Discrepancy between ‘contributing to’ and ‘sharing variance with’ the effective energy for height in high jump

ABSTRACT

In high jump, the thigh and shank rotations mainly induce the effective energy for height ($E_{\mathrm{vert}}$) by directly or indirectly (via joint work) converting horizontal-kinetic energy. Meanwhile, inter-individual differences in $E_{\mathrm{vert}}$ may not only be explained by large contributors. Here we show that the $E_{\mathrm{vert}}$ components due to relatively small contributor segments share variance with total $E_{\mathrm{vert}}$ while those due to the two largest contributor segments do not, by analyzing high jump of 15 male jumpers (personal best: 1.90–2.31 m). The largest $E_{\mathrm{vert}}$ components were from the stance-leg thigh and shank (36 ± 7%, 34 ± 7% of total $E_{\mathrm{vert}}$), but each of them did not significantly share variance with total $E_{\mathrm{vert}}$ (r² < 0.12). Meanwhile, each of the thoracic and stance-leg-foot components significantly shared variance with total increase in $E_{\mathrm{vert}}$ (r² > 0.30), despite their relatively small contributions (11 ± 2%, 4 ± 1%). The stance-leg thigh and shank components had a strongly trade-off relationship (r² = 0.60). We reveal that large contributors to the performance variable do not directly imply by their large contribution that they explain inter-individual differences in motor performance, and vice versa. We provide an example where large contributors to the performance variable are related to individually different strategies for achieving performance rather than to performance itself.

KEYWORDS:

• Inter-individual variability
• Fosbury-flop
• running jump
• performance
• biomechanics

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics approval statement

The Human Research Ethics Committee at the University of Tsukuba, Japan, approved the study protocol (A reference number: PE021–140).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science [21K17592]; Tateishi Science and Technology Foundation [2221014].