American jump-rope teams will have to bounce back to the drawing board after losing to their Japanese rivals in an international double dutch competition at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, a neighborhood that first put the sport on the map.

For the sixth year in row, a Japanese team was awarded “Best of Show” in the 16th annual Double Dutch Holiday Classic. A team called Masterpiece took home first place, and two other Japanese teams ranked second and third, pushing the leading American team, the Bouncing Bulldogs, to fourth place. A member of the second-place team GM7, Masayuki Eaito,24, said he had been jumping for only two and a half years, but that he had always loved gymnastics.

A Bouncing Bulldogs jumper, Anna Holdaway, 20, said that while American teams tend to be more technically skilled, the Japanese teams integrate more dance into their routines. To help his team compete, the Bulldogs coach Ray Fredericks, sent 20 students to Japan, where they practiced and performed with Japanese teams. Ms. Holdaway said both teams benefited from the exchange: “They teach us break dancing moves, and we teach them more tricks inside the ropes.”

The host of last night’s event, David Walker, said double dutch has become an international sport over the last 20 years, and the competition at the Apollo has drawn teams from Belgium and France as well as Japan. Mr. Walker said double dutch became popular in the 1950s, appealing to girls in disadvantaged communities because it cost nearly nothing to play. Recognizing that these girls needed an athletic outlet, Mr. Walker collaborated with the New York Board of Education to make double dutch an intramural sport in 1973.

As one of the teams performed a speed challenge — a jumper hopped in circles as quickly as possible — Mr. Walker pointed out that the girls swinging the rope were coaching their teammate, telling her to speed up or slow down in order to keep pace with the rope. “Look at their cooperation. It’s like there’s an umbilical cord connecting them,” he said.

“I call this the making friends sport,” he added.

Thirty teams participated in the competition and more than 1,400 people cheered in the audience. Two members of a Chicago jumping team, Sharita Childs, 16, and Tiffany Dickerson, 16, agreed that impressing the crowd is the most important part of the competition. “If the crowd responds it gives the judges something to think about,” Ms. Childs said.