2009 Slam dunk: How I’ll do it

Posted December 29, 2008 in Basketball, Fitness

OK, here’s my plan to achieve my New Year’s Resolution:

  1. Technical progression. I know how to slam dunk and seem to remember being able to do it on a 285cm rim. I my recollection is correct, this means I need to increase my jump by 20cm. My progression will be: touch the rim, grab the rim, dunk with a small stone, dunk with a tennis ball, dunk with a volley ball, dunk with a basket ball.

  2. Strength progression. I’ll work on increasing my 1RM for full squats (front and back), deadlifts, chins, dips and shoulder press. According to the ExRx Strength standards I’m mostly novice, so I’ll try to work my way up to intermediate.

  3. Olympic Lifts. They are good for the vertical jump, but the movements are not easy to learn. I’ve found a local weightlifting association that teaches how to do them, so that’s another step on the way, but will mostly be from March onwards.

  4. Plyometrics. Not sure about these. Everybody seems to agree that they help a lot, but I get the impression that I’ll focus on getting stronger first and see how it goes.

  5. Other factors. Time to review the Best Plays of the NBA dvd that I brought back from the states to get into the right mental state :-) Weather: My basket jump training will be outdoors, so hoping on good weather. State of the basketball court: I remember playing on an outdoors court once, that was made out of some artificial material with very good grip. It was actually annoying for real basketball, since the grip on your shoes was so strong that pivoting on your feet because difficult, but we could all jump higher.