It's Not Fancy, But @#&* It Works

It has been noted on more than one occasion, that the ability of an athlete to powerfully extend the hip, correlates rather well with athletic capacity and prowess.
There are many ways to facilitate hip function in athletes including barbell training, kettlebell training, and Olympic lifting to name a few. Often over looked but no less potent, is the good old fashioned Jump. I'm not talking about 150 reps of jumping onto a 24 inch box. No, I'm talking about nasty jumping, higher, farther, bigger.

Do you know how high a box onto which you can jump? Running start? Standing start? Sitting start?

No? Doode. Get on it!



Let's talk about why jumping beyond the metabolic box jump effort is so badass.

1) You don't need any equipment.

2) Results are measurable, and repeatable.

3) You will know precisely how high a fence you can jump should you be running away from a stampeding herd of musk ox. It happens you know.

4) There are real consequences to not making it onto over the jump. You will have to learn to develop a strategy to bail. Which is good. Because bailing happens.



5) Jumping means landing. Teaching athletes to land safely protects them from landing injuries in the future? Why do you think there are so many ACL tears amongst female athletes? How many of those women were not taught how to land?

6) Jumping is elemental and primal. Everyone knows how they can do it. It scales for huge numbers of athletes.

7) You can see the direct implications of your lacking flexibility and hip mobility.
It's hard to stick a max jump if you can't pull your knees up to your forehead.



8) Jumping variations and permutations are endless. Boxes, long jump, high jump, jumping with dumbells, sitting start, standing start, running start....

9) Jumping from a seated position teaches pure concentric power by breaking the eccentric-concentric cycle typical of a quick stretch down-up. Think deadlifting, but speed.

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10) You have to be responsible for your own carcass. Sure you may squat 400, but you also weigh 215 bro. Oh, you can jump onto a 56 inch box? Legit!

11) There is some real fun to be had in this kind of training. It's not so, muscle-heaving-power-snatch-jerky. You know? Fun?



12) Most importantly. It works.

So, I triple dog dare you to find out how high you can jump. And keep your eye posted on the SFCF blog for a little upcoming jumping challenge.


Coach K-like mike, I wanna be like Mike -Star