3 Critical Exercises To Increase Vertical Jump – Here’s How To Actually Do Them!
posted in Exercises To Increase Vertical Jump, General |In a recent article I wrote, I discussed 3 critical exercises to increase vertical jump. These exercises were squats, calf raises and leg raises. Keep in mind that these are 3 strength exercises I think are extremely important if you want to increase your vertical jump.
However, these alone will not get your vertical jump to 44 inches or above. To do that, you have to be sure to train the 3 core areas of strength, explosiveness and power.
To read more about how to increase these 3 areas in combination, CLICK HERE.
In this post I want to talk mainly about proper form for squats, calf raises and leg raises. While there are different variations of these exercises, I will talk about the basic form to get you started.
1. Free Weight Squats
***CAUTION – Always make sure to have a spotter and use a weight belt when doing squats***.
We want to do free weight squats because using free weights will not only strengthen your legs, but also your core muscles, such as your abs. First use a comfortable weight. Rest the bar on your trapezius muscles (above your shoulders connected to your neck), and slowly life the bar off the rack. Walk out to where you can squat fully down without the squat rack in the way.
Put your feet about shoulder width apart and while keeping your back as straight as possible, squat down as far down as is confortable. As a guideline your knee joint and hip joint should be horizontally aligned when you are in the lowest position. Slowly bring yourself back up into the standing position.
Initially you want to do 2 warmup sets of 15 reps, followed by 5 sets of 10, 8, 6, 6, and 6 reps, increasing the weight as the reps go down.
2. Calf raises
Calf raises are another one of the critical exercises to increase vertical jump because your calves are a key muscle group that give you both power and explosiveness. The most simple way to do calf raises is to stand on the edge of a stair or other raised surface on the balls of your feet. Make sure your heels are hanging off the edge of the surface. Lower yourself down so that your heels fall below the surface, then raise your self up on the balls of your feet.
Start off doing this with both feet, doing 5 sets of 20 reps. As your strength grows, switch to doing these one leg at a time.
3. Leg raises
What I mean by leg raises are the kind where you hang from a chin-up bar and lift your knees to your chest. This is a critical exercise to increase vertical jump because it not only strengthens your abs (part of your core), but it also strengthens your hip flexors, which provide additional explosiveness.
While hanging from a chin-up bar, raise your legs up to your chest (your legs will be bent at the knees) and try to touch your knees to your chest. You wat to make sure that you really try to isolate the abs in this exercise. Slowly lower your legs back down to the hanging position. Do 5 sets of 2o reps of these.
It’s important in all of these exercises to make sure you use proper technique not only to avoid injury, but to also get maximum benefit. Avoid swinging or rocking to do an exercise. Focus on isolating the muscles you are trying to work and let them do the work.
For additional exercises to get you dunking faster, make sure to check out THIS RESOURCE.
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