How Do I Get Explosive Strength?
By
Joe Hashey
At Synergy Athletics and on nearly every training forum, people ask, “What
exercises do I need to become more explosive?” Well before we get into the
exercises, it’s important to understand the factors that create “explosive”
abilities.
Explosive strength is the ability to exert maximal force in minimal time. At
the simplest level, an athlete needs to improve two training factors to get
explosive—strength and rate of force development. Zatsiorsky defines strength as
“the ability to exert maximum maximorum external force.” However, strength
doesn’t always mean moving weight quickly.
The rate of force development means the speed at which force can be produced.
Rapid rate of force development means that strength can be applied quickly to
the load (your body weight, a barbell, etc.). So back to that question, “How do
I get explosive?” Honestly, it really depends on where your weakness is—overall
strength or rate of force development.
Let me tell you a story to make it clearer. Roger comes to the gym and starts
squatting. When he can squat his body weight, his standing vertical jump is 20
inches (arbitrary numbers for this story). After seeing those results, Roger
continues squatting until he can squat twice his body weight. He goes back and
tests his vertical and achieves a jump of 30 inches.
Encouraged by these results, Roger squats until he can drive up a huge
amount—three times his body weight. He goes back to test his vertical and it’s
still 30 inches. What went wrong? Roger definitively became stronger, but his
vertical jump went stagnant. Roger’s problem is his rate of force development.
Although his strength had improved, the speed at which he can apply force did
not improve.
Let’s take a look at another scenario. The Johnson family found a fancy
“sport-specific training facility” in town that was a turf field with agility
ladders, plyometric boxes, bungees, and parachutes. They fell in love with it
and sent their son Tim to improve his vertical jump.
Tim performed box jumps in each workout, and after the first month, his
vertical increases from 20 inches to 25 inches. Encouraged by these results, Tim
kept up his box jumping for another month and his vertical increased again to 30
inches.
If it worked twice, it must work again, Tim reasoned. After one more month,
his vertical remained at 30 and again for each month after. Tim’s problem was
lack of strength development in his program. He didn’t have enough strength to
apply more force in order to perform a higher vertical jump.
So how do you increase your explosive strength? Train both explosive strength
and your rate of force development. Here are some example exercises:
Lower body strength exercises:
- Squat
- Deadlift
- Step-ups
- Lunges
Rate of force development exercises:
- Box jump
- Broad jump
- Throwing things
- Single leg box jumps
When you’re training athletes or just training to gain real world strength,
multiple facets of strength need to be developed. Traditional strength exercises
will increase the vertical jump in someone who is limited by strength. Explosive
exercises will increase vertical jump but only until the movement is limited by
the lack of strength.
I’ll add that there are secondary factors that will apply such as
coordination and neural adaptation to the movement, but let’s get strong and
explosive! So I’d have to answer the question, “What exercises do I need to
become more explosive?” with another simple question—“Is that person too weak or
too slow?”
Joe Hashey is a certified strength and conditioning coach and owner of
Synergy Athletics. Visit his site (www.synergy-athletics.com)
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