When you break down running, it is a series of single leg explosions. The faster and more explosive you are with each leg, the faster you will run.

Your goal is to have your foot quickly get off the ground, but in that split instance it is touching the ground, you need to generate a lot of force to get you to run faster. The longer your foot spends on the ground when you are sprinting, the slower you will run.

Thus, when you are training for speed, it is imperative that you are training that type of fast twitch movement for the leg.

People ask me all the time what is the one exercise that my athlete needs to do to get faster? I think if you go through my blog, you will see similar posts of “the best exercise” to do for speed. And they are all good! This next exercise though should be incorporated into anybody’s speed program.

That exercise would be rapid fire single leg box jumps.

Stay with me though, you need to know your progression.

First, the athlete should be able to do single leg jump ropes fairly fast and fairly efficient. If they can’t do this, then the leg isn’t strong enough to handle the single leg box jumps.

If you can do single leg jump roping, then your athletic coordination is pretty good. You can stay on the balls of your feet effectively so you are fairly strong. You also have some fast twitch development already being able to have the leg hop over that jump rope fast.

If the jump-roping is there then you can progress to the single leg box jumps. Set up a 6 inch box. This should be plenty high for your athletes.  

Now, have the athlete stand on one leg and rapidly jump up and down on the box as fast as possible for 8 seconds roughly. Switch legs and repeat. Your focus is to do this as fast as possible while not slipping and falling.

If you can do this pretty fast, then you could increase the height an inch, but keep the duration around 8 seconds. Going beyond 8 seconds will start dipping into other energy systems. You should still be getting the same number of jumps at the new height.

This drill will help your acceleration and explosiveness to get to top speed as fast as possible. It will mimic the eccentric explosion you need when you are running for top end speed.

If you only have time to do one drill with minimal equipment, then start with this drill. I guarantee your athlete will start moving faster and sprinting better in no time.

Photo courtesy of Josiah Mackenzie on Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/josiahmackenzie/