Before we get to the challenge let’s talk about why jumping rope deserves a slot in your training regimen.

Why You Should Jump Rope

Now you may be wondering why jump rope?

You could be doing a million different types of functional exercise, so why throw jump rope in the mix?

One word. Efficiency.

The number one resource we are all trying to get more of – TIME – is directly linked to your workouts. With a 30 minute jump rope HIIT workout you can expect to burn somewhere between 300 – 450 calories or more depending on your weight, throughout the course of a day.

125 – pound person = 300 calories
155 – pound person = 375 calories
185 – pound person = 450 calories

That’s the equivalent amount of calories to a massive double bacon cheeseburger, or 15 Oreos, or 16 donut holes, or… you get where we’re going with this.

Do a jump rope workout and you can do a little binge eating.

Just kidding (mostly.)

Anyhow, it’s true that jump rope is also a sport, but in our case we are treating it more like a tool.

An incredibly efficient fat burning tool.

In addition to being an incredibly efficient tool here are a list of the benefits you can expect to experience when starting to implement jump rope exercises into your fitness program.

Benefits of a Jump Rope Workout

Efficient – Not going to beat a dead horse here, but to reiterate the point made above – the better you get at skipping rope – the more calories you burn in less time.

Portable – You can throw it in your bag whenever you leave the house and grab a workout anytime no matter where you are in the world. That means no more gym membership (unless you want one.)

Total body – Jumping rope activates every part of your body from head to toe. From your shoulders down to your calves you will experience the burn…we promise.

Low risk of injury – Compared to most forms of exercise jumping rope is extremely safe. You are hopping an inch or two off the ground at most if your form is correct, so the risk of injury is relatively low.

Fun – The beauty of the jump rope is that you can always learn new tricks and improve your skillset. There is no plateauing unless you choose to do so. This always keeps your workouts interesting and engaging. It’s like we always say at Jump Rope Dudes – if it’s not fun, it’s not sustainable.

Cool – Let’s face it. Those dudes who can whip a jump rope around like a ninja straight up look cool. The more you practice – the better you get – the cooler you feel.

Easy to get started – All you need to get started is a jump rope and the 4-week challenge we posted for you at the end of this article!

Improved agility – If you are an athlete looking to improve your agility and footwork then jump rope is perfect for you. There is a reason why the best fighters in the world include jump rope exercises in their training regimen.

Improve endurance – Beyond the fat burning effects discussed above, you can expect to experience a significant improvement in your endurance as well. All without leaving the driveway or parking lot outside your home.

How to Pick Your Jump Rope

Durability – The beauty of skipping rope is the freedom that comes along with it. You don’t want to be caged into working out inside, so make sure you pick up an all surface rope that is durable for both indoor and outdoor use.

Specifically we would recommend either a steel or PVC cable rope. For the handles you’re going to want a ball bearing system to extend the life of the rope as well.

Sized correctly – Make sure you are picking up a rope that is sized correctly for you. If you stand on the rope with one foot and bring both handles up towards your body, the bottom of the handle should be just below your armpit. Another good rule of thumb is that the rope should be 3 feet taller than however tall you are.

Picking a rope for your goal – Pick a rope optimized for your goals. If you want to work on your agility make sure you pick up an agility rope (lightweight rope.)

The agility rope will definitely burn a ton of calories as well, so if you are looking for agility plus fat loss that’s a safe option as well.

Alright, so you know why you should be jumping rope, you know all about the benefits and you know how to pick a rope. The next step is picking up a rope and beginning to add jumping to your current regimen.

To get you started in a big way over the next 4 weeks we are giving you some of our most entertaining and effective workouts to try out. You only have 3 of these HIIT jump rope workouts a week, so you can throw these on strictly cardio days or stack them on your normal routine.

Day 1 is linked up below. Get after it!

4 Week Jump Rope Workout Challenge

Week 1 Day 1

Week 1 Day 2

Week 1 Day 3

Week 2 Day 1

Week 2 Day 2

Week 2 Day 3

Week 3 Day 1

Week 3 Day 2

Week 3 Day 3

Week 4 Day 1

Week 4 Day 2

Week 4 Day 3

The post 4 Week Jump Rope Workout Challenge appeared first on Onnit Academy.

