TRAINING FOR MARKING OF COURTS AND FIELDS IN AND GAMES IN ‘TRUE-NORTH’ DIRECTION

Dr.R.Kalidasan, Assistant Professor (SG) & UGC Research Awardee Department of Physical Education & Yoga, Bharathidasan University, Tiruchirappalli

Abstract

Sports especially outdoor games are played on grounds, which is broadly classified as courts and fields. The small area games such as , , Ball Badminton, , , , Tennis are played on the courts. The large area games such as , are played on fields. The play area of almost all the outdoor games that are played on courts and fields are marked in the north-south direction except Kho-Kho in order to avoid sunlight falling directly on eyes of the players. This is one among many reason for laying the court / field in the north-south direction. It has been the practice for past many years to lay the court / field in north-south direction with the help of compass. The compass will generally give only magnetic north direction and not true-north direction. Technically there are three types of north, namely Magnetic North, True-North and Grid North. In the modern time, to find the true-north direction, many techniques are used. GPS is one of the popular techniques used throughout the world to find the true-north. But ‘sun shadow technique’ is the cheapest and the most accurate technique to find true-north, which is highlighted in this paper.

Key words: Marking, Magnetic North, True-north and Shadow technique

TRAINING FOR MARKING OF COURTS AND FIELDS IN SPORTS AND GAMES IN ‘TRUE-NORTH’ DIRECTION

Dr.R.Kalidasan, Assistant Professor (SG) & UGC Research Awardee Department of Physical Education & Yoga, Bharathidasan University, Tiruchirappalli

Introduction Sports especially outdoor games are played on grounds, which is broadly classified as courts and fields. The small area games such as Basketball, Badminton, Ball Badminton, Handball, Kabaddi, Volleyball, Tennis are played on the courts. The large area games such as Football, Hockey are played on fields. The play area of almost all the outdoor games that are played on courts and fields are marked in the north-south direction except Kho-Kho in order to avoid sunlight falling directly on eyes of the players. This is one among many reason for laying the court / field in the north-south direction. It has been the practice for past many years to lay the court / field in north-south direction with the help of compass. The compass will generally give only magnetic north direction and not true-north direction.

Types of north Technically there are three types of north, namely Magnetic North, True North and Grid North. True-north differs from magnetic north, which varies from place to place and over time due to local magnetic anomalies. A magnetic compass does not show true-north. In fact for over millions of years, magnetic north wanders considerably and occasionally reverses, so that the magnetic north pole to near the geographic south pole at some periods in the earth’s history. In the arctic region, a magnetic compass is not very useful. Sun shadow technique In the modern time, to find the true-north direction, many techniques are used. GPS is one of the popular techniques used throughout the world to find the true-north. But ‘sun shadow technique’ is the cheapest and the most accurate technique to find true-north. It requires two straight long iron rods (8 mm) with three feet height, five straight small iron rods (8 mm) with half feet height and one Hammer. Apart from the above said items the sun light and a leveled area is needed. This technique should be experimented either in the early mornings or in the evenings, so that one can get good length of shadow. First fix one 3 feet long rod using hammer in the ground, perpendicular to the ground at 90 degrees. Then take a small iron rod and fix exactly at the end point of the first long rod’s shadow. After 20 minutes take another small iron rod and fix it with help of hammer exactly at the shadow end point of the first long rod. Similarly every 20 minutes take another small iron rod and fix exactly at the shadow end point of the first long rod. Continue to fix at least five small iron rods. Normally all five small iron rods will be in one line. With help of a rope all the five small iron rods are connected, which will be in the east-west direction. Another long rod has to be kept exactly perpendicular to the east-west line drawn earlier. This long rod will be in the true-north direction, with the help of the rope, a line can be drawn, which will be in the north- south direction. Conclusion In future, all courts or fields to play outdoor games should be marked in true-north direction. True-north marking of courts and fields requires training. It is suggested to include true-north marking in the curriculum of under graduation programme in Physical Education.

Reference Idioms - Meaning of “true north”- English Language. (2011, April 1). Retrieved from http:// english.stackexchange.com/questions/18888/meaning-of-true-north

True north – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. (2015, August 5). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/True_north