Just messing around I did them the other day standing on one leg stationary onto the hood of my Jeep (about 39 inches). I would do them off of 2 legs but I have plantar fascitis in the other foot that I’m trying to heal.
Colin has a point. The only benefit I see to box jumps is they allow you to concentrate on explosive strength, which can be good depending on the training cycle. By landing on the box you’re not having to worry about the impact when landing as you would with a barrier jump.
But if your worried about impact forces then IMO you have other training things to attend to first 
CoolJ, you appear to be locked in “small man world”. A 320lb lineman preparing for the jump test at a combine, will be performing a lot of plyo’s, among other things, and at that bodymass you better believe impact forces are a major consideration.
James
If he is strong enough to jump that high, shouldn’t he be strong enough to absorb the force coming back down?
if not that could be something he could work on
What if he falls flat on his face tripping over the box, or jam his shins on it? What then?
There has got to be safer alternatives like landing on mats etc
But I still feel that if you can’t handle the landing forces then that person won’t be jumping as high as his potential will allow.
Also when one jumps onto a box, I don’t think one is jumping with the same form and force as a maximal effort free standing jump.
I prefer box jumps. You might be able to handle the landing forces but if you want to do high volumes, you’d better soften the landing which is why boxes are useful. Jumping technique is the same.
Its virtually impossible to have an accident with boxes if you’re using them for this purpose. You don’t have to set the box at maximum height.
The way I see it, landing increases nervous and muscular fatigue without a training benefit, so why do it? Carl Lewis didn’t do LJs in practice much for this reason. You want to train explosiveness and such, not ability to absorb force.
And it’s not that the athletes can’t absorb the force, but why would you? If a big guy is capable of a high jump, that’s some extra effort expended on the landing without any benefit. CoolColJ, I read your ‘can’t they handle it’ comment as sort of equivalent to saying an athlete should be able to haul their stuff into the facility and out every day, they should be able to do that if they’re athletes right? Except it’s effort that would take away from the energy available for results-producing training. If the landing adds stress and doesn’t add a benefit, then why do it?
While we’re on the subject of jumping, check out this clip–a dunk at 12 feet.
For those of you think it is possible to train to jump high without training the landing, that’s absolutely ridiculous! I’ve seen literally hundreds of athletes who have all the talent in the world but their technique is absolutely H-O-R-R-E-N-D-O-U-S!! That would be like saying, “Just run as fast as possible and don’t worry about being able to slow down!” Does it sound more ridiculous now! And landing skills don’t always have to do with absorbing force (but this is important as well!), teaching landing skills has more to do with teaching efficiency. When I teach someone to squat I don’t teach them to just push up when their butt hits their heels, I want a specific depth and a specific knee and hip angle and I want them to know where the heck their body is going!! If the goal of lift and jump training was to move from point a to point b as fast as possible then you wouldn’t have to worry about anything else but that, but normally THE GOAL IS TO REPRODUCE A SPECIFIC MOVEMENT FROM START TO FINISH, hence the landing skills. As noted physical therapist Tom Purvis has said, “IT AIN’T THE FALL THAT KILLS YA, IT’S THE LANDING!!” And yes, strength is important to power, so the ability to pause and jump or land and pause and jump is relevant to jump training, hence the whole starting-strength training system! STOP THE INSANITY!! And for juggler or whatever, IF YOU SEEK RESULTS YOU WILL NEVER CHANGE, BUT IF YOU SEEK CHANGE YOU WILL SEE RESULTS!! And of course landing has a benefit, when you go skydiving do they not teach you how to land to keep you from breaking your legs (this is a bit extreme, but you get the point!)!! Sometimes opening your eyes helps you see “it” a little better
Well if landing from a height didn’t build up eccentric strength, bring about structural changes, and push back the golgi tendon thresholds, then alttitude drops and depth jumps wouldn’t work
A wise man said “before you can exert force you have to be able to absorb it”
Why does Charlie sometimes recommend “up” and “out” plyos before reactive plyos in a cycle?
The answer to that question will answer all the questions in this thread.