Summary

– The tuck jump builds lower-body power and coordination

– It works all the major lower-body muscles and the core.

– Tuck jumps should not be used for conditioning, due to safety concerns. (Don’t do them for high reps as part of a circuit workout.)

– To prepare your body for tuck jumps, work on landing safely.

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When the workout calls for tire flips but you timed your Shroom TECH Sport just right. – The weekends are for having some fun with your workout. What challenge are you taking on this weekend? – 📸 @cpenadown

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There’s a famous photo of Bruce Lee jumping in the air with dumbbells in each hand and his knees tucked to his chest. His body is so neatly folded it almost looks like he’s crouching on the ground. The photo perfectly illustrates The Dragon’s mystique: a man who made incredible displays of power and athleticism seem simple and effortless.

In case you haven’t deduced as much already, Lee was doing a tuck jump in that pic, and the move was one of many he used in a workout regimen that was ahead of its time. If you hope to capture some of his explosiveness, this guide to tuck jumps will help you master an exercise that put spring in the step of one of the greatest martial artists of all time.

What Is The Tuck Jump?

The tuck jump is a vertical jump in which you raise your knees to your chest as you rise into the air. Interestingly, unlike other vertical jumps, the tuck jump is not purely a triple-extension movement. That is, vertical jumps, along with Olympic weightlifting exercises such as the clean, have the hips, knees, and ankles all extending simultaneously to generate explosive movement. While the tuck jump begins like a vertical jump, the knee tuck causes hip-, knee-, and ankle-flexion, which contributes greatly to its effectiveness. Tuck jumps are primarily done by athletes to develop power and coordination.

Like all jumps, tuck jumps are a full-body exercise that work a lot of big muscles, so you often see them used in exercise classes and circuit workouts for the sake of raising the heart rate, but we don’t suggest that you perform them for that purpose. The tuck jump is a high-impact exercise—even more so than most other jumps, due to the height and the tucking of the knees—and performing it with anything less than perfect form is dangerous. So is jumping into tuck jumps too soon (no pun intended), failing to build up to them gradually.

For those reasons, we recommend starting with lower-intensity jump exercises for a while to condition your joints for the impact of tuck jumps, and ultimately using the tuck jump for its original intention—to develop explosive power. (See “Alternatives To The Tuck Jump” below.)

“The majority of people who do tuck jumps aren’t ready for them yet,” says Sam Pogue, CPPS, FRCms, VP of Brand at TrueCoach, and a performance coach to athletes, including World Series champion pitcher Jake Arrieta. But we’ll show you how to prep your body the best way possible to fast-track your hops.

What Muscles Does The Tuck Jump Use?

The tuck jump works all the muscles of the lower body and the core. Here’s a breakdown of how they contribute to the movement.

Glutes and hamstrings. Both muscle groups have an eccentric contraction (that is, they tense while lengthening) as you lower your hips toward the floor during the jump’s countermovement—think: coiling the spring. Then, when you explode upward, the glutes and hamstrings shorten rapidly to drive the hips forward, creating the power that propels the jump.

Quads. Like the glutes and hamstrings, they contract eccentrically on the way down and then concentrically to extend the knees as you jump. When you’re in the air, the rectus femoris quad muscle works again, along with the hip flexor muscles, to pull your knees up toward your chest.

Calves. The calves extend the ankles, assisting the glutes, hamstrings, and quads in getting your feet up off the floor.

Core. The abs and lower back must brace the spine as you lower into the jumping position, as well as when you tuck the knees and land back on the floor.

All of the above muscles also work as shock absorbers, reducing the force that acts on the joints upon landing.

While tuck jumps work many muscles, don’t make the mistake of thinking that they’re a great way to “tone” your legs. Jumps work primarily fast-twitch muscle fibers to provide explosive movement, but the volume you’ll train them for isn’t enough to build serious leg muscle, and no muscle group stays under tension long enough to induce the metabolic stress that’s associated with muscle gains. Jumps are done to translate the strength you build with more traditional lower-body exercises (squats, deadlifts, lunges, etc.) into powerful movements you can make on an athletic field, such as running, jumping, and cutting.

