A Portable Motion Sensor to Measure the Movements of Runners for Biomechanics Analysis

Abstract

Learning the activities of professional runners has always been very important for researchers because it leads to learning their movements by amateurs. Therefore, learning and recording movements accurately help to learn amateurs. In this paper, a portable system to record the obtained data of runners is presented. The presented system consists of an accelerometer and gyroscope sensor, a Bluetooth module as well as a processor that the data of three-dimensional angular velocity and linear acceleration sensors are read and recorded with the help of the small processor. This data is then stored in the processor and then sent to a Bluetooth module through the UART protocol. The data are sent to a personal computer for recording and simulation. The data are read using Matlab software and then illustrated. The results show that this system measures motion parameters for runners and can be calculated steps of movement. Additionally, the outcome result can be compared with professional runners by the amateurs for learning. The presented system is very small and inexpensive that can be easily used to record the activities among amateurs and improve their movements.