MEMORIAM Prof. Dr. Léon Lewillie

MEMORIAM
Prof. Dr. Léon Lewillie
JAN SWAMMERDAM, DUCHENNE DE
BOULOGNE…LEON LEWILLIE…
OR HOW THE STUDY OF MOVEMENT
BECAME A MULTI-DISCIPLINARY SCIENCE.
Swammerdam was a biologist, anatomist, chemist,
doctor and explorer. In 1658 he showed the Duke of
Tuscany how to stimulate a nerve with scissors to
make it contract - an experiment that could be
repeated at will. These experiments and this demonstration took place 129 years before the similar
experiments for which Galvani always receives the
credit (1).
Duchenne (de Boulogne), a better-known figure,
was a doctor, therapist, physiologist, engineer and
inventor. He was the first to introduce electrical
stimulation, and he invented and developed various
prostheses and orthoses (Duchenne de Boulogne,
1872). All this took place more than a century
before the development and marketing of the FES.
Léon Lewillie also researched movement, not
through the eyes of a doctor but through the eyes of
a kinesiologist, inventor, physical educationalist,
ergonomist, biomechanic, physiologist, electro-physiologist and historian. Léon Lewillie was at the
same time a philosopher, a humanist and a sportsman at the highest level.
To quote Simon Bouisset (2): “Il est vrai que Léon à été
bien plus que le premier président de la Société de
Biomécanique Française, le premier président du
“Workinggroup of Biomechanics in Sport of UNESCO et le
premier président de la commission mondiale de
Jan Pieter Clarys
Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Experimental Anatomy
Biomécanique en Natation du (CIEPS/ICSSPE).
Il a été en raison de la qualité de ses travaux scientifiques
parmi les premiers à avoir été significative dans le domaine
de la Biomécanique du Sport et de la Natation en particulier.
Il a eu non seulement l’initiative du premier congrès de la
Société Française mais c’est lui qui a concrétisé le premier
Symposium de Biomécanique en Natation à Bruxelles en
1970.
Il nous a donné une autre dimension de l’étude du mouvement.”
Léon Lewillie was born in the Brussels district of
Ixelles in 1925 and died at the age of 76. He graduated in Physical Education, qualified as a teacher and
subsequently took his doctorate. He also studied
kinesiatrics, initially working as a biometrics assistant, and was appointed professor of the theory and
history of physical education for courses in the
‘analysis of movement and the biomechanics of locomotion and sporting activities’ ‘physical activity in
the workplace’ and ‘physiology applied to physical
exercise’.
It is no easy task to summarise Professor Lewillie’s
career. A modest man, he frequently concealed his
own sporting achievements. This club president,
whose interests focused on the general development
of the disciplines practiced within the Belgian swimming league, became a registered member in 1938.
Rev Port Cien Desp 6(Supl.2) 9–12
9
MEMORIAM
He rapidly entered the world of competition and
won the Belgium 200 metres free style championship. His commitment to these events during the
occupation is evidence of his determination to assert
the value of sport in socially and politically difficult
times.
He rapidly developed the idea that longevity in water
sports was achieved through practising a variety of
different disciplines, and this he demonstrated personally, becoming the only Belgian to win the water
polo championships over a forty-year interval – at
the age of 16, at schoolboy level, and again at the
age of 56, not as a veteran but in a division 3 team.
It was not until ten years later that he competed at
the Masters swimming championships.
But Léon Lewillie lived several lives. Not only did he
co-found the Biomechanics Society, he was also a cofounder of the Sports Biomechanics Working Party
(ICSSPE, UNESCO), and co-founder of the
International Society of Biomechanics (ISB) and the
International Society of Electrophysiological
Kinesiology (ISEK). Above all, Léon Lewillie was a
versatile scientist with a very varied output.
Léon Lewillie the inventor gave us the first remote
pulse rate transmission device. “The equipment
should be as light and unobtrusive as possible, so
the use of transistors was obviously appropriate. The
transmitter consists of a quartz-driven oscillator
stage and a final stage sending via a telescopic car
radio antenna.” (5, see diagram).