Benefits of the Tuck Jump

Tuck jumps are mainly used to increase bilateral power output. That is, to train your ability to move explosively on two feet. “Jumps are also really good for developing coordination,” says Pogue, “increasing your understanding of where your body is in space.” Because the tuck jump has the added hip and knee flexion at the end, its coordination demands are higher than a typical vertical jump. “It’s akin to the long jump,” says Pogue, the track and field event where you kick your legs out in front of you to get as much distance as possible. If you can tuck jump proficiently, it’s pretty much a given that you’ll be able to run fast, jump high, and turn on a dime when needed during sports play.

Nevertheless, you’ll notice that athletes get tested on their vertical jump height, not their tuck jump performance. “The tuck jump isn’t as applicable to sports as a vertical jump,” says Pogue, “but it’s a good jump to practice if you want to maximize athleticism.”

Pogue, himself a former baseball player, liked to use tuck jumps during games, because of their effect on the central nervous system. Explosive, reactive movements make the mind more alert and focused, so you can use tuck jumps to “wake you up” before you need to do something that’s explosive, fast, or requires maximum attention. “Baseball can be slow sometimes,” says Pogue, “so I used to use tuck jumps to recharge if I’d been standing around for a while.” Doing one or two reps before you step up to bat could make the difference between a strike and a base hit.

As tuck jumps place so much stress on the hips, knees, and ankles, they’re sometimes used in clinical settings to help identify an athlete’s risk of injury, particularly to the knee. A study published in Athletic Therapy Today concluded that tuck jumps may be a useful assessment tool in gauging neuromuscular control, and risk of ACL injury among female athletes.

How To Stretch Before Doing A Tuck Jump

Use the following warmup drills from Onnit Durability Coach Cristian Plascencia (@cristian_thedurableathlete on Instagram) before performing tuck jumps in a workout.

How To Do A Tuck Jump

Step 1. Stand with your feet between hip and shoulder-width apart and soften your knees.

Step 2. Bend your hips and knees to lower your body into a quarter-squat. You’ll end up in the universal athletic stance (picture a lineman in football)—hips and knees bent, chest lined up with your toes, looking forward, and ready to explode. Your torso should be about 45 degrees to the floor with your lower back in its natural arch. Swing your arms back as you bend your hips back so that they run parallel to your spine.

All of the above must happen quickly and in one movement. Think of it as coiling a spring as you dip your hips down and back before you reverse the movement to explode upward.

Step 3. Immediately rise up, extending your hips, knees, and ankles (come up onto your toes) and swinging your arms forward and up to jump as high as you can into the air. As you rise, pull your knees upward with you, tucking them under your chest. Your thighs should end up parallel to the floor. Try to stay tall as you tuck—don’t actively crunch yourself into a ball.

Step 4. Extend your knees on the descent and use your toes to buffer your feet as you land. “Land like a ninja,” says Pogue, bending your hips and knees as needed to absorb the force of the ground, although you should end in the same athletic position that you started the jump.

Take a moment to reset your feet before you begin the next jump, and begin it from a tall standing position again. You can also begin each successive jump immediately, rebounding out of your landing, but we don’t recommend this unless you’re an experienced jumper, and we definitely don’t like it as a means to get cardio. “Doing multiple reps like that can get really sloppy,” says Pogue. As you fatigue, your form will break down, and that’s when people get hurt. “If you want to get your heart rate up,” says Pogue, “there are other ways to do it without risking a blowout of your ACL.” When you can do 2–3 sets of 1–3 reps with good landings, you can attempt doing the tuck jump with continuous reps (no reset).

Don’t think you have to jump to the moon to demonstrate your explosiveness. If you can jump to where your feet are at the level your hips would be while standing, Pogue says you’re getting some pretty good air. As for loading the jump with dumbbells, a la Bruce Lee, it isn’t necessary, and it increases your risk of a bad landing.

When Should I Do The Tuck Jump?

For maximum power development, do tuck jumps when you’re fresh, at the beginning of a workout (but after you’ve warmed up thoroughly). They’re a great way to kick off lower-body sessions, so try them before squats or deadlifts, or any running/sprinting you do. As stated above, you can also do them during downtime from sports activities, for the sake of keeping your energy up.

