Progress Report

Tonight marks two months on the program. I have increased my standing vertical by 5 1/2" to 22 1/2". My Run in vert is up by about 2 1/2 inches to 25 1/2". I am now touching about 10'5" with the run in. My max squat is up to 275 lbs. (I weight 200, stand 6'5", and reach about 8'3 1/2").

I can now dunk a volleyball one handed and I am having some success dunking a basketball one handed. I would of thought that I needed to be closer to touching 10'8" before getting here. I am jumping off one foot and I can't get nearly as high jumping off of two feet. I don't know if this is a technique issue, I have read that a two-legged jump is supposed to be bigger, but it isn't working that way for me.

My goal is to add about 2 inches to my vert each month. So I am ahead of schedule for standing, and behind schedule for run-in vert. I am not sure why I am seeing such different progress in each, maybe i need to test run-in vertical differently. Right now I am taping a yard stick on a wall and jumping up and touching it.

In other news I am starting to get some shin splints. Nothing serious yet, but I am probably going to stop doing plyometrics for the next month or two and do Olympic style lifts instead. At two months it is time to make some changes to the workout anyway to ensure that my muscles keep adapting and growing. I have replaced the Bulgarian Squats with lateral lunges with light weights. And as i mentioned I am replacing all of the high impact pylometrics with oympic style lifts. So the Depth Jumps, Single leg hops onto a box, tuck jumps, standing vertical jumps, two legged jumps, double one leg hops, and explosive step-ups are out. I am also going to add in some cardio into the program. This month I am going to do two or three days of 20-30 minutes of cardio. One of those days will be running if my shins don't hurt, otherwise it will be stairmaster, elipitical, rowing, and stationary bikes. If you didn't guess I haven't done the jump rope work yet - just haven't had the time and frankly I have never enjoyed jumping rope - but before the plan is over I am going to do at least a month of it.