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The golf ball aerodynamics of Peter Guthrie Tait

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2016

Chris Denley  and
Chris Pritchard
Chris Denley
Affiliation:
British Aerospace, Brough, North Humberside HU15 1EQ, McLaren High School, Callander FK17 8JH
Chris Pritchard
Affiliation:
British Aerospace, Brough, North Humberside HU15 1EQ, McLaren High School, Callander FK17 8JH
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Extract

The eminent physicist, Peter Guthrie Tait, having constructed mathematical models of the flight of a golf-ball and having carried out an extensive series of experiments to evaluate their parameters, specified the maximum distance a golf ball could be made to carry by the most accomplished golfer. He was then upstaged by his son who hit a monumental drive which pitched even further. The golfing press of the day - what there was of it - was happy to run the story and scientists themselves seemed to enjoy the joke at Tait’s expense. Macfarlane, for example, related the anecdote in the following terms in a lecture delivered just eight months after Tait’s death:

“He […] communicated his results to the Royal Society of Edinburgh and there stated definitely the longest distance to which a golf ball could possibly be driven […] but the champion golfer upset his father's calculations […] by driving a ball five yards further.”

Type
Research Article
Information
The Mathematical Gazette , Volume 77 , Issue 480 , November 1993 , pp. 298 - 313
Copyright
Copyright © The Mathematical Association 1993

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References

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