Elitetrack: Sport Training & Conditioning

after reading mike’s powerpoint about how leg stiffness and being able to produce power in a short space of time being a key factor in improving sprint speed, how often should an athlete perform plyometrics a week, what amount of volume, and what exercises?

at the moment i would tend to do at least one plymoetrics sesh a week, usually 2, and they consist of (not in one session, just the different types of exercises)

box jumps, from standing and with slight run in

depth jumps (what is optimum height of box)

double leg hops over mid shin height hurdles (keeping legs straight, dorsi and plantar flexing ankle)

single leg hops over mid shin height hurdles

bounding

double leg hops over 2ft6-3ft hurdles

vertical jumps

I would say two sessions a week would be ideal; one high contact session(100+) and one lower one(50ish). You could do a few contacts a day on any CNS day. As for depth jumps, the height is completely athlete dependent, as well as dependent on your goals. Anything between 6 and 18 inches works, maybe 24.

When in doubt keep the volume low.  When we do the stiffness jumps we might do 3x10 after a WR workout or something like that.  We’ve done depth drops from about 12 inches this past cycle and done about 5x15 going down stadium steps.  It seemed like volume for that was a little on high side so you may not need to do that much.  I think total volume is athlete dependent as Zack mentioned with box height.  A typical plyo session after sprints might include 3xSLJ,STJ,3SLJ,RRLL or 5x5 hurdle hops.  Volume could be similar for single leg hurdle hops.  Box jumps aren’t quite as intense because of the lack of eccentric loading so you could do slightly more volume.