Trunk contact is commonly observed near the time of anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries. Soft landings and falling after landing are suggested to decrease ACL injury risk. The purpose was to assess the effect of natural landing, soft landing, and falling techniques on variables associated with ACL loading, including knee flexion, impact forces, knee abduction angles and moments during single-leg landings with or without mid-flight medial-lateral external upper-trunk perturbation. Twenty-eight participants performed single-leg landings using the three landing techniques with or without mid-flight perturbation. Falling resulted in variables associated with decreased ACL loading compared to natural and soft landings, especially for perturbation conditions. Falling techniques are suggested to modify variables associated with ACL loading when the sports environment allows