Alternatives To The Tuck Jump

As you might have guessed, if you don’t land the tuck jump properly, you’re going to land hard, and that can wreak havoc on your ankles, knees, and hips. Pogue recommends building up to tuck jumps by first mastering the depth jump and box jump, in which you practice proper landings and absorbing the impact.

Depth Jump Prerequisite

Start with the most basic version of the depth jump, which has you rising onto your toes and then dropping your heels. It may not look like much, but it will go a long way toward conditioning your joints for a hard landing, especially if you haven’t jumped since you were a kid.

Step 1. Stand with feet hip to shoulder-width apart and raise your arms overhead.

Step 2. Raise your heels up, balancing on the balls of your feet.

Step 3. Now, in one motion, drop your heels and drive your arms down behind you, landing in a quarter-squat/athletic position. Stick the landing so that your ankles and knees have a moment to fully absorb the force.

Perform 3 sets of 3 reps, 1–2 times per week. Pay attention to how you land (it may help to have a friend watch you, or set your phone up to film your sets). You should be able to land without your knees caving inward, feet rotating out, or losing your spine position. Do not move on to any other jumping exercises until these problems are corrected.

Depth Jump

When you feel you’re doing the prerequisite exercise smoothly, and you’re sure it’s not aggravating your knees or ankles, move on to the classic depth jump and box jump below. (Note that it may take a few weeks to feel comfortable with the depth jump prerequisite; don’t rush it.)

Step 1. Place a box or step that’s about 12 inches high on the floor. Stand on the box with feet between hip and shoulder width.

Step 2. Step off the box with one foot and let yourself drop to the floor, landing with both feet in the quarter-squat/athletic position with arms driving behind you and parallel to the spine. Stick the landing, and step back up on the box to repeat for reps.

Perform 3 sets of 3 reps, 1–2 times per week. Again, be aware of any changes in your shin position (they must be vertical upon landing) and be sure that you’re landing with feet forward and flat on the ground. When you feel comfortable doing the depth jump from a 12-inch box, increase the box height to 24 inches. When you can perform depth jumps safely from a 24-inch box, you should be ready to do tuck jumps.

Box Jump

While you work on the depth jump, practice the box jump too (in the same session or in another workout that week). The box jump develops power similar to the tuck jump, but is safer and less demanding.

Step 1. From a standing position, bend one knee and raise it in front of you until your thigh is parallel to the floor. Notice where your foot is—the height of the box you use should be below that level. Place an appropriate-sized box on the floor and stand a foot or so behind it.

Step 2. Bend your hips and knees as described in all the jump variations above, lowering into the athletic position, and then jump up onto the box, controlling your landing.

Perform 3 sets of 3–5 reps. Gradually increase the height of the box over time.

In addition to lower-level jumping movements like those above, lower-body strength lifts such as squats and Romanian deadlifts will help enormously to prepare your body for tuck jumps. Pogue recommends doing the single-leg version of these exercises too, as most landings won’t happen on perfectly even feet.

The post Tuck Jumps: How To Do Them & Why Your Workout Needs Them appeared first on Onnit Academy.

The only thing is, you suck at it. Maybe you can only do some basic jumps or a double under or two, but you want to be able to do the jump rope tricks you’ve seen in the movies. We’re talking Rocky IV montage-type stuff. And there’s no reason you can’t with a little practice.

My business partner Dan and I started as fat guys. We lost 130 pounds collectively by putting the jump rope at the center of our training, and now we both maintain 6–8% body fat year round.

We run jumpropedudes.com which is designed to help people like you get in amazing shape with rope jumping.

So without further ado, welcome to the Jump Rope Dude Dojo!

First off, if you’ve never picked up a jump rope before, or it’s been years since you’ve done it consistently, check out our tutorial on How To Jump Rope HERE.

Once you’ve got the basics down, we can talk tricks.

There are 4 cool tricks we’ll teach you below, and each one is a combination of two or three basic moves stacked together.

It’s difficult to explain in writing how to execute each jump rope movement, so we created a video tutorial you can watch. However, written directions do appear below to help you further.

(Notice that the vid shows these tricks in a slightly different order than listed here. We reordered them after we shot them, from easiest to hardest, and we suggest taking them on that way.)

