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Jumping and landing performance in school-aged children

Abstract:

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to analyze the differences in the kinetics of the landing phase of a counter-movement jump in a group of school-aged children, according to their gender, age and level of overweight. A secondary purpose was to analyze the relationships between the landing phase and the jump height and peak power during the push-off phase. Methodology: We analyzed the jumps of 57 boys (age = 9.3±0.9 years) and 45 girls (age = 9.2±1.0 years) from the 3rd, 4th and 5th courses of the primary school with force platform. Results: There were significant differences among courses in the jump height (3rd = 15.9±2.5 cm; 4th = 17.0±3.1 cm; 5th = 20.9±4.1 cm) and in the peak power (3rd = 33.2±3.9 W/kg; 4th = 34.7±3.9 W/kg; 5th = 41.5±5.0 W/kg), but not between genders. The children without overweight showed greater jump height and peak power (p<0.001). There were no significant differences in the second peak vertical force value during the landing movement (F2) between the subjects without overweight and the others, probably because the children without overweight performed higher jumps than those with overweight and obesity (18.9±3.9 cm and 15.5±2.7 cm, respectively). There were no significant correlations between jump height and F2, which would point out that the children can perform landings with low F2 values regardless of the landing height. Conclusions: The lack of significant relationships between the power during the push off phase and the peak force value during the landing phase suggest that the ability to perform soft landings does not depend on the explosive force. The differences in explosive force in the children with and without overweight were not found in the landing phase, probably because of the lower jump heights reached by the children with overweight.