White boards covered in a frenzy of programs, set/rep schemes, and various strength & conditioning formulas outline one length of our gym. It's like a scene from "A Beautiful Mind" when they find Russell Crowe in the peak of his schizophrenia with thousands of newspaper clippings, scattered papers, and formulas written everywhere. This is where we post our athlete group workouts and on this particular day we were drilling explosive body weight movements.
 
Regardless of the exercise itself, anytime we incorporate body weight work, our athletes respond the same way. Small smirks and over confident swaggers. We drill body weight exercises to perfect form, drill Olympic style lifts without having to load excess weight, and help prevent injury.
 
With no further delay, I introduce you to our exercise.....

 

 
The Squat Jump
 
Background:
This is an explosive movement that incorporates the body weight squat and vertical jump. Explosive movements like these can improve your overall strength & power, increase metabolism, and help with power production. It also benefits balance, range of motion, and flexibility.
 
Why Train Explosively?
There are tons of strength benefits when you are training to move loads as fast as possible even if it is body weight. The main focus is to the development of fast twitch muscle fibers which play a crucial role in getting stronger and more powerful. Tennis athletes will be able to find increases in quicker court movement, increased power in serves & shots, and strength gains in lower extremities to help prevent injury.
 
Benefits of the Squat Jump:
The squat jump is an easy exercise to incorporate into your workouts to engrave this Olympic style lift for explosive training.

•    It is an ideal method to training powerful ankle, knee, and hip strength.

•    Works a triple extension, in a chain sequence of the ankle, knees, hips producing forceful extension to move as fast as possible.

•    Core stability and the posterior chain are also trained in this movement when you start to load weight, which makes this movement a total body workout.

How to Perform the Squat Jump:

Start your feet off in a position as if your going to squat with a heavy load, position your hands interlocked behind your head. Lower into a parallel position and then explode up as high as possible. Make sure to really focus on driving through your ankles, knees, and hips. When landing, attempt to land on the front half of your feet as you absorb the load, slowly roll back onto your heels into the start position as your hips descend into the

next rep.
 
You can start this exercise with doing one jump, reset while taking a breath, then repeating. Another option is to perform it continuously jumping.
 
As you progress with this body weight movement you can slowly start implementing excess loads. One option is to load a barbell, placed behind your neck. Another option is light dumbbells held off to your side with arms extended. The intent is to not perform the heaviest amount but to stay jumping powerful, as soon as you can't perform a decent jump you will need to decrease the load.
 
Sample Progression:
Weeks 1-3: 3-4 sets x 5 reps
Weeks 4-6: 4-5 sets x 3 reps
Weeks 7-9: 3-4 sets x 5 reps
Weeks 10-12: 3-4 sets x 4 reps
 
Vary the loads through this program but make sure that you start off with no weight so you can fully drill proper technique. Loading weight is not necessary.
 
You can also incorporate the jump squat into a strength & conditioning circuit....
 
Sample Circuit:
Body Weight Jump Squats x 6 reps
Push ups x 10-12 reps
Reverse Lunges x 10-12 reps each side
V-sits x 8-10 reps
Mountain climbers x 10-12 each leg
 
Perform the entire circuit all the way through, rest 1-2 minutes, repeat for 2-3 sets.
 
Closing Words:
Smirks are replaced with gasps for air and swaggers are quickly put in check. Explosive movements are not only physically and metabolically taxing, they require a lot of focus. Really concentrate on the mechanics of the movement so it can transfer over into your game. I hope this exercise can help you increase lower extremity strength and keep you in top performance shape!