I get a lot of questions about how to increase vertical jump. Most of those looking to increase their vertical jump are athletes between the ages of 12 and 24. That’s not to say older athletes aren’t interested in a better vertical, it’s just that most are entering middle school, high school, or college. competition levels. Our first answer to the question of how to jump higher is to increase dexterity and range of motion in all major muscle groups.
The reason is simple, the more the muscles can be stretched, the bigger and faster they will become. However, simply being loose isn’t enough, if it were you’d see plenty of yoga instructors dominating the court. It is equally important that you increase the strength of your muscles at the same time that you increase your range of motion. In simple words, the more you can stretch, the longer the fibers of your muscles will become, which means that when you build your mass, they will be faster AND stronger.
So the next logical question is what exercises can you do to increase your flexibility? You may have a little stretching routine that you developed at some basketball camps or even at your regular practices. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that most coaches have NO idea how to get their equipment to stretch properly.
They may tell you that letting go is important and that stretching is the key to good practice, but ironically, they only spend 5 or 10 minutes doing it. It takes 10-15 minutes to stretch properly before any activity, and that’s just to warm up in the moment. Ideally, you should spend 10-20 minutes both morning and night on a specifically designed stretching program. I’ll give you some areas of the body that you can focus on to increase your vertical jump; it is too difficult to describe the actual stretches with words alone.
Everyone knows it’s important to stretch your quads and calves, we agree. Also, spend more time than you’re used to stretching your hamstrings, most hamstring pulls are the result of poor stretching and poor quad strength. The hip flexor is the muscle that connects the quads to the butt and when you see Kobe Bryant swinging his leg back and forth while he’s slightly bent over, that’s what he’s stretching. It’s really very simple, stretch better, increase vertical jump.