The Importance of Plyometrics in an Athlete Training Program

When evaluating and creating training programs there a lot of aspects to take into account. With several means to use to improve speed, agility, power, explosiveness and endurance, which is the right combination to achieve your goals?

This is a question many coaches and professionals ask themselves as they lead individuals and teams through their programming. BSP uses several training modalities to elicit the desired response through our training programs. If you watch a training session at BSP you will see plyometrics, linear speed, change of direction, explosive lifts like Olympic lifting and strength- based lifts like squat and deadlift.

Many athletes and parents are aware of and comfortable with the speed, agility, power and strength work, however the plyometrics can be a new or curious topic. Most people think of, or are limited to box jumps as a plyometric exercise when in reality there are hundreds of exercises that can be much more beneficial than a single box jump.

Let’s dig in…

First of all, why are plyometrics important? Plyometric and jumping movements create very quick and explosive contractions of the muscle tissue in order to create a rapid response. This contraction enhances the rate of motor unit firing. Basically, it makes motor muscle fibers contract faster. It also improves our Golgi Tendon function. The Golgi unit is a mechanism at the end of the muscle in the ligamentous structure which rapidly contracts the muscle when it has been stretched. Finally, the incorporation of plyometrics also improves the tissue density of the connective tissue which aides in injury prevention.

Now that the anatomy and physiology lesson is out of the way, why should YOU really incorporate plyometrics?

Sport Specific

The advantage of plyometrics over all other training modalities is that you can change the starting and ending position to mimic sport scenarios. After you have moved through some of the basic drills such as box jumps and lateral bounds you can moved to something that looks more like your sport and position. For example, our track athletes will move to a seated box jump which mimics the knee angle they will have when in the starting blocks. It is important to be explosive from any angle and any position. If you only train a box jump you are only training your ability to be explosive in a standing bilateral (two feet) position. Unfortunately, much of sport is played on one leg and in much lower positions. That is not to say that the box jump does not have carryover, it is just that the benefits tend to decrease after 3-4 weeks of performing the movement.

In another example, many of our baseball and softball players will use Lateral bounds in their programming. This movement requires an athlete to stand on one leg, jump as far to the side and possible, then land on the opposite leg. Example By performing this movement our athletes become more explosive and powerful laterally. This new lateral power, when expressed in a throw or swinging a bat will create additional rotational power.

Variability

You can also adjust the planes of movement that you are moving through. Much of lifting and strength training exercises are just up and down movements. This type of training creates and accepts force in the Sagittal plane alone.

 Again, much of sport requires you to move side to side, move your feet and shift your weight. Strength training is very important and has significant carryover, however, if you stop there the enhancement of athleticism will be limited. With plyometric training we can incorporate single and double leg movements, turns, transitions from one leg to another and even use different surfaces (i.e. dropping from one box to the ground and jumping of one leg back onto another box). This incorporation of complex plyometric measures will use the additional strength that you have developed through your strength training and enhance your explosive power in sports specific scenarios.

This is not to say that plyometric training is superior to any other style of training. It is simply another tool in the tool bag of athletic enhancement. It is just as important as lifting, sprinting, and performing change of direction drills. The exemption of any of these modalities would limit your results.

If this is something that you are interested in be sure to follow our content here, on our Instagram or even at our Youtube channel to see how we incorporate these drills. Here is a series of over two dozen simple plyometric drills that we use.