Vertical Jumping Reorganization with Aging: A Kinematic Comparison between Young and Elderly Men

Abstract

To our knowledge jumping kinematics have never been studied in elderly persons. This study was aimed at examining the influence of aging on vertical jump performance and on interjoint coordination. Two groups of adults, 11 young men ages 18–25 years and 11 older men ages 79–100 years, were filmed while performing a maximal squat jump. Compared to young adults, jump height was significantly decreased by 28 cm in the elderly. Older adults spontaneously jumped from a more extended position of the hip. Results showed a decrease in hip, knee, and ankle linear velocity and angular amplitude with aging. The decrease in jump height was attributed to a decrease in explosive force and in the range of shortening of extensor muscles. In agreement with the literature, a proximo-distal coordination pattern was observed in young adults. Older adults used a simultaneous pattern. This may indicate that adults adjust their pattern of joint coordination as they age.

Reproducibility and relationship of single‐joint strength vs multi‐joint strength and power in aging individuals

“…The CMJ movement could be readily performed by all subjects in our group of community-dwelling healthy elderly women. Furthermore, numerous studies have performed maximal vertical jumping (CMJ and/or squat jump) in old subjects (up to 100 years) without reporting methodological problems (Bosco & Komi, 1980;Paasuke et al, 2000;Caserotti et al, 2001;Rittweger et al, 2004;Haguenauer et al, 2005). It cannot be excluded, however, that individuals with serious musculoskeletal problems (i.e., back pain or arthritis) would have difficulties in performing the CMJ without pain.…”

Control of Poly-Articular Chain Trajectory Using Temporal Sequence of Its Joints Displacements

“…Fingertip trajectory concavity depends also on the spatial position of the target to reach and increase from ipsilateral to contralateral sides [20]. In human jumping and animal leaping, we showed that, whereas the magnitude of the velocity vector increased all along the CoM trajectory during push-off, its orientation was reached at 20% of total push-off time in Microcebus murinus [21] and at 40% in humans [22] and then remained constant. In other words, after an orientation phase of the body CoM, these species tend to maintain their trajectory linear.…”

Robot-assisted assessment of muscle strength

“…~ 300°/s) of typical isokinetic devices. For instance, humeral internal rotation velocity during throwing (overhand pitching) may reach 130–134 rad/s and knee and ankle angular velocity during jumping is about 12–15 rad/s [26–28]. …”