How Does a High Jumper Train?

Leg and Core Strength Training

A key part of a high jumper's training regimen involves weight training and other exercises focused on increasing leg and core strength and stability. The goal in the high jump is to produce one extremely powerful and explosive effort in order to clear the body over a bar. In order to achieve greater heights, legs must be as strong as possible. Doing exercises like squats, lunges, bicep curls, leg press, quadriceps extensions and heel raises with heavy weight loads are common ways to build power in the legs. While the primary force for a jump comes from the leg, core strength and stability is also an integral component for a high jumped. Not only does core strength allow the legs to impart more strength into a jump, but core strength is also needed to rotate the body during a jump to clear the bar as efficiently as possible. Crunches, side crunches, ab press, lower back extensions, and various isometric exercises, such as holding one's legs a few inches from the ground while lying prone, are common exercises for building core strength.

In addition to strength, speed and explosiveness are an important part of a high jump. Since a high jump involves an approach, which is essentially a controlled sprint, drills of repeated sprinting of short distances between 20 and 100 meters are useful to increase approach speed. Various leaping exercises, such as leaping straight upwards, standing board jumps, and running long jumps are often used to work on explosiveness, as well as repeatedly practicing actual high jumps onto a pad.

In addition to the purely physical forms of training, high jumpers must hone their jumping technique extensively if they hope to excel. High jump is not a simple matter of jumping straight up as high as possible: if it were, very little technique would be necessary. The fact that high jump involve clearing the body over a high bar, makes less intuitive jumping styles more effective. There are several different jumping techniques and each one presents its own difficulties. The most powerful jumping technique, called the flop, involves approaching the bar at a diagonal and jumping up and back, with the head and shoulders crossing over the bar first, while the back is arched over the bar. Perfecting jumping technique requires repetitious jumping, often over a bar lower than one's actual competitive potential. Having coaches an trainers observe form while jumping is also a key part of honing a jump to clear the highest possible height.