Better free throws through science

Researchers from Canada to Arizona are using science to make better golfers, basketball players, even umpires. By devising high-tech helmets, electronics and sensors to measure the body's mechanics, the scientists say they can boost even an amateur's skill.

In On the Ball, the latest episode in the Scientific American Frontiers series, sensitive guy Alan Alda becomes the guinea pig, donning gear or changing his thoughts to putt straighter, dive deeper and sink a free throw.

The program airs tonight at 9 on WEDU-Ch. 3.

Joan Vickers, a researcher at the University of Calgary, says eyes are the key. She designed a helmet with cameras and mirrors to track where athletes look. Almost all novice golfers follow the ball with their eyes, she says. Instead, they should focus on the target for at least one to two seconds before swinging.

Vickers' "quiet eye" technique improved free throws by 22 percent on the University of Calgary's women's basketball team.

In Arizona, the hypothesis is that performance comes when the brain is balanced. If a player can turn off the verbal, left side of the brain and tap the right side's balance and coordination, he or she will improve, researchers promise. Alda wears a cap with electrodes and rides a balance board, all to get his brain adjusted for a golf putt.

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