This was in 1961, and the system was never
improved or marketed. Twenty years later, the ‘sport
tester’ based entirely on the principles described by
Lewillie was a huge success.
He also designed a radio transmission system making it possible to measure amplified EMG signals,
and another system for the remote recording of respiration. Right from the start, electromyography was
clearly the instrument of choice for this research.
However, for Lewillie two conditions were necessary
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Rev Port Cien Desp 6(Supl.2) 9–12
for its effective use: a very compact device, and an
understanding of the relationship between the electromyogram and other biomechanic parameters.
Miniaturised technologies led to storage and telemetry systems that could be used in the field without
risk of interfering with movement.
This was during the years between 1965 and 1968.
The telemetry system has been copied, improved
and marketed by others, but not by Léon Lewillie.
Twenty years later, there were still several EMG telemetric systems on the market, and K2 and TEEM
systems enjoyed great success as portable respiratory measurement systems.
Léon Lewillie the physiologist started out in 1959
with his doctorate entitled “Changes in the oxygen
coefficient during increasingly intense physical activities”, although he had already been working for
eight years with professors Delanne and Segers on
physiological and statistical aspects of several tests
of speed and racing aptitude on young people aged
between 12 and 18. He also studied the comparative
state of preparedness of young people in different
sporting disciplines, and the relationship between
the clinical examination of these young people and
their fitness for physical exertion in terms of the
impact of acute hypoxia on the heart rate and arterial pressure.
In the early 1960s he set about researching the
changes occurring in the mechanisms for adapting to
rest and effort under the influence of drugs given to
young sportsmen and women. He studied practically
all the drugs used of the time period.
Meanwhile, Léon Lewillie had never turned his back
on his original university qualification in physical
education, though his approach was philosophical and
rarely practical - although titles like “Effects of training and fatigue on motor systems in the sportsman”
or “Swimming performance and the result of a compromise between two contradictory requirements”
might lead us to imagine otherwise. Léon Lewillie
liked to philosophise about “swimming for all”,
“sport in the media” or even “sports leisure and
wine”. He often quoted Giraudoux: ‘”Man is not an
animal destined by life for the knacker’s yard”, or
“Often the sportsman dies at the same age as the man
who doesn’t do any sport. But the one has lived in a
state of preservation, and the other in a state of life”.
MEMORIAM
In the early 1980s, Léon Lewillie worked for a short
period as an ergonomist on two projects for the
European Commission. One was a study of impact
in road accidents, the other on biomechanical and
musculo-skeletal problems caused by loading various types of car boot.
There remain the three most important Léon
Lewillies: the biomechanic, the historian and the
electro-kinesiologist.
The biomechanicist loved simple things. His first
interest was the definition of movement in images,
using light trails, stroboscopy and a camera.
Analysis in a single plane enabled him to study a
large number of movements, and where threedimensional analysis was necessary he achieved this
by using two cameras and a calculator. Later he
turned to automatic film analysis and on-line systems with a television camera.
Light traces, combined with stroboscopy, remain for
a long time his preferred method, resulting in analyses of different swimming styles, including the particular swimming style required in water polo, as
well as the various movements made by sportsmen,
factory workers and persons with disabilities. He
was never interested in major biomechanical calculations or formulae, or in simulation and modelling.
He was fanatically opposed to the ‘science salesmen’, who arrived with complex and sophisticated
equipment dictating the method of measurement
and analysis, as a result of which scientists were no
longer the masters of their own experiments and
ideas. Neither did he ever regard himself as a biomechanic. His colleagues gave him that label; he always
called himself a ‘kinesiologist’.
Then there was Léon Lewillie the historian. Of
course he was responsible for the ‘history of physical
education’ course, but he was not satisfied with the
literature by Butler (1930), Diem (1931) and Strobel
(1936), nor with the reports of the International
Society for the History of Physical Education and
Sport (HISPA), though he never failed to attend the
society’s congress, and he loved presenting his
research results there. He frequently spent weeks
and sometimes months in the cellars and antiquarian
sections of the most important libraries in Belgium.
