Well, you can always jump next to a wall with something like concrete blocks and see how far up you can touch, and/or mark off a wall in feet and inches or cm. Or you can jump for the rim/net on the B-ball court, or even jump up and grab the rim if you're tall enough and jump well enough. Vertical leap just seems more interesting to me, but this is just IMO. I do see what you're saying about the box giving a "tangible level" to aim for.

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

I use box jumps as a way to help work and strengthen my weak and inflexible hips, so that I can go deeper with heavy back squats. Setting up for the jump, and especially getting the knees up high to finish on the box is a good way to work the hips for me.

Like you are saying when I want to train just jumping explosiveness I do rim grab repeats of say 8-12 without stopping running from left side of 3pt line to right side of 3pt line. This is much more specific training, especially if you are a one leg leaper like I am.

With your extensive fast twitch training, I'm surprised you even read ST:)

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Mostly gave it up until the winter : (

At this point I'm just short course racing(sprint and Oly) so I can still get away with a little bit of fun training I used to do in my soccer and basketball playing days.

So, given your FT background, do you feel you are better on the bike or the run??? My impression is that FT folks can do pretty well on the bike, and swim if they have the needed swim skills and background, but have more problems with the run, since running 5K and up is pretty much a ST-dominant activity. I've known lots of former swimmers who could bike pretty well but always got passed a lot on the run. In fact, the headline "Lead swimmer passed on the run" is pretty much standard in triathlon. I'm rarely the leader out of the water but usually up there, and I get passed tons on the run. I once had a guy (in my AG, not overall) by 10 min out of the water and he passed me in the last 1/2 mi of the run; I tried to speed up but my legs just didn't have much left at that point:(

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Predictably I find I'm very good at shorter distance speed no matter the sport, and don't lose much even after long periods of being sedentary. Like you, I tend to notice my weakness more on the run, especially anything over 3 miles. I have the speed skills to run very fast, but my weakness is the aerobic base to support more moderate paces longer, especially lately now that I am years removed from competitive soccer. When I was nearer time-wise to my peak in soccer, I could actually run not terribly slow 5K times(<20 min) with very little training, probably a result of the 15 years or so of short-moderate distance running during competitive soccer. The bike does seem to be generally easier to build speed over longer distances for me.

Ya, I used to play a lot of tennis in HS and college, in addition to my swimming, and when I first started running and cycling for triathlon, I ran a 19:55 5K on mostly just tennis/swim fitness. Unfortunately, after lots of running, was only able to get it down to an 18:55. Oh well, ya just can't have everything:)

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

Impressive. What an athlete

Check out Stefan Holm's 6 feet hurdle jumps http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVZ3ZcorTF0 :-)

It has something to do with a woman and her box.

Point is her box jump is not that amazing for an professional athlete who specializes in explosive movements. That would be no problem for almost all female track and field athletes. I just wanted to find a dude doing crossfit who jumps way higher to rile up the masses here.

What I saw was after jumping up, she just hops off to do it again, while crosscut dude screams at the ceiling for some reason and just brags.

Yeah. Probably because she is a real world class athlete and not some douchebag pretending to be an athlete.

>That would be no problem for almost all elite, sprint-or-jump-specialist female track and field athletes.

FIFY.

Ya, that's exactly what I was thinking; not sure exactly where the cut-off would be but I would guess most 800 m and above female runners would not be able to do that jump.

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."

It is impressive but it is a cheating box jump, just like 99% of the box jumps on youtube. She is getting more height by tucking her legs up under her, rather than landing in the same position that she took off in. This is cheating and any trainer who allows it does not know what they are doing with box jumps. That is how good athletes get hurt. Box jumps, so popular on youtube, are done wrong by most and are a big source of injuries in the gym. Many strength coaches have stopped using them for that reason.

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Simplify, Train, Live

I'd totally call the crossfit cops!

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Sub-9 IM. Navy SeaBee deep sea diver. Can Do!

If thats what it takes for her to ride a 10sec 200m and a 33sec 500m, Ill do them 8 days a week!!!

Um pretty sure there are way more events than the longer distance track runs, pole vault, high jump, trip jump, long jump, 100m, 200m, 400m, javelin (possibly), decathlon, all the hurdles, steeplechase etc. In fact just at the gym last night a local collegiate basketball player (female) was doing box jumps on a three foot platform with around 5-6 plates stacked on top (probably around 4 feet total) and they seemed effortless.

Right, that's what trail and I were saying, i.e. that most elite sprinters, jumpers, etc, could do that jump, but that the longer distance runners would have more trouble with it. I was simply suggesting 800 m as the dividing line between sprint and distance.

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"Anyone can be who they want to be IF they have the HUNGER and the DRIVE."