Are You Ready For Vertical Jump Training Program?
In order to jump higher and increase your vertical jump training, you must do the right exercises and know what you are doing. Some athletes are not ready to enter an intense program until they have achieved some basic fitness levels.
Your fitness level can only improve if you overload your body, which is pushing your body beyond what you are already doing. You should have some cardiovascular endurance, muscular strength, good nutritious diet, muscle endurance, along with flexibility. After that, you can challenge your body with more advance fitness exercises to increase your vertical. When you reached an adequate fitness level, your will be ready for an intense vertical jump training program.
Training Exercises That Increase Your Fitness Level
1) Aerobic (or Cardiovascular) Exercises
Cardiovascular endurance is an achieved thorough regular aerobic exercise, which is a repetitive movement of large muscle groups over an extended period of time. Examples of aerobic exercises include jogging, swimming, rope jumping, and… of course playing basketball.
2) Increase Muscle Strength
Muscle strength is improved by applying resistance to a muscle group. Lifting weights is a good way of improving muscle strength. Calf exercises, squats, lunges, are some examples in increasing strength for jumping higher.
3) Improve Muscle Endurance
Muscle endurance improves in conjunction with muscle strength. Muscle endurance is the ability of the muscle to repeat that movement over a period of time. With regular exercise, your muscles burn energy more efficiently and endure overloading for longer time. Rope jumping, and long distance running, are some examples for building endurance.
4) Improve Joint and Muscle Flexibility
Joint flexibility refers to the range of motions (ROM) the joint can undergo as limited by the joint’s structure and surrounding connective tissues. Warming up and then stretching your calves, hamstring and quad muscles are important activity in preventing injuries and increasing your fitness level. Joint flexibility can also give dramatic increases in vertical leap height.
5) Nutritious Diet
A good healthy diet promotes faster recovery and is important for your body to repair itself. Avoid eating junk food or sugars, and make sure you diet includes protein, good carbs and fats, along with vitamins. Drinking plenty of water will also enhance your growth and ability to handle an increase load of exercises.
6) Reduce Body Fat
If you are overweight, you should concentrate on building muscle and reducing that extra fat. Limiting your caloric intake, eating healthier foods and doing vigorous exercises will assist you in losing that excess weight.
Remember, this is the start of your jumping higher program. After you have reached a good fitness level, you can begin to do exercises to increase your vertical explosion. Those exercises are called plyometrics. Plyometric training will develop quick twitch muscle fibers needed to increase your vertical. Many athletes omit these exercises, resulting in them not drastically increasing their vertical jump.