3.3 Landing Mechanics and Force Absorption

The short version

Nobody films their landings. Everybody films their jumps. That imbalance is roughly why most jumping injuries happen on the way down rather than on the way up, and it is the reason this article exists.

Here is the bit of physics that runs everything. Gravity pulls you down, and when your feet hit the floor all that downward motion has to stop. How much motion needs stopping is decided for you — it depends on your weight and how fast you were falling, and you cannot argue with either. What you can change is how long you take to stop. Land with stiff, straight legs and the whole thing gets done in a fraction of a second, which means enormous force. Let your ankles, knees and hips fold, and the same job gets spread over more time and more distance, which means far less force through any one part of you.

So this article is about doing that well: how the work should be shared out, what happens when one joint refuses to do its bit, which landing faults actually matter, and how to build the skill up in a sensible order instead of hoping for the best.

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Landing is a chain, and the knee pays for the weak links

Height is not the only thing that decides how hard a landing is. Two people can drop from the same box and one will take twice the peak force of the other, purely because of how much time and joint range they used on the way down (Devita & Skelly, 1992). This is worth sitting with, because it means "go lower" is not the only lever you have. How you land matters as much as how far you fell.

The joints work as a team. Forefoot touches first, the ankle gives a little, then the knee bends, then the hip folds, then the trunk stays organised over the top of it all. Each link takes a share. Done properly it feels almost soft, like a car with good suspension going over a speed bump instead of a shopping trolley hitting a kerb.

When one link opts out, another one covers, and it is usually the knee. Stiff ankles that will not bend, hips that do not want to sit back, a trunk that collapses forward — every one of those shortfalls gets paid for somewhere else, and the knee is the joint most often left holding the bill. That is why knee pain in a jumper so often turns out to be an ankle or hip problem wearing a disguise.

One fault gets more attention than all the others. The knee caving inward on landing has been studied more than any other movement error, because it shows up again and again in serious knee ligament injuries (Hewett et al., 2005; Koga et al., 2010). If you only ever check one thing on a landing, check whether the knees track over the feet or drift toward each other.

You do not get to skip this before bouncing. Landing well is the entry requirement for any jump training, not a nice extra to add later. Rebounding is just landing plus an immediate push, so an athlete who cannot absorb a landing cleanly has no business trying to spring out of one.

Build it in an order that makes sense. Get the position right first, standing still. Then add impact from a small height. Then add flight, so you are jumping rather than dropping. Then take it to one leg. Then add direction, so you are landing sideways and diagonally, not just straight down. Only then start making it unpredictable with a partner or a ball. Skipping steps is how people end up practising a bad landing very quickly.

Cueing cannot fix a strength problem. If the legs are not strong enough to control a controlled lowering, no amount of "soft knees" and "chest up" will help. Telling someone to hold a position they do not have the strength to hold just makes them tense. The capacity has to be built alongside the technique, not instead of it.

Listen to it. This is the cheapest coaching tool there is and it works embarrassingly well. Quiet landings usually mean the force is being shared out properly. Loud, slapping landings usually mean it is not. You do not need a force plate to hear the difference from across a room.

The rest of the article goes into the detail: force-time curves, how each joint contributes, the specific faults and what they predict, the screening tools coaches use, and full progressions with numbers attached. Those sections are more technical, so read them when you want the mechanism rather than the map.

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How landing strategy changes the force-time curveTwo force-time curves on landing. A stiff landing shows a very high, narrow peak, while a soft landing shows a lower, broader curve spread over a longer time.How landing strategy changes the force-time curveStiff landing (short duration)Soft landing (longer duration)ContactMid-landingEnd02× bodyweight5× bodyweightTime from contactVertical ground reaction forceHigh peak forceForce spread over time

Figure 3.3.4 — The total impulse is fixed by the height fallen, but the peak force is not. Spreading the landing over more time and more joint range lowers the peak substantially.

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The joints share the work

A good landing distributes the work across the ankle, knee and hip. The forefoot contacts first and the ankle begins to dorsiflex, the knee flexes, and the hip flexes while the trunk inclines slightly forward. All three joints contribute, and the muscles crossing them work eccentrically to control the movement.

