Abstract
This study was intended to determine the thrust mechanism during underwater dolphin kick using a simulation model SWUM (SWimming hUman Model). The input data for the simulation were measured for 8 elite competitive swimmers. The SWUM was applied to recreate the dynamics of the underwater dolphin kick on the simulation. The thrusts and joint torques generated during underwater dolphin kick were simulated using the applied SWUM. The results showed that the feet mainly generated the thrust and not only joint torques of low limbs but also trunk was very important to generate the thrusts. Furthermore, it was suggested that one of the reason many butter.y swimmers had a low back pain was cyclic large torques generation by the trunk during underwater dolphin kick.
