Increasing vertical jump...

[daman1]

I am looking for any exercises you all can suggest to improve my verticle jump. Post away...

[Hit-That]

Get yourself some Jumpstretch bands. Go inside a power rack and set the safety rails low. Wrap tha bands around the safety rail and through your weightlifting belt. You are going to jump with all of your might. Perform something like 8 sets of 3 reps. Do this once a week like on Mon. On Fri you should be doing a heavy squat workout strictly for strength training.
If you have a reverse hyper, you can also do heavy sets with weights on one day and on the other day use the bands on it.

Guarantee you will jump higher.

[sepjuice]

strength shoes do work(used them during H.S). the just wear down. but their whole routine of workouts is polymetrics...thats the key...

[sinista63]

I started dunking at the age of 14. I was 6'2" and 185 at the time. What got my verticle up at the time was strength shoes and power cleans. The strength shoes seemed to help (but i'll be the first to admit that I didn't train with them as much as I should've) but doing power and hang cleans put my verticle through the roof.

[abstrack]

strength shoes do work(used them during H.S). the just wear down. but their whole routine of workouts is polymetrics...thats the key...

Thats what i was goign to recommend, also some ankle weights work pretty good for what he is trying to acheive. I used the above techniques during H.S. and was able to grab the rim at 5'5". I know it is not dunking but for my height I used to be able to battle the boards with in our league

[abstrack]

i think Party boy knows more on this subject, I would hit him up with a PM

[Act of God]

I was a long/triple jumper in HS and college. I totally agree on the plyometric training...good stuff.

Everyone here has the right idea about what to do, but I would add something. Jump Squats. Its basically the same idea as the jumpstretch bands, which are probably safer. Regardless, I use like 135 only and do sets of lik 6-8 jumping as high as I can.

The only thing is, people look at you like you're an asshole in the gym

[GearAholic]

plyometrics work great so do the strength shoes and so is the jump squats but what also works wonders is box jumping we would have 3 boxes at diffrent heights and jump on the lowest one for one set of 20 move up to the next 1 for one set of 20 then move the the highest one which was a little above 3 ft for 2 sets of like 10-15 then we also used dumbells jumping onto the low box then we would also go out to the field and do alot of plyometrics bounding, frog leaps, high skips, and such for 50 yards we would do each 1 for 2 sets and we also incorperated sprints and such and then just standing straight up and down jumpingas high as we could and making our knees hit our chest for about 20 secs there is so much more i could go on but we would do this 3 days a week and my vertical shot thru the roof i had a 36 in vertical at 230 go figure

[saboudian]

In the offseason, focus on increasing your squat.
As the season approaches, start gradually phasing out your wt training to 1 day a week for maintenace, and at the same time gradually start adding in more skills/plyo/cardio work.

Some have suggested some good plyometric exercises, and theres plenty more out there, but strength is the foundation.

[bustermayer]

I found that doing really deep squats with moderate weight helps out alot. Something you can squat easily, and do 5 sets of 15 or 20 and you'll see results in a couple of weeks.

[roccoswello]

To max out your vert you need to improve the explosiveness of your lower body. Work the following routine into your leg day or use as your leg workout:

Exercise I. Smith Machine Squat/Squat Jump Compound Set:

In a Smith machine, go heavy with low reps on standard squats, thighs parallel to the floor at the bottom of each rep. Then rest just long enough to drop the weight considerably and do squat jumps. Focus on pushing the weight up as fast as possible and actually leave the floor briefly at the top of the motion. If your to tall for the Smith machine use a (light) free-weight barbell.

Exercise II. Standing calf raises with drop set:

Pile on the weight for a set of 8 reps, going all the way to the top and squeezing your calves. Then, drop the weight and do 10 reps as fast on the way up as you can. You should still control the resistance during the "down" portion, but the "up" phase should be super explosive--even if it means bending your knees to power the weight upl

Exercise III. Box Jump/Leg Extension Compound Set:

Find an open space and either a sturdy box or flat bench. Step off the box or bench and as soon as you hit the floor, explosively jump up as high as you can for 5 reps. The key here is to not rest on the floor--gather yourself when you're on the box, but when you hit the floor, your feet should touch for only a split second.

Follow those with 10 reps of leg extensions, again using explosive movements.

Also, your vert on the court extends past the weight room. Play pick up games you'll be jumping constantly and training your legs to be more explosive.