What studs should you choose when next buying a pair of boots?
Leinster Sports Clinic on triangular studs V’s rounded studs
‘A note to all parents & coaches, we have noticed a huge increase recently in knee injuries in junior and senior players in Rugby / GAA, Camogie, football & hurling.
Many of these injuries can be prevented by small changes in the footwear of the players, the recent trend is to wear boots with triangular studs , when the foot is planted in the ground the player tries to rotate the foot and the foot due to the triangular stud is staying planted in the ground , thus causing a severe rotation of the knee joint where injury is then sustained( particularly ACL/PLC Ruptures) .With a rounded stud the stud rotates effectively and the knee is rotating in line with the foot therefore no excessive pressure is put on the knee joint. It may be worth thinking about when purchasing your next pair of boots.
The science bit ...
Firstly, when the stud acts with maximum resistance against flow directed onto its drive surface, the “form drag” attributable to the abrupt drive surface is substantially supplemented by “friction drag” associated with the large surface area of the stud on the inclined downstream side. Secondly, because the abrupt drive surface interrupts and distorts flow to an extreme extent, we find that flow past the stud requires disturbances in the ground surface well out beyond the sides of the stud and this accounts for a high level of drag. More particularly, where two adjacent studs are positioned sufficiently close side-by-side that their zones of flow distortion overlap, the studs start to behave like a continuous bar whose effect extends right across and indeed potentially beyond the sole.’
