We apologize in advance for the clickbait but we might as well settle this now! We think the notion that black people have a higher vertical jump than people of other races - based purely on race - is absolute bollocks.
It is a narrative that has been advanced by a series of prominent individuals - among them are celebrities, politicians and even prominent academics. We accept that some of them are genuinely carrying the courage of their own convictions, while others we assume are trying to advance a particular agenda - whether that be social or political.
To some degree we can also understand why many people buy into that narrative. The numbers are just that compelling. Some sources reveal that blacks constitute more than 80 percent of the players currently competing in the NBA - the world’s premier domestic basketball competition. But it is an American competition. Not a European competition, not an African competition and not an Asian competition.
For those wondering why we are pursuing this basketball line, it is the one sport where the height of a Vertical Jump can either make or break a career. We also feel the demographic makeup in the sport’s premier teams, including the United States national team, best illustrates why it is that people believe black people jump higher than people of any other race.
In keeping with the national theme, it is also impossible to ignore that the United States team which won the gold medal at the Rio Olympics could not have been more black. What people tend to take for granted though is that the other three teams which competed in the semi-finals of those Summer Olympics were predominantly - no, OVERWHELMINGLY WHITE!
While we think you are already starting to see why we believe the notion of black people Jumping Higher is fundamentally flawed - it would be remiss to stop now!
It is also worth noting that just one African team (Nigeria) qualified for the basketball tournament at the Rio Olympics and because we like teasing, we are going to give you one guess as to where they finished in Group B.
Yes, there is more to basketball than just Jumping Higher than everybody else but Jumping Higher than everybody else matters more than anything else in basketball.
And a broader examination of the numbers in basketball presents us with a bit of a problem here. The global context reveals that black athletes are not the dominant force that you thought they were in the sport - far from it in fact.
Blacks from the United States are outstanding basketball players - the best in the business actually - and they do indeed Jump Higher than most other basketball players. However, we would put it to you that things like geography, culture and nationality are much more telling factors than genes and race - if the latter two can be considered meaningful factors at all.
What Is The Most Athletic Race?
The problem with this question is that so many of the statistics rolled out are based on very specific regions of the globe.
Which race dominates sprint racing?
Which race dominates the NBA?
Which race dominates the NFL?
Which race dominates the MLS? Although it does need to be said that the bar for soccer performance in the United States is not particularly high anyway.
The answer to all of those questions is black of course - we all knew that already!
However, the vast majority of those black athletes are based in the United States, most of them are products of the United States or some part of the Americas in general.
It is certainly apparent that large numbers of black athletes in this part of the world do gravitate towards sport - probably for various reasons. Some of those reasons might be social, some of those reasons might be financial and dare we say, some of those reasons might be political.
While the numbers are compelling, as we have pointed out in various places here but we are not convinced they provide the context required to do the argument justice, really! But we are going to give it a go anyway.
What probably should not be lost on any of us, in the American context, is that many of these sporting institutions have grappled with race for decades, close on a century even.
Okay, we are being a little too diplomatic. Historically, these sporting institutions have at the very least facilitated blatant racism and discrimination. Those issues still feature prominently in the discourse today.
Despite all of that, black athletes in the United States still enjoy some spectacular success, despite making up just less than 13 percent of the population.
It is fair to say blacks are contributing more than their 13 percent share to the most high profile sports in that country, most which are heavily reliant on physical prowess. We can’t ignore that either but why is this the case?
Is the history of racism and discrimination in the United States perhaps a motivating factor, even if it is to a small degree? A symbol perhaps of a racial group breaking the shackles in society.
Some people say that blacks are the most athletic race because their legs are longer (in proportion to the rest of their bodies) compared to their white counterparts.
Others say blacks are the most athletic race because they have narrower hips than their white counterparts. Physical dynamics!
Another link presented for blacks being the most athletic race has to do with the width of their calf bones when compared to their white counterparts
There are those who have argued that blacks are the most athletic race because they generally have a wider wingspan than their white counterparts
We actually touch on tendon length a little later in this blog but it perhaps worth mentioning at this point that there are those who also carry the conviction that blacks have a greater tendon to muscle ratio than most of their white counterparts.
It has also been suggested that most black athletes have a greater bone density than their white counterparts - all of which will have contributed to the capacity of blacks to store and release elastic energy better than white. We do actually touch on the capacity of men to store and release more elastic energy than their female counterparts in a previous blog about the Average Vertical Jump on this page.
Then there is also the school of thought which strongly suggests that the body structure of the black athlete facilitates more efficient athletic movements - whether that be on the football field or on the basketball court.
We have also been told that some of the black success on the sports field can and should be attributed to greater mental composure, especially during a bout of adversity or what pundits will call Big Match Temperament (BMT).
As compelling as some of these explanations might be, there are naturally also many in the academic community who are quite prepared to challenge some of the ideas. We won’t bother hiding that we are also more inclined to side with the skeptics and we are prepared to be labelled for it too.
Does Race Matter In Athletics?
This is an article about Jumping Higher and for that reason we are going to focus on the one track and field code where Jumping Higher is a prerequisite - the high jump! We are prepared to make a concession here. The two most prominent faces in the history of the sport - the World and Olympics Record Holders - are undeniably black.
However, in equal measure it is impossible to ignore that no black man - or woman for that matter - has won an Olympic Gold Medal in the High Jump tournament this century (2000s and 2010s). In fact you have to go back to the mid-90s to find a black winner at the Summer Games.
To answer this question directly, we don’t think that race matters a considerable amount in athletics - if at all. However, we do feel there is an argument to be made that geography matters much more with athletics, particularly in the High Jump event.
If you examine High Jump performances this century, you will quite clearly find that the Gold, Silver and Bronze medals are very much a European and even Eastern European affair. With the right resources and attitudes, there is nothing that cannot be trained or coached, regardless of your genetic background.
We are going to take some liberties here and put it to you that the high jump is not one of the blue ribbon events in track and field - and for anybody who has followed any American sports in the past 50 years you would have noticed that it is all about the glamour and the money that tends to come with the territory. It is about the financial emancipation that comes with it, perhaps.
As we have already suggested, this is by no means a scientific observation but we don’t get the impression that the high jump is as compelling a route to financial prosperity as the sprint events are in track and field in the United States.
As we have hinted in the introduction to this article, we think that the majority of black Americans who take part in sport likely gravitate towards basketball, more so than any other race in the United States - because of the economic and even academic opportunities that come with the territory. Nobody is going to complain about a football or basketball scholarship.
Basketball is also a glamorous option for black American athletes and we think the sprint events in track and field fall very much within that mould - not just for black athletes living in the United States but indeed for those in the Caribbean, who have taken sole ownership of the 100m event in the Athletics World Championships pretty much since they started back in 1983.We will also touch a little more on this later.
We all already know that the Vertical Jump is ultimately a test of lower limb - and indeed lower body - functionality or strength. There is no walking away from that!
A key component of the Vertical Jump test is also the measure of Explosive Power produced by an athlete. When we strip this down to the nuts and bolts, the Vertical Jump is a measure of strength. In the context of this article, that would also be jumping strength.
The sprint races in track and field athletics are also a de facto measure of lower body strength and functionality. Since 1983, finding a white fellow on the 100m sprint podium at major events has been harder than Finding Wally (we believe the North Americans call him Waldo). Naturally, that has led to what we feel are some misconceptions about black strength.
However, once again, very few of the black men who have absolutely dominated this event have represented any of the 54 African nations at these events. Namibia’s Frankie Fredericks does admittedly come to mind but the vast majority of these black men have been from North and Central America.
Does Race Affect The Vertical Jump?
However, we are a little worried that our bias is coming across a little too strong in this blog, which is why we are prepared to examine this matter of race and strength further, although serious doubts remain on whether that automatically translates to a Higher Jump.
