13.3 Plyometric Technique
Key Takeaways
Domain 3.B.5 plyometric items turn on the stretch-shortening cycle: a fast eccentric stretch, a short amortization phase, and an explosive concentric.
Coach landings first: quiet feet, hips back, knees tracking over midfoot — not valgus, not heel-slapping, not a stiff locked knee.
Progress from jumps in place to standing jumps, multiple hops, box jumps (jump up, step down), bounds, and only later depth jumps.
Volume is counted as foot contacts; common teaching ranges are about 80–100 contacts for beginners, 100–120 intermediate, and 120–140 advanced per session — label these as common programming, not unpublished NSCA-CPT policy.
Contraindications include poor landing mechanics, acute injury, and many special-population situations (for example osteoporosis, pregnancy, or a client who cannot absorb force).
13.3 Plyometric Technique
Quick Answer: Domain 3.B.5 plyometric videos are stretch-shortening cycle tests. The client stretches the muscle-tendon unit (eccentric), passes through a short amortization phase, and explodes (concentric). Land quietly, knees track over the midfoot, and progress from jumps-in-place toward bounds and depth jumps. Count volume as foot contacts. Common teaching ranges are about 80–100 / 100–120 / 120–140 contacts per session for beginner / intermediate / advanced — common programming, not unpublished NSCA-CPT policy. Poor landings, acute injury, and some special populations are stop signs.
Plyometrics are not “jumps for calorie burn.” They are a high-rate force method. Program Execution items will show you a landing and ask whether the next progression is earned.
Stretch-Shortening Cycle and Amortization
Three phases:
- Eccentric (stretch / loading): The muscle-tendon unit lengthens under load — the drop into a jump, the give on landing, the reach-back of a medicine-ball throw.
- Amortization (coupling): The brief isometric transition between lengthening and shortening. Shorter is better if the landing is still safe. A long pause dumps the stored elastic energy as heat and turns the drill into a separate squat-then-jump (still useful for teaching, but not a true plyometric rebound).
- Concentric (shortening / propulsion): The explosive jump, bound, or throw.
Teaching order matters. Most general-fitness clients must first stick a quiet landing (force absorption) before you ask for a short amortization. If you cue “off the ground as fast as possible” to a client who valgus-collapses, you are speeding a fault.
Video pass: Client drops from a 6-inch box, lands softly with knees over midfoot, then rebounds only when that landing is already boringly good. Video fail: Client jumps off a high box, lands loud with knees caving, pauses two seconds, then hops — and the trainer calls it an advanced depth jump.
Landing Technique — The Gate for Every Progression
Body position: Athletic stance. Hips back and down, trunk fairly tall (not a rounded dive), eyes forward, feet about hip- to shoulder-width for bilateral landings. Arms can reach forward or in a ready position to counterbalance.
ROM: Enough hip and knee flexion to absorb force — usually a partial squat, not a rock-bottom collapse and not a locked-knee stilt landing. Ankles dorsiflex; land midfoot to forefoot and let the heel kiss, not slap.
Speed and control: The landing should look quiet. Noise is a proxy for poorly absorbed impact. Early teaching slows the landing. Rebound speed comes later.
Knees track: Knees travel in line with the second toe / midfoot. Valgus (knees collapsing inward) is a stop-the-drill cue, especially on single-leg landings. Do not let the knee shoot far past the toes because the heel slammed and the shin dumped; that is a different fault (lack of hip use).
Muscular involvement: Quadriceps and glutes eccentrically, calves as springs, trunk as a stiff cylinder. The lumbar spine should not be the primary shock absorber.
Breathing: Do not lock a maximal valsalva through a long set of hops. A brief brace at impact is normal; the face should not be purple.
Cueing: “Land quietly. Sit the hips back. Knees over midfoot. Soft but athletic.” If you need a second landing cue, you are not ready for height.
