GLOSSARY

Anatomy is the science that studies the structure of the body and its parts, that is, the shape, size, location, and relationships of its different components.
The word comes from the Greek ana, meaning “apart,” and tome, meaning “cutting,” because anatomy was originally founded on dissection.

Main Branches

• Gross anatomy: the study of structures visible to the naked eye, such as bones, muscles, and joints.
• Microscopic anatomy: includes histology and cytology.
• Surface anatomy: identifying underlying structures through the skin, such as palpating the kneecap or the spinous processes of the vertebrae.
• Regional and systemic anatomy: studying the body by regions, such as the lower limb, or by systems, such as the muscular system.

Relevance to Sport

A coach or physiotherapist who knows anatomy understands which muscles and joints each exercise involves; for example, determining whether a runner’s anterior knee pain comes from the patellar tendon or the patellofemoral joint is impossible without anatomical knowledge.

Key Teaching Point

Anatomy answers the question “what and where,” while physiology answers “how it works”; in sports science the two are always used together.

Physiology is the science that studies the function of the body and its parts; it examines how cells, tissues, organs, and systems work and how they coordinate with one another.
The word is formed from the Greek physis, meaning “nature,” and logos, meaning “knowledge.”

Relationship to Anatomy

Structure and function cannot be separated, a principle known as the structure-function relationship.
For example, the thin walls of the alveoli in the lungs allow rapid oxygen exchange, and the thick, muscular wall of the left ventricle is built to pump blood to the whole body.

Exercise Physiology

A branch called exercise physiology examines the short-term changes the body undergoes in response to physical activity, such as increased heart rate and breathing, and its long-term adaptations, such as more mitochondria and a greater cardiac stroke volume.

Key Teaching Point

Most principles of training design, such as progressive overload and recovery periods, are built on physiological knowledge; without it, training is designed only on guesswork and personal experience.

Sports anatomy is an applied branch of anatomy that studies the structure of the body with a focus on movement, athletic performance, and sports injuries.
In this approach, every bone, joint, and muscle is examined not only for its shape and location but also for its role in movement and the loads it bears in sport.

Main Areas

• Functional anatomy: which muscle plays the main role in which movement and exercise.
• Biomechanics: the study of forces, levers, and joint angles in sporting movements.
• Injury anatomy: knowing which structures are most often injured in each sport, such as the cruciate ligament in football or the rotator cuff in swimming.

Application

For example, a weightlifting coach who knows that the gluteus maximus and hamstrings are the main hip extensors can choose a suitable accessory exercise to improve the deadlift, and a physiotherapist who understands the structure of the ankle can design a return-to-play program after a sprain.

Key Teaching Point

Sports anatomy is a bridge between the basic sciences and the training field; its aim is to support performance enhancement, injury prevention, and the rehabilitation of athletes.

The levels of structural organization describe the hierarchical arrangement of the body’s components, from the simplest to the most complex level.
Each level is built from units of the level below and acquires new properties.

Six Main Levels

• Chemical level: atoms and molecules, such as ATP and the proteins actin and myosin.
• Cellular level: cells, such as a muscle fiber.
• Tissue level: groups of similar cells, such as skeletal muscle tissue.
• Organ level: several tissues forming an organ, such as the biceps brachii with its muscle, connective, and nervous tissue.
• Organ system level: organs working together for a common purpose, such as the muscular system.
• Organismal level: the whole human body.

Relevance to Sport

A strength training session acts on every level: protein synthesis rises at the chemical level, fibers grow at the cellular level, the muscle becomes stronger at the organ level, and at the organismal level the athlete lifts a heavier weight.

Key Teaching Point

These levels are the roadmap of this encyclopedia; its topics also start with the cell and tissues and lead on to the body systems.

An organ is a distinct structure in the body made of two or more types of tissue that performs a specific function.
The heart, lungs, liver, and stomach, and even every bone and every skeletal muscle, are organs.

Structure

Each organ usually contains all four basic tissues: for example, the quadriceps femoris consists of muscle tissue for contraction, connective tissue in the fascia and tendon to transmit force, nervous tissue to receive commands, and blood vessels for nourishment.
The main functional part of an organ is called the parenchyma, and its supporting tissue is called the stroma.

Relevance to Sport

The largest organ of the body is the skin, and by weight, the skeletal muscles together form the largest part of the body; regular exercise also improves the function of organs such as the heart and lungs.

Key Teaching Point

An organ is a unit that brings several tissues together for a shared task; this is why injury to an organ often involves several types of tissue at once.

An organ system is a group of organs that work together to carry out a common, larger function.
The human body is usually studied in eleven main systems: integumentary, skeletal, muscular, nervous, endocrine, cardiovascular, lymphatic and immune, respiratory, digestive, urinary, and reproductive.

Cooperation of Systems in Sport

No system works alone; in a 400-meter sprint, the nervous system issues the movement command, the muscular and skeletal systems produce the movement, the respiratory and cardiovascular systems deliver oxygen, the endocrine system mobilizes energy by releasing adrenaline, and the skin removes heat through sweating.

Key Teaching Point

The topics of this encyclopedia are arranged by these systems; in sporting practice, however, an athlete’s performance is the result of the coordination of all systems, and weakness in one, such as anemia in the circulatory system, can limit overall performance.

