New Research: Comparative Biomechanical Analysis of Volleyball Court Shoes During Sport-Specific Tasks in Competitive Adolescent Female Volleyball Players

Summary

As a popular and growing sport in the age of biomechanics, volleyball faces many of the modern scientific questions related to athlete performance and injury risk being asked elsewhere: what movements are unique or repeated often in this sport, are there any risks associated with this movement, and how might athletes’ equipment affect their performance of these movements? This study aimed to answer some of these questions using two common movements in volleyball, the countermovement jump and three-step approach  jump, and using three different volleyball court shoes. Understanding how different shoes impact an athletes’ biomechanics during common sport-specific movements is a relatively new but potentially important consideration for athletes and their families when purchasing shoes, so this study aimed to answer that question. 

Twenty-nine competitive adolescent female volleyball players completed a countermovement jump and a three-step approach while wearing each of three commercially available volleyball court shoes in a randomized order, with Theia3D markerless motion capture and force plates recording lower-limb joint angles and forces during takeoff during the three-step, and landing during the countermovement jump.

Each shoe was associated with a distinct movement pattern. One shoe consistently allowed the least ankle dorsiflexion of the three, and players wearing it showed more compensatory knee and hip flexion during landing, along with greater external knee rotation, suggesting the body was shifting shock-absorption demands away from a more restricted ankle and onto the knee and hip instead. A second shoe was associated with significantly greater knee valgus, a side-to-side inward collapse of the knee during landing, during both tasks. A third shoe limited a different, specific combination of ankle movements, ankle inversion range of motion and ankle internal rotation, compared to the other two. There were no significant differences in jump height or peak landing force across the three shoes, meaning these movement differences occurred without any difference in overall jumping performance. The authors are careful to note that while these biomechanical differences are consistent with movement patterns previously associated with loading-related concerns in volleyball, this study did not directly measure real-world loading outcomes, so the differences identified here should be understood as distinct movement strategies associated with each shoe rather than direct evidence that any one shoe is safer or riskier than another.

Disclaimer: The following summary details independent academic research. Theia3D is intended for research, sports performance and educational use only. It is not cleared as a medical device and is not intended to be used for the diagnosis, treatment, mitigation or prevention of any disease, injury or medical condition.

Editor's note: Theia3D version 2023.2.0.3160, as stated in the paper. Here, Theia3D served as the motion-capture tool for a footwear-comparison study, rather than as a system being validated against marker-based motion capture within this particular study.

Why This Matters

Volleyball involves frequent jumping, landing, and multidirectional movement, and as participation in the sport continues to grow, so does the range of court shoes marketed to players. With varying designs, features, and claims, shoe choice is a genuinely difficult decision for young athletes and their families that may also have implications for injury risk. Most existing volleyball footwear research has looked at individual, isolated factors like dorsiflexion range of motion or sole density, rather than directly comparing how different, currently available shoe models affect movement patterns across the specific jumping and landing tasks volleyball actually requires. Clarifying whether and how shoe choices impact athletes’ biomechanics during these sport-specific tasks offers athletes, families, and performance staff a more concrete, evidence-based basis for an everyday decision that is often made on comfort or brand preference alone.

Study Overview

Design

A within-subjects, repeated-measures laboratory study comparing lower-extremity kinematics and kinetics across three volleyball court shoe conditions during a countermovement jump and a three-step approach jump in competitive adolescent female volleyball players.

Participants

Twenty-nine healthy, competitive adolescent female volleyball players (age 15.52 years; height 168.72 cm; mass 62.44 kg) from club or select teams, free of lower-extremity trauma in the six months prior to testing.

Data Collection

After a standardized warm-up for each shoe condition, participants completed three trials of a countermovement jump and three trials of a three-step volleyball approach jump while wearing each of three volleyball court shoes, in a randomized order, with adequate rest between conditions. Kinematic data were collected using eight Qualisys Miqus cameras (540p at 300 Hz) processed through Theia3D, synchronized with embedded force plates.

Analysis

Peak lower-extremity joint angles and moments at the ankle, knee, and hip were calculated across the landing phase of each task, defined from initial contact to maximum knee flexion. Differences across the three shoe conditions were assessed using Friedman tests with post-hoc paired comparisons and effect sizes for significant findings.