A major fear we have is that any scientific experiment done on this will produce misleading and a frankly isolated set of results. But, as we said, we are open to a counter argument being made…”in the name of balance”.
Some tests have indeed found that there is a “strong correlation” between the Vertical Jump and a person’s ethnicity.
It has been “established” that black men jump as much as eight centimetres higher than their white counterparts, after performing a standing countermovement jump with the full use of the upper and lower limbs to propel themselves higher into the air.
It was also established that the group of black men produced greater power output from the lower limbs than their white counterparts, albeit by a smaller but significant margin. It is perhaps worth noting that none of the men who took part in this study had been competitive jumpers or cyclists - which is why we gave it more than just a brief perusal.
The idea being that all of the men were on an equal footing, so to speak, before the experiment began.
Problems With Testing For Impact Of Race On Vertical Jump?
For the social experiment we are citing here, just 31 men were used.
All fifteen of the black men used for the social experiment were from the Caribbean
The sessions conducted for this experiment were limited and the findings of such a study are therefore limited, which means you cannot really carve them in stone. You might win yourself a classroom debate though...and that is always nice.
Are There Any Muscular And Mechanical Differences Between Black And White Men?
There is some meaningful consensus that at the very least, black men do have a greater percentage of twitch fibres in their skeletal muscles than their white counterparts.
There is also come consensus that the level of muscle stiffness in black men is greater than is the case with their white counterparts. That is a meaningful finding because of the relationship that exists between fast muscle fibres, stiff muscles and increased power output from the lower limbs and indeed the recording of a higher vertical.
Also of some interest to the experts is the length and strength of the muscles tendons in the lower limbs. Many of them believe that this is an element of biology that works in the favour of black men over their white counterparts.
That matters because, the longer the tendon, the greater the likelihood of elastic power being stored and released with greater force. We all already know that greater elastic energy almost always contributes to a higher vertical jump.
If I am not careful, this research might start altering my own amateur position on this subject matter. That said, I am going to dig in my heels for now.
Conclusion
It might very well be that black people do jump higher than their white counterparts, based purely on physical or racial attributes.
It might well be that those who refuse to look at the evidence, which has already been represented, are merely champions of the left - advancing a liberal and politically correct agenda.
It is also impossible to ignore that many established academics and scientists share the conviction that black people jump higher and are naturally better athletes. Those people surely know a considerable amount more than a mere freelance blogger from a far-flung corner of the earth.
But when we examine this again, what is actually wrong with challenging the notion that the height of a Vertical Jump and the production of Explosive Power comes down to nothing more than race or ethnicity?
Surely being born with genetic advantages would ordinarily be a source of tremendous pride. You will not have to search that long and hard to find a black athlete who welcomes the notion.
Black comedian Chris Rock even jokes about the very subject matter in some of his material - about black people being physically endowed in more respects than just sport. It is not something that too many people are actually shy about.
However, the problem with so many of these studies and experiments is that their focus groups are limited in their scope. Why aren’t more blacks living and competing in Africa being subjected to the same level of scrutiny - if any at all? How many whites from Europe, South America and even Africa are featuring in this research?
Why are there not more black athletes from South America being subjected to this scrutiny?
Which is the perfect Segway to the final problem we have here.
Why is so much of the emphasis being placed on competitive athletes, whether that be amateur or professional. We need more studies to be done on the “Average Joe”, people who do not possess the same level of athletic prowess or ambition.
People who should just be able to Jump Higher, without the Weight Training or the Plyometrics. Until something a little more conclusive comes along, we are inclined to side with those who do not believe race and ethnicity make you Jump Higher.
Hey, I’m Aleksandar and I am a Basketball freak! That is why I decided to create this blog. Teaching people How to dunk a basketball and How to Jump Higher in this sport or other related sports that require vertical jumping, is my specialty. If that’s your aim, then you have come to the right place.