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By Nathan Inman

Clemson Formula SAE (CUFSAE) is hitting the ground running this semester. With multiple competitions under its belt, CUFSAE is already seeing success through the early portion of the semester.

Just days after the semester officially began, CUFSAE started off on the right foot on Aug. 21 and 22 when the team traveled to Summit Point Motorsports Park in West Virginia for the Pittsburgh Shootout. Team lead for CUFSAE, Kyle Jobman, spoke to RHBSSI to detail the early accomplishments.

“We had two competitions already, one at the end of August, the Pittsburgh Shootout up in West Virginia. We placed fourth out of 25 there for internal combustion,” Jobman said.

In addition to placing fourth overall, the team placed third in the south autocross competition and fifth in the north autocross.

“It’s been very helpful,” Jobman said. “We actually, at LPG, ran a test with two water pumps for our cooling system, because we’re looking at adding two water pumps this year. So it was helpful to get that data and actually see if it would be beneficial to us.”

Jobman also mentioned that the team has looked at data on other elements of the car, which has allowed them to identify additional areas for improvement.

Alongside the competitions and ongoing design of CUFSAE’s next build, the team has also been hard at work recruiting new members.

“Recruitment has been very good,” Jobman said. “I think after all the recruiting events, we had about a little over 120 new members join the team. We’ve been getting them a bunch of new-member projects to get them kind of into the flow of how we do things as a team.”

Jobman added that for the team’s final event of the semester in November, there is no cap on the number of members allowed to attend, giving new members their first taste of live competition.

CUFSAE was also a recent beneficiary of RHBSSI’s awarding of funds to multiple Clemson student motorsports organizations, which, Jobman explained, will help the team immensely as it begins planning for its major Michigan competition in May.

“That $2,500 will definitely go towards helping us out a lot,” Jobman said. “We’ll probably end up buying competition tires with that; those usually come in at about $1,000 a set. So we’ll probably end up buying two sets of those, and that’s really helpful for us because, going into Michigan, we want to have a fresh set of tires. And then obviously testing leading up to Michigan, we want to use a fresh set of tires there, too, so that should help us out there.”

With a hot start to the semester for CUFASE, the team is only just getting started, and it appears that the sky might truly be the limit.

By Aubrey Tarbox

Oct. 4 is National Golf Lovers’ Day!

Working outside his typical research area focused on collegiate athletics, faculty fellow Chris Corr, Ph.D. – principal lecturer and program coordinator of Clemson’s Athletic Leadership program – collaborated with the Colorado Golf Association over the summer. The association sought to better understand the developmental benefits of their junior caddy program, beyond the traditional motivations of a typical summer job for a student. 

Surveying caddies over the course of the summer, Corr and his colleagues found that the junior caddies developed useful skills – not just in golf – such as timeliness, organization, and responsibility while also cultivating valuable professional networks while out on the golf course. 

“Those are just broad social skills that are positive for everyone to have,” Corr said. “It doesn’t necessarily matter what job you have as a high schooler in the summer, like I could be a lifeguard at a pool and I could have the same developmental components. This project was looking at those developmental aspects of sport with caddying rounds of golf as a context.” 

Through the Colorado Golf Association’s junior caddy program, high school students work toward eligibility for the Evans Foundation Golf Scholarship. The Evans Scholarship provides a full cost of attendance scholarship for more than 300 high school students heading off to college each year. 

“If you caddy enough rounds – which are called loops – and meet academic expectations and service obligations, you can qualify for the Evans Scholarship, which covers the entirety of costs associated with college attendance,” Corr said. 

While the primary motivations for junior caddies participating in the program are based around eligibility for the Evans Scholarship, the findings from Corr’s study this summer indicate that junior caddies developed skills from their experience in the program. So even if they don’t receive the Evans Scholarship, junior caddies’ experiences within the program still have value. 

Corr was also recruited by the manufacturer True Temper to work on a similar project he completed with Callaway Topgolf last summer, but this time with driver clubs instead of putters. 

“This fall we’ll begin data collection in collaboration with faculty at the University of Louisville and the University of New Mexico,” Corr said. “What we’re looking at is: if you’re told a driver is supposed to make you hit the ball farther, do you genuinely believe that? And when you actually go out and hit balls, if I show you data that it doesn’t really do anything, what is your response to that?” 

