Need help with height in jumps | Golden Skate

Need help with height in jumps

Tinymavy15

Sinnerman for the win
Record Breaker
Joined
Dec 28, 2006
I am currently working on my double axel, but am having increasing difficultly getting my doubles ratified in competition because of the lack of height. I am a skater of a more muscular build, but don't quite have the jumps to go along with my body. My axel is ok, and the salchow, but on the loop, toeloop and lutz especially I can't seem to get up high enough. Any tips?

I do off-ice jumping, and i think that is helping, but any other ideas?
 

skatergirl45

On the Ice
Joined
Jan 1, 2008
So, on your loop, make sure you are jumping up first then rotating it. That should help and with all your jumps dont think about going around, think about up and out. I use this technique on my dbl toe and dbl sal and it really helps. Also, don't try to look for the ice after you go up, instead, wait for your body to come to the ice. Lastly, I would say to make sure that you are using your muscles in such a way that helps you because if you aren't using your muscles correctly, they won't help you and it will just be extra weight.

Hope this helps!
 

mskater93

Record Breaker
Joined
Oct 22, 2005
Make sure you are getting the entire muscle explosion on your take offs. Too often you see people jump who's take off knee is still bent meaning they didn't complete the motion of the take off and get the entire lift possible.
 

vlaurend

Final Flight
Joined
Jan 14, 2008
Two thoughts. . .
First, the more height you want, the lower you need to get (i.e., deeper knee bend) before takeoff. Also, the more you need to point your toes of the takeoff foot as you leave the ice. That should give you the full range of motion and give you more height.
Second, you probably need to start doing strengthening exercises for your hamstrings, calves, glutes, quads and core muscles to give you the added strength you need and prevent overuse injury on your takeoff leg. See if you can get a qualified trainer or physical therapist to give you exercises to do.
 

Tinymavy15

Sinnerman for the win
Record Breaker
Joined
Dec 28, 2006
Thanks for the tips guys! I will try them out tomorrow at the rink and let you know how it goes.
 

antmanb

Record Breaker
Joined
Feb 5, 2004
One thing that helped me immensely with height on my jumps was doing a lot of weightlifting exercises designed by a personal trainer.

I was lucky to use a personal trainer who was interested in advancing his own knowledge not on my paying time. I leant him my copy of the Carl Poe book conditioning for skating: off ice techniques for on-ice performance (which i can't recommend enough).

After reading that he incorporated a number of weightlifting exercises (the most important being the clean and jerk) which were designed to help the fast twitch muscles in my leg and created the explosive action required for big jumps. The height difference in my jumps was marked.

Ant
 
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Skate@Delaware

On the Ice
Joined
Nov 4, 2004
The book by Poe is excellent, I would make sure you do your plyo exercises and add in what is called "explosive weight lifting" as well, always under the supervision of a trained expert (not a trainer but an expert with a B.S. degree from a college/university). He/She will make sure you don't overtrain and stay injury free.

You will be AMAZED at the difference!
 
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