics’, ‘Health and Injury Prevention’, ‘Simulation in Sports’ and ‘Materials and Equipment Mechanics’. We had industry speakers from Pentland Brands (Speedo & Canterbury), Defence Science and Technology Laboratories and ANSYS, as well as academics and PhD students from UK universities – Manchester Metropolitan, Loughborough, Sheffield Hallam, Chichester and Strathclyde.

Over 110 people from 12 universities, 11 companies and students from a local college joined us for the day, attracting new audiences to Sports Engineering. There were prizes awarded for best student presentation (including Speedo prize), best poster, two student engagement awards and best tweet. Our twitter feed for the day can be found @SportsEngUK or using the #SESday. Feedback forms (and discussions) indicated the event was again very well received, although some people would have liked fewer talks to allow more time for discussion. There was clear interest to continue making this an annual event in the Sports Engineering calendar, and Loughborough University will take on the role of host in 2019. We would like different institutes to host the event on a rotational basis, facilitating travel from different areas of the UK while helping to keep the event fresh, encouraging new industry partners, and university students and staff to attend. Continued interest in the event will help to build up a UK hub of sports engineers, inspiring a new generation to come through and join the ISEA. We would also like to set up a community for all Sports Engineering PhD students to communicate and share ideas, with possible funding going towards further networking.

Finally, we would like to thank the ISEA for sponsoring the event, without the sponsorship it wouldn’t be possible. I believe many people made new contacts and explored new collaborative projects in turn growing the sports engineering community in the UK.

Some quotes from the day:

“#SESday @sportsengUK. It is obvious that the importance of Engineering will always help improve sports in general and help to strengthen unity & love all over world, ethnic groups, professionals & educational backgrounds. Thus, kudos to the organisers of Sports Engineering seminar. Great event. Looking forward to the next one soon.” – Student

“Thanks to everyone for all the hard work making the event a success, I thought it was great. Hopefully if there is another seminar next year I’ll finally be able to stay for the drinks afterwards!” – Industry representative

“Thanks again for inviting me to present at the seminar. I thoroughly enjoyed the event and I’ve benefited from gaining a number of new contacts and research insights.” – Industry representative

“Thank you and well done for ensuring the presentations and day ran smoothly yesterday, not an easy task. We look forward to welcoming you to Loughborough next year.” – Academic Lecturer