Stop Missing And Learn To Jump Higher And More Explosively
One of the most important fitness qualities in sports like basketball and volleyball is vertical jumping. If you have a strong vertical jump, you put yourself at a strong advantage versus your competition. Because of this, you will come across many vertical jumping programs when looking for a way to gain an edge, but the truth is that not all of these programs hit the mark.
Learn To Jump Higher And Step Up Your Game
When looking for vertical jumping programs, you should find programs that focus on explosive power training. The vertical jump is an explosive movement, so any training for the skill should be focused accordingly.
So what exactly is meant by an explosive movement?
An explosive movement is one in which there is no deceleration in the muscle contraction. For example, in a vertical jump you do not slow down in order to stop the upward movement. Rather, you continue to accelerate until your force lifts you off the ground. This is an explosive movement.
Other examples of explosive movements include throwing objects or punching through a board, as in karate. Though there is some deceleration at the very end of these movements, the force generated to go against the resistance (i.e. a ball being thrown or a board being punched through) is explosive in nature.
Getting back to vertical jumping, you must first determine the explosive movement that you must train. In this case, it is hip extension. In other words, you need to explosively train extension of the hip joint–the primary movement in jumping.
It should come as no surprise that the best way to accomplish such explosive training is by jumping, itself. But in order to improve the jump, and get more height in your vertical jumping, you must apply some kind of external resistance in order to challenge your muscles responsible for hip extension.
So how do you apply an external resistance to your vertical jump?
The easiest ways are to either hold a weighted object or wear a weighted vest. But here’s the kicker–you still want the movement to be explosive. To work on explosiveness, you need to work on speed and acceleration. Therefore, the external resistance should be very light, in comparison to traditional resistance training.
Another thing to consider, in your search for quality vertical jumping programs, is that explosive power training sets should be of low repetitions. Remember, speed and acceleration are the two keys to explosiveness. As your muscles begin to fatigue, your speed and acceleration will decrease. Thus, repetitions should be kept at a maximum of six with light resistance in order to provide the necessary stimulus without sacrificing speed and acceleration.
Do Some Exercising To Increase Vertical Jump
Vertical jumping programs should focus on explosive power. You should look for programs that promote speed and acceleration of movement. Look for light external resistance, explosive movement, and low reps. The fundamental movement of such a program should be the vertical jump itself.
Other ideas to consider would be box jumps, standing long jumps, toe jumps (similar to jumping rope), and depth jumps. These are the staples of the quality vertical jumping programs to take your game to the next level.
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