Jump!!!

Back when we were kids, jumping came naturally.  Our bodies were young, elastic, and bouncy!  Nowadays, most of us have to be more careful when we jump so we don’t get hurt.

 

Good jumping starts with our feet.  As we lift off the ground, we want to lift our heels first and toes last, articulating through our feet.  On the way down, we want to reverse that process, letting the balls of our feet land first and rolling down to our heels.  This helps our bodies absorb the shock of reconnecting with the ground.

 

Not surprisingly, knees also have a lot to do with good jumping.  We bend them to get the energy to launch ourselves in the first place, but we have to remember to bend them again as we land.  We want to come down more like rag dolls, who land softly in a lump and less like china dolls, who hit stiffly and shatter.

 

The final piece of good jumping is core control.  Core control is what keeps us from crashing inelegantly.

 

Jumping is a great way to add oomph to our workouts (jump squats!  jump lunges!  plyojacks!) and it can be fun as long as we take a moment to make it safe.  However, some of us find jumping inappropriate for our bodies—this can be because we have large breasts that don’t get adequate support or because we have gimpy knees or because our ankles dislike us (this is not an exhaustive list, of course!).  Done safely, it’s great, but it is totally all right to skip it if it doesn’t work for us.

 

Happy bouncing!