You Can Learn To Jump Higher

ANYONE can improve their vertical leap and learn how to jump higher!

The key to increasing you vertical jump is learning the role your body type plays. Age, gender, race e.t.c., are not as important as most people think. You need to assess your own individual response to certain exercise routines, as this varies from person to person. Just assigning you a list of exercises simply doesn't cut it if you want real hops...you NEED a cycle based on exercises for your given body type, concentrated on your weaknesses. This group of exercises should cycle from Strength to Explosiveness to Plyometrics.

Basic Steps To Get Started

1. Assess your current level of fitness and your expertise with previous types of working out. The most effective way to get gains is to construct a totally new strength foundation. Then start performing an explosion phase. This will result in further inches.

2. Do Lifts. Entire body conditioning is a key factor for such an athlete and there is no superior exercise than the full back squat. This provides progressive increases on spinal loading, which provides stabilization under tension, and additionally improves stretch-response of hip muscles and hamstrings.

3. Root the squat centrally within most of your lower body workouts. 6-8 decent lifts gets the best strength improvements and vertical carryover. On the days of your upper body workouts, use the same philosophy, with the core exercises being bench press, overhead press variations, pull-ups and dips. Keep in mind to work often overlooked muscles at the end of your workout - muscles such as hip flexors, the shins , transverse abdominals e.t.c.

4. Make sure to use a lifting technique in a safe and efficient way. Undergo 3-5 week strength phases for upper and lower body. Done properly, visible gains of 5+% on each lift should be seen weekly. Following this, you will be able to see how your jump is bound to increase.

5. Properly utilize explosive and plyometric training as well as your strength training. These are your "field workouts" and are finished pre-weights. E.g., on Day 1 you begin by using a series of tempo runs, sprints and low-intensity plyometrics (after the proper warm-up of course). By the time Phase 3 comes around, this will have slowly switched to shorter tempo runs, overspeed (downhill) sprints and high-intensity plyometrics.

6. Emphasis on the heavier weights will decrease as you advance through the phases.

7. Visualize by closing your eyes, imagining yourself exploding upwards. Picture yourself with large leg muscles that are coiled like springs, set to propel you higher. Say to yourself "I feel myself getting more strong and much lighter." After that jump another time. You should notice a marked |increase in your vertical jump. (Sports psychologists have long recognized the helpfulness of "mental practice" in improving athletic performance.)