His research, publications and presentations were on
themes such as ‘Professional sport in the Greek
world’, ‘Swimming across the centuries’, ‘The history of scientific measurement’, ‘Scientific research in
sport and physical education’, and the works of
Duchenne de Boulogne, Marey, Von Humboldt and
Galvani. Inevitably, he also researched the history of
electromyography.
In short, the history of sport and certain aspects of
scientific research were a major interest in Lewillie’s
career. In 1982 he published ‘Le sport dans l’art belge
de l’éque romaine à nos jours’ (Lewillie-Noel 1982) in a
de luxe edition illustrated with a hundred works by
Belgian artists, providing a very personal overview of
the history of sport in Belgium – an unequalled
work and, so far, unique of its kind.
Table 1. Number of peer-reviewed publications
specifically concerned with EMG and sport.
Swimming:
33*
Cycling:
22*
Running:
17*
Skiing:
13*
Tennis:
8
Gymnastics:
8
Weightlifting:
7
Triple/high/long jump:5
Golf
5
Speed skating:
4
Soccer:
3
Rowing:
3
Judo:
3*
Archery:
2
Windsurfing: 2
Volleyball: 2
Baseball:
3
Water polo: 2
Javelin:
2*
Kayak:
2
Badminton: 1
Basketball: 1
Bowling:
1
Cricket:
1
Fin swimming:
1
Handball:
1
Rifle shooting:
1
Sailing:
1
Skiff:
1
Shot putt:
1
Softball:
1
Synchro swimming: 1
Wrestling:
1
* not included in the table: windsurfing 1 (Clarys et al, 1986a, in Dutch); judo
3 (Miura et al, 1970; Ikai and Asami, 1963; Takahashi et al, 1971 in
Japanese); swimming 2 (Lewillie, 1967 in French; Kipke, 1966 in German);
cycling 1 (Monod, 1963 in French); weightlifting 2 (Ono, 1962 in Japanese;
Lukachev 1970 in Russian); javelin 2 (Salchenko and Smirnov, 1982 in
Russian; Tanner, 1982); skiing 1 (Schaff and Hauser, 1987, in German).
However, the best-known Léon Lewillie was the
electromyo-kinesiologist. This is easily explained.
He worked with electromyography techniques, but
as his main interest was in the description of movement and its applications in sport and ergonomics,
he had no wish to be an electro-physiologist. As he
did not really regard himself as a biomechanic either,
he called himself ‘the schizophrenic of EMG’. His
EMG work in the field of water sports and his own
techniques for recording muscular work via telemetry are known throughout the world. “The study of
the movements of a swimmer largely depend on the
Rev Port Cien Desp 6(Supl.2) 9–12
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MEMORIAM
limits posed by water to the use of current investigation techniques. Laboratory measurements are by
and large unsatisfactory; in this activity, where
human performance stands at barely a tenth of what
can be achieved on dry land, the resistance of the
ambient environment has enormous importance”.
For Léon Lewillie, the analysis of movement
required a qualitative and quantitative understanding of muscle action. From its first applications,
electromyography was clearly the best available tool
for this research. However, two conditions had to be
fulfilled to enable it to be used effectively: a very
compact device, and an understanding of the relationship between the electromyogram and other biomechanic parameters.
It is thanks to Lewillie that the use of EMG in sport
has almost become a scientific discipline in itself,
and it is no surprise that the table below reveals the
existence of so many studies focusing specifically on
EMG and swimming.
Léon Lewillie may be thought of primarily as an
inventor, but he also constantly combines effectiveness with simplicity. A striking example of this was
the electrodes that he used in these “dynamic” and
“ballistic” movement studies. Normal electrodes
could not be held in a suitably fixed position during
movement; he needed electrodes that were firmly
embedded in the skin. Most of these EMG studies
were carried out using the little metal rasps used for
mending punctures on bicycle tyres, a technique that
more than halved the number of artefacts appearing.
