Land like a dancer

In mainstream physical education, nobody seems to know what to do with dance. Sure, it's exuberant human movement and people get sweaty and their bodies get healthier and all, but it's just not our thing, you know. We want sets, reps and labor. And most of all, we want to be able to quantify everything that we do with bodies. We want to be able to claim scientific expertise and certainty. But dance resists quantification and thus it's hard to manage, track, administer and control. So while dance may have its merits, we'd rather not deal with it. But now it's starting to look like dancers really have the edge. All that training they do pays off in great neuromuscular control, integration and coordination. And even more to the point, it pays off in injury-resistance, a quality that many conventionally-trained athletes would dearly love to posess. For proof, see the recent New York Times piece by Gia Kourlas. Research at the New York University Langone Medical Center's Hospital for Joint Diseases suggests that dancers' landing technique is superior to that of the typical athlete. See  "New Leaps in Research on Injuries."