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When one joint cannot contribute, the others must absorb more. Limited ankle dorsiflexion, for example, is a common finding and it immediately shifts load upward. So does a hip that does not flex, which produces the characteristic upright, knee-dominant landing where the knees travel far forward and take almost all of the load.

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The kinetic chain of force absorption on landingA left to right chain showing ground contact, ankle, knee, hip and trunk, indicating how landing force is distributed across joints and highlighting the knee as the joint most often overloaded.The kinetic chain of force absorption on landingGround contactForefoot contactsfirst, then heelsettles. Contact areaand timing set upeverything above.AnkleDorsiflexion absorbsthe first portion.Limited ankle rangeshifts load upwardimmediately.KneeFlexion absorbs a largeshare. Vulnerable whenit is the only jointbending or when itcollapses inward.HipFlexion and externalrotation absorb forceand controlfrontal-plane positionof the knee.TrunkPosition determineswhere the centre ofmass sits. An uprightor laterally tiltedtrunk changes jointloading throughout.

Figure 3.3.1 — Landing force is absorbed by a chain of joints working in sequence. When the ankle or hip fails to contribute, the knee absorbs the shortfall, which is why so many landing injuries are knee injuries.

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What a good landing looks like

• Forefoot contacts first, then the heel settles; the landing is not flat-footed or heel-first.
• Ankles, knees and hips all visibly bend, and the movement looks continuous rather than abrupt.
• Knees track over the middle of the feet and do not drift inward.
• Trunk inclines slightly forward with the chest over the middle of the feet, not bolt upright and not folded.
• Both feet contact at the same time in a two-foot landing, and weight is shared evenly.
• The landing is quiet, and the athlete can hold the position without a secondary hop or a stumble.

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Why the knee is the problem joint

The knee sits in the middle of the chain and has limited ability to resist side-to-side movement. It is essentially a hinge, and it depends on the hip above it and the foot and ankle below it to keep it aligned. When the hip abductors and external rotators do not control the thigh, the knee drifts inward relative to the foot, a position usually described as dynamic knee valgus.

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This position matters because it combines several loading patterns that stress the anterior cruciate ligament simultaneously. Prospective research has associated greater knee abduction load during landing with subsequent anterior cruciate ligament injury, and the position is central to most injury-prevention programmes (Hewett et al., 2005).

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A useful mental model: The knee is rarely the cause of the problem, it is where the problem shows up. Look at the hip and the ankle before blaming the knee.

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The mechanics, the risk factors and the assessment

Impulse, peak force and stiffness

The impulse required to arrest a landing equals the change in momentum, which is set by the landing velocity and body mass. Because impulse is force multiplied by time, a longer landing duration necessarily means a lower average force. This is why coaching cues that encourage more range and a longer absorption produce measurable reductions in peak ground reaction force (Devita & Skelly, 1992).

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Landing stiffness describes how much the leg deforms under the landing load. Stiff landings show high peak forces and short durations; soft landings show the opposite. Neither extreme is universally desirable. Very soft landings take longer and are unsuitable when the athlete needs to rebound immediately, while very stiff landings raise peak tissue loading.

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The trained athlete needs to select stiffness according to task. Landing to stop, as at the end of a rebound in basketball, calls for a soft, long absorption. Landing to rebound, as in a depth jump, calls for a stiff, short contact. Teaching both, and teaching the athlete when to use each, is more useful than teaching one universal landing.

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Frontal-plane control and injury risk

Dynamic knee valgus is a combination of hip adduction and internal rotation, knee abduction, and often tibial external rotation and foot pronation. It is the position most consistently associated with non-contact anterior cruciate ligament injury, and video analyses of actual injury events frequently show it in the moments before rupture (Koga et al., 2010).

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The underlying contributors are usually a mixture. Hip abductor and external rotator weakness is common. Limited ankle dorsiflexion range restricts forward travel of the shin and encourages the knee to find range elsewhere. Trunk control matters too, because lateral trunk lean shifts the centre of mass away from the stance limb and increases the frontal-plane moment at the knee.

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Fatigue makes all of it worse. Landing mechanics measurably degrade under fatigue, with reduced knee flexion and increased knee abduction commonly reported. This is one of the strongest arguments for placing landing and plyometric work early in a session and for ending sets on quality.

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Landing faults, what they indicate, and what to trainA table of five common landing faults with the likely underlying cause and the corresponding training response.Landing faults, what they indicate, and what to trainLikely causeWhat to trainKnee collapses inwardHip abductor and external rotator weaknessHip abduction strength, banded landing drillsStiff, straight-leg landingFear, inexperience or eccentric weaknessAltitude landings, tempo squats, cueing depthHeels slam down firstPoor foot contact strategy or calf weaknessForefoot contact drills, calf eccentricsTrunk stays upright, hips donot bendLimited hip strategy; knee-dominant patternHip hinge patterning, Romanian deadlift (RDL) and deadlift workAsymmetric landing, one sideloadedStrength or confidence asymmetrySingle-leg landing work, unilateral strengthLoud landing with asecondary hopInsufficient eccentric capacity for the heightReduce drop height, build eccentric strength

Figure 3.3.2 — Landing faults are usually symptoms. Treating the symptom by cueing alone often fails if the underlying capacity or mobility restriction is not addressed.

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Assessment tools and what they can and cannot do

Several screening approaches exist. The drop vertical jump, in which an athlete drops from a box and immediately performs a maximal jump, is filmed from the front and the side and used to observe knee position and joint excursions (Hewett et al., 2005). The Landing Error Scoring System provides a structured tally of specific errors from two camera angles and produces a single score (Padua et al., 2009).

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These tools are useful for structuring observation and for tracking change within an athlete over time. Their limitations should be understood honestly: The predictive accuracy of movement screens for future injury at an individual level is modest, and a good score does not confer immunity (Bahr, 2016). Screens are best treated as a way to identify things worth coaching rather than as a reliable forecast.

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A simple practical alternative that requires no equipment is to film a two-foot and a single-leg landing from the front and the side on a phone, and to watch for the six features listed earlier. Most meaningful faults are visible without instrumentation.

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Eccentric capacity as the underlying requirement

Landing is an eccentric task, and eccentric strength is the capacity that makes controlled landing possible. Muscle is capable of producing higher force eccentrically than concentrically, and eccentric-specific training produces adaptations including increased strength at long muscle lengths and changes in tendon properties (Douglas et al., 2017).

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This matters because a landing fault produced by insufficient capacity will not respond durably to cueing. An athlete who lands stiffly because they cannot control the descent will revert as soon as attention shifts or fatigue rises. Building eccentric strength through tempo work, controlled lowering and eccentric-emphasis loading addresses the cause.

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Practical options include tempo squats with a slow lowering phase, Romanian deadlifts, Nordic hamstring curls for the posterior chain, controlled step-downs for single-leg eccentric control, and calf eccentrics for the ankle. These sit alongside, not instead of, landing drills.

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Does landing training actually reduce injury?

This is one of the better-supported areas in sports injury prevention. Multi-component neuromuscular training programmes that include landing technique, plyometrics, strength and balance work have been shown in meta-analyses to reduce anterior cruciate ligament injury rates, with the largest effects reported in female athletes in team sports (Webster & Hewett, 2018).

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The important caveats are that the effective programmes are multi-component rather than technique-only, that they require sustained adherence rather than a short block, and that compliance is the strongest predictor of benefit (Fort-Vanmeerhaeghe et al., 2016). A programme performed twice weekly through a season outperforms an intensive pre-season block that is then abandoned.

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The practical conclusion is that landing work belongs in the warm-up permanently rather than being treated as a rehabilitation phase to be completed and left behind.

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Building landing competence

Landing progresses through position, impact, flight, limb, direction, and finally unpredictability. Skipping stages is the usual reason athletes plateau or get hurt.

