Power

According to physics power is force times velocity.  Translate that into English and you can say that to be powerfull you must be strong, and fast about it.

Here's an example of how power works:

Right now you can do a vertical jump of 26 inches.  You would like to improve.  You weigh 135lbs, and unless you tie on some helium baloons or put some weights in your pockets you will keep on weighing 135 lbs for the near future.  So to be able to jump higher you will need to push against the ground faster.  You need to be able to explode.  

Here´s inspiration.  I plan to show this to my 13-15 year old team before I increase their box jump sets from 12 inches to 18.  (We all start somewhere)

Now obviously strength is a factor, someone who can do a full set of squats with 150lbs on the barbell (correct technique!!) will be able to push their body weight up faster than someone who uses the broomstick in their squat exercises.  You can't neglect your strength training, but the ability to explode is what will carry you higher, and that needs to be trained specificly.


Here are two examples of training exercises targeting explosive force.  There are lots of things you can do.  Bouncy medicine balls, lateral jumps, lunge jumps... I even saw a guy once jumping into a handstand and pressing out to work his shoulder strength.  (He practiced capoeira and had trained handstands and other stuff like that for years)










One important thing to note is that you really want to warm up, stretch before and cool down after doing power exercises.  When you do these "reaction jumps", or upper body exercises with the same principle, you get more explosion out of your muscle beacuse you stretch the muscle fibers first, causing the reaction contraction to be much stronger.  But that means that your muscles and joints will be challenged in a new way.  Be sure that you have a good level of basic fitness and are using good technique... Have fun and enjoy.