Corr’s passion projects with golf stems from his connections within the Clemson community and a familial tie to the sport. 

Toney Penna, an Italian-American professional golfer and designer of clubs and gear, was his great-grandfather.  

“He was one of the first major golf club designers in the United States,” Corr said. “He was a first-generation Italian immigrant, went through Ellis Island with his parents as a young child, and he played professional golf in the United States.
He played at the Masters, had a professional career. He was connected all over, being of Italian ancestry at that time period, the 40’s and 50’s, he was connected to a lot of celebrities that were Italians. So some really neat stories passed down within our family that I’ve always gravitated to for sure.” 

To learn more about Corr and what he’s currently studying in collegiate athletics, check out his faculty profile and follow along on RHBSSI social for updates on National Golf Lovers’ Day. 

By Nathan Inman

The American Rally Association hosted the Overmountain Rally in Newport, Tennessee, on
Sept. 18-19. Among the numerous volunteers in attendance at the event were several members
of the Clemson Tiger Racing team.

The opportunity to attend the event all began when the head of the ARA academic relations
team reached out to CTR about volunteering as marshals for the race weekend. After an
extremely successful and enjoyable weekend, there is now an opportunity for CTR to create a
deeper relationship with the rally organization.

“We’re looking to form an academic partnership with the ARA, which will provide our members,
in the future, opportunities to go work in the sport of rally, whether that’s with teams, in the crews
or as engineers, or to volunteer at rallies moving forward,” Matt Flaim, assistant team principal
and driver for CTR, said. “It also opens the door to potentially, sometime in the future, create a
collegiate rally program for us, which would enable us to have our own rally car and compete
against other schools who already do something similar, like UNOH and Oregon.”

Throughout its brief history, CTR has primarily focused on endurance racing, which would
seemingly make the transition to adding a rally component a bit difficult. However, several
members of the team appear eager to make it happen after their experience.

“We were all on a group chat together after the rally, and we were all starting to look at Subarus
on Facebook Marketplace, because we were like, ‘dude, we have to get involved in this,’” said
Hadley Smith, operations lead for CTR. “It’s so much fun, and we need to — our next CTR car is
1000 percent gonna be a Subaru that we can just rip around and rally race with.”

Going into the event, many of the CTR members had varying levels of familiarity with rally
racing. Many of those who said they had no clue about the motorsport before the event now say
they are fans for life.

“I’ve been racing for 10 years, from carts, formula cars, sports cars, on tarmac, on the road, on
street courses, never off-road, but I’ve been aware of Rally,” Matteo Naranjo, lead driver for
CTR, said. “It was a unique experience that’ll definitely influence me on where I want to go next
in my racing career.”

“Rally is such a diverse motorsport, which I had no clue of,” CTR member Garrison Dull said.
“I’ve seen the clips growing up, never really followed it to a T, but when you look at it, it was like,
you’d have a driver who’s a 68-year-old Hollywood stunt driver, all the way to Def Leppard’s lead
guitarist. You’d have a 17-year-old who was a co-driver, I mean, you’d have a carpenter, a
veteran, you name it — it was such a diverse sport.”

For other members, though, the experience was a dream come true for lifelong rally fans.

“I’m a die-hard Subaru fan since as long as I can remember,” said Victor Cruz, race engineer
and mechanic for CTR. “I’ve been watching on TV since as long as I can remember, but I’ve
never been able to go to one because I just never knew where they were. So, with CTR, they
finally gave me the chance to see this in person, and I’m eternally grateful.”

“I knew what Rally was because of that, of course, but I had only really seen clips,” CTR
mechanic Brody Heinick said. “I hadn’t really fully gone in and watched Rally, and just seeing all
my favorite cars in their element at the rally up close… it was just really awesome to see that out
there.”

For one team member, the experience created a full-circle moment.

“I grew up in Ireland, and rally is kind of what got me into motorsports,” Ryan Oliver, head of
media for CTR, said. “I grew up around a lot of rally drivers and corner marshals, and now, after
spending the last few years getting more into motorsports and becoming a corner marshal last
weekend, it just showed a whole different light on rally from what I remember as a kid.”