Jump Rope Tricks Tutorial

Trick 1: Double Under + Run In Place

Trick 2: Double Under + Side Swipe

Trick 3: Double Under + Criss Cross

Trick 4: Side Swipe + Criss Cross + Run In Place

Double Under

Jump a bit higher than usual, about 4 inches above the floor, so you can get two revolutions before your feet touch down. Don’t try to swing the rope twice—just swing hard once when you jump and let the momentum carry it around for the second spin.

Run In Place

Alternate high knees as you swing the rope. You should look as though you’re running in place. Keep your torso upright and make sure you land on the balls of your feet.

Side Swipe

Swing the rope to your left side, bringing your hands close together to point 90 degrees out from your left hip. At the same time, pick your left foot up off the floor and shift your weight onto the right foot. Let the momentum spin the rope for one full revolution.

Now swing the rope across your body, bringing your left hand over your right until you’re pointing your arms out 90 degrees from your right hip and raising the right foot. Continue swinging the rope side to side in a figure-eight pattern as you lightly bounce off one foot at a time.

Criss Cross

Jump and cross both hands in front of your body so your right hand points left and your left points right. Imagine putting guns into your holsters on each hip. Land, jump again, and unfold your arms to return to your sides (draw the guns out). The motion is a figure-eight. Be careful not to pull your arms apart too quickly or you’ll snare yourself in the rope.

BONUS TIP: If my blinding speed and cat-like reflexes make it too difficult for you to see what I’m doing, slow the videos down to 0.25 speed.

After you’ve watched the video, and you’re all kinds of jacked up on jump rope, make sure to go check out ONNIT’s new speed rope. It’s what we use for doing ticks and what we recommend for anyone getting started with jumping rope.

The post 4 Jump Rope Tricks You’ve Seen In Movies appeared first on Onnit Academy.

Formerly skinny guys like me tend to fear that too much conditioning will inevitably cause their powerful body to wither from that of a high-performance beast to an emaciated marathoner. As a result, they skip conditioning entirely – leading to higher body fat, compromised health markers, and a greater propensity for injury.

As bad as that sounds, most of these trainees would sooner die than walk around smaller, weaker, and less masculine.

I understand the mindset. I was a scrawny runt terrified of losing muscle and power. While these fears aren’t completely unfounded, the horrors of conditioning eroding muscle tissue are overblown.

Luckily, there are certain types of cardio that do the opposite: they build athleticism while shredding fat and preserving your precious muscle.

Conditioning workouts with “hardcore” equipment like sleds and battle ropes are currently enjoying the spotlight, but there’s one old school tool doesn’t get the attention it rightly deserves: the jump rope.

While you might not immediately assume the jump rope could be as sexy or badass as sprints or sled work, the fact is, it’s been an indispensable tool for everyone from prize-fighters to football players to fitness models.

These days, however, the jump rope seems to have fallen a bit out of favor, and has become an extremely under-utilized training implement. That ends here. It’s time to re-think the jump rope because it truly is the ultimate low impact training tool for accelerated fat loss, increased athleticism, and unreal conditioning.

Jump Rope Benefits

The reasons to pull out the old speed rope and start skipping Rocky-style are legion. Here are few of the main ones.

Jumping Rope is an Ideal Warm-Up

Firstly, let’s just establish that warming up is far more important than most believe. In addition to having all sorts of hormonal benefits, the fact is raising core temperate and increasing blood flow is great for both mind and muscle. It helps create the right mental and physiological conditions for a great workout.

There really is no better warm-up tool before intense training than a simple jump rope. Skipping rope before Plyometrics, sprints, and explosive lifts fires up the nervous system, increases core/muscular temperature, and conditions the tissues of the lower body for explosive activity.

Explosiveness isn’t in your bag of tricks? No worries. For most gym rats, skippin’ rope will improve coordination and athleticism in five minutes before your workout.

The Jump Rope Poses Minimal Risk for Injury

Jumping rope is a low-risk tool for two reasons. Firstly, jumping rope is a self-limiting exercise: to jump rope without failing, you must stay in an aligned, joint stacked position while moving – forcing your trunk to stay engaged and resilient under the load of movement.

If you miss, mess up, welt your calves or triceps, or catch a toe, the exercise ends. All of this makes it extremely unlikely to over-do it; and, even better, nearly impossible to incur injury.

