Improve You Speed And Agility With Plyometrics
Learn what plyometrics can do for your speed and agility. This article will teach you what benefits you can receive. To summarize, you will learn the: what (can plyometrics do for you), the why (you should use this sort of training) and the how (it can benefit you). The relation to speed and agility will also be discussed.
Let's explore what plyometrics actaully are
Considered to have first been discovered in Russia, and pretty soon adopted across the world for its spectacular training effects plyometric training has a simple goal: to better link strength and speed with the result of great improvements in power output.To put it simply: plyometric training increases your power output by training your body to use more strength with higher speed.In basketball for example plyometrics are used to increase an athletes running vertical jump.
To achieve results plyometric focuses on:
- harnessing your bodies ability to absorb and store force;- releasing that force quickly (resulting in spetacular power output);
Plyometrics can be implemented in any sport that involves one or more of these actions: kicking, lifting, jumping or throwing. Here are some examples: baseball, football, basketball, soccer, power lifting, disk throwing.
Purpose of plyometrics as part of a speed and agility training program
The effect of plyometrics is twofold: it not only strengthens your joints, tendons and muscles, but it also trains your nervous system to react more efficiently. These side effects allow speed and agility to be quickly improved -- especially if you already have well developed musculature.
The conditioning of the nervous system is the reason plyometric training produces very quick results. Because of this pay special attention to these guidelines:
never train when in a fatigued state
focus on each and every rep
* keep the rep number low (no more than 20 regardless of the exercise used)always remember to keep the set number under 3 (no more than 3 reps of a given exercise per training session)
Drill this into your head: Train HARDER, not looonger.
Long term gains with plyometric training will result more from changes in body composition -- a focus on good nutrition and avoidance of injury is very important to the results you see with plyometrics. Plyometric training will change the structure of your muscles and tendons.Plyometrics will make your muscles and tendons more springlike.
I'd like to know exactly how a plyometric movement works!
* first the body absorbs and stabilizes the force from a negative (eccentric) contraction
* as it does this, it loads up your muscles and tendons with force (think of it like a compressing a spring)
* the spring unloads and the body (for legs) or an object (for arms) is propelled with astounding speed
Here’s an example,when you cock back your arm to throw a rock the natural thing you do is to first cock your arm backwards. The effect of this is that the muscles of your arm and shoulder muscles lock, forcing your tendons to stretch thus storing a lot of force in those tendons and essentially turning them into loaded springs. When you throw, the stored force is released, allowing the rock to be accelerated at a rate which is higher than your normal rate of force development.
The reason plyometric training was so big when it came out in the 70 ’s is that it allowed athletes to specifically train their muscles and tendons to be more spring-like. You naturally use plyometric movements but before plyometric training came out there was no clear cut way to train for this. That is why it was thought for so long that jumping for height for example was an innate ability.
To summarize, plyometrics kill two birds with one stone: they teach your nervous system how to correctly perform movements at higher speeds and they condition your tendons, ligaments and muscles to aquire more spring-like characteristics allowing for greater acceleration. These benefits directly translate into gains in general speed and agility.To further support this process you should also learn about:speed and agility training and strength
The question is: how do I adapt the principles of plyometric training to my speed and agility training? The answer is, and you aren’t going to like it, by tailoring your plyometric training to the specific speed and agility requirements of the sport that you are practicing. This is a long discussion and goes way beyond the scope of this article. For more tips click here Speed and Agility
To summarize this article:
* what plyometrics are
* how plyometrics work
* the role of plyometrics as part of your speed and agility training
* the benefits you can expect when introducing plyometric drills into yours speed and agility training
I also recommend you check out this article and learn this very usefull exercise for speed and agility training and decreasing chance of injury