How to Jump Higher

I'm writing this blog because I'm tired of seeing instagram posts saying "3 exercises every athlete needs to jump higher", and other nonsense to that context. I understand clickbait and marketing but it is misleading the public to say there are a few specific exercises and rep schemes to jump higher. Improving is a long-term process, that requires years of repetition and adaptation at the physiological level. With that being said, the process is not complicated. There are two components, 1. skill of jumping and 2. engine for jumping

Skill of Jumping

If you wanted to get better at shooting a basketball, you would spend a lot of time shooting right? You would do this for any skill you want to improve. It is no different for jumping. Every motor pattern(skill) has its own unique coordination pattern. Just pitching a softball has a different neural pattern than pitching a baseball, squatting has a different neural pattern than jumping and a loaded jump has a different neural pattern than an approach vertical. Although there are similarities, you cannot do one and get better at the other. You need to perform the task you want to get better at.

The more you perform the pattern, the more opportunities you give your brain to find the optimal way pattern to perform the task. This is accomplished through myelination. When you perform a task, the brain sends electrical signals down the spinal cord to the muscles. Myelin is what coats the axons that carry these signals. The more you perform a task, the thicker the myelin becomes, and the faster the signal is sent. This is a neural adaptation unique to specific practice. Think of Steph Curry shooting, the action is so effortless because he practiced the skill over and over, resulting in a highly myelinated pattern.

With this being said, if your goal is to jump higher, your program should revolve around maximal effort jumping. This means you should strategically plan your training in a way that allow you to safely jump as frequently as possible. It is important to note that maximal effort jumping has a higher physical cost than shooting a basketball. Going from 0 jumps per week to 100 is a great way to flare up your tendons. Jumping everyday is a great way to flare up your tendons. A good rule of thumb is to begin at a low volume and gradually increase, leaving 2-3 days between maximal effort jump sessions.

Engine

Jumping is a skill, but it is a skill that requires high amounts of force to be produced in a short amount of time. This is where building the engine comes into play. You need to have high relative strength. Strength can be broken down into: maximal strength, explosive strength, and reactive strength.

Maximal Strength

It is no secret that there is a high correlation between relative strength and vertical jump height (specifically 2 foot jumping). Physics tells us we need to apply a force into the ground that is in excess of our body weight to leave the ground. The more total force I can apply, the more force I can apply in a short time frame. Strength is the foundation of explosiveness.

Jumping is a powerful activity, so the goal of strength training is to improve the ability of our nervous system to recruit our most powerful muscle fibers. In order to recruit these high threshold motor units (HTMU), there needs to be a high intensity. Typically >80% 1RM if using percentages. If the goal is to improve our force producing capabilities, the exercise protocol should stress our ability to do this, improving our neural drive. Heavy, full range of motion training. The greater the range of motion, the more motor units activated, and the stronger the neural drive must be.

Explosive Strength

Jump height is a measure of explosive strength: the ability to produce high amounts of force in a short amount of time. There is a time constraint to jumping, so success is dependent on how much force we can produce in the time jumping allows. Training for maximal strength raises our potential for explosive strength, but we must train our nervous system to express our strength fast. Along with jump practice, other methods for this include:

-loaded jumps

-olympic lifts and their derivatives

The most important aspect to explosive strength training is INTENT. If you are not moving as explosively as possible, you will not improve your nervous system's ability to produce force fast. Strength training trains our nervous system to recruit HTMU, explosive strength training trains our ability to recruit these HTMU as fast as possible. To ensure this, there needs to be a low number of reps per set (>6), with long rest (>2 minutes) between sets, and the intent to move as fast as possible with every repetition.

Reactive Strength

Reactive strength refers to the function of our stretch shortening cycle (SSC). A vertical jump has three phases of muscle contraction: eccentric, amortization, and concentric. The faster we can go through these three phases, the more elastic energy will be returned, more force produced, and the higher the jump height.

Think of the muscles and tendons as a rubber band. The harder and faster you push down on the spring, the faster it will shorten, and the longer it will fly. This is essentially how the stretch shortening cycle works, and it starts with the eccentric contraction. We must lower the center of mass with a great deal of speed and force to create a strong stretch on the rubber band.

The amortization phase, or bottom portion of the jump acts as a spring board. The faster we can reverse the downward movement, the more elastic energy is returned. If the amortization phase is too long, energy is leaked, and the stretch from the eccentric phase is wasted.

The concentric phase is the shortening of the muscles, or the upward phase of the jump. The concentric phase depends on the quality of the eccentric and amortization phase.

The best way to train reactive strength is through sprinting and plyometrics. Methods include:

-Depth/drop jumps

-hurdle jumps

-bounds

-hops

-full speed sprinting