Compare this to something like sprinting. Naturally, I’m a huge fan of sprints, agility drills, and movement skills, but they’re just that — learned movement skills.

Performing any coordinative skill under excess fatigue runs the risk of engraining a poor movement pattern and subsequent injury. (In other words, sprinting while exhausted is a great way to snap yo’ shit up.)

Sprints are a great exercise, of course, and not inherently “bad” or dangerous. There’s a skill component that requires mechanics and practice before piling on tons of volume – which can be a slow process, especially if you want to get lean in a hurry. With regard to its accessibility, the jump rope is just a superior choice to condition the body for higher impact movement training without a high risk of injury.

Secondly, jumping rope is a low-impact movement, despite a high number of foot strikes. Here’s why this is important for us formerly skinny guys: unlike many other repetitive impact exercises, the lower impact does not create a hyper-catabolic environment — so you can use it get shredded without worrying about dropping lean body mass.

Jumping Rope Builds an Important Movement Foundation

Jumping rope develops speed, agility, and a coordination foundation for sports. Sprinting and high velocity movements are great — they build great levels of conditioning, improve athleticism, preserve muscle, and shred fat.

Problem is, most guys haven’t sprinted in ages and those who have sprinted leave much to be desired with efficiency and technique. Keep in mind: high-speed movements like sprints (or anything that requires directional change) create massive stress on the joints, ligaments, and tendons.

You wouldn’t jump directly into near-maximal lifting would you? No; it would be irresponsible to jump into high impact sprints and/or change of direction work without first practicing and conditioning those tissues for impact.

All of which is to say that the jump rope is exceptionally effective in terms of both developing proper patterning and acute movement prep. Rather than being the guy who pops his hammy playing flag football, use the jump rope as a warm-up and conditioning tool to prepare the body for rapid movement.

The Jump Rope is Well-Suited to Power Development

When combined with weight training, jumping rope is a viable method to developing explosive and reactive power. Additionally, jumping rope requires minimal equipment or space and has a non-existent learning curve, making it a simple tool for power development.

Jumping Rope Leads to Increased Athleticism

Building on the above two points, jumping rope is an excellent way to develop the individual qualities that make up coordinative athletic movement — what we typically call, “athleticism.”

Hitting the weights hard and eating well is important, but true athleticism requires coordination, not just brute strength. Everyone loves being big, strong, and fast, but they’re useless without technique and the ability to consistently express those physical qualities on demand.

Jumping rope not only allows you to develop these qualities individually, but also trains your body to seamlessly integrate them in concert with one another. How does this help you? Simple: spending a few minutes a week with a jump rope will help you avoid being the dude who gets juked by some goon during a pick-up game.

The Jump Rope is Amazing for Interval/Conditioning Work

Despite being low-impact, jumping rope is a great conditioning tool. Rapid arm movement, maintaining a rigid core, and quick feet all combine to send your heart rate sky-high.

Better yet, it’s a great way to condition frequently without undue stress on your joints, hormones, and nervous system.

On Selecting a Rope

“Okay dude, I get it, the jump rope is pretty bad ass. Now what?”

Here’s where you can run into a major snag in most gyms — there are no decent jump ropes. Those plastic pieces of crap tied in knots and thrown in the corner are worthless. Instead, you need a quality rope. So you should probably just buy your own.

Like anything else, you get what you pay for. If you get a high quality rope and take care of it, it’ll last for a long while. If you buy a piece of crap for 10 bucks, you’ll be replacing it constantly.

Beyond quality, the most important attribute of any given rope is its length. A rope that’s too short won’t allow you proper clearance; one that’s too long will have too much slack and you won’t be able to bring it around quickly enough. In either case, your training will be compromised, and you’ll be frustrated as hell.

The rule of thumb for length is that the jump rope should measure from the bottom of the foot, just past the armpit when bent in half.

That isn’t your only option, of course: a solid leather rope with a bit of weight to it will be more than adequate for your needs, and for all of the workouts you’ll find in this article. You just won’t have the same level of adjustability.

Either way, grab yourself a quality rope, and toss it in the ol’ gym bag, so you’ve always got it hand.

