The High Jump Height Through Fosbury Flop

Abstract

Fosbury style is used by elite high jump players to compete the jump. This style consists of three phases, namely, approach phase, take-off phase and flight phase. These three phases are important to consider when making the best height of jump. Existing models describe the two-dimensional motion of the athlete or do not consider the take-off plane. This study is aimed to develop a mathematical model to describe the three-dimensional motion of the athlete in the air. Such an approach has not been considered in the literature. Proposed model is used to analyse the impact of parameters which are used when making a high jump. The take-off angles, air resistance, take-off velocity, centre of mass, body’s moments of inertia and gravity mainly affect in height of the high jump. In this paper, we mainly focus on the impact of moments of inertia of the body. Height of jump is varied with take-off angles and velocities while other parameters remain constant. Using this model, in particular, we may compute the take-off distance of each jump. Further, influence of body’s moment of inertia is examined and can assist to rotation around front axis when over passing bar. The study uses secondary data for numerical simulations. The numerical simulations are executed using the MATLAB software.