With the experience now having come and gone, the future of CTR could very well be defined
by the event. Only time will tell if — or, more likely, when — the team will make the ambitious
leap into rally racing.

By Nathan Inman

Earlier this year, Clemson Baja SAE partnered with the Clemson construction science and
management department to construct a brand-new test track with support from Blanchard CAT.
Within months, the track was fully designed and constructed, giving Baja a new way to test its
vehicle ahead of competition.

In prior years, Clemson Baja would travel to competitions with the durability of its builds not
completely tested. The new test track now gives the team the chance to diagnose and fix any
issues before making the trip to compete, an opportunity, the team says, that will prove
immensely helpful.

“We’re super excited to have it for this upcoming year, get the car done a couple weeks earlier
and be able to actually get out there, test stuff, break stuff and then resolve it,” chief engineer
Kevin Blakeney said. “You can only simulate so much — getting out there and putting the car
actually in a situation and getting that testing done. If something breaks, we can go in, figure out
what in our simulation was wrong and how to resolve that problem before competition.”

While the test track was completed ahead of Baja’s summer competition, their vehicle was not
race-ready, leaving the team unable to test it on the track before traveling to New York.
Blakeney said testing the build would have allowed them to catch certain issues that they did
not find until the competition began.

“Unfortunately, the car was not done in time to actually test on (the track) beforehand, but we
have gotten out there and tested a few times afterwards,” Blakeney explained. “It’s definitely
safe to say that, had we been able to get it out there earlier on the test track, we would have
found a couple of the issues that we had to resolve at competition when we found them.”

As Clemson Baja enjoys the test track and the advantages that come with it, Blakeney said that
other schools have shown interest in traveling to Clemson to run the track ahead of competition.
Earlier this month, ahead of Clemson football’s home opener against Georgia Southern, the
Georgia Southern Baja SAE team traveled to Clemson to run the course.

“Really, it was very helpful for both of our teams,” Blakeney said. “We got to see what each
other does, and how each of our different cars and our setups run on the track. It was also nice
because they got into the competition coming up in a couple weeks, and it was good for them to
be able to get out and rip on the car.”

Blakeney added that the Georgia Southern team found an issue with their vehicle after running
it on the track — an issue that likely would have gone undiagnosed if not for the test session.
Since that track day, Blakeney says that other schools have also reached out with interest in
testing on the track. As interest continues to rise, the possibility of an unofficial competition
weekend rises with it.

“We’ve definitely gotten some interest in some schools coming down moving forward,” Blakeney
said. “I think it’s a great thing to have them out there. With the construction science department
being willing to continue adding onto our track, we would love to get it a little bigger, a couple
more obstacles, and maybe even host a local, non-official competition where we bring in
schools from the Carolinas and Georgia, and maybe up in Virginia.”

With the school year now fully underway, Clemson Baja is hard at work on its new build for next
year’s competition. Time will only tell as to just how beneficial the team’s new test track will
prove to be.

With another school year underway, the Robert H. Brooks Sports Science Institute is proud to introduce its team of seven student interns for the Fall semester. Including three returning students from previous semesters, this group will help advance the Institute’s mission while preparing for the third annual RECESS Symposium in November. We are excited to see all that this team will contribute!

By Katie Gerbasich

As the fiscal year wraps up, we are looking back at the Clemson students the Robert H. Brooks Sports Science Institute (RHBSSI) supported through travel grants this year. Spanning three departments, this funding allowed students to attend sports conferences, competitions and experiential learning events that furthered their education and professional development.

Department of Bioengineering 

In August, Bianca Henline, Sydney Savage and Abbie Underwood attended the American Society of Biomechanics (ASB) Annual Conference in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 

Henline presented her thesis research, which focused on the development and application of a method for simulating commotio cordis-inducing impacts to evaluate the effectiveness of football chest protective equipment. The presentation represented the culmination of approximately 2.5 years of dedicated research with the Clemson Impact Performance of Sports Protective Equipment Creative Inquiry team, which she led.

Her most significant takeaway from the conference was learning from companies in the forensic industry. 

“Before attending the conference, I had committed to a position in the forensic field, and engaging with the research and findings of others provided insight into potential applications within my own professional responsibilities,” Henline said. 

Later in October, senior Bioengineering student Chloe Izant attended the Biomedical Engineering Society Conference in San Diego, California. 

Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management

In February, Enzo Ferriera attended the Commission on Sport Management Accreditation (COSMA) Conference in St. Augustine, Florida, where he presented research on behalf of a group of fellow Ph.D. students. 

Their project, Navigating Research Practices as Graduate Sport Management Students: The Issue of Miscitations in the Sport Literature, explored their experiences conducting rigorous academic research and highlighted the issues of miscitation encountered throughout the research process.

The presentation examined possible reasons for the prevalence of miscitations in research practices and literature. It offered recommendations for graduate students and faculty to strengthen research practices in sport and recreation management. The project also served as a stepping stone toward publication, as the group prepares the final version of the manuscript to increase rigor across the field.

“The RHBSSI has always been supportive of our group’s scholarship and professional development through travel grants, events on campus, and partnerships with our faculty advisors,” Ferriera said. “These avenues have certainly paved the way for us to succeed in academia and our future goals in the sport management world, as well as making it possible for our research initiatives to reach the audiences that they need so that they can create an impact on the field right away.”

In May, Benjamin Hinckfoot and Innhoo Baek attended the North American Society for Sport Management Conference (NASSM) in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Hinckfoot presented research titled Assessing Holistic Outcomes of a Short-Term Service Abroad for Intercollegiate Athletes. 

Alongside Department of Automotive Engineering student, Hadley Smith, PRTM students Jenny Pinion, Emma Shurley, and George Rieger participated in a case-study competition at the Women in Motorsports Mobil 1 event in Indianapolis, Indiana, where they placed second and received a $1,500 award. 

After advancing in the Lap 1 pool, which comprised 21 universities from the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, the team presented to five industry leaders against five other universities at the Dallara Convention Center.

Their final-lap challenge involved developing an idea for a corporation already involved in, or planning to enter, the motorsports industry to engage the rapidly growing global community of female fans, a demographic characterized by high emotional investment and purchasing power.

Faculty fellows Felipe Tobar and Ashlyn Hardie served as co-advisors for the group. 

“Working with these four bright students has been a joy and a testament to the fact that when we give them the tools and the opportunity to pursue their dreams, they will shine,” Tobar said.

Department of Communication 

Students in faculty fellow Brandon Boatwright’s COMM Sport and Social Media Class traveled to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta Training Ground, where they watched a practice and received an exclusive tour of the new Emory Healthcare Studio, a first-of-its-kind media operations facility. The class spent the semester developing social media strategies for Atlanta United FC. 

The trip allowed students to connect with their client while exploring potential careers in the sports industry. 

“Seeing the new studio was truly a testament to how social media is changing the sports industry,” Katie Gerbasich, a student who attended the trip, said. “The content team at Atlanta United was able to advocate for their importance and get major funding for state-of-the-art equipment.”

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Overall, the Institute was thrilled to financially support seven individual students and two student groups to attend sports conferences and events in fiscal year 2026, which began July 1, 2025 and ends June 30, 2026.

Click here to learn more about the Institute’s Clemson Student Travel Grant program. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis, here.

The Robert H. Brooks Sports Science Institute is excited to welcome two new Clemson faculty members to its cohort of Faculty Fellows.

Brook Russell, Ph.D. 

Associate Professor of Applied Statistics, School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences

Dr. Russell is an associate professor in the School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (SMSS), with a portion of his research and mentoring activities focusing in sports analytics and human performance. He has collaborated with Paul Hogan, Senior Assistant Football Strength and Conditioning Coach at Clemson University, to understand the extreme athleticism of football players. This collaboration has resulted in the manuscript Analyzing dependence matrices to investigate relationships between National Football League Combine event performances, published in the Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports in 2018. In this work, they analyzed National Football League Combine event performances using both extreme-value and non-extremes-based approaches and explored how these approaches can inform the evaluation of NFL prospects. This research was then presented at the New England Symposium on Statistics in Sports in October 2021. Dr. Russell aims to further examine the performance characteristics of elite football prospects and contribute to the growing body of research on sport performance metrics and talent evaluation.

He is also currently partnering with the Institute’s Dan Duncan Professor of Sports Marketing, Dr. Angeline Scheinbaum, to understand how sponsorships of local sporting events impact corporate community involvement.

