How You Can Jump Higher

By Lindsay Barnes

An athlete needs a great many skills in order to become an overwhelming force in whichever sport he or she engages in: excellent hand-eye coordination, speed, and strength are among them. Another incredible skill that athletes need to have is the ability to jump higher. Everyone, even people who don't play any sports, has toyed with the idea of being able to jump higher, mainly because it's pretty interesting and impressive. There's just something so awe-inspiring about seeing a person be able to jump up and soar higher than everyone else around. Just imagine the amazement you felt every time you watched a professional basketball player leap up and sink a winning shot almost effortlessly. Didn't that make you wish you can jump higher?

You might have tried, but weren't exactly successful in your efforts. Not everyone can easily hit on the right formula for jumping higher on their first go. Being a high jumper takes a lot of training and discipline. You need to really work on your lower body strength and improve the way your muscles function. This is because the strength of your jumps is dependent on your legs, which act as the spring that pulls you down and launches you upward as forcefully as possible, thereby determining the height of your jump.

So instead of just working on making high jumps, you need to develop your lower body and leg strength in order to achieve the desired height of your jumps. An important type of exercise you can do is plyometrics. This consists of a series of workouts that let your muscles contract and expand rapidly, which is what happens when you start out still or slow and immediately work to jump. Plyometrics isn't advisable for everyone, least of all people who are out of shape, because this really requires you to be properly conditioned.

To improve the strength of your thighs and legs, you should also do workouts that will condition them to become more able to function powerfully in a short amount of time. Squats are probably the best exercise that will help you achieve higher jumps. There is a type of squat performed especially for high jumps. You can start by crouching down with one foot in front of the other, then springing up as high as you can, landing into a crouch once more, with your feet positioned the same way.

Try adding variety to this by jumping with your right foot in front for one set, then the left foot in front for the next. You can also add variety by using ankle weights for the jumps, jumping over an object, and modifying your speed and the number of jumps you make. - 29951

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