Homeostasis is the body’s ability to maintain a stable internal environment despite changes in the external environment or those caused by physical activity.
The word comes from the Greek homoios, meaning “similar,” and stasis, meaning “standing still.” Variables such as body temperature, blood glucose, blood pH, blood pressure, and water and electrolyte balance are kept within a narrow range.

Mechanism

Every regulatory system has three components: a receptor that senses the change, a control center, usually the brain or a gland, and an effector that produces the response.
Most of this regulation works through negative feedback, meaning the body’s response acts in the opposite direction to the change.

Relevance to Sport

Exercise is one of the greatest challenges to homeostasis; when running in hot weather, for example, the rise in body temperature is sensed by the hypothalamus, and the body dissipates heat through sweating and widening the skin’s blood vessels.
In intense activity, the accumulation of hydrogen ions lowers muscle pH, and the respiratory system removes carbon dioxide through faster breathing to maintain acid-base balance.

Key Teaching Point

Regular training increases the body’s ability to maintain homeostasis; a trained athlete sweats earlier, has a larger plasma volume, and is more resistant to heat and fatigue. A severe disruption of homeostasis, such as heat stroke, is a medical emergency.

Anatomical terminology is the standard, precise language used to describe the location, direction, movement, and structures of the body.
Most of these terms have Latin or Greek roots, and their official list is defined in the international reference Terminologia Anatomica.

Main Groups

• Directional terms: such as anterior, posterior, medial, lateral, proximal, and distal.
• Regional terms: such as cervical, lumbar, brachial, and femoral regions.
• Planes and axes: such as the sagittal plane and the longitudinal axis.
• Movement terms: such as flexion, extension, abduction, and rotation.

Relevance to Sport

Instead of the vague “pain above the knee, a bit over here,” a physiotherapist says “pain on the anteromedial knee, distal to the patella”; this precision ensures that the doctor, coach, and therapist all understand exactly the same thing.

Key Teaching Point

All of these terms are defined relative to the anatomical position, regardless of whether the athlete is standing, lying down, or jumping at that moment.

The anatomical position is a standardized reference posture of the body on which all anatomical descriptions are based.
In this position, the body stands upright and the palms face forward.
The value of this convention is that directional terms such as anterior, posterior, medial, and lateral always carry a fixed meaning, regardless of whether the person is actually standing, lying down, or performing a sporting movement.

Features of the Anatomical Position

• Body and head: the person stands erect, with the head level and the eyes looking straight ahead.
• Upper limbs: the arms hang at the sides of the trunk with the palms facing anteriorly; the thumbs therefore point laterally and the forearms are in supination.
• Lower limbs: the legs are together and parallel, with the toes pointing forward.
• Feet: both feet rest flat on the ground.

Importance in Describing Position and Movement

All directional terms and the body planes, namely the sagittal, frontal, and transverse planes, are defined on the assumption that the body is in the anatomical position.
For example, the statement “the sternum is medial to the shoulder” remains true in any posture, even when the person is lying on the floor.
Likewise, during a handstand, the head is still anatomically superior to the feet, even though it is lower in space.
From a movement perspective, the anatomical position also serves as the zero position of the joints, and ranges of motion such as flexion and extension are measured from it.

Related Positions

The anatomical position should not be confused with lying positions.
In the supine position, the person lies on the back facing upward, whereas in the prone position the person lies face down; the bench press, for instance, is performed supine and the plank is performed prone.
Kinesiology sometimes also uses the fundamental position, in which the palms face the body rather than forward; this posture is more natural, but it is not the formal reference for anatomical descriptions.

Applications in Sport and Training

Coaches and physiotherapists rely on this shared language to describe technique precisely, analyze movement, and assess injuries.
For example, when a coach says that the knee should not collapse medially during a squat, the direction is defined relative to the anatomical position and means the same thing to every professional.
In a biceps curl performed with the palms facing up, the forearm is in the same supinated position as in the anatomical position, which places the biceps brachii in a more favorable mechanical position for elbow flexion.

Key Teaching Point

Whenever you are unsure how to describe a movement or a location, mentally return the body to the anatomical position and then determine the direction.
A common mistake among athletes, and even students, is to define directions according to the body’s current orientation; in the prone position, for example, the back faces upward but is still called the posterior surface.

The axial region is the central part of the body, comprising the head, neck, and trunk, and it forms the longitudinal axis of the body.
The upper and lower limbs, which make up the appendicular region, are attached to this axis.
The main roles of this region are protecting vital organs, supporting body weight, and providing a stable base for limb movement.

The Axial Skeleton

In adults, the axial skeleton consists of about 80 bones: the skull, which protects the brain; the hyoid bone; the auditory ossicles; the vertebral column, which protects the spinal cord and transmits body weight; and the thoracic cage, comprising the ribs and sternum, which encloses the heart and lungs.

Significance in Sport

The muscles of the axial region, particularly the abdominal, back, pelvic, and diaphragm muscles, make up what sports science calls the core.
These muscles transfer the force generated by the legs to the arms; in throwing a ball or punching, for example, force begins at the ground, travels through the trunk, and is released at the hand.
Poor control of the axial region can cause energy leaks and increase the load on the joints of the limbs.

Key Teaching Point

With its natural curves in the cervical, thoracic, and lumbar regions, the vertebral column acts like a spring that absorbs the impacts of walking, running, and jumping; maintaining these curves is therefore very important in weight training.