Progression: Jumps in Place → Bounds / Depth Jumps
Intensity rises with height, horizontal speed, single-leg support, and how much gravity you add on the way down. A common teaching ladder (from NSCA-style classification used in strength and conditioning texts):
| Stage | Examples | Intensity (common teaching) | Coaching note |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0. Landing school | Drop landings from a 2–12 in step, stick and hold | Low | Not even a plyometric rebound yet; this is the gate |
| 1. Jumps in place | Squat jump, tuck jump (if they can land it), ankle pogo | Low | Two feet, little horizontal travel |
| 2. Standing jumps | Broad jump, vertical jump with a reset | Low–moderate | One explosive effort, then reset |
| 3. Multiple hops / jumps | Repeated broad jumps, hurdle hops | Moderate | SSC demand rises; quality over the last rep |
| 4. Box drills | Jump onto a box, step down | Moderate | Height is concentric; stepping down avoids extra eccentric load |
| 5. Bounds | Alternating single-leg bounds for distance | High | Horizontal speed + single-leg landing |
| 6. Depth jumps | Step off a box, land, immediately jump | High | Do not jump off the box; heavier clients need lower boxes |
Box jump safety: Jump up, land with the whole foot on the box, stand tall, step down. Jumping down from a high box as a default is extra eccentric load the client may not have earned. Depth jumps are a different drill with a different purpose.
Depth jump details: The client steps off, does not hop off. Box height in S&C teaching is often in a broad range (about 12–42 inches in older tables), with lower heights for heavier athletes and anyone whose landing is still noisy. A common caution in that literature is that athletes over about 220 lb should not use high depth-jump boxes (often cited around 18 inches as a ceiling). Treat those numbers as common programming heuristics, not as a secret NSCA-CPT exam cutoff the outline never published.
Strength heuristic (also common S&C teaching, not a published CPT statute): High-intensity lower-body plyometrics are often delayed until the client can squat roughly 1.5 × body weight with competent mechanics. Many personal-training clients never need depth jumps. A quiet squat jump is already a lot of “power” for a general-fitness goal.
Worked progression: Luis, 185 lb, recreational, landing from a 6-inch step is loud and valgus. Today’s program is drop landings and squat holds — not tuck jumps, not depth jumps. When he can stick three quiet landings in a row with knees tracking, add jumps in place. Bounds wait until single-leg landings from a small hop are clean.
Volume as Foot Contacts — Common Teaching Ranges
Plyometric volume is usually counted as foot contacts: each time a foot strikes the surface.
- A bilateral squat-jump landing is commonly counted as 2 contacts (both feet).
- A single-leg hop landing is 1 contact.
- Upper-body plyometrics may count catches or hand contacts analogously.
Common programming ranges per session (widely taught from NSCA-associated plyometric tables; not unpublished NSCA-CPT policy and not a magic exam statute):
| Experience | Typical foot-contact range per session |
|---|---|
| Beginner (little or no plyometric experience) | About 80–100 |
| Intermediate | About 100–120 |
| Advanced | About 120–140 |
Low-intensity landing school for a true novice may sit below 80 contacts. High-intensity depth jumps should not be piled up just because the client has “contact budget” left. Quality is the governor. Rest between quality efforts is long — S&C teaching often uses about a 1:5 to 1:10 work-to-rest ratio so the next rebound still looks like the first. High-intensity lower-body plyometrics are often limited to about 1–3 sessions per week with 48–72 hours before repeating the same high-impact work.
Worked count: 4 sets × 5 bilateral squat jumps = 20 landings × 2 feet = 40 foot contacts. Add 2 sets × 4 single-leg hops each side = 16 contacts. Session total = 56 contacts — still a beginner-sized day if landings are crisp. If landings degrade at set 3, you stop, even if the spreadsheet wanted 90.
NSCA-linked power texts also remind coaches that more is not better: a few well-mastered drills beat a long menu of sloppy jumps. Two or three plyometric exercises in a session is plenty for most clients.
