Football!

This weekend, as part of FCA I went to the UH vs. Idaho football game. It was surprisingly really interesting and fun! Since my family doesn't have a TV, I don't really ever watch football and so I didn't know what to expect; but with Coach Dom's help I understood more than I usually do. Anyway, as I was watching, I was reminded of the homework problem we did about the football players who got tackled. However, instead of just reading about it, I got to watch and see it in real life! A physics problem come to life! I was able to see an actual sticky collision and envision that the two football player's momentums were conserved throughout the tackle. As one football player ran into a second football player, the (initial velocity of the first football)(first football player's mass) + (the initial velocity of the second football player)(second football player's mass) = (first football player's mass + second football player's mass)(final velocity). This law could also be applied to when a football player caught a ball. If the football player is standing still, when he catches the ball, the final velocity of the ball + football player is from the initial velocity of the ball. In all, I thought it was really cool to be able to watch physics come to life and try to figure out all the different ways physics could be applied throughout the game.