Key Findings

• One shoe (RIP-IT) consistently allowed the least ankle dorsiflexion across both the countermovement jump and three-step approach, and was associated with the greatest knee flexion and the greatest external knee rotation during landing, a pattern consistent with the body compensating for more limited ankle motion by relying more heavily on the knee and hip to absorb landing forces.
• A second shoe (Mizuno) was associated with significantly greater knee valgus than the other two shoes during both the countermovement jump and the three-step approach, a side-to-side inward knee movement pattern that has previously been associated with certain loading mechanisms at the knee.
• A third shoe (Adidas) limited ankle inversion range of motion compared to one other shoe and limited ankle internal rotation compared to both other shoes during the countermovement jump, reflecting yet another distinct pattern of ankle motion restriction.
• There were no significant differences in peak vertical ground reaction force or jump height across the three shoe conditions, indicating that these movement-pattern differences occurred without a corresponding difference in overall jumping performance.
• The authors emphasize that while these biomechanical patterns are consistent with movement characteristics previously associated with loading-related concerns in volleyball, this study did not directly measure real-world loading outcomes, so the findings should be interpreted as evidence that footwear measurably impacts jumping biomechanics, not as direct evidence that any shoe tested is more or less likely to lead to a loading-related concern.

What This Means for Movement Science Researchers and Volleyball Performance and Footwear Assessment Teams

For researchers, performance staff, and footwear-focused teams working with volleyball players, this study offers a specific, practically grounded finding: commercially available volleyball court shoes can lead to measurably different jumping movement patterns, even when jump height and landing force stay the same across shoe conditions. Each shoe tested here was linked to a distinct lower-limb movement pattern, limited ankle dorsiflexion and greater compensatory knee and hip motion for one shoe, greater knee valgus for another, and a different, more selective pattern of ankle motion restriction for a third, giving teams a concrete, measurable way to think about how a specific shoe's structural design might shape an athlete's landing strategy. This kind of comparative, sport-specific footwear analysis is a useful application of motion capture for sports performance and equipment-focused research more broadly, offering a way to evaluate how equipment choices interact with movement patterns under realistic, sport-specific task demands.

The Role of Theia3D in Movement Analysis

Theia3D served as the markerless motion-capture tool in this study, enabling detailed lower-extremity kinematic and kinetic analysis across three separate shoe conditions and two distinct jumping tasks in a relatively large group of adolescent athletes, without the repeated marker setup and placement time that comparing multiple footwear conditions with a marker-based approach could otherwise require. It was not itself compared against marker-based motion capture within this particular study.

Study Limitations and Future Directions

The authors note that their sample was limited to healthy, adolescent female volleyball players, so these findings may not generalize to male athletes, older or more elite competitive levels, or other sports with similar jumping and landing demands. The sample size, while adequate for the comparisons made, was modest given the number of variables and conditions tested, and the authors recommend larger future samples to improve reliability and generalizability. Testing was conducted in a controlled motion-capture laboratory setting rather than in a game-like environment where movement is more variable and dependent on live play, and testing occurred over a limited period that does not reflect how shoe performance might change with long-term wear. The three-step approach analysis focused specifically on the final step’s landing phase immediately prior to takeoff rather than the final landing phase after the jump, due to how kinetic data could be retrieved; the authors recommend future work also examine the final landing phase for a more complete picture. The study also did not directly quantify specific structural footwear properties, such as collar height or toe-box width, limiting the ability to pinpoint exactly which design features drove the observed biomechanical differences. The authors identify expanding this kind of research to male and more elite volleyball populations, directly quantifying specific footwear design parameters, and increasing sample size as important next steps.

Full Study and Further Reading

Citation: Davis, A. N., Huang, A., Erdman, A. L., Riesenberg, J., Wilson, P. L., Ellis, H. B., & Ulman, S. (2026). Comparative biomechanical analysis of volleyball court shoes during sport-specific tasks in competitive adolescent female volleyball players. Frontiers in Sports and Active Living, 8, 1824023. https://doi.org/10.3389/fspor.2026.1824023 Link: Read the full study

Does Volleyball Shoe Choice Change How Young Athletes Land?

This study of 29 competitive adolescent female volleyball players uses Theia3D markerless motion capture to show that three different volleyball court shoes were each associated with a distinct lower-limb movement pattern during jumping and landing tasks, without any difference in jump height or landing force. If your work involves sports performance or footwear research, talk to our team about applying Theia3D to your own studies.

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