Flow simulation of a simplified athlete geometry using partially-averaged Navier-Stokes

Engineering of Sport 15 - Proceedings from the 15th International Conference on the Engineering of Sport (ISEA 2024)

Although there are many validation studies in sports engineering for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations, there are few repeated studies and comparisons between different research groups. Common test cases for validation could strengthen the reliability and trust in CFD simulations, and help further develop the field. Examples of this from the aerospace and automotive industries are the AIAA CFD drag prediction workshop1 and the automotive CFD prediction workshop 2 , respectively. These initiatives use both simplified and realistic geometries. In this work, a simplified model representing an athlete’s head and torso is proposed for a similar initiative in sports engineering. The model is intended to be simple enough to allow efficient simulations and experiments, as well as featuring important flow phenomena in sports aerodynamics. The model should also be sufficiently generic to be representative for several sports disciplines. In addition to presenting the model, initial CFD simulations and wind tunnel experiments are presented.