End Week 7 and semi-off week.

I have realized by now that I am not going to reach my goal.  I knew the 8" was ambitious, but I was really hoping to loose a lot of weight while doing the program and thought that would really help my leaping because it has in the past. But as I went through the workout I decided I needed to focus on the jump training. So for now I'm going to have to rethink my overall goals. Because of a couple bad weeks I am behind 3 weeks or so on the program so I will add those think I might get a dunk off the bounce on the hoop that I play on at Gold's. So I think that is what I will be trying for. So my new goal is to get a dunk, probably off a bounce,  by October 18th which is two days after I finish the program. I think that is very doable.  If I can add 2-3 inches it shouldn't be a problem at all.

One thing I've noticed that seems to be a big issue with how high I get on my running jump is my approach.  I'm not sure exactly what it is yet, but something must be wrong with the way I am transferring my momentum. This really explains why my one-step vertical is exactly the same as my running. I really need to figure out how to work on that so any advice would be helpful. 

For the last 2 weeks my workout has been a little screwed up. I was able to finish week 7 fully, but was unable to do the measurement jumps on Wednesday, which would have been the start of week 8, because of the pain in my knees. I also decided to skip the Plyo that day. Then I missed the Strength and Explosion on Saturday because I went to a football game. Luckily I was able to make that up and do a light squat, ham curl,  calf raises and in-place lunges on Monday and my knees felt good.  I also got the off-days in and played basketball twice.

Yesterday I was able to do the jump measurements that would have been for week 8 had I done it, but since I skipped most of week 8 I am calling it week 7.5 measurements. I started the real week 8 yesterday. I decided to do things a little differently this time. Since it was a plyo day, I did all my stretching and warm-up and then did the 4 50yd Sprints before I did my test jumps.  I did this because I always jump better when I'm really warmed up and have played one game first. It seemed to have decent results.  My legs felt loose and they got less sore. Had my best jumps yet. Remember that these are off really sore legs, because I squated on Monday, and only decent knees this week. Hopefully next week is even better when I get that full recover.

End Week 6           End Week 7
Standing: 25.5"       Standing:26"
One Step: 28"        One Step: 29"
Running: 28.5"        Running: 29"

Overall improvement so far (7 weeks)
Standing:     +1"
One Step:   +2.5"
Running:      +2"

Thanks for reading.

-JWD