VERTICAL JUMP CHARACTERISTICS FOLLOWING ANTERIOR CRUCIATE LIGAMENT RECONSTRUCTION

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to compare two-legged countermovement vertical jump characteristics between operated and non-operated lower limbs of twelve recreational athletes who had undergone unilateral ACL surgical reconstruction. A control group of eight uninjured athletes was employed. Bilateral vertical ground reaction forces, joint angles, moments and powers patterns were measured and statistically analysed. The examination of the angular kinematics revealed for the injured limb a significant reduction of the knee and ankle extension angles at the take off and an ankle ROM reduction. Examining peak moments and powers the injured knee exhibited significant lower values. The reduction of the knee peak power seems to be compensated in most of the subjects by an increase of the omolateral ankle peak power.