When it comes to jumping high, or producing explosive, reactive movement on the court or field, it often seems like some athletes “have it”, while others are severely lacking. Despite getting stronger, some athletes will still remain in “turtle mode” for reactive demands, while their peers train, get stronger, and are able to improve on the springy base they already have.
What is this “springy base”?
The answer is: the foot.
As I learn more and more about the “ageless wonders” in jumping and dunking, they tend to have one thing in common that supports their anti-gravity pursuits as legendary Kadour Ziani shows at age 40… explosive strength and function of the foot.
The foot is an incredibly complex, and effective piece of human machinery that rapidly absorbs and releases many times our body weight through its bony and connective tissue with each step and jump. It is what makes explosive movement possible.
The foot is also often overlooked in training by the vast majority. I don’t know if this is because we tend to count the “hits” and overlook the “misses” in traditional strength and speed programs, or because the foot is more complex than our “9-second attention span society” has time to think about, yet considering it in training is really important.
Although not an exhaustive list, here are 10 quick “hits” of information that pertain to improving that aspect of athleticism we often need to be reminded of, which is getting better feet, spring and related power.
- Don’t do all lunges through the heel with a passive foot
- Find other cues than “through the heel” i.e. “casted” foot
- Utilize movements that reflect portions of stance in the weightroom
- Do more barefoot work
- Do more jump rope work
- Do higher repetition elastic training
- Focus on having a good variability in running and jumping
- Do intrinsic foot strengthening
- Do tripod and rocker based work
- Train your feet through different environments, and avoid over cushioning shoes with excessive heel drops (track spikes and “negative drop”)
Alright, here we go!
1. Don’t do all lunges through the heel
If you are a biomechanist, sprint coach, gait enthusiast, or have listened to a few of the podcasts I’ve done with Jeff Moyer then you know about the evils of heel striking. Having a heel strike gait is many times indicative of a weak ankle (although there can be several factors). When we program lunges in a program, why let athletes get away with the same crap they are doing in poor running mechanics.
Use your lunges to help train the ankle strength and foot cues you are trying to get through. This can come down to even static work, as isometric lunge holds in the Jay Schroeder camp are done with the front heel just off of the ground (although there are other strike patterns you’ll want to look for in moving lunges).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g77_KUzqUTo
Dr. Tommy John demonstrates an isometric/superslow lunge with proper front foot placement.
This doesn’t mean 100% of the time you can’t do this, since lunges train deceleration, and athletes often decelerate with different foot mechanisms than acceleration, but it’s an important consideration.
2. Find other cues than “through the heel” or a “casted” foot
I’ve talked about this one many times before, but having athletes blindly do all lifts “through the heel” to engage the posterior chain is a band-aid cue that cuts off the ankle from the rest of the body. It can be helpful on the novice level for performing the lifts (from the ankle up) correctly, but remember that keeping the feet flat in lifting came out of the need to lift maximal weights in competition, where the “old school” strong men engaged in squats with the heels completely off the ground.
It’s fine to keep the feet flat on the ground, as is often needed for any heavy or substantial lift, but don’t forget that how you cue tension and pressure in the foot is a huge aspect of what you get out of the lift. Firing patterns in the foot reflect themselves upstream in recruitment patterns and timing.
3. Utilize movements that reflect portions of stance in the weight room
Gait and stance is rarely considered in a weightroom setting. On one end, the human body and its ability to produce sprint movement is incredibly complex, and on a simple level, just doing squats, deadlifts and related explosive movements with proper foot coaching, and in the appropriate dosage and progression in the weight room and then leaving speed to the track is perfectly fine for many athletes.
On a deeper level though, various setups and perturbations can be used to engage early and midstance foot firing patterns.
4. Do more barefoot work
This one is self-explanatory. Do more barefoot work, and you’ll get stronger and more functional feet. Shoes are great for movements that are explosive and reactive enough that you’ll likely bruise your heel otherwise (e.g. sprinting and change of direction work; you don’t heel strike in sprinting, but the heel often does contact and the foot experiences extreme vertical forces in general), but many times we don’t look to let our feet do the job they are supposed to.
Whenever the environment and injury risk allows, barefoot work is best. Not only does barefoot work improve intrinsic foot strength automatically, but it also allows for a better sensory link of the feet to the ground, a better tripod, and better upstream firing patterns.
I like doing as much as possible in the weightroom barefoot, as well as any plyometric work done in the grass. I’ll often look to do short approach jumps of all types (track jumps, dunking, etc.) without shoes on. The ability to do this is very indicative of someone whose feet work well.
