For winning road bicycle racing, cyclists have been trying to acquire pedaling techniques to improve performance. One of the techniques is Pull-up action during upstroke that contributes to energy efficiency. However, it is difficult to realize Pull-up action while in high speed pedaling. In our group, methods to support learning the slow motions which are hard to realize have been discussed in terms of Neurocognitive Rehabilitation. Based on this idea, three elements are designed in order to support all processes of acquiring this action: (A) putting in the situation that the user required Pull-up action to rotate cranks continuously, (B) making easy to sense differences of that action and the need of the part of leg’s muscles doing it and (C) detecting the changes of legs. On the basis of these things, support system that has independent cranks placed outside of each legs embedding controllable crank-length mechanism is developed.

Travel distance per charge is one of the important elements of electric power assisted bicycles. General method of measuring travel distance per charge is “BAA standard” method. However, in this method, measurement variation caused by difference of riders occurs. To reduce the variation, automatic measurement of travel distance per charge is needed. For realization of automatic measurement, we have measured electric power assisted bicycles by using chassis dynamometer and pedal sensors. In this study, the influence of pedaling for travel distance per charge of three electric power assisted bicycles was measured. The results of measurement showed that crank input torque affected the travel distance and maximum measurement variation caused by three riders was 2 km. Moreover, it was possible that maximum measurement variation was 3km.

In this study, joint torque of lower limbs in bicycle pedaling were investigated numerically. An approximation method of relationship between the angle of the ankle and normal force in the rotation direction of a bicycle crank while pedaling was investigated. A linear relationship between ankle angle and normal force in the rotation direction of a bicycle crank was applied to calculate positions of lower limb joints. Cycling performance tests were carried out with six amateur male cyclists as subjects. Via Nirone 7-ALU (Bianchi Corp.) was applied to for the performance tests. Six subjects were divided into two groups according to a different ankle angle movement patterns. Subject A, B, C, E and F were divided into the first group. Subject D was divided into the second group. Positive crank torque time of second group was longer than positive crank torque time of first group.

Bathing in a bathtub filled with water is a custom common in Japan. Since comfort is important in bathing, comfortable bathtub design is desired. In the previous study, the algorithm to estimate reaction forces from bathtub was constructed. However, in order to evaluate the comfort of the bathtub in simulation completely, it was necessary to know bathing posture without experiments. The objective of this study was to construct the algorithm to estimate bathing posture. This algorithm determines the bathing posture that minimizes weighted summation of i) sum of joint torques of hip, knee, and ankle, ii) passive elastic joint torques of toes, and iii) inverse sign of the buoyancy. In the calculation, gravity, buoyancy, passive elastic joint torque and estimated reaction forces by algorithm constructed in previous study were considered. In order to examine this algorithm, a bathing experiment to obtain the data of bathing posture for 10 subjects and 4 bathtub shapes for each subject was conducted. It was found that the estimated bathing posture were consistent well with the measured bathing posture within 5.2% error.

Swing motion of the tote bag become overload with the shoulder of human during walking, compared to bag weight during standing. It was thought that the load from swing motion of tote bag can be reduced by preventing it. In this study, to examine the influence of preventing swing motion of the tote bag on human body, swing motion of the tote bag and wobble motion of human body, and load on the shoulder of human were measured on the condition of fixed the tote bag to human body or not. The coefficient of variance of vertical motion of the tote bag and human body, average value of the load on the shoulder and maximum value of moment about the center of gravity of the upper body on the condition of fixed the tote bag to human body were compared to not fixed.. In conclusion, this study suggested that the load on human body from swing motion of the tote bag was reduced by fixing the tote bag to human body.

This study conducted an experiment on 18 university rugby players in order to verify the effects of yoga on mental and physical aspects of athletes. Nine participants were assigned to the yoga group, in which they took part in yoga in a laboratory for about 30 minutes, while the others were assigned to the control group, in which they stretched in the same way. Range of motion(ROM) of each participant was measured as an index of flexibility before and after yoga or stretching exercises. Their ROM of hip and knee joints were calculated by measuring their change of angles using a motion capture system when the participants were holding the pose of “putting one's knees on one's chests” and “the Garland Pose,” both of which belong to Asana yoga. In addition, five participants in the yoga group continued practicing yoga for about an hour once a week for two months. After that, an interview survey on them was conducted to clarify the effect of yoga on the athletes' mind, body, competition and training. The results of the experiment showed that the participants' ROM of hip and knee joints increased significantly only after experiencing yoga. On the other hand, the results of the interview indicated that the participants' awareness of their bodies increased through yoga, which may improve their concentration, and they felt improvement of their flexibility as well. From these results, it may be concluded that yoga is beneficial as a mental and physical training method for athletes.

The bath room is the place where serious injury accidents might happen. In particular, stepping over bathtub apron is one of the most dangerous motions. There were few studies in which the load of stepping motion was discussed in detail. In order to improve safety of stepping motion for elder people whose muscle forces decline, the load of the motion has to be clarified. The objective of this study was to evaluate the load of stepping over bathtub apron by analyzing muscle activity using musculoskeletal simulation. Compared with gait motion, which is the most daily activity and has less risk of falls, activities of quadratus femoris of trailing foot, both side gluteus maximus, six lateral rotator muscles, trunk muscles and psoas major, were found to be significantly greater. From these muscle activities, it was concluded that the motion requires muscle activities to i) decrease landing shock in advance, ii) stabilize hip motion, iii) control upper body inclination and iv) flex hip to lift foot up.