My all-time favorite athletes are my three children: Carter, Ella and Memphis. I’ve been thinking of ways to use my passion for basketball strength and conditioning to help them enjoy their athletic careers, and came up with a fun game to help them increase their vertical jump. Beware: Although this is a great way to increase vertical, it’s also a clever way for kids to delay brushing their teeth.
INCREASE VERTICAL JUMP
The picture below is the doorframe to Carter’s room. Each numbered piece of paper is a quarter inch higher than the next. Every time he touches a piece of paper, I take it off the frame and we celebrate. 
I remember the first time I touched the door frame of my room, the ceiling in my house, the foam on the backboard, the rim, and eventually the top of the square. Each benchmark was a big deal because I’ve always dreamt of flying like Michael Jordan. I don’t have any expectations that Carter will be able to dunk from the free throw line, but I know from training thousands of athletes that the best way to increase vertical leap is to jump as high as you can, and do it often. If you want to jump higher, you have to practice jumping high. We have a couple other athletic related bedtime routines that we’ve implemented and it’s been amazing to see how fast kids improve. I love this challenge because it’s based off of the principles of success and progression. We started touching strips that were almost easy for him in order to build up his confidence. He must have told me ten times, “Dad… this is easy!” As I took off the lower numbered pieces of paper, the challenge grew only slightly because the next piece of paper is just a tad higher than the one he just touched. Here is a short video of Carter touching #7 for the first time:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Km4RT5HG4rg
THE RESULTS
In the four weeks we’ve been doing this drill, Carter has gone from touching #5 to touching number #12. This means he’s increased his vertical jump almost two inches!
I’m excited to see him discover how to jump off one foot and learn how to use his arms for power. You can already see in the video how he throws his hands back to put his front core on stretch. These are things I might have to coach him a little on, but for the most part, all I have to do is present him with a challenge and his body will figure out the rest.
If you’d like to see more basketball-specific exercises to increase vertical jump, visit our YOUTUBE channel.
Do you have any fun ideas to help kids become more athletic and increase vertical? Leave a comment below and tell me about it!