Sample Jump Rope Uses

For Warming-Up

Take 5 minutes or set a number of jumps (200) as your goal before moving onto the rest of your dynamic warm-up. Jumping rope primes the nervous system, increases core and muscular temperature, and conditions the tissues of the lower body for explosive activity.

It shouldn’t be exhausting, but enough to get your heart racing, calves bumpin’, and mind ready for the workout ahead.

Simple skips are best:

Using the Jump Rope for Calf Training

If your legs are dwarfed by those of a Flamingo, you’re not alone. And jumping rope will help. High volume, high frequency, and high loading are three obvious ways to speed up muscular development of any muscle group.

As mentioned previously, calves are conditioned to a lot of volume from everyday tasks like walking; so regular hops over the rope aren’t the best use of your time. Instead, incorporate the jump rope as a warm-up tool and then add in single leg countdown skips for greater muscular tension and growth.

Wanna super charge it? Combine this with a dedicated calf specialization program and you’ll start carving an impressive pair of calves, stat.

Single Leg Countdown Skips

Start with 10 hops on your right leg, perform them all in a row and move directly to 10 hops on your left. If you miss, just pick up where you left off and continue all the way to 1. Start with two sets and add one set each week for the next six weeks.

Jump Rope Conditioning

The jump rope allows you to get creative as a conditioning tool. Because it’s low impact with low stress on the joints, it’s a fantastic addition to density training circuits as a back-end exercise.

The neural demands are light enough that it won’t overly fatigue the nervous system and hinder training results with big-bang exercises like deadlifts.

As a stand alone conditioning implement, Double Unders and the Runnin’ Man are my two go-to conditioning drills with each being performed twice per week with at least 48 hours between workouts.

Here’s how they break down:

Double Unders

Just like it sounds – whip the jump rope two times in a row with one singular jump. Work up to sets of 10 and use a lighter rope. Rest 30-60 seconds and continue for 10-15 minutes or until your lungs and calves explode, your choice.

Runnin’ Man

Just as it sounds, run in place while skipping the rope. Not only will this improve your coordination, it’s a deceptively tough conditioning workout. Go for time and work up to 10-15 minutes of continuous “running.”

The impact is far less than your traditional steady state cardio or plodding along on the treadmill.

Jumping Rope for Active Recovery

Take 10 minutes; throw on some jams, and go to work with any of the above workouts. Even working at higher intensities won’t be enough to hinder your recovery unless you’re very deconditioned.

Stick with single skips, get in a light sweat, and finish off with some mobility work. Don’t make it complicated, just get it done.

The following is a Complete Jump Rope Workout Program written by Dan Witmer, the Jump Rope Dude, from Jump Rope Dudes. 

Jump Rope Workout Program

I put together a 4-week jump rope and bodyweight challenge to get you on track to making exercise more fun and your body leaner. Each week the workouts get progressively more difficult, so make sure to start with the beginner workouts in Week 1 and move up to advanced – only if you are capable.

The workouts are progressive in nature, so whether you are a beginner or advanced, you are going to want to start on week 1. The workouts are set up in such a way that, in most cases, you’ll alternate a jump rope exercise with a bodyweight exercise.

The program asks you to perform 3 days a week of training with the jump rope and your bodyweight. This leaves you 4 days to play with as far as programming goes.

If you are a beginner, I would suggest a light recovery or rest day until your work capacity increases. If you are advanced, you could use these 3 days as your recovery/work capacity days in between your hard training/weight lifting days.

After the fourth week, take an off-week to allow the body to recover, then repeat the program again.

Week 1: Day 1

Week 1: Day 2

Week 1: Day 3

Week 2: Day 1

Week 2: Day 2

Week 2: Day 3

Week 3: Day 1

Week 3: Day 2

Week 3: Day 3

Week 4: Day 1

Week 4: Day 2

Week 4: Day 3

Advance Your Training with Onnit Academy On Demand

When your 4 weeks of the Jump Rope Juggernaut Plan are over, you need to sign up for Onnit Academy On Demand! If you enjoy the knowledge, experience, and programming of The Onnit Academy…it is now available On Demand.

With Onnit Academy On Demand, you can access the world’s greatest fitness professionals anytime, anywhere, for one low monthly price. Whether you’re a professional trainer, a fitness enthusiast, or just looking for a new routine, we’ve got you covered.

