The quads and calves are the money-making areas you need to concentrate on to make real gains with your vertical jump workouts. You will also be inadvertently working out your other leg muscles in the process—which is a good thing!—but really tightening the focus on your quads and calves are where the best gains in power and jump height will be found.
Not only do you want to focus on these two muscles, but you’ll also want to increase speed and power to gain hops. You’ll have a number of exercises at your disposal, we’ll cover a few here, just remember where to target your efforts. Keep in mind: if you get too bulky, you’ll lose speed. Lose speed, and you won’t jump as high…so you’ll need to keep up with the speed training, too.
We’ll begin with a few of the best, classic exercises you need to have in these vertical jump workouts. The most popular exercises would be lunges and squats, both of which train your target areas as well as the entire leg. Don’t fret if you don’t belong to a gym: just try wall sits. A wall sit is where you lean against a wall with your back to it, then lower yourself until your thighs are parallel to the floor. Hold your angle as long as you can stand the burn.
To concentrate on your calves, you should do the traditional calf raise exercise. If you want to maximize your burn, hold weights and simply raise yourself onto your toe tips and hold it, lowering slowly until you begin to feel the protest. Or, again, you can do this outside the gym. Stand with your toes pointing at the stairs and your heels hanging behind you, rise to full height on your toes and then slowly lower yourself. Repeat until you feel it, then keep going a bit.
After you get stronger in your main, targeted muscles, you need to begin zeroing in on including speed training as well. You have a number of options to work on your quickness while paying focused attention to your key muscles.
Running the 40-yard dash is perhaps the most well-known exercise for speed. This sprint is designed with nothing but speed in mind: it’s all acceleration. Another element to increase your speed is getting yourself an agility ladder and just do various drills with it. Run through it, do the side-to-side step with it, per the instructions. Don’t try this with a regular maintenance ladder, either!
Last but definitely not least is the box jump to get quicker. Play it safe and get a plyometric box, about 24”-36” high to start with—though you can practice with anything that can withstand your weight. Simply jump on top of the box, and land slowly—so you don’t knock it over or fall off. Jump down and then—without losing a nanosecond—leap back up. It’s the explosion of the jump as well as the height that matters.
To summarize: if you want maximum payback from your vertical jump workouts, concentrate on what counts. That is: your calves and quads, and improve your strength and quickness, and you’ll be setting personal records with your vertical jump.