Why don’t we run like Cheetahs? Obviously we are not cats and have far different anatomy. What concerns me is that humans are not orbs, and we have anatomical limits and constraints that make biomechanics far more complicated than physics classes. One of the debates is what is more important, vertical forces and horizontal forces with sprinting. I will bring up the debate later this week as an excellent explanation of the challenge of getting people faster will be posted by a guest. My point on this entry is that optimum is not just physics, but the limits of anatomy, especially injury. We don’t throw and jump at various optimal angles on paper because either we can’t do it anatomically or it actually decreases performance when we do. The best product of performance is near ideals, but often injury will occur when we adapt athletes to much to models that are theoretical. We need to appreciate what the body can do vs what looks good on our own paper.
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