Plyometrics are traditionally THE way to decrease the explosive strength deficit. I plan to cover plyometric action and plyometric training in great detail in a later chapter, but for now I just want to give you a basic overview: The main purpose of plyometric drills is to enhance the ability to more rapidly express strength (increase rate of force development), develop reactive rebound type strength,** and improve your capacity to use your tendons as movement generators. Plyometric exercises force an imposed stretch on your muscles and their value comes from this stretching action and, in the case of the vertical jump, the fact that they closely resemble the actual vertical jump from a recruitment pattern perspective. Plyometric drills enhance the efficiency of the entire absorption, stabilization, and release of force in a sports specific manner. They enable you to work on expressing your strength in a manner specific to jumping.
**Plyometric strength is also termed elastic strength, reactive strength, reversal strength, and rebound strength. Don’t let the terminology confuse you! They all mean the same thing.
When you engage in a bout of plyometric training it’s not necessary to use a ton of various plyo drills in order to have an effective workout. People tend to overcomplicate plyometric work, and I’ve been guilty of this myself, but all lower body plyometric drills do basically the same thing:
They all involve some type of hopping, bouncing, jumping, or running variation. In my opinion there isn’t any magic in any given exercise, the only magic is in the intensity of exercise. There are low intensity movements like double legged line hops, which work best to train movement efficiency and basic coordination on the feet. There are very high intensity movements like depth jumps, which build max power. If possible you should try to choose exercises that most closely hone in on your specific needs, and you should always choose exercises that correspond to your level of development.
You should also choose exercises involving stretch rates and stretch loads that are similar to those encountered in the specific activity you wish to improve. In the case of the vertical jump, you want to improve vertical jumping, so your exercises should obviously come close to duplicating the jump. As far as that goes a simple depth jump is the most specific plyometric exercise.
The original Vertical Jump Bible incorporated a smorgasboard of plyometric exercises. It had about 5 different categories of plyometrics with a good 10 or 15 exercises in each category. As I've grown in knowledge as a coach my use of plyometrics has changed. I now only use a handful of drills.
My reasoning will be explained a bit further in a later section, but these are a few of the typical drills I use:
Double legged line hops Single legged line hops Ankle jumps
Tuck jumps
Lateral barrier jumps
Depth jumps (various heights and various ground contact times) Depth jumps between boxes
Skipping Bounding
Single leg bounding
That's it! Each exercise has a specific purpose. If you wish to get creative it's relatively simple to come up with your own plyometric variants. Here are some ideas:
Low Intensity Plyo Exercises
Draw a line on the ground and jump side to side over it with 2 legs Do the above front to back
Draw 4 imaginary stars on the ground forming a box with each star separated by 12-18 inches. Hop around the box on one leg
Get in a squat position up on the balls of your feet and bounce in place
Put a low box in front of you - jump up on it and step off. Do the same with one leg. From the side…..from the other side.
Medium Intensity Plyo Exercises
Get underneath a basketball goal and rhythmically jump up and try to touch as high as you can without any pause between repetitions
Get in a lunge position and jump up as high as possible landing in the same position as you started.
Switch legs in midair
Jump side to side over a cone, bench, or other knee-high object Jump high and bring your knees to your chest
Put a medium to high box (18 to 40 inches) in front of you and jump up on it
Put a low box (6-12 inches high) and bounce rhythmically up and down off and on it with one leg...repeat from the side, repeat from the other side
Skip for max distance Skip for max height
Stand on a box about 18 to 24 inches high, step off the box, and land softly up on the balls of your feet in a motionless position (depth drops)
Perform a standing broad jump High Intensity Plyo Exercises Hop forward on one leg Hop sideways on one leg
Sprint with exaggerated strides trying to get up as high as possible and cover as much ground as possible with each stride (bounding)
Stand on a box, step off, hit the ground, and jump as high as possible...repeat to the left, to the right (depth jump)
Remember to choose exercises based on your developmental level. A depth jump off a high box would be too intense for a beginner or someone who lacks strength. Youngsters should spend the majority of time working with basic low intensity hops, skips, and jumps until they have a modicum of strength in place. The general recommendation is that an athlete should be capable of a 1.5 x BW squat before participating in high intensity plyometrics.
Volume Guidelines
A typical workout might have 1 to 3 exercises of plyometrics, for 3-5 sets each, for a total of 50-100 ground contacts per session. Your repetitions per set will typically range from 1 to 10. If in doubt always stop any plyometric workout before, or as soon as, your performance in the movements begins to decline. In my opinion a set should ALWAYS stop prior to 10 seconds unless you're intentionally trying to build up power endurance, which isn't the focus of this book. One way of auto-regulating the repetitions per set is simply start your set and stop at the first sign of performance drop-off in the set.
For example, say you're performing tuck jumps and your first rep is ok, your 2nd thru 5th reps are good, and you start to lose it on your 6th rep. That's a good time to stop the set. Exercises should be
performed with a mix between effort and efficiency. In other words, you want to go HARD and try to get up high, but you also want to stay smooth and light on your feet, almost like you’re dancing. I find the cue “100% height at 90% effort” works well because it teaches a person to put out high power while still staying relaxed.
Volume of plyometric work will also vary depending on the intensity of the exercise and level of the athlete. A plyometric workout incorporating high intensity exercises like maximal depth jumps (discussed later) can be very intense, but may only have 15-20 total jumps in a session, whereas a lower intensity plyometric workout of various lower level drills like ankle jumps, tuck jumps, etc. might include around 80-100 total jumps (or ground contacts) in a session. There may be some utility for lower level athletes to perform more volumous workouts (more total jumps per session) as it gives them a stronger jump training stimulus and may allow their bodies to better adapt to jumping. However, this is with the caveat that the athlete’s body is working efficiently, as high volume jump training on a poorly
functioning system (discussed later) is virtually guaranteed to cause overuse aches and pains of some sort. Regardless of the volume, the above mentioned rules still apply: Stop the workout and exercise as soon as any performance drop-off is noted. The gains from plyometric work are largely neurological in nature, and neural related gains require high quality efforts.
Progress in plyometrics can occur 3 ways: Via increased height/distance jumped, via increased efficiency of movement (maintaining the same performance while being smoother and quieter), or by decreased ground contact times between repetitions. Over time one should progress via all 3. In other words, you want to jump higher, while being smoother, while spending less time on the ground between reps.
As far as rest intervals go, you want to be fresh enough to generate a high intensity effort with every rep of every set. Take your time between sets and don't rush. You might rest 3 to 5 minutes in between sets of high intensity exercises like depth jumps and bounds and a minute or 2 between
"easier" exercises like ankle jumps. Go when you’re ready and don’t rush yourself.
Frequency: Plyometrics can be performed every day depending on the intensity and volume of the exercise, but a typical prescription is 3 days per week for low and moderately intense exercises, and 1-2 days per week for more intense exercises like high volume depth jumps from high boxes.