{"id":11956,"date":"2026-09-18T06:00:44","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T05:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bjsm\/?p=11956"},"modified":"2026-09-03T16:28:38","modified_gmt":"2026-09-03T15:28:38","slug":"growth-matters-injury-risk-changes-with-biological-maturation-in-junior-tennis-players","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bjsm\/2026\/09\/18\/growth-matters-injury-risk-changes-with-biological-maturation-in-junior-tennis-players\/","title":{"rendered":"Growth matters: injury risk changes with biological maturation in junior tennis players"},"content":{"rendered":"

Keywords: <\/b>junior tennis, biological maturation, peak height velocity, injury prevention, youth athletes<\/span><\/p>\n

This blog provides a summary of our recent study published in the <\/span>British Journal of Sports Medicine <\/span><\/i>[1].<\/span><\/p>\n

Why is this study important?<\/b><\/p>\n

Junior tennis players are not simply \u201csmall adults\u201d. During adolescence, athletes experience rapid changes in height, body composition, muscle strength, flexibility and coordination [2]. These changes can affect how the body responds to tennis training and competition [3].<\/span><\/p>\n

In many youth sports, injury prevention is still often based on chronological age, such as under-12, under-14, under-16, or under-18 categories [4]. However, two athletes of the same chronological age may be at very different stages of biological maturation [5]. One player may be in the middle of a growth spurt, while another may already be several years past it.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is especially important in tennis, where young athletes are exposed to repeated sprinting, stopping, changing direction, trunk rotation and high-volume hitting [6]. Despite this, little has been known about how biological maturation relates to injury risk in junior tennis players. We wanted to better understand when young tennis athletes may be most vulnerable to injury and whether these vulnerable periods differ between boys and girls.<\/span><\/p>\n

How did the study go about this?<\/b><\/p>\n

We retrospectively analyzed 15 competitive seasons of data from a tennis academy in Japan. The study included 100 junior tennis athletes, with 50 boys and 50 girls.<\/span><\/p>\n

We estimated each athlete\u2019s biological maturation using age at peak height velocity (APHV), which is calculated from the longitudinal height data. APHV refers to the age when an athlete reaches their fastest rate of height growth during adolescence (Figure 1).<\/span><\/p>\n

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Figure 1<\/b>: An example of a growth velocity curve showing the identification of peak height velocity (PHV) and age at peak height velocity (APHV).<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0This is a useful marker because it allows us to look at injury risk in relation to each athlete\u2019s own growth timing, rather than simply using chronological age [7].<\/span><\/p>\n

Each athlete\u2019s development was divided into five maturity phases:<\/span><\/p>\n