Increase Your Vertical Jump

Last Updated on January 10, 2009 by Jimson Lee

In 1985, I was fortunate (or unfortunate) to be competing against Bruny Surin and Eldrick Floreal in the long and triple jump. Both of these athletes had their own successes later in life, but I still remember Bruny showing up for the Canada Games Trials wearing basketball high-tops and competing in the Triple Jump. He went on to beat the entire field by 1 meter!

Bruny had a vertical leap over 42 inches and rumour has it that it was almost 48″.

How do you increase your vertical jump? Guest Blogger Kyle shares his insight.

Hey listen are you interested in increasing your vertical jump, well keep reading this article because you have come to the right place. I am a vertical jump training advisor with a ton of knowledge and personal experience gaining a great vertical jump. Jumping can be a really fun exciting way to build power and strength; it also will help take your sport to the next level. Here I will share with you the basics from how to eat, how to exercise and how recovery is key to success for achieving an eye popping vertical jump.

Nutrition To Fuel Your Body:

Stay in the ZONE so eat 5 to7 times small meals throughout the day in order for your body and mind to perform at peak levels; as well as giving your body and mind nutrition to heal and repair itself through recovery. The foundation to your diet should consist of wet carbohydrates like fruits and vegetables, not dry carbohydrates like pasta, or white breads. Next you need your protein such as chicken, tuna, salmon, lean beef, and protein shakes. Finally you will need essential fats, which are Omega 3 and Omega 6. Also get you vitamins and make sure you drink plenty of water throughout the day.

Exercises To Increase Your Vertical Jump:

Keep you core muscles strong, make sure you are doing abs, obliques, and lower back exercises. Always keep you posture to keep you back and abs lean. When you are working out to increase your vertical jump you will build lean muscle tissue, this in itself will help you jump higher. Keep your exercises explosive and quick, do not over train but keep the intensity high. Do not go to failure, when you feel like your next rep will not be as explosive or you ca not lift the same weight stop the set or exercise. For example for maximum jumps, jump as high as you can then when you land jump back up to the same height as your first jump, these are reps you want to count, if you jump lower stop immediately.

More exercises you can do at the gym are power exercises like: Plyometrics, repetitive jumping, depth jumps, attitude jumps, and skipping rope, flying pull ups and jumping push ups. Some Strength work is good to do as well. So at least once a week do heavy weight lifting using reps of 5 to 7, doing compound basic power lifting exercises like the squat, dead lift, and bench press.

Key To Always Increase Your Vertical Jump:

If you want to increase you vertical jump you need to time your exercises with a stopwatch. You have to know how long you take to complete each set and each rest time. If you can decrease the amount of time you take to complete an exercise your will improve your results guaranteed. So for example if you can go from doing 20 maximum jumps spread out over 2:30 minutes and than over time you can slowly add an extra 2 jumps every 1 to 2 weeks and at the same time decrease the total time it takes you; your vertical jump will continue to increase, the math does not lie. For advanced athletes you may need to eventually add a weight vest or belt with an increase of 1 to 2 pounds per week.

Technique:

Next you have to understand technique and how it can help you get to jump higher to your full potential at your current strength and power levels. You must use your whole body to jump not just your legs, swing your arms forcefully up and over you head as you explode upward with you lower body. Using you arms will help you jump at least a few inches higher than you current standing jump.

Rest:

Make sure you get plenty of rest and sleep, this is essential to recovery, if you miss this you will not make gains, and you can cause injury or illness from lack of recovery.

Ok so now you know how to eat, recover and exercise for peak performance in your sport and increasing your vertical jump. Now get to work if you want to gain some serious inches to your vertical jump, train smart and intensely.

About the Author
My name is Kyle, I have played and studied basketball my whole life. For more information to increase your basketball game Click Here!