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You could probably get decent gains from just playing hard in your sport (not inducing huff-puffing runs, just sprinting back on D, jumping as hard as you can for the ball, power stuff like that would induce vert gains). Don't overdo running for cardio, since that won't help your vert. Go hard and go powerful.

... Are pistols great? I dunno, seems like a waste of time if you already have access to a squat rack.

Late, but welcome.

Good stuff, man. You're where what I wanna shoot for in strength levels.

Keep doing what you do. Don't lose the drive. :]

When I was a kid I used to just practice moves in the park. Stuff like that definitely helps your handle. I would practice what you don't feel comfortable with (off hand, spins) and try to get as many practical moves as you can into your arsenal. You oughta aim for being able to pull off any move while closing your eyes. It's up to you to go through drills. Do them as fast and smoothly as you can in order to get the most benefit out of it.

Hope that helps.

Wassup.

You're welcome.

'Sup, dude.

Might help if you post up a video of yourself if you're not feeling shy. That way we can see exactly what level you're at in order to help you.

Something that might help with your shots would be to establish your form and keep that form. This is important, because it's what should come automatic when you start playing games. It should flow smooth and you should never think about it too hard. For example, a textbook jumpshot's power comes from the legs and the follow through from the elbow flicks out smoothly. I always practice my form before any jumpshot session by banking the shot near the rim or aiming for a soft placement in the net. (When I mean near the rim, probably just outside the low post or a little inside the paint works well.)

I move to free throws after that and then choose a couple of spots on the court to practice. 50 to 100 shots at each spot is decent practice.

You ought to master those mid-range shots before moving on to the three-point.

For dribbling... you can just dribble a lot. Keep it low, keep it crisp, and never do a move that'll have you stuck. Every move should have the ability to flow into another move into another move. For example, I could do a crossover to the right hand, then a behind the back into a left hand spin pivot into a step back move into a low dribble to avoid the imaginary hands of the defender, etc.. Basketball is fluid and never stagnant.

4-Hour Body is a good read when it comes to weight loss.

If I could break down the nutrition summary, it would be to include protein in your breakfast (four eggs or so), and eat greens. Protein can come from lentils, protein shakes, etc.. Also, the author (can't remember the dude's name for the life of me) recommends you to gorge yourself once a week (go easy with breakfast though). This spikes metabolic levels... or something like that.

Know what, I'm just gonna quote the five rules for fat loss here from the book.

RULE #1: AVOID “WHITE” CARBOHYDRATES.
Avoid any carbohydrate that is, or can be, white. The following foods are prohibited, except for within 30 minutes of nishing a resistance-training workout like those described in the “From Geek to Freak” or “Occam’s Protocol” chapters: all bread, rice (including brown), cereal, potatoes, pasta, tortillas, and fried food with breading. If you avoid eating the aforementioned
foods and anything else white, you’ll be safe.

Just for fun, another reason to avoid the whities: chlorine dioxide, one of the chemicals used to bleach flour, combines with residual protein in most of these foods to form alloxan. Researchers use alloxan in lab rats to induce diabetes.

That’s right—it’s used to produce diabetes. This is bad news if you eat anything white or “enriched.”

Don’t eat white stuff unless you want to get fatter.

RULE #2: EAT THE SAME FEW MEALS OVER AND OVER AGAIN.
The most successful dieters, regardless of whether their goal is muscle gain or fat-loss, eat the same few meals over and over again. There are 47,000 products in the average U.S. grocery store, but only a handful of them won’t make you fat.

Mix and match from the following list, constructing each meal with one pick from each of the three groups. I’ve starred the choices that produce the fastest fat-loss for me:

Proteins
*Egg whites with 1–2 whole eggs for flavor (or, if organic, 2–5 whole eggs, including yolks)
*Chicken breast or thigh
*Beef (preferably grass-fed)
*Fish
Pork
Legumes
*Lentils (also called “dal” or “daal”)
*Black beans
Pinto beans
Red beans
Soybeans
Vegetables
*Spinach
*Mixed vegetables (including broccoli, cauliflower, or any other cruciferous vegetables)
*Sauerkraut, kimchee (full explanation of these later in “Damage Control”)
*Sauerkraut, kimchee (full explanation of these later in “Damage Control”)
Asparagus
Peas
Broccoli
Green beans

Eat as much as you like of the above food items, but keep it simple.

Pick three or four meals and repeat them.

