How To Jump Higher For Cheerleading, Both Men And Women Will Benefit From A Good Jump Program
The Two Most Important Variables of An Effective Jump Program
I hope you are familiar with the two principal variables of a vertical jump program: strength and quickness. That's what's going to make you explode. I'll give you an example.
Let's say you were a sprinter, and you ran the hundred meter dash, would you train sprinting by running the mile or by running two miles? No, because that would train your endurance. It's a completely different type of muscle, and that's not the muscle you want to be training. And as long as you continue to train your jumping endurance, you are not going to maximize your jumping potential.
To jump higher, you want to train your explosion. All of the exercises that are recommended for people who wish to jump higher are called "explosion exercises." They're all vertical jump exercises that are going to teach you to push you're your potential more and more.
For instance, if you can jump eighteen inches right now, and if your training teaches you to jump a little higher each time, then you're going to be increasing that level almost each workout. Each week, you're going to see slight increases, and that's going to build up until a point where you're going to be warmed up, or you'll just have played a game, and you'll realize now you can jump higher than you ever have been able to before.
So once again, if you jump at a certain level and you're training at a lower level than how high you can jump, it's not going to get you anywhere. It's going to get you endurance, which is a good thing. But it's not what you're looking for, and that's not why you're here.
I know I can be real redundant about this, about strength plus quickness equals explosion, about not training your endurance about training the explosion that your muscles have-that's two different types of muscles.
The skill sets you need to jump higher can be broken into nine very specific categories. Some of them, you may have an excellent grasp on already. For instance, body composition is one of them. If you're overweight, that extra weight is only going to drag you down; so that's one of the categories. There are nine different categories that are going to help you jump higher, and if you're able to maximize each one, you'll be able to reach what is called your "physical explosion capability." Your legs can only create so much explosion, so there is a limit to how high you can jump; but I'll guarantee you none of you are reaching that potential right now. I'm not even reaching that potential right now.
by: Jacob W. Hiller