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Divya Srinivasan, Ph.D., CPE

McQueen Quattlebaum Professor of Industrial Engineering and Bioengineering 

Dr. Srinivasan is the McQueen Quattlebaum Professor of Industrial Engineering and Bioengineering, and a Faculty Scholar in the Clemson University School of Health Research. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, in 2010. She worked as an EU Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Musculoskeletal Research in Sweden. She joined the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at Virginia Tech in 2016 and served as an assistant and associate professor there prior to joining Clemson in 2021. She currently directs the Biomechanics, Ergonomics, Safety and Training laboratories at Clemson University. She is also the director of the Clemson SHERPA Center, which focuses on human performance and worker safety/health. She has over two decades of research experience in human performance assessments, human motion modeling (including digital human modeling), injury prevention, and collaborative and wearable robotics, including exoskeletons to improve performance, health, and safety. Her research program has been funded by multiple grants from the NSF, NIOSH, NIH, and industry sponsors totaling nearly $28 million in the last 10 years, resulting in over 85 peer-reviewed journal publications and almost 200 international conference presentations to date. 

By Katie Gerbasich

This summer, the Robert H. Brooks Sports Science Institute is excited to welcome back two former interns to the team. Bringing a wide range of experience in communication and event planning, the pair will help lead preparations for the third-annual RECESS symposium while continuing to support the Institute’s mission.

Katie Gerbasich – Communications Lead

Katie Gerbasich graduated this spring from Clemson with a degree in Sports Communication. She has worked with the Institute for the previous three semesters as a writer and editor. Gerbasich hopes to pursue a master’s degree in sports analytics.

“I truly love working with this team,” Gerbasich said. “This new role will be an exciting oppurtunity to continue growing professionally.”

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Lucy Hart – Events Lead

Lucy Hart recently graduated from Clemson in December with a degree in Sports Management. Since then, Hart has been working as a People Operations Intern for the Savannah Bananas on the Banana Ball World Tour, gaining hands-on experience in sports operations and event management.

“I can’t wait to come back to RHBSSI as the Events Lead once again,” Hart said. “I am excited to be back in Clemson to complete my master’s in public administration and jump back into my work with the Institute.”

By Katie Gerbasich

As the Spring semester wraps up, interns from the Robert H. Brooks Sports Science Institute are looking back on their experiences that defined their time with the program. This semester marked the Institute’s largest intern cohort to date, including two Beyond the Game student-athlete interns. From hands-on work in content creation to collaborative storytelling, each intern contributed in unique ways while also beginning to shape their future plans.

To round out this semester’s cohort, RHBSSI also welcomed two Beyond the Game student-athlete interns, who balanced their contributions to the Institute alongside the demands of their sport and academics. Their presence added a valuable perspective to the team and further highlighted the Institute’s commitment to supporting student-athletes in exploring opportunities beyond competition. As the semester comes to a close, the impact of this diverse group of interns will continue to shape the Institute.

For the second year in a row, Clemson Paralympic Soccer went head-to-head in an official match against the CP (Cerebral Palsy) Soccer All-Stars at Clemson University’s Historic Riggs Field on Saturday, April 25, 2026. This event marks the second time in U.S. college history that two Cerebral Palsy soccer teams have competed against each other in a university stadium.

The match was close, with the score tied 1-1 for most of the game. But in the end, the Clemson team scored an additional goal in the second half to secure a victory.

Check out this instant replay of the game-winning goal, captured by Drew Landon Media, by Player of the Match, Shae Hammond.

Post-event surveys showed that, at the start, around 43% of attendees were unaware of the sport and, by the end of the match, over 60% of attendees’ perceptions of Paralympic athletes had positively changed. 88% of fans expressed an interest in supporting adaptive sports in the future.

“Clemson University is inarguably a trailblazer in the world of adaptive soccer,” head coach and faculty fellow of the Institute, Felipe Tobar, said.

The team at the Robert H. Brooks Sports Science Institute (RHBSSI) thanks Clemson Paralympic Soccer for involving the Institute in its activities as a sponsor.

“So much positive energy and goodwill,” RHBSSI Director John DesJardins said. “I’m so happy for the program, faculty, staff and students that it supports.”

To learn more about Clemson Paralympic Soccer within the Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management at Clemson, click here.

Photos provided by Carol San Martin