Many other researchers since then have used (and
improved) these “rasp” electrodes.
Lastly there is Léon Lewillie the man of the world,
active in many fields… a member of the Belgian
resistance organisation, the ‘Armée Blanche’; a free
mason since the war, and a master mason for many
years; an experienced specialised oenologist; but
above all a man, teacher, professor, father, brother,
fellow team-worker, scientist, president and fine
friend: all in all, a very great man.
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Rev Port Cien Desp 6(Supl.2) 9–12
REFERENCES
1. Boerhaave H, Gaubius HD (1737). Joannis
Swammerdammü Amstelaedamensis, Biblia Naturae sive
Historia insectorum. Publié par I Severinum, B Vander Aa,
P Leydae (Leiden-Pays Bas).
2. Bouisset S (1999). Correspondance avec Madame A.M.
Lewillie.
3. Clarys JP, Jiskoot J, Lewillie L. (1973). L’emploi des traces
lumineuses dans l’analyse biomécanique de différents
styles de notation. Kinantropologie, 5(2), 123-144.
4. Clarys JP, Lewillie L (1971). The description of wrist and
shoulder motion of different water poloshots using a simple light-trace technique. In L. Lewillie and J. Clarys (Ed.)
1st International Symposium “Biomechanics in
Swimming”, 248-256.
5. Lewillie L (1960). Evolution du coefficient d’utilisation
d’oxygène au cours de l’activité physique. Travaux de la
Soc. Belge d’Education Physique 13, 1-14.L.
6. Lewillie L (1962). Effets de l’échauffement avant l’effort.
Sport 5(20), 22-28.
7. Lewillie L (1968). Analyse télémetrique de l’électromyogramme du nageur. Trav. Soc. Med. Belge d’Educ.
Physique, 20, 174-177.
8. Lewillie L (1970). Analyse de divers style de natation par
traces lumineuses. Educ. Phys. et Sport 103 (suppl. 17), 3-10.
9. Lewillie L (1971). Graphic and electromyographic analysis
of various styles swimming. Biomechanics II. Ed. Karger,
253-257.
10. Lewillie L (1976). Telemetry of electromyographic signal in
swimming. In Nelson R.C. and Morehouse (Eds.)
Biomechanics IV, 203-207.
11. Lewillie L (1976). The History, the Evolution and
Diffusion of Sports Games in Different Cultures. In
Renson, B., De Nayer, P., Ostin, P. (Eds.) Kinanthropology,
369-374.
12. Lewillie L (1976). Variability of myoelectric signals during
swimming. In Komi, P.V. (Ed.) Biomechanics VB, 230-234.
13. Lewillie L (1982). Research and Swimming – Historical
and Scientific Aspects. In P. Hollander, P. Huijing and G. de
Groot (Eds.) Actes du Congrès “Biomechanics and
Medicine in Swimming”.
14. Lewillie L and Bourgeois M (1982). Mathematical Model
and Langrangian Analysis for the Dynamics of the Human
Body in the Crawlstroke. In H. Matsui and M. Miyashita
(Eds.) Biomechanics, 978-985.
15. Lewillie L; Sneppe R (1968). Telemetric measurement of
the respiratory function, Ergonomics, 11(1), 77-81.
16. Lewillie L. Coût de l’activité physique sous forme d’intervaltraining, Revue de l’Education Physique, 2(2-3), 133-147.
17. Lewillie L, Jaumain P (1961). Transmission à distance de la
fréquence cardiaque. Travaux Service d’Etude INEPS, 1,
115-119.
18. Lewillie L. Quantitative comparison of the electromyogram
of the swimmer. In L. Lewillie and J. Clarys (Eds.)1st
International Symposium “Biomechanics in Swimming”,
155-259.
19. Lewillie L, Segers M (1961). Comparaison de l’état de préparation de sport appartenant à deux disciplines différentes. Travaux Service de l’Etudes INEPS, 1, 30-31.