How To Jump Higher With Depth Jumps, Box Heights Part 1

Okay guys, today I want to talk to you a little about a very important vertical jumping exercise, that is extremely important for increasing your plyometric ability and that is going to be depth jumps. First of all, it’s important to understand that depth jumps is different from drop jumps or shock drops as well as box jumps. See, a depth jump is when you jump off a box at a certain height absorb the energy into the ground and then jump as high as you can upwards, that is a depth jump. Now, a drop jump or a shock drop is when you jump off a box and just absorb the energy without the successive jumping into the air and a box jump is simply when you jump from the ground up into the air. So, once again, you’ve got your depth drop and shock drop which are more or less the same thing, some may make a differentiation there then we’ve got your box jump were your simply jumping from the ground onto a box, then we’ve got your depth jumps were you’re jumping off a box absorbing and then jumping as high as you can into the air.
Those of you who are on The Jump Manual know this is an exercise we use on plyometric days as well as an integration on our strength training days. And this is a very important exercise, because it teaches you to do what you do in athletic competition, which is absorb force and then transfer that force into the air. Now, depth jumps do a few different things and if you watch the plyometric video you’ll understand. But, they do increase the tendon stiffness in your Achilles tendon, as well as in other areas in your body so that you can probably absorb force now if that tendon is not properly stiff if it’s too soft then you are not going to be able to transfer energy quickly enough to take advantage of the force that’s being applied into the ground.
And now, really the reason I’m making this video is because a lot of questions get asked what box height should I use when I’m doing depth jumps? Now, this is…a lot of people have different takes on this, but I think that it’s pretty simple and if you have the right equipment it should be a very easy decision. The height that you need to be using with your depth jumps is the height that allows you to obtain the maximum vertical height during the jump. So, first of all, what you need to be doing is measuring the jump height of each vertical jump. So, when you jump off of the box you absorb the energy into the ground and you jump into the air, you need to have something that you are touching or you need to have some way of measuring each jump. Now, you can station the box in front of the rim or you can station the box at a ceiling level, and you know use your tip of your finger, then use your knuckle then use the top of your hand, some way you need to have of measuring the jumps. And, that is, because you are trying to jump and train yourself to jump higher, as we have talked about in all our videos, you’re not training yourself to jump, to increase your vertical jump endurance or your ability to jump at a certain height over a sustained period of time you wanna be able to increase the jump height your maximum ability to jump high on one repetition. So, what you need to make sure you are doing, is that you are jumping as high as you possibly can. That way you can be absolutely certain that each jump is actually furthering your ability to jump higher and you’re not just grinding out mindless repetitions. I say that all the time and people still don’t get it; and some of you guys are I know this Jacob I know this, but some people still don’t get that. So, I think it’s very important to internalize that and measuring it is the surest way to get a bead to get a bead on that intensity level per repetition.
Okay, now, as with jump height you wanna choose… you see your ability to absorb force is going to determine how high of a box you can use. For instance some of you are going to jump off a 12” box and you’re really going to jump just as high if you weren’t jumping off a box. But, what you’ll notice is if you incrementally increase that box height maybe you go from 12 to 18” then to 24” and you keep going up you’ll realize there’s a point where your jumping higher and then if you go past that point you realize you’re not jumping quite as high and what you wanna do is start with a low box height and test and see how high you jump and then increase that height and once you which a height that you’re jumping higher, make sure and test it a few different times you know 3-5 times to make sure that your really jumping higher at this box height then each time you do that exercise you wanna retest warm yourself into that higher box height and make sure that that is the box height that is getting you to jump at your maximum intensity. So, once you have found the box height that allows you to jump at your maximum intensity, vola that is what you will use during your repetitions. Now, the reason you want to retest that often is because your ability to absorb and transfer force it going to improve over time so what you are going to wanna do is retest that next week start at a lower box height and you may notice that you can now handle a larger box. So, that’s what you’ll wanna do. That was the main point of this video is to let you know that you need to choose the box height that maximizes your ability to absorb and transfer force, and that will change and you need to adapt to that. That is the reason I am making this video.
Now, let me rant a little bit, so this is not going to be the point of this video. And I’ll probably make a more sisicnt video based on the comments. But, consider this fact, based on the height of the box you’re using your going to jump higher into the air. So what that tells you is that based on the force your absorb you will actually jump higher if you can absorb that perfect amount of force now consider that when you are doing your vertical jump approach when your approaching the rim and you wanna dunk you wanna block a shot, you need to work on your approach at also providing that type of force absorption before the jump. If you run in to your vertical jump very slowly you’re not going to provide enough of that eccentric energy in order to transfer it into the air during a vertical jump. So what you need to realize is during those box jumps that is optimal amount of eccentric energy that needs to go into the counter movement to jump higher. So when you’re doing your regular jump approaches what you need to think about is how can I get that same amount of force that way I can jump higher a lot of times its going to mean running a little faster when you do your vertical jumps, and it’s also going to mean jumping into the jump a little higher, it may mean slowing down or jumping a little lower what you need to do is find that happy medium where you’re not running so fast into it that you’re not able to handle the force absorption and transfer the energy.