Purpose: The loads applied on the musculoskeletal system during the long jump takeoff step are not well established for nonamputee athletes or athletes with a lower extremity amputation. Information on joint loading and potential injury mechanisms is important for improving training or rehabilitation protocols, prosthetic design, and the general understanding of the long jump.
Methods: Three-dimensional takeoff step kinematics and kinetics were used for inverse dynamic model calculations on three male athletes with and seven male athletes without a below the knee amputation (BKA). Athletes with BKA used their affected leg as their takeoff leg.
Results: Despite equivalent long jump performance, ground reaction force application characteristics were widely different, and calculated joint loads were significantly lower in athletes with BKA compared with nonamputee athletes during the takeoff step. The takeoff step of the long jump for athletes with BKA seems to be dominated by sagittal plane movements, whereas it involves sagittal plane movement and compensatory joint work in the frontal plane for nonamputee athletes.
Conclusions: Coaches and athletes should adapt training protocols to the unique musculoskeletal loading patterns of long jumpers with or without a BKA. Specifically, nonamputee athletes should strengthen the muscles responsible for hip and knee extension, as well as for frontal plane stabilization, early in the season to avoid injuries. The presented data enable clinicians to identify potential causes of pain or injury more differentially in both groups of athletes and might stimulate future research in the field of robotics and prosthetic components. Furthermore, the altered joint mechanics of athletes with BKA versus nonamputees serves as an explanation for their previously described more effective takeoff step.