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A landing progression from simplest to most demandingSix stacked rows moving from a squat and hold on the floor through to reactive single leg landings from height, showing the order in which landing competence is built.A landing progression from simplest to most demanding1. Snap-down from standingNo drop. Athlete drops the hips fast and sticks the position. Teaches the shape.2. Altitude landing from a low boxStep off, land on two feet, hold three seconds. Introduces impact.3. Two-foot landing from a jumpCountermovement jump, land and stick. Adds flight and less predictable contact.4. Single-leg landing from a low boxHalves the base and doubles the load per limb. Frontal-plane control is exposed.5. Lateral and rotational landingsLanding while moving sideways or turning. Closer to sporting reality.6. Reactive and unanticipated landingsLanding with a cue, a ball or contact. Highest demand, last to be introduced.Lower demandHigher demand

Figure 3.3.3 — Each level should be quiet, balanced and holdable for two to three seconds before moving up. Height is the last variable to increase, not the first.

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Coaching the landing itself

1. Teach the shape first without any drop, using a snap-down so the athlete feels the hips move back and down quickly.
2. Add impact from a low box with a two to three second hold, so the position must actually be controlled rather than passed through.
3. Use sound as feedback. Ask the athlete to make the landing quieter and let them solve it; most will find more joint range without further instruction.
4. Film from the front for frontal-plane control and from the side for joint excursions. One camera angle hides half the information.
5. Progress to single leg before increasing height, because single-leg landing from a low box is more informative than two-foot landing from a high one.
6. Introduce lateral and rotational landings before reactive ones, and introduce reactive landings last.

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Programming

Landing work is low in volume and high in attention. Typical prescriptions are two to four sets of three to six landings, performed early in a session or as part of a warm-up. Because the metabolic cost is negligible, it can be included frequently, and frequent short exposures generally serve technique better than occasional long sessions.

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The stopping criterion is quality. When landings become noisy, when the athlete needs a secondary hop to stabilise, or when the knee begins to drift inward, the useful part of the set is over.

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What to pair it with

• Hip strength. Hip abduction and external rotation work addresses the most common cause of frontal-plane collapse. Standing hip abduction, side-lying work, banded lateral walks and single-leg exercises all contribute.
• Ankle mobility. Restricted dorsiflexion shifts load upward. Ankle mobilisation and calf work through full range address the restriction rather than compensating around it.
• Eccentric strength. Tempo squats, Romanian deadlifts, Nordic curls and controlled step-downs build the capacity that landing depends on.
• Trunk control. Anti-lateral-flexion and anti-rotation work supports the trunk position that keeps the centre of mass over the stance limb.

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Sport applications

In basketball and volleyball, landings are frequent, often single-leg, and frequently occur while the athlete is contested or off balance. Landing work for these athletes should progress quickly to single-leg and to landings with a distraction or a contact.

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In football and soccer, the highest-risk landings often occur in combination with a change of direction or a deceleration rather than from height. Landing training should therefore be integrated with deceleration and cutting work rather than kept separate.

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In gymnastics and skiing, landing forces are far higher than in most team sports, and technique is highly specific. General landing work builds capacity, but sport-specific landing practice under supervision is irreplaceable.

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For older adults, the relevant version of landing competence is the ability to recover balance and absorb an unexpected loading event. Low-amplitude hopping and step-down work serve this purpose without the tissue cost of jumping from height.

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Common mistakes

• Treating landing as the end of the jump rather than a skill. Most programmes count jumps and ignore landings entirely, which leaves the higher-risk half of the movement untrained.
• Cueing a fault that is actually a capacity problem. An athlete who cannot control the descent will revert under fatigue no matter how well they are cued. Build the eccentric strength.
• Increasing drop height too early. Height is the most tempting progression and the least useful. Single-leg landing from a low box teaches more than two-foot landing from a high one.
• Filming from one angle. Frontal-plane collapse is invisible from the side, and joint excursions are invisible from the front.
• Cueing knees out excessively. Overcorrecting into a wide, externally rotated position is its own fault. The target is the knee tracking over the middle of the foot, not pushed outward.
• Doing landing work at the end of a session. Mechanics degrade under fatigue, so late-session landing work rehearses the fault rather than the correction.
• Stopping the programme once the athlete looks competent. The injury-prevention benefit tracks with ongoing adherence. Landing work belongs in the warm-up indefinitely.

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Coaching cues

• Land quiet
• Hips back and down
• Knees over the middle of your feet
• Toes down first, then settle
• Chest over your feet
• Freeze it for three seconds
• Both feet at the same time

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FAQs

How much force does a landing actually produce?