Almost all restaurants can give you a salad or vegetables in place of french fries, potatoes, or rice. Surprisingly, I have found Mexican food (after swapping out rice for vegetables) to be one of the cuisines most conducive to the Slow-Carb Diet. If you have to pay an extra $1–3 to substitute at a restaurant, consider it your sixpack tax, the nominal fee you pay to be lean.

Most people who go on “low”-carbohydrate diets complain of low energy and quit because they consume insucient calories. A half-cup of rice is 300 calories, whereas a half-cup of spinach is 15 calories! Vegetables are not calorically dense, so it is critical that you add legumes for caloric load.

Eating more frequently than four times per day might be helpful on higher-carb diets to prevent gorging, but it’s not necessary with the ingredients we’re using. Eating more frequent meals also appears to have no enhancing eect on resting metabolic rate, despite claims to the contrary. Frequent meals can be used in some circumstances (see “The Last Mile”), but not for
this reason.

The following meal schedule is based on a late sleep schedule, as I’m a night owl who gives up the ghost at 2:00 A.M. at the earliest, usually with wineglass or book still in hand, à la heroin addict. Adjust your meals to t your schedule, but make sure to have your first meal within an hour of waking.

Meals are approximately four hours apart.
10:00 A.M.—Breakfast
2:00 P.M.—Lunch
6:30 P.M.—Smaller second lunch
8:00–9:00 P.M.—Recreation or sports training, if scheduled.
10:00 P.M.—Dinner
12:00 A.M.—Glass of red wine and Discovery Channel before bed

Here are some of my meals that recur again and again:
• Breakfast (home): Scrambled Eggology® pourable egg whites with one whole egg, black beans, and mixed vegetables warmed up or cooked in a microwave using Pyrex® containers.

• Lunch (Mexican restaurant): Grass-fed organic beef, pinto beans, mixed vegetables, and extra guacamole.

• Dinner (home): Grass-fed organic beef (from Trader Joe’s), lentils, and mixed vegetables. Just remember: this diet is, rst and foremost, intended to be eective, not fun. It can be fun with a few tweaks (the next chapter covers this), but that’s not the goal.

RULE #3: DON’T DRINK CALORIES.
Drink massive quantities of water and as much unsweetened tea, coee (with no more than two tablespoons of cream; I suggest using cinnamon instead), or other no-calorie/low-calorie beverages as you like. Do not drink milk (including soy milk), normal soft drinks, or fruit juice.

Limit diet soft drinks to no more than 16 ounces per day if you can, as the aspartame can stimulate weight gain.

I’m a wine fanatic and have one to two glasses of red wine almost every evening. It doesn’t appear to have any negative impact on my rate of fat-loss. Red wine is by no means required for this diet to work, but it’s 100% allowed (unlike white wines and beer, both of which should be avoided).

Up to two glasses of red per night, no more.

RULE #4: DON’T EAT FRUIT.
Humans don’t need fruit six days a week, and they certainly don’t need it year-round. If your ancestors were from Europe, for example, how much fruit did they eat in the winter 500 years ago? Think they had Florida oranges in December? Not a chance.

But you’re still here, so the lineage somehow survived.

The only exceptions to the no-fruit rule are tomatoes and avocadoes, and the latter should be eaten in moderation (no more than one cup or one meal per day). Otherwise, just say no to fruit and its principal sugar, fructose, which is converted to glycerol phosphate more eciently than almost all other carbohydrates. Glycerol phosphate → triglycerides (via the liver) → fat
storage. There are a few biochemical exceptions to this, but avoiding fruit six days per week is
the most reliable policy.

But what’s this “six days a week” business?

It’s the seventh day that allows you, if you so desire, to eat peach crepes and banana bread until you go into a coma.

RULE #5: TAKE ONE DAY OFF PER WEEK.
I recommend Saturdays as your Dieters Gone Wild (DGW) day. I am allowed to eat whatever I want on Saturdays, and I go out of my way to eat ice cream, Snickers, Take 5, and all of my other vices in excess. If I drank beer, I’d have a few pints of Paulaner Hefe-Weizen.1 I make myself a little sick each Saturday and don’t want to look at any junk for the rest of the week. Paradoxically, dramatically spiking caloric intake in this way once per week increases fatloss by ensuring that your metabolic rate (thyroid function and conversion of T4 to T3, etc.) doesn’t downshift from extended caloric restriction.

That’s right: eating pure crap can help you lose fat. Welcome to Utopia.

There are no limits or boundaries during this day of gluttonous enjoyment.

There is absolutely no calorie counting on this diet, on this day or any other. Start the diet at least ve days before your designated cheat day. If you choose Saturday, for example, I would suggest starting your diet on a Monday.

Hope that helps, man.