Biomechanical Comparison of
Deep Water and Treadmill Running

Presented by:

John A. Mercer, Ph.D.

The coordination of a movement is the process of mastering redundant degrees of freedom of the moving organ, in other words, its conversion to a controllable system.

The presentation of deep water running mechanics has been broken down into the following sections. You can go directly to any section, as well as to the data, but is recommended that you start with the introduction.

• Introduction
• Purpose
• Running Kinematics
• Methods
• Kinematic results and discussion
• EMG results and discussion
• Limitations
• Practical Applications
• References

• EMG setup.
• Table 1: Heart rates and strides rates during DWR and TMR.
• Table 2: Correlations between angles during DWR and TMR.
• Figure 1: Comparison of heart rates for different submaximal levels of oxygen consumption.
• Figures 2-4: Ankle, knee and hip changes during a stride.
• Figures 5-7: Knee-Hip angle-angle plot.
• Figures 8-10: Knee-Ankle angle-angle plot.
• Figures 11 and 12: Knee-Ankle angle-angle plot during DWR C1 only.
• Figures 13-15: Muscle activity levels during DWR.

• Mercer, J.A. & Jensen, R.L (1997). Reliability and Validity of a Deep Water Running Graded Exercise Test. Measurement in Physical Education and Exercise Science, 1(4), 213-222.
• Mercer, J.A. & Jensen, R.L. (1997) Heart Rates at equivalent submaximal VO2 do not differ between Deep Water Running and Treadmill Running. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research (in press).