CoachesEducation.com

Hi.

I'm a basketball player and I've always wondered why I am a two-legged jumper. If I run and jump off of both legs I get higher in the air than if I jump off my left leg. I don't think poor coordination is the problem, however.

Anyways, I read in one of the articles on this page, that for block starts in sprinting the "quick leg" is the leg you kick a ball with. For me (being right-handed) that's my right leg. But I've always used my left leg to jump. Now I'm wondering if my right leg simply has more power and if that's the reason why I'm a fairly good two-legged jumper but only an average one foot jumper...?

Doesn't this mean that pretty much everybody who's right handed should use their right leg as take-off leg if possible? Do long, triple or high jumpers normally use their left leg if they're right-handed?

When a sprinter assumes a crouch position the strongest (dominant) leg is forward. When the sprinter hears the gun the initial reaction to the gun is a quick, powerful extension of the back leg (quick leg).

An athlete with good jumping ability, who is jumping with two legs, has to be trained the basic fundamentals of jumping, no jumpers in track & field jumps with two legs it's not fundamentally sound. A High Jumper who jumps from the right side of the landing pit uses the left foot takeoff (dominant leg) and for the jumpers who jump from the left side of the pit uses the right foot takeoff(dominant leg).

If I'm playing basketball standing underneath the basket and for me to dunk the ball I would use two legs to jump. If Michael Jordan wanted to dunk the ball and was five feet away from the free throw line with a running start he would not jump with both legs. He would use the quick leg and dominant leg takeoff.