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Bleh well turns out this flu was pretty bad...could barely work let alone train this week. I'm out of the woods now though, might be able to train Monday...I will have had effectively 1.5 weeks off because of Easter/flu...grrrr. Anyway nothing I can do about it! Hopefully my small strength gains I've made haven't gone anywhere.

I seriously get itchy feet though when I can't train for whatever reason...can't stop watching old adarq/brozknows/my old videos and getting all motivated! Haha.

^^^
I don't know guys. Ok, RFD is very important, quad/hip dominance too but i feel there is something more weird/uncommon here.
It is not just a 2*BW squat in the equation. LBSS is almost 6', healthy, fit, lean, practicing a competitive sport, doing his plyos and jumps ordinary...
RFD or quad/hip dominance should be the reason why his SVJ is, say, 32'' and not 37''.
25'' just doesn't make sense!

IMO, he's got to try something else. Clearly squat strength just isn't correlating with his jumping right now. It's always the same thing though...everyone suggests a million different ways he can get back on track in regards to jumping high enough to dunk (which is totally achievable for him - he's not trying to join TFB) but nothing actually changes. Here's just a small selection:

My biases aside, you might consider switching up your squat form just to have a break from squatting.  Some front squats or pause squats might be good to incorporate. 

That's what I said to him too. It appears LBSS has very strong hips but is lacking in quad and calf strength/efficiency/power. If he gets that up then... you know...

I agree with acole , you always neglect p-chain if i am not wrong. Put some RDL/BSS somwehere in there and stick with them , progress until pchain is strong.
Edit: I also agree with raptor on the other thread , you also neglect calves.

Just my 2 cents.

My advice would be to focus on basic strength work and a form of max effort jumps. Squats, deadlifts and one(!) explosive lift (preferably powerclean) should be that basic strength work and max effort jumps can be done in addition. If you have to, keep the BSS if you are interested in single leg jumps as well. If you squat heavy on Monday, you might do them on Wednesday, so that Friday can be squats again. You have to treat them as a main exercise for them to be of any worth IMO.

You should really go with an explosive schedule for the next few weeks...

Sure we've had these discussions before but you never did anything like this... it would be interesting to see what you'd gain out of it.

And even from the man himself:

someday i would like to have a truly decent squat, but that does not have to be right now. i should be focused on jumping, speed, and explosiveness.
going to regroup and come up with a better plan. i love squatting to the point where it's gotten in the way.

I don't want to sound like I'm having a go at LBSS, I really want to see him dunk probably more than any other member with that goal, it's just frustrating to see that he essentially keeps doing the same thing with no change in results. I would love to see him really change up his training for a sustained period of time and just see what happens. I know how changing up my training from random squat/sprint sessions to a more regimented periodisation routine helped me break through some plateaus last year. Will the same thing work for LBSS? Maybe, maybe not, but at least by trying something else we'd know more about what does and doesn't work for him, because, as Vag said, he's an unusual type of athlete to say the least. IMO, whatever it is, JackM split, track training with Avishek, Joel Smith 1-legged program, at least it's trying to challenge the current situation of big squat, low jump in some way.

It could be the piriformis muscle.

I think that's most likely what it is...I tend to get these little niggles on my left side (knee last time, hip tightness before that), my theory being that it's because I SLRVJ exclusively off my left.

Track/jumps:

My gym was closed over Easter so I just did some random exercises at the track, wanted to sprint to see if this annoying glute/hamstring spot flares up again.

Dynamic warmup

50m x 2, 100m x 1

Then went to a 10' ring to test my SVJ just to see where my strength is at. First proper jump after a warmup was ~32'' (half a finger above the rim)  , pretty happy with that given I haven't been training explosively for it or anything, just squats + staying low BW. Really shows how much my SVJ is dependent on squat strength. I didn't do any more, got enough from that.

Jump rope: 4x30s fast

Pullups: 3x8

Annoyingly though I got this tightness in my left glute/hamstring again, very weird muscular tight spot. It goes away after a day or so with some tennis ball rolling, might be just weakness from not sprinting for so long. It's not a major issue, just flagging it.

Ah, I'd missed the scoobychau lolz. I used to comment on his journal a lot but I've given up now. He just doesn't understand basic athletic training principles.

Quote from: acole14 on March 06, 2013, 08:53:38 pm

Thanks man, interesting observations. I'd love to see a study on femur/tibia lengths, height and SVJ in trained individuals and see if there's any correlation.

The study has been done in recreational athletes.  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16503672

Only foot length had any correlation to vertical jump.   I don't think you are going to find a significant difference in trained athletes as far as tib/femur and SVJ goes.   In general the advantages somewhat balance out.  Lankier longer femur guys will have an obvious leverage advantage IF they have equal strength levels through the range of motion... which they usually don't because they have to do a lot more work.

Cool, thanks for the link. Interesting stuff.

Gym:

Activation/warmup

SL TKEs: 2x20/leg@15kgs

RDLs: 2x8-10@30kgs (warmup), was going to do heavier but I went at a bad time, Friday afternoon so all the racks were taken, got sick of waiting so I just did some weighted back extensions instead.

Back ext: 2x10@6kgs, 1x10@16kgs

Close-grip pullups: 2x8

Crap workout, probably worst in awhile but it's just an assistance session so that's OK. I really hate my crowded gym sometimes, wish I had the space/time/money to set up a low-key home gym like entropy or adarq, just a rack w/pullup handles, barbell, weights, maybe few kettleballs. That's my dream anyway

Quote from: acole14 on March 17, 2013, 06:01:00 am

Quote from: Raptor on March 17, 2013, 05:06:58 am

Quote from: acole14 on March 17, 2013, 04:09:51 am

I agree with what Koing (cool name bro) is saying overall. I guess on the other hand there's the specificity crew who would argue it's a good thing to accelerate the eccentric phase because you want to do that in a bilateral jump.

Except you don't use that depth to jump so the specificity "jumps" out the window.

Shit I meant standing not bilateral. Running bilateral is a different story as you say.

Well they still miss the point if the subject is training for strength and hypertrophy.

Yeah, but I'm guessing the reason entropy brought it up is because he isn't training for hypertrophy as such, more for athleticism, and obviously SVJ is a big part of what we define as 'athleticism'. Someone might say to him "Hey, you should accelerate your eccentric phase to mimic the eccentric of the SVJ", but I agree with you that it's not really necessary for that aspect and maybe even dangerous in heavy strength work like back squats. It's probably more important to try and accelerate the concentric phase rather than the eccentric in heavy squats. I found DL bounds/tuck jumps were good for getting better at accelerating the eccentric phase of the SVJ, made most of my improvements in the SVJ when I was doing well in those.

Anyway, just random thoughts on what Koing-bro brought to the table.

Quote from: acole14 on March 17, 2013, 04:09:51 am

I agree with what Koing (cool name bro) is saying overall. I guess on the other hand there's the specificity crew who would argue it's a good thing to accelerate the eccentric phase because you want to do that in a bilateral jump.

Glad you liked that! Btw any luck with choosing squatting shoes? Have you seen the underground elite ones btw? They look like a decent budget shoe if you're not keen on spending over $200 on the higher end ones.

Good discussion above also.

Yeah I did actually see those. Not bad price-wise, about $110AUD with shipping to Melb. I guess if you only really need a solid elevated heel in a good pair of shoes, you're just paying more for brand/look with the AdiPowers/Romaleos.

I agree with what Koing (cool name bro) is saying overall. I guess on the other hand there's the specificity crew who would argue it's a good thing to accelerate the eccentric phase because you want to do that in a bilateral jump.