In different countries there are between 5% to 50% of the left-handed\u00a0people, most of whom live in Africa (Fig.1). It is estimated that there\u00a0is about 240 million left-handed people around the world. So far the reasons\u00a0for left-handiness have not been fully explained. There are various hypotheses\u00a0that have not yet been confirmed. One of them propounds that left-handiness\u00a0is innate and develops because of a dominant gene (Annett, 1981). Another\u00a0hypothesis gives priority left-handedness to the \u00a0impact of the environment.\u00a0There are many facts \u00a0that justify the third hypothesis according\u00a0to which right-handiness steeped in and approved by tradition, preserved\u00a0for hundreds of years and passed down from generation to generation, has\u00a0eventually become an inborn ability (Handelsman, Smirnov, 1960; Krestownikov,\u00a01951; Starosta 1963; 1977). It is even more plausible because, as some\u00a0researchers claim (Ludwig, 1932), a human being in the course of many\u00a0centuries of evolution has gone through different stages. At the very\u00a0beginning he was left-handed, then ambidextrous and finally right-handed.\u00a0This hypothesis can be strengthened by the fact that the relics of ambidextrous\u00a0education can now be found in some societies for example in Japan.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n This hypothesis seems also to be supported by studies of numerous authors\u00a0(Kreutz, et al., 1970; Passian, et al., 1969; Pocelujev, 1951; Storjohann, 1969; Suchenwirth, Gallenkamp, 1967; Szuman, 1957) which concerned the\u00a0domination of the upper limb in the ontogenetic motor development of man. They show an increasing domination of the right hand in the grip of infants\u00a0between thr 4th and the 11th month (Fig.2). The decreasing number of the left-handed and the both-handed with age amongst individuals of both sexes\u00a0is shown also by extensive studies of many authors (Fig.3,4). The results of those studies seem to indicate a modifying role of the environment\u00a0in the shaping of the dominating upper limb in man.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Living in the right-handed society, do the left-handed have to adapt\u00a0to it? For centuries it was a necessity as left-handiness was considered to be a freak of nature and left-handed people were treated as inferior.\u00a0This is why there are so many pejorative terms and expressions associated with left-handedness such as a lefty, a southpaw, a left-handed meaning\u00a0clumsy and awkward or immoral, or the Polish expression “to get out of bed with the left leg first” meaning in English “to get out\u00a0of bed on the wrong side” and another Polish expression that employs the term “left” – “to obtain something on the left”\u00a0meaning in English “to obtain something on the crook.”<\/p>\n For centuries the left-handed have been ignored and very often even,\u00a0persecuted by almost every human community. The right hand, as dominant and most important, was encouraged and maintained by religious cults.\u00a0In the Middle Ages it was believed that the right hand was given by God and the left hand was given by Devil. This is why the left-handed\u00a0people were persecuted by the Spanish Inquisition. There is a deep-rooted belief prevailing in the social consciousness up till now that left-handedness\u00a0is a deviation from the norm, and the right-handedness is considered to\u00a0be this norm. Over centuries left-handedness has been thought to be\u00a0a defect, a disease and even a handicap. This is why, the whole environment\u00a0of the left-handers, including parents, teachers and coaches, aimed at\u00a0changing them in an attempt to develop a right hand ability in them.<\/p>\n Thus,\u00a0under such pressure the left-handed tried to quickly adjust to the surrounding\u00a0environment. This kind of adaptation carried out in the atmosphere of almost neurosis and without any didactic knowledge and experience led\u00a0to numerous disorders in the whole body of a left-hander (Fig.5). These practises took place especially during the early childhood of the young\u00a0people. The attempts at those more or less successful adaptations of the left handed resulted in different types of the left-handedness (Fig.6).\u00a0The effects of these alterations have become a serious social problem. For example, in Germany, where there is about 8 million left-handers an\u00a0Advice and Information Centre for the Left-handed and Altered Left-handers was established. Moreover a “Handbook for the Left-handed” was\u00a0then published (Meyer, 1991). Due to the greater tolerance there is now a possibility of maintaining left-handedness.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The question is how the issue of the left-handed is approached in sport?\u00a0Similarly to other spheres of human life, tolerance has become in sport one of the greatest achievements. What does that mean in practice?