This week I'm on holiday in Cornwall again, not as sunny as when we were here in August but much less crowded. We've had the local theme park pretty much to ourselves and went to a pool with waterslides today.
I've always noticed that I go down waterslides much faster than anyone I'm with and shoot out the end alarmingly fast. I've always assumed therefore that a heavier person goes faster. (With the exception of the rather unfortunate gentleman who got wedged stuck halfway today - there is always someone worse off somewhere...)
When we were here last time I remember taking the corners on one particular slide fast enough to make me feel quite unwell, and landing hard enough to hit the bottom of a reasonably deep splash pool at the end. On the same slide today I was noticeably slower and managed to keep my head above water at the end. I was rather pleased with myself as I'm sure that being a few pounds lighter is what has made the difference.
But then my geek brain started wondering, exactly why is it that heavier people go faster? The acceleration due to gravity is the same for everyone. A brief foray into the Google Oracle tells me that it's complicated and a number of factors are in play, but it's actually volume/size that has the most effect due to drag and friction. One neat experiment showed that the speed of differently weighted sliders is actually the same, but the heavier slider will have greater momentum causing them to keep going at the end of the slide.
http://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=517165
Either way, my empirical observation is that I'm getting slower as I get lighter, which is fine by me and my queasy stomach. Hopefully by the time I make it to this place next summer, I will be gliding gracefully and serenely before slipping into the pool with barely a ripple.
With regards to getting to the bottom of the slide quicker, I'll race you! Generally if you sit up your body weight is on a smaller area and your bum acts like brake pads, slowing you down. If you lay down then you have a larger area of contact but less pressure. If you the slide is wet enough then the lower pressure is going to allow you to ride the water. I go a step further and go down slides on my heels and elbows. While this increases the pressure on the four points the much smaller contact surface means that I tend to go down very fast and end up skimming across the landing pool. On the blue slide at our local pool I managed to slam my feet into the very end of the splash pool.
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