Inventing for Sports

Inventing for Sports invites readers to view sports as an activity inherently and intimately intertwined with advances in science, technology, and medicine. Although athletes will always remain central to recreational and competitive sports, inventors and their innovations are just as crucial and inseparable. Historical and contemporary case studies illustrate that every sport and every athlete is mediated by inventions, including highly engineered equipment, sport-specific apparel, assistive technologies, protective gear, nutritional aids, and measurement and officiating devices. Athletes and coaches also engage in non-technological innovation when they introduce new training regimens and in-game strategies. For weekend warriors and professional athletes alike, advanced technologies and innovative techniques often make the difference between victory and defeat, safety and injury, and participation and exclusion.

In these essays, the perspective shifts from athletes and athletic contests to the inventors who create high-tech equipment, apparel, protective gear, and officiating technologies that infuse all modern sports. Sports inventors frequently are amateur or elite athletes who became frustrated when they lost a contest, sustained an injury, endured a bad call, or found themselves unable to participate fully in their chosen sport. They are motivated to develop sports technologies to (1) improve performance and gain a competitive advantage; (2) prevent injuries and enhance safety; (3) aid officiating; and (4) make sports more fun and inclusive for everyone. Their innovations tend to challenge a sport’s longstanding norms and traditions. Inventing for Sports examines the social and cultural reception of sports technologies, the passionate debates they spur, and the myriad ways they change the games. The book also describes different approaches to the assessment, regulation, and governance of sports technologies and helps readers understand why game-changing innovations are ultimately adopted or rejected.