\u00a0Does that imply the possibility of taking part in training courses designed for right-handed people or its special mode for the left-handed? The left-handed\u00a0person had usually adjust to the training prepared for the right-handed. Rarely did it happen that a certain element of training was provided exclusively\u00a0for a left-handed person. If it happened it was the sportsman initiative and programme to do so. It is hard to determine the percentage of the\u00a0left-handed who used this kind of self-improvement. In the studies\u00a0of lateralisation carried out over many years I have not encountered any\u00a0technique\u00a0teaching programme or individualisation of training\u00a0adequate for a left-handed person.\u00a0Since the problem of the left-handed was non-existing in the theory of training, it was hard to expect a different situation in practice.<\/p>\n It was recognised neither in the theory of motor learning, nor in anthropokinetics\u00a0(Szopa, 1992] nor in sport kinetics (Hirtz, et al., 1994). One of the anthropokinetics handbooks (Celikowski, et al., 1979) mentioned the problem\u00a0but did not attempt at solving it. Only some publications (Fischer, 1988; Oberbeck, 1989; Osi\u0144ski, 1993) approached the issue more seriously.\u00a0The problem of individual sports training for the left-handed has not been solved although it affects a greater part of the population.<\/p>\n This is why the aim of the present paper is :<\/p>\n 1. Presenting the types and effects of adaptation (transformation) found\u00a0in those who practise different, according to the complexity, sports.<\/p>\n 2. The search for more feasible ways of the left-handed training.<\/p>\n The types and effects of motor adaptation in sport.<\/strong><\/p>\n As there was no appropriate research material available I was forced\u00a0to analyse the individual cases of five distinguished sportsmen. I will be dealing with only successful cases of motor adaptation because only\u00a0those were examined in the literature. The publications concerning a lateral differentiation in fitness most often cite an example of right-handed\u00a0Takacs (Fig.7) \u2013 (Jokl, 1981). After losing his dominant hand he earned, in the World Championship and the Olympic Games, two gold medals\u00a0for gun shooting with his left-hand. Taking into account the classification of sport disciplines according to their co-ordination complexity, the\u00a0adaptation in question belongs to the first level, i.e. the easiest one\u00a0(Farfel, 1960). The example of a more complex modification can be found\u00a0in case of A.Grubba, top level competitor of the table tennis. It is worth noticing that this naturally left-handed player scored his greatest\u00a0successes on the international arena while playing with the right hand.\u00a0He was not forced to the change in the use of his dominant hand. It was\u00a0rather a result of a coincidence he encountered in his childhood. The effects of this were then strengthened by his sports achievements in a\u00a0discipline demanding the third and highest level of co-ordination.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Stadler and Bucher (1986) refer to another interesting case. They mention\u00a0a left-handed M.Strupler who had played handball in a first League Swiss team for 15 years (Fig.8). Trying to adjust to his right-handed team colleagues\u00a0he worked out and perfected the techniques of all game elements using both his hands. In this way he had an advantage over other players as\u00a0an ambidextrous player is much more dangerous opponent to face. His left-handed throws were not always successful. The reason for that is he practised\u00a0them less as his coach was not satisfied with this way of throwing. Very often the disagreement broke out between the player and his coach which\u00a0ended in the coach saying”. If you make a left-handed throw to the net once more you will leave the field” (Fig.9).<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The left-handed sportsmen are very often forced to change the dominant\u00a0hand particularly in asymmetrical sports disciplines (Fig.10). For example, K. Date a left-handed tennis player from Japan who under the pressure\u00a0of her family has to use the right hand during the play. Moreover, in Japan it is unacceptable, especially, for a woman to be left-handed. It\u00a0has been noticed that Date takes the racket in the “forbidden”\u00a0left hand in the most critical situation during a play. Despite the modification\u00a0imposed on her by the closest environment she has succeeding in becoming\u00a0one of the leading tennis players in the world (6th place in ATP ranking\u00a01996).