Sebastian Bayer’s 8.71m European Long Jump record, the second greatest indoor performance of all-time, provided the final afternoon of competition at the 30th European Athletics Indoor Championships in Turin’s Oval Lingotto with an historic, somewhat Beamonesque moment of brilliance. “Right now I cannot tell you how I managed to jump that far” Bayer, 22, whose [...]

By Boo Schexnayder When we examine many of the fine points of the approach, setup, and takeoff, the long jump appears to be a rather complex event. As coaches, we must consider how the %%%%%%penultimate step%%%%%% is set up how the foot contacts the ground, lowering issues, how the takeoff leg sets up, the takeoff [...]

By James Hay Despite its importance to success in the long jump, the takeoff has been accorded little attention by sports biomechanists. We conducted a study to determine the characteristics of an athlete’s technique that determine the vertical velocity gained during the takeoff. We found that the vasti, soleus and gastrocnemius experienced a lengthening-shortening sequence [...]

By M. Galloway and K. Connor The purpose of this study was to identify whether visual control strategies ( or steering) in the long jump run-up had an effect on the subsequent velocity, or the stride pattern, after the point of steering. Click here to read the entire article.

By A. Seyfarth, R. Blickham, and J. L. Van Leeuwen Our goal was to test a series of models whose components are important for describing the dynamics and optimal techniques for the long jump. In the first step, a close fit between measured ground reaction forces and the force predicted by a model was achieved. [...]

By A. Seyfarth, A. Friedrichs, V. Want, R. Blckhan A mechanical model is proposed which quantitatively describes the centre of gravity (c.g.) during the take-off phase of the long jump. The model entails a minimal but necessary number of components: a linear leg spring with the ability of lengthening to describe the active peak of [...]

By Mark A. Scott, Francois-Xavier Li & Keith Davids In the approach phase of the long jump, athletes attempt to strike the take-off board accurately with a minimum loss of speed, and in an optimum body position for take-off. Previous research has shown that skilled long jumpers demonstrate an ascending-descending trend of variability rather than [...]

By D. Glize and M. Laurent The production of a stabilized locomotor pattern is crucial in sporting activities such as the run-up in long-jumping, a task which is characterized by high spatio-temporal constraints. The aims of this study were as follows. First, we wished to investigate how athletes stabilize their stride patterns so as to [...]