Socks really slow down the possible approach velocity in this type of jump, where pure barefoot can allow for some more speed. I’ve actually had cases of athletes whose feet were so dysfunctional that having them take their shoes off and do jumps, such as high jumping, reduced their ground contact time and immediately improved their takeoff effficiency.
5. Do more jump rope work
The jump rope is too “simple and dumb” to elicit good results in the minds of many. Sometimes we try so hard to be smart and cutting edge that we forget the amazing training tools that have always been there for us.
Maybe the jump rope doesn’t elicit the highest ground forces, but it allows athletes to get a large amount of “stiff” ground contacts, and also has helpful elements of rhythm. Jumping rope shouldn’t be the meat and potatoes of a training program, but it can have great effects on warming up and cooling down.
Barefoot and single-leg variations and highly under-rated and an effective training tool. Try barefoot, single-leg jump roping for a few minutes before your workout in your next training cycle.
6. Do higher repetition elastic training
Spring-boarding off of the last point, higher repetition elastic work has a huge training effect on the tendons and connective tissues of the body. Try going out and sprinting 3 or 4 intense 200m sprints in track spikes, and tell me how your Achilles tendons and entire calf complex feels the next day.
We see elements of “endurance” plyometric work in many high-level training systems, and I’ve written a bunch of articles on the topic. In the video below, Stefan Holm (owner of some of the stiffest “springs” in the world) demonstrates some longer bounding work, seen in the initial moments of this popular training video.
7. Focus on having a good variability in running and jumping
Speaking of Stefan Holm, it is important for the foot to have some variability in its motor patterning for the prevention of injury. Something that always amazes me about Holm is his forefoot dominance in general movement (such as his run-ups to the bar), but then his plant through the full foot. I recommend training the foot in various modes to this end, such as slant boards, as well as environmental training, and performing many types of jumps.
Holm demonstrates amazing variability through a variety of takeoffs and foot mechanics.
Here is a nice way to develop some intrinsic ankle strength
Although it’s impressive to be able to take off of one leg “off the toe”, as shown below, this style is also very injurious, and can shorten and impede careers.
8. Do intrinsic foot strengthening
There are many ways to strengthen and “activate” the feet. A nice standby that I think has good value is the short-foot. See the video below for a nice description of this movement as a means for run preparation.
9. Do tripod and ankle rocker based work
The gait guys are two really smart dudes who give away a lot of amazing free information on developing the feet, and I’ve learned a lot from them in terms of things like foot tripod, windlass ideals, toe mechanics, and more.
It’s important for the foot to be strong in pushing off, but what about how the ankle moves in loading forces. Athletes who have bad feet often don’t set up well in their jumps, squats and agility patterning through anterior compartment weakness, and a lack of proper foot mechanics.
Although the reductionist idea of using banded joint distraction as a cure-all to “get athletes to squat right”, it doesn’t engage the motor patterning of the foot.
The video below is a great piece by the gait guys in showing some basic ankle rocker exercises with some thoughts on the role of the toes.
Simple exercises like this can be next level in getting through to a larger spectrum of your athletes.
10. Train your feet through different environments, and avoid over cushioning shoes with excessive heel drops (track spikes and “negative drop”)
Last, but not least, to have well-functioning feet, footwear, and environmental concerns are a must. Training barefoot is great, but at some point, you are going to be doing a lot of sprinting and training in shoes. In considering shoes, heel drop and cushioning is a massive factor.
Do you know the heel drop in millimeters in the shoe you have right now? Shoes are generally anywhere from an extreme 20-millimeter drop, down to a zero drop, or even “negative drop”, such as wearing sprint spikes.
Of course, there is the “extreme negative drop” in strength shoes, which is probably upwards of 75 millimeters!
Generally speaking, the more you are seeking speed and power, and the less injury issues you have, the more you should be looking for minimal drops in your training shoe. Distance runners with poor foot action and an injury history obviously need to make more considerations before going to a low-drop shoe.
As far as performance is concerned, however, have a working knowledge of the how and why of your footwear is crucial, as well as the impact of rotating footwear and training floor/ground factors.
Exposing the feet to a variety of environments is also a big deal, so barefoot work, training on the grass, track, even sand is useful. I like the training effects begotten through training in sprint spikes, so I would be aware of how that fits into a yearly training routine.
Conclusion
Although not an exhaustive article, the 10 ideals above should give you some good ideas in developing some strong and efficient feet in tandem with the strength and power you are building in the weightroom.
“Speed Strength is, without doubt, a game changer. There are limiting factors and key differences in every athlete. Whether fiber type, ability to use the stretch-shortening cycle effectively or even anthropometry. Having the knowledge to use these differences to the benefit of the athlete is a skill that Joel highlights brilliantly in this book.”
-Steffan Jones
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