History and Objectives: The ultimate objective of rehabilitation in sport injury is the rapid and safe return of the individual to his pre-injury status. If the therapeutic plan is oriented only to increase strength, tolerance and range of motion and such factors as balance, agility, deep sensation and neuromuscular coordination are not stressed the risk of repeated injury will increase. In this study the effect of walking and running as the main function of lower limbs are considered.

Materials and Methods: This study has been carried out as a clinical trial using six functional performance tests of single leg hop distance test, vertical jump, anaerobic power test, modified Romberg test, shuttle run and single leg hop for time before and after exercise in two groups of 15 healthy girls matched for age. All the girls had three sessions of 15 minutes running forward and background each week for six consecutive weeks. At the end of each week, some of the tests were performed and finally after eight weeks, all the tests were repeated again.

Results: In the group walking or running forward, vertical test revealed 0.46% (P>0.003), single leg hop for time 10.52% (P>0.005), vertical jump 9.95% (P>0.005), anaerobic power 4.58% (P>0.005), modified Romberg test 59.26% (P>0.003) and shuttle run test 2.19% (P>0.001) improvement and for those with backward walking or running, single leg hop distance test revealed 4.5% (P>0.003), single leg hop for time 23.89% (P<0.005), vertical jump 2.98% (P>0.005), anaerobic power test 0.53% (P>0.005), modified Romberg test 68.33% (P>0.003) and shuttle run test 6.88% (P<0.001) improvement.

Conclusion: In rehabilitation planning, when improvement of strength, velocity, agility, static balance and aerobic power is considered, walking and running backwards and when increase in vertical jump, or aerobic power is the aim, walking and running forward is recommended.