Quantification of Impact Accelerations of the Head During the Heading of a Football

The effect of repeated blows to the head is well documented in boxing. As early as 1928 Martland described the so-called punch drunk syndrome. Roberts (1969) investigated 224 former professional boxers and 17% showed chronic neurological damage attributable to boxing. Ross et al. (1983) showed that even boxers with a moderate number of bouts may suffer cerebral atrophy.