<\/p>\n <\/p>\n All human movements are adapted to the dominant hand. A higher efficiency\u00a0level of one upper limb is shifted to the lower limb and limits the direction of turns in sports exercises. The right-handed perform this type of exercise\u00a0into the left and consider their right leg as dominant (Starosta, 1975; 1990). Only particularly talented people may achieve success in such complex\u00a0movements involving the whole body. For example, left-handed C. College won the European ice figure skating Championship. However, her further\u00a0achievements were hindered by her inability to perform jumps with many turns, a complex task in terms of co-ordination. According to her new\u00a0coach the difficulties stemmed from the fact that she made turns in jumps in the wrong direction. Although she had already held European\u00a0Championship she had to learn jumps with turns into the right direction. This skaters modified her technical skills twice: in the early stage of\u00a0her career when she learnt to perform jumps in a way typical of the right handed (turns to the left) and then adapted herself to make the jumps\u00a0characteristic for the left-handed (turns to the right). In both cases the adaptation was successful. I provided the examples of those sportsmen\u00a0who were successful in the change of their dominant hand (or the direction) due to different conditions, however, not all individuals show equally\u00a0positive modifications. Many left-handed people, unable to adjust to the demands of the imposed training system (mainly technical-tactical preparation)\u00a0intended for the right-handed, give up practising the discipline liked by them or definitely decided against exposing their left-handiness. This\u00a0problem affects almost all sports disciplines. Nevertheless, it becomes\u00a0more evident in these disciplines that are concerned with a lateral differentiation\u00a0in the fitness of the particular parts of the body (limbs) or of the whole body.<\/p>\n Moreover, many publications clearly focus their attention to preoccupied\u00a0with the problems of the right-handed by helping and suggesting how to\u00a0defeat the left-handed (Ogurenkow, 1989). I have not come across any such\u00a0publication that would give similar advice to the left-handed. Thus, it may be considered paradoxical for the members of this social minority\u00a0to try to win the highest sports awards in various disciplines, for example in boxing and fencing (Fig.11), tennis (Fig.12) and table tennis (Fig.13).\u00a0Taking into account the opinions of 16 specialists in table tennis I drew up a psychomotor evaluation sheet for a left-handed sportsman who (Fig.14)\u00a0possess those specific abilities that are respected\/and appreciated by <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n![\"Figure](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thesportjournal.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/03\/Fig1.jpg\")
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\nFig.1. Left-handed subjects to total ratio population(%) of selected countries and according to several authors [Starosta 1995]<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.2. Right hand catch to total catch ratio (%)\u00a0in new-born child in different months of life [Szuman 1957]<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.3. Ratio of right- and left-handed and ambidextrous\u00a0childs in pre-school years [Pocelujev 1951]<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.4. Ratio of right- and left-handed and ambidextrous\u00a0persons in different years of life n=2935 [Starosta 1995]<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.5. The effects of transforming the left-handed\u00a0into the right handed, i.e. the change of the dominant limb in everyday\u00a0living [Starosta 1995]<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.6. The types of Left-Handedness in sport everyday\u00a0life [Starosta 1995]<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.7. The right-handed Takacs from Hungary win\u00a0with the left hand in pistol shooting in the World Championship and the\u00a0Olympic Games<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.8. The left-handed handball player M.Strupler\u00a0remembered his coach telling him: “If you make a left-handed throw to\u00a0the net once more, you will leave the field”<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.9. The left-handed handball player M.Strupler\u00a0remembered his coach telling him: “If you make a left-handed throw to\u00a0the net once more, you will leave the field”<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.10. Classification of variants movement symmetry\u00a0and asymmetry in different sport disciplines [Starosta 1990]<\/p>\n
\nthe right-handed. This gives rise to a situation which is conducive to\u00a0the achievement of sports success by left-handed tennis players.<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.11. Left-handed sportsmen and his achievements in boxing and fencing [Starosta 1991]<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.12. Number of left-handed tennis players among\u00a010 best competitors (according ATP ranking) in different years [Starosta\u00a01991]<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nFig.13. Number of left-handed table tennis players\u00a0among 10 world best women and men competitors (according ITTF ranking)\u00a0in different years n=25 [Starosta, Perek 1991]<\/p>\n