The program contains 2 different video channel packs, The Master Coaches Channel Pack, and The Legends of HQ Channel Pack.

Each of these packs gives you access to 6 top fitness professionals offering their own unique 4 week training programs targeted towards specific goals and techniques. Every 4 weeks, these trainers will introduce a new 4 week program expanding your library and allowing you even more fitness programming options.

The post Become a Jump Rope Juggernaut with this Complete 4 Week Workout Plan appeared first on Onnit Academy.

The camps divide roughly into those coming from a Crossfit background that emphasizes strength, an endurance (running/skiing/triathlete) background that emphasizes speed and aerobic capacity and the American Ninja Warrior types that focus mainly on obstacle proficiency. With such a diversified field of athletes, it is no mystery why so many people are venturing across fitness paradigms to discover how truly multi-dimensional their strength is.

As a personal trainer, I have grazed on the many paradigms offered for OCR and tried my best to find the middle ground in my own training. It’s not easy, that’s for sure. Figuring out how to be strong, fast and still manage to complete the variety of obstacles they throw at us is a puzzle the majority of us are still trying to crack (Maybe all of us, considering there is no longer a reigning champ year in and year out at any championship obstacle race). But, one thing is for certain. There are fundamentals that transcend the specifics of almost all sports – strength, flexibility, speed, aerobic capacity and agility.

It is agility, the last of these aspects of athleticism, which is neglected by most OCR training regimens.

Despite this neglect, agility, or what colloquially we refer to as “fast feet”, is crucial in OCR because it will help you navigate tough terrain, especially when running downhill or down stairs, more efficiently.

At Squaw Valley, during the Spartan World Championships, a lot of the downhill running was done over scraggy rocks that provided countless opportunities to misstep, potentially injure one’s self, and ultimately lose a lot of time.

Due to the fact that downhill running naturally aids recovery and is generally easier for everyone, skills that will improve your efficiency are often overlooked. Yet this lack of development shows. I cannot tell you how often I see people at a stadium trudging down stairs they should be running because they can’t pick up their feet. Don’t let this be you.

By incorporating 5-10 minutes of jump roping everyday, you can significantly improve the quickness of your feet and your ability to explode off your toes. You will simultaneously strengthen the neuro-muscular connections between your brain and your feet, giving you greater precision and conscious control over them.

Jump Rope Workout

Try a simple 1 minute on, 30 second rest for 15 minutes (for ten full minutes of jump roping). My wrestling coach in high school had me do this to teach me how to maneuver around the ring and develop rhythm in my movements. If this gets boring or too easy, do it on one leg, or alternate between legs.

Any basic exercise can be made progressively more difficult. Jumping rope is no exception. Agility ladders may also help, though they are not as well suited to continuous dynamic movement as a jump rope and should be used in addition to rather than as a substitute for a rope. Those partial to quantification have access to several new “smart ropes” that can help you plot your progress and give you benchmarks for improvement.

Ultimately, you will only be able to move as fast as your legs and feet can carry you – whether it’s down 6 flights of stairs at Citi Field or a riverbed on the side of a mountain in Tahoe.

This means not just running, squatting, and doing burpees to prepare your legs, but also training the agility and responsiveness of your feet for the demands of a race. Pick up your jump rope and don’t let yourself be caught flatfooted. You may even develop a little rhythm for your victory dance…

The post Why You Should Bring Back Your Jump Rope Workout appeared first on Onnit Academy.

Other Exercise Info

Tip Writer: Mark de Grasse
Demonstrator: Eric Leija

The post Mach 10 Workout: Battle Jump Rope Workout appeared first on Onnit Academy.

The motion of the Diagonal Pull is amped up with a 180 degree jump switch between every repetition in this very dynamic progression.

The post Diagonal Pull Jump Switch Battle Ropes Exercise appeared first on Onnit Academy.

The Jumping Jack Slams with the ropes are a great variation from other rope exercises. This involves a much greater explosion since you are leaving the ground on every jump. This extra generation of power translates into more calories expended. Start by holding the ropes at your sides. Perform jumping jacks as you would normally, but you never let go of the ropes. This exercise is great for building strength and endurance in your upper body.

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