Hey all
I had my first DE lower body workout yesterday.
And i did 5-6 sets of 3 depth jumps for plyometric jumping exercise.
But i didnt really feel them doing anything.
can anyone recommend a better thing to do ?
maybe you need to do more ? maybe i need more exercises ?
you probably shouldnt “feel” plyos - if you do, its probably not going to be good, as in tearing a ligament or something
Depth jumps are one of the best things you can do to work the CNS and reflexive ability. You can’t really feel it in your muscles though. After a while, you’ll see results. I’ve read you shouldn’t do them for too many weeks in a row. There are a wide variety of other plyometrics you can do. Box jumps, box squat jumps, vertical jumps, broad jump, 2 and 1 leg hops over distances, sprinting, etc etc.
I remember the first time I did a DE day and started off with vertical leaps. Didn’t think much of it until I got about half way through the rest of my workout and realized I was getting my ass kicked by weights I could handle no problem. It does a number on the CNS.
If you really want to see how they’re working, test your vertical leap or box jump, then keep doing the depth jumps for 4-6 weeks and test it again. You’ll see the difference, even if you don’t feel it.
blunt
That’s perfectly fine. You shouldn’t have any more than about 35-50 total ground contacts in any one week (Christian Thibaudeau’s figure–that’s an upper limit, less is perfectly fine), so 6x3 is fine when doing plyos. They are not, repeat not, a muscle fatiguing program. They work on the CNS and the ability to absorb, redirect, and produce force. They are much more CNS fatiguing than one would think from a “feeling” standpoint.
Check out some of Thib’s articles to find him writing about them. He and others have said this many times–most coaches tend to way overdo it on plyos and it leads to tendon/ligament problems from too much high velocity absorption.
Of course, it depends on what the rest of your DE day was like–were the plyos on the same day as your DE work, or were they the day after your DE session? What did your DE session look like (sets, reps, etc)?
Loui Simmons has said that a trainee shouldn’t do ANY plyometric work until they can squat twice their bodyweight. He’s also said that Soviet Weightlifters would significantly lower their training volume when they did a training cycle with depth jumps.
agree with FightingScott–but I don’t think that 2x bodyweight squat requirement is a hard and fast rule. A lot of athletes can’t do that, but still need to use plyos. However, the general principle that you should be able to easily control heavy squat weight or your own bodyweight in certain exercises still applies. Plyos are used for shocking the system, and newbs generally don’t need that kind of stimulus. Unless they play sports already and need some with reactive strength.
Also, not everybody uses hard impact plyos–it’s gotten to be such a broad term that sometimes it just means jumping or bounding. I personally disagree with this way of defining “plyos” but I’m just saying.
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
agree with FightingScott–but I don’t think that 2x bodyweight squat requirement is a hard and fast rule. A lot of athletes can’t do that, but still need to use plyos. However, the general principle that you should be able to easily control heavy squat weight or your own bodyweight in certain exercises still applies. Plyos are used for shocking the system, and newbs generally don’t need that kind of stimulus. Unless they play sports already and need some with reactive strength.
Also, not everybody uses hard impact plyos–it’s gotten to be such a broad term that sometimes it just means jumping or bounding. I personally disagree with this way of defining “plyos” but I’m just saying.[/quote]
I agree with that last part. I kind of just threw out some exercises, but some are more rate force development rather then “plyos”. I also agree that you don’t need to squat 2x your bodyweight. I think that if you can squat that much, the benefits of “plyos” will be better then without that much max strength.
However, before I was injured(torn ACL), I did depth jumps from 2-3ft and got up to a 32inch jump (running start though) without even touching the weights. And no, I did not get injured because I was not ready for depth jumps. I was playing basketball, got pushed in the air and landed awkwardly.
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
blunt
That’s perfectly fine. You shouldn’t have any more than about 35-50 total ground contacts in any one week (Christian Thibaudeau’s figure–that’s an upper limit, less is perfectly fine), so 6x3 is fine when doing plyos. They are not, repeat not, a muscle fatiguing program. They work on the CNS and the ability to absorb, redirect, and produce force. They are much more CNS fatiguing than one would think from a “feeling” standpoint.
Check out some of Thib’s articles to find him writing about them. He and others have said this many times–most coaches tend to way overdo it on plyos and it leads to tendon/ligament problems from too much high velocity absorption.
Of course, it depends on what the rest of your DE day was like–were the plyos on the same day as your DE work, or were they the day after your DE session? What did your DE session look like (sets, reps, etc)?
[/quote]
it was the Ws4sb workout so it looks like this
5-8 sets of 1-3 depth jumps
bulgarian split squats /w front foot elevated
hyperextensions
weighted abs.
not actually when you say it i went to faillure on the hyperextensions with 12 kg and 12 reps even though the bench i was using had a lower REM than the one i use regularly.
but ill read up on some of thibs articles.
Btw at what height should you start making depth jumps ? i was doing them from 2-2.5 feet.
Use whatever box height lets you jump the highest. More static guys will use lower boxes while more spring guys will use higher boxes.
so you just have someone tell you that you went highest with that box contra the lower one ?
Well you have to reach up and touch something. I guess someone seeing it could work, but I’d want number rather relying on just eye sight. Maybe even doing a depth jump onto a box, but that could turn bad if you reach a box where you can’t just as high.
ya i see what you mean… im going to follow your advice. chalk and a black wall should keep me posted.
DjSm28 you seem pretty informed on the area.
when doing the depth jumps. what should focus be on ? on landing and going to a quarter squat ? or to land an jump as high as possible ?
[quote]blunt wrote:
ya i see what you mean… im going to follow your advice. chalk and a black wall should keep me posted.
DjSm28 you seem pretty informed on the area.
when doing the depth jumps. what should focus be on ? on landing and going to a quarter squat ? or to land an jump as high as possible ?
[/quote]
Thanks. There are a lot of people a lot more informed then I am though. I just like to read a lot about this stuff because I’m trying to become more athletic myself. I am pursuing my Exercise Science degree too so I can make a career out of making people more athletic.
Back to your question. I use to think that minimal knee bend was optimal, but I’m starting to think that its more about landing softly and knee bend doesn’t matter as much. Of course, the less knee bend you have, the faster you jump up since it will take less time to go back up, but that might have more to do with your fast vs. slow twitch ratio.
So just remember to land soft and jump as high as you can. I guess if I had to put more importance on one, it’d be getting as high as possible because that is what you’re training for, but then again, I don’t want people getting injured either. It’s all about being smooth.
If you have some money to spend, I recommend reading Kelly Baggett’s No Bull Speed Manual. There’s a lot of good information in there about importance of strength and efficiency of running/jumping. Eric Cressey’s Ultimate Off-season is another great resource for athletic training. If not, there is a lot of free information out there that is good as well.
I personally like Kelly Baggett, Eric Cressey, and Joe Defranco. Other guys like Mike Robertson, Christian Thibaudeau, among many others are great resources too.
This went a little longer then I thought it would so main points are: 1.Land soft 2.Jump high 3.Don’t hurt yourself 4.Read as much as you can about the subject
Good luck and keep us posted.
Ok…
soft landing i wasnt aware that it was a concern i just tried to land in a quarter squat to keep ground contact as short as possible.
i started loggin in a thread over at strenght sports
http://www.T-Nation.com/tmagnum/readTopic.do?id=1878020
So feel free to drop by.
and thanks for the answers everyone