Contraindications and Special-Population Caution
Do not layer high-impact plyometrics on:
- Poor landing mechanics (loud landings, valgus, heel slap, trunk collapse) — this is the everyday CPT stop sign.
- Acute injury (sprain, strain, post-surgical restriction, bone stress symptoms, painful tendinopathy that worsens with impact).
- Some special populations, as a history-based decision:
- Osteoporosis / osteopenia: high-impact depth jumps and aggressive bounds are a poor match; some clients may use very low-amplitude, clinician-cleared impact later — default to caution.
- Pregnancy: jumping and bounding are generally avoided; use other power options if a clinician and the client agree (for example a light medicine-ball chest pass from a supported stance).
- Obesity with joint pain, uncontrolled hypertension, or recent cardiac events: impact and breath-holding are extra load — choose other methods.
- Youth: can learn landing and low-amplitude jumps, but they are not automatic depth-jump candidates; coordination and landing quality first.
- Older adults: may use very small hops or step-down landings for power and fall resilience if balance and joints allow; many should not bound.
- Neurologic conditions with poor reactive balance: skip reactive bounds.
Surface and shoes belong in the next section too, but they start here: grass, rubber, a sprung wood floor, not wet concrete. Worn shoes that collapse medially make valgus more likely.
Video-Item Checklist for Plyometrics
- Position — Athletic, hips back, trunk not diving.
- ROM — Enough flexion to absorb; not a locked knee.
- Speed/control — Quiet landing before a short amortization.
- Cueing — Would you stop for valgus or noise?
- Muscles — Hips and thighs absorbing, not lumbar spine.
- Breathing — Brief brace, not a strained purple face for 20 seconds.
- Safety — Height earned? Surface? Special-pop match? Stepping down from box jumps?
Traps
- Starting with depth jumps because they look advanced.
- Jumping off the box and calling it a box jump.
- Counting “sets” but never counting contacts — or chasing 140 contacts with broken landings.
- Cueing “faster off the ground” before the client can land quietly.
- Treating 80–100 / 100–120 / 120–140 as a secret NSCA-CPT law rather than common teaching ranges.
- Programming aggressive plyometrics for acute injury or a special-population client who cannot absorb force.
A client performs repeated squat jumps but pauses two full seconds in a deep squat between each takeoff, and the trainer wants “more plyometric quality.” What should you coach about the stretch-shortening cycle?
The long pause is ideal because amortization should last as long as possible to store more heat
Static stretching the calves for 45 seconds immediately before the next jump is the best way to shorten amortization
Skip landing mechanics and move to depth jumps so amortization becomes automatically short
A two-second pause means the client is not yet using a short amortization; keep teaching quiet landings, then cue a quicker coupling only if the knees still track and the landing stays quiet
Which statement about plyometric volume is the best NSCA-CPT teaching line?
Volume is always 200 sit-ups, because core work is plyometric
Volume is typically counted as foot contacts; common teaching ranges are about 80–100 contacts for beginners, 100–120 intermediate, and 120–140 advanced per session, and those figures are common programming — not unpublished NSCA-CPT policy — with quality stopping the set before the spreadsheet does
Beginners should start at 140 contacts of depth jumps because the advanced range builds a base
Foot contacts only count on the left foot so you can double the session without fatigue
A new client lands from a 12-inch box with loud heel slaps and knees collapsing inward. They also report a recent ankle sprain that still hurts. What is the correct plyometric decision?
Withhold high-intensity plyometrics: poor landing mechanics and acute injury are contraindications, so regress to landing-school or non-impact power and do not progress to bounds or depth jumps
Cue “get off the ground faster” and add alternating bounds to distract from the ankle
Start depth jumps from 30 inches because height teaches the knees to track
Have a pregnant client in the same hour copy the same 12-inch drop jumps so both get “power”
Sections you finish are checked off in the contents.