Data shows that left-handed athletes have unique advantages in the tense duel sports, such as baseball, cricket and table tennis.
From table tennis star Ding Ning to badminton stars Fu Haifeng and Lin Dan , there are many left-handed athletes in the competitive sports industry. Now researchers say they have found the reason why left-handed athletes will perform very well in some top events.
Chen Wenhong
Research results were published in Bio Express, which mentioned that left-handed athletes have unique advantages in time-strength duel events, such as table tennis and cricket. Perhaps because their movement methods are different from those of right-handed opponents, the opponent does not have time to make adjustments in time.
"The data shows that the more time is tight in the competition, the greater the proportion of left-handed athletes among athletes," said Dr Florian Loffing, author of the paper and from the University of Oldenburg, Germany. "We are not used to using left-handed, so we may not have trained the best countermeasures to fight left-handed."
Generally speaking, the left-handed population accounts for about 10-13%, but in some confrontational events, the proportion of high-level left-handed athletes has always been much higher than this level.
Zhang Jun
Live-handed athletes often achieve great achievements in the sports circle, such as famous baseball experts Sandy Koufax and Randy Johnson, cricketers Garfield Sobers and Mitchell Johnson, table tennis players Wang Nan and Kasumi Ishikawa .
Previous studies have listed many possible explanations, including the more efficient connection between the two hemispheres of the brain of left-handed athletes. Another study says that the difference between left-handed men gives left-handed men an advantage: most athletes are right-handed, and they are better at playing ball with right-handed athletes. But there is another question, why are the proportion of left-handed athletes in different events very different?
Fu Haifeng
To explore this issue, between 2009 and 2014, Profen collected information on the world's top 100 players in badminton, squash , tennis, table tennis, men's cricket, and men's baseball events and left and right hand usage habits.
Preliminary study found that the proportion of left-handed athletes in different events varies significantly. Left-handed athletes account for 30% of top baseball pitchers, compared with 13% in men's badminton and only 8.7% in men's squash. Among female athletes, more than 19% of top table tennis players are left-handed, while squash is only 8.4% and tennis and badminton are less than 8%.
Profen analyzed the game records and data collected by the Hawkeye measurement system, and examined the time characteristics of each item, such as the time interval when the tennis ball hits the opponent's racket in a tennis game, or the time interval when the player throws the ball to the bat in a baseball game.
results show that the time to play baseball is the most tight, followed by cricket and table tennis. The hit speed of other sports using rackets is relatively slow, and the slowest is squash. Whether it is a male or female athlete, reaction time is very critical. This may be because athletes are unfamiliar with the characteristics of left-handed opponents, so it is even more difficult to expect their actions.
Bao Chunlai
Profen also mentioned that the research results support the hypothesis that left-handed people have always existed in humans because theirs is more dominant in fighting.
Profen believes that other factors will also have an impact, including the team tactics in some projects. But he advises right-handed athletes to practice as much as possible with left-handed ones, especially when the situation is tense. He also mentioned that the advantages of left-handed may be shown in the speed program.
Dr. Scott Hardie of Abertay University, also participated in the study, said “Another entry point for this phenomenon is that left-handers can process high-speed information and respond in a timely manner.Chris McManus, professor of psychology and medicine at the University of London, supported the study, but he said the advantages of left-handed people may only be reflected in the high-level athletes of . "That means that left-handed athletes do have advantages, but this advantage will only be highlighted when the situation is very tense, that is, the pace of the game is getting faster and faster," he said. "That means that the difference will not have much impact on amateur players - their competitiveness is not at that level. ”
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(Source: Aiyuke)
