Health Benefits of Trampolining

The non-somersaulting health benefits of trampoline is one of the best kept secrets in the world. Rebounding will exercise and strengthen every muscle, organ, and cell in your body. Trampoline is not only fun but will enhance overall coordination, strength, flexibility, timing and balance,
Michael Brook, owner of High Performance Productions

Brook is a 25-year national veteran of high performance, a Colorado State Trampoline Champion, Member of the Great American High Diving Team and a premier professional freestyle snow skier in the aerial acrobatic event.

NASA Science

Studies by NASA scientists show that rebounding is 68% more effective than jogging, and yet requires less effort! You can also develop both upper and lower body strength just as effectively as weight lifting; this is without the strain or threat of pulled or torn muscles. Rebounding outperforms swimming as an all round exercise.

Real Health Benefits

Apart from being great fun, bouncing on a trampoline brings a number of very real health and wellbeing benefits including:

Balance: Trying to bounce in one place on a trampoline means you have to develop a keen sense of balance; also awareness of how you can adjust body balance by small movements at the body’s extremities.
Coordination: Closely related to balance is the need to coordinate arm and leg actions, as well as many fast-twitch muscle groups, necessary to form the different shapes and perform the various somersaults and twists.
Bilateral motor skills: The action of bouncing whilst trying to maintain balance and coordinate bodily extremities calls on both sides of the body and, indeed, the brain to become engaged which is quite different to many ground based sports where one side can often be favoured (most notably in football for example).
Rhythm : Again closely related, but distinct, is the need to bounce in tune with the trampoline; this allows a gymnast to achieve optimum height for least effort.
Self-confidence: Even those least confident with sports will find it possible to make some progress on the relatively forgiving surface of a trampoline and this progress will help boost confidence.
Cardiovascular fitness: Bouncing on a trampoline increases the pulse rate and strengthens muscle groups essential for a healthy cardiovascular system.
Bone Density: Bouncing repeatedly puts bones under small amounts of stress sufficient to help them build themselves up to cope with that stress. This in turn reduces the risk of factures and osteoporosis.
Improved lymphatic circulation: Probably not quite as good as detoxing entirely but the short periods of weightlessness between periods of higher than average G forces that occur whilst bouncing actually helps the body get rid of toxins. Physical activity and gravity effects are essential to the lymphatic system achieving this; both are more actively engaged when trampolining than with almost any other sport.
Low impact: Although an impact sport, the period of acceleration and deceleration is much longer than with activities such as jogging where the surface used has no give at all. It was notable that during the build up to the World Cup in 2002 David Beckham was seen building up fitness and ball skills on a mini-rebounder for this very reason.

Further information on training benefits etc… are available below:

Some medical aspects of trampolining

The articles linked from here were all published on the National Sports Medicine Institute website, not a normal stopping place for those who follow trampolining. Permission has been sought from the NSMI webmaster to duplicate these articles here.

[At present this link seems to be unavailable although since NSMI
is still listed by the Department of Culture, Media & Sport as an
operating body we suspect it will be restored in due course.]

Articles found to be of interest included: