



My name is [insert name here], and I am an Olympics addict.

Three days after the closing ceremony of the 2014 Winter Olympics, I find myself going through a bit of Olympics withdrawal. I, like so many other people pulled in by NBC’s Olympics coverage, became mildly obsessed with curling (and, honestly, the truly amazing pants that the Norwegian men’s curling team wore – seriously, check them out on Google). I’ve always loved watching the bobsled events, so I indulged in a bit of that, but mostly I wanted to watch the figure skating. I used to watch as much figure skating as I could find on TV, and the addition of the team skating event this year got me back to watching what most people would consider a mildly-excessive amount of the sport.

I never remember watching skating with the idea of becoming a figure skater (although I may have at some point – my childhood dreams were varied, and included attending clown college at one point). I’ve never been the most graceful person, and even after the better part of a decade of ballet classes, I still sometimes lose my balance standing still and occasionally walk into stationary objects. What drew me in was the absolute beauty of the skaters – male or female, they appeared constantly graceful, even when they didn’t land a jump properly, and made everything look so easy.

After studying physics, I have an even greater respect for figure skaters. As this Huffington Post article so succinctly puts it, “it’s ultimately about science.” Parents, if you have daughters who love figure skating, you can use it as a great way to introduce some basic concepts of physics and really pique their interest. The video (from the National Science Foundation) included in the article may be too advanced for younger children, but parents can watch it and then explain it to their children at a more age-appropriate level.

The simplest and most fun way to talk about the physics of figure skating is angular momentum – the way that a spinning object wants to keep spinning. Most physics departments have a demonstration of this concept (which is probably my favorite demo to show off, and to use myself!) that is laughably simple – a regular lab stool mounted on a frame so it rotates freely. You sit on the stool with your arms out and start spinning. When you bring your arms in towards your chest – just like figure skaters do when they spin or jump – you speed up noticeably. Put your arms out again and you slow down. (This is clearly not a good idea to do if you have motion sickness issues.)

This is always one of the most popular demos, especially with girls – they love the idea of doing something that figure skaters do. And if it gets more people interested in physics, male or female, it’s a worthwhile endeavor.