It depends heavily on drop height and landing strategy, but landings routinely produce peak vertical ground reaction forces of several times bodyweight, and stiff landings from height can produce considerably more (Devita & Skelly, 1992). The important point is that the peak is strongly influenced by technique, which is why landing training changes loading measurably.

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Should I always land softly?

No. Soft landings are appropriate when the goal is to stop and absorb. When the goal is to rebound immediately, as in a depth jump or a sprint contact, a stiffer and shorter landing is correct. The skill is selecting the right strategy for the task, and both should be trained.

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Is knee valgus always bad?

A small amount of inward knee travel appears in many normal movements and is not automatically pathological. What matters is the magnitude, whether the athlete can control and reverse it, and whether it appears under load and fatigue. Uncontrolled collapse under load is the concern, not any visible deviation.

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Can landing training prevent ACL injuries?

Multi-component neuromuscular training programmes that include landing technique alongside strength, plyometrics and balance have been shown to reduce anterior cruciate ligament injury rates in meta-analyses. No programme eliminates risk, and the benefit depends on sustained adherence rather than a short block of work.

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Why do my landings get worse when I am tired?

Fatigue reduces the capacity of muscle to control the descent and appears to degrade the coordination that maintains alignment. Reduced knee flexion and increased knee abduction under fatigue are commonly reported. This is why landing work belongs early in a session and why sets should end on quality.

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My ankles feel tight when I land. Does that matter?

Yes, it can. Limited ankle dorsiflexion restricts how far the shin can travel forward, which reduces the ankle contribution to absorption and shifts load to the knee. Addressing the restriction directly is more productive than trying to coach around it.

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Recommended videos

Each video below was chosen because it covers a specific part of this article in more depth than text alone allows.

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Related reading on FitXplor

• 3.1 Introduction to Plyometrics
• 3.2 The Stretch-Shortening Cycle
• 3.7 Deceleration: Braking Mechanics and Eccentric Strength
• 3.8 Jump Training and Vertical Power
• 3.10 Agility and Change of Direction

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References

Hewett, T. E., Myer, G. D., Ford, K. R., et al. (2005). Biomechanical measures of neuromuscular control and valgus loading of the knee predict anterior cruciate ligament injury risk in female athletes. American Journal of Sports Medicine, 33(4), 492–501.

Devita, P., & Skelly, W. A. (1992). Effect of landing stiffness on joint kinetics and energetics in the lower extremity. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 24(1), 108–115.

Padua, D. A., Marshall, S. W., Boling, M. C., et al. (2009). The Landing Error Scoring System (LESS) is a valid and reliable clinical assessment tool of jump-landing biomechanics. American Journal of Sports Medicine, 37(10), 1996–2002.

Koga, H., Nakamae, A., Shima, Y., et al. (2010). Mechanisms for noncontact anterior cruciate ligament injuries: knee joint kinematics in 10 injury situations from female team handball and basketball. American Journal of Sports Medicine, 38(11), 2218–2225.

Webster, K. E., & Hewett, T. E. (2018). Meta-analysis of meta-analyses of anterior cruciate ligament injury reduction training programs. Journal of Orthopaedic Research, 36(10), 2696–2708.

Fort-Vanmeerhaeghe, A., Romero-Rodriguez, D., Lloyd, R. S., et al. (2016). Integrative neuromuscular training in youth athletes. Strength and Conditioning Journal, 38(4), 9–27.

Malliaras, P., Cook, J., Purdam, C., & Rio, E. (2015). Patellar tendinopathy: clinical diagnosis, load management, and advice for challenging case presentations. Journal of Orthopaedic & Sports Physical Therapy, 45(11), 887–898.

Douglas, J., Pearson, S., Ross, A., & McGuigan, M. (2017). Chronic adaptations to eccentric training: a systematic review. Sports Medicine, 47(5), 917–941.

Bahr, R. (2016). Why screening tests to predict injury do not work — and probably never will. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 50(13), 776–780.

Dowling, B., McPherson, A. L., & Paci, J. M. (2018). Weightlifting and landing mechanics: implications for injury risk. Sports Health, 10(4), 348–354.