You said so yourself, risk vs benefits.
Landing from a vertical jump is even more stressful than most depth jumps, due to the increased falling height. If you’re using this exercise for high volumes, you’ll simply wreck your knees. I’m only 180lb but I’m still very careful with the volume of ‘flat’ and ‘down’ plyos I do.
As far as having to absorb force before you can apply it, that is true - but during a vertical jump, the part where you’re absorbing force before applying it is when you’re dipping down for the pre-stretch.
“Just run as fast as possible and don’t worry about being able to slow down!”
Isn’t that exactly what most people do? I never think about slowing down at the end of a sprint, there isn’t much of a technical component to it - its just natural - as is landing from a jump. Just because you’re not practicing it in high volumes, doesn’t mean you don’t know how to do it safely.
‘And of course landing has a benefit, when you go skydiving do they not teach you how to land to keep you from breaking your legs’
I don’t understand this analogy. How is this comparable to landing from a vertical jump? I’ve never heard of anyone injuring themselves because they couldn’t land from their own vertical. Sure, if an athlete is that badly coordinated, you may have to teach him how to land properly. Even then, the movement is only used in training - it is never replicated during sprinting and most sports. It happens in basketball and volleyball, but you’ve already got so much ‘sport specific’ training with the jumps and landings while playing those sports, you shouldn’t even need to be doing additional plyos.
That saying was from Jay Schroeder and it’s not meant to be taken literally, but read between the lines and you will understand
[QUOTE=CoolColJ]Well if landing from a height didn’t build up eccentric strength, bring about structural changes, and push back the golgi tendon thresholds, then alttitude drops and depth jumps wouldn’t work
We weren’t talking about depth jumps, altittude drops, or anything other than box jumps, which are a separate thing. You might as well say that we should do them with a barbell, since weights work, and with jumpstretch bands, since they work with squats . . .
If you want to do plyos, then do them. If you’re doing an exercise that is about something else, why add a stressful element if that element isn’t what you’re working on with that exercize? If you want to work on reversal strength or whatever, then that’s different. I was referring to keeping the energy on the element being trained.
Your working on jumping and leg/hip power, I presume, there are not much other reasons to do boxjumps, although olylifters sometimes do these to help them get under the bar faster, but dropcleans probably do a better job here.
And so they are all interrelated
I just found a Louie Simmons article where he discusses box jumping. It’s at:
http://www.westside-barbell.com/articles.htm#
About halfway down the PDF series of articles, there’s one titled I think “Explosive Strength and Power”. Halfway through that he gets into box jumping.
Jay Schroeder stole that. Bet? Once again opening your eyes will help you to understand the skydiving analogy. This is a plain assumption that athletes know how to land properly and it is absolutely INCORRECT!! No, most athletes do not know how to land, or for that matter jump properly!! If athletes knew what was best for them, what’s a coach for anyway? And for the slowing down component I wasn’t talking about sprinters that’s not difficult, I was talking about field-sport athletes, but I do understand the confusion! And aren’t box jumps only used in training, I didn’t think anybody actually said they’re used in sports, so why bring that up?, doesn’t make any sense!! Can someone at least come up with a conclusion and stop making guesses or assumptions. The only thing I’ve been saying is that there are a lot of assumptions about athletes abilities, especially technical abilities, and that most assume that they can jump up and down very well but often there technique is, how can I say it nicely, LACKING!! Their skills are relative!! Maybe compared to an armchair quarterback they’re exceptional, but often their technique is awful!! Has anyone here ever listened to an elite athlete speak about performance or technique? How about on that HSInternational.com video where jon drummond says that he feels that pull-ups translate better to strength in sprinting performance because you’re dealing with your own bodyweight just like in sprinting? WHAT?! Another assumption. I’ll stop complaining. My feelings deal strictly with my experience with athletes so I guess it is possible that some of you may work with athletes who perform very well technically, but I’ve never seen one (and I’ve worked with some exceptionally talented individuals). Sell crazy somewhere else, we’re all stocked up here!!