Shoes manufactured for sports are primarily designed to protect the foot and ankle. It gives the utmost comfort to your foot and reduces impact when performing jumps or sudden sprints.
People may have thought that basketball shoes can make them jump higher. But in reality, they do nothing to aid that process. The shoes can simply provide a better surface for your feet to generate higher jumping force. Their design or the material used doesn’t contribute anything to create higher vertical jumps.
So, let us understand the purpose of using basketball shoes and why they don’t help us to make higher jumps.
Can Basketball Shoes Make You Jump Higher?
Basketball shoes don’t make you jump higher. No shoe can do that because they aren’t designed to give you a boost during a jump. The feeling of jumping better and higher is given by the cushion in the shoes. But they don’t do anything other than give comfort and support to your feet.
Popular shoe manufacturers never claim such false notions even when advertising their products. But in 2010, APL shoes were banned by NBA since they claimed to increase the jumping height and it was considered unfair. But in reality, the shoes didn’t give any advantage over other players and it definitely didn’t boost their jump to 3.5 inches.
Popular online sports newspaper Diario AS posted an article with a video that explored the inner section of the APL Concept 1 shoe. It was apparent that the company used a set of 8 springs under the sole. It also has a plastic hinge mechanism which is supposed to aid the spring action. But despite all these innovative designs, there wasn’t a considerable improvement in the jump.
The major reason for the failure of their claim was the increase in the weight of the shoes. It is impossible to jump higher with heavy shoes. The ability to generate a large amount of force within a short time requires light feet.
Therefore, a basketball shoe cannot increase your vertical jump. It can aid you to improve your ability to jump but cannot physically give you an advantage.
How to Improve Basketball Jump?
Jumping higher in basketball depends solely on your athletic ability. You need to generate a large amount of force within a short time to launch your body into the air. So, you have to train your muscles to generate such forces and only this can help you to jump higher vertically.
Two important factors must be improved to increase the vertical jumping height. They are Force and Flexibility. We shall now discuss how to improve these two factors to achieve higher jumps.
Increase Force
Force is generated from your muscles. Your muscle fibers must be trained enough to create a good amount of force. To increase the force you can do,
Strength Training
- Train every part of your body that will aid your jumping. The important parts to focus on are Quadriceps, Hamstrings, Hip Flexors, and Core Muscles.
- Strengthen each of them with weight lifting and running exercises.
- Have a complete body workout with specialized weight training for each of these muscles.
- Once your muscles are trained to withstand heavy weights, it will be easier to train them for jumping with greater force.
Decrease Body Fat
- You need lean muscles in the body to have higher flexibility. It will aid you to create a spring effect and boosts your vertical.
- If you have a higher body weight, try reducing it with a lot of cardio exercises. It will also help you improve your stamina and aid you to perform other exercises easily.
HIIT Exercises
- This is an important exercise that will help you to become quick enough to jump higher.
- High-Intensity Interval training helps you to become faster and more responsive. It also aids you to reduce a considerable amount of body weight and makes you light enough for generating higher jump forces.
- There are special workouts for basketball players such as re-leaps, lateral hammer hops, etc. which can be done at a higher speed to improve the jumping height.
These workouts can easily help you to improve your jumps considerably. Try to be consistent in your training to witness considerable improvement each day.
Increase Flexibility
After every strength training session, you must never forget to stretch your muscles. Remember that you are not aiming for bodybuilding. You don’t need bulk muscles in your body because they will not help you to be quick enough.
Therefore, you need to do proper stretching for each muscle, especially for the lower body. When you combine strength with flexibility, you will have greater force along with higher spring action.
The muscles will be able to contain the large force and rebound it so that you can reach a larger vertical height easily.
Flexible muscles will also reduce the impact on your bones and you can avoid accidental fractures when jumping. If you understand these mechanics, you will be dunking in the game in a very short time.
How Much Height Can Basketball Shoes Add?
Basketball shoes can add anywhere from 0.5 inches to 2 inches to your height depending on the thickness of the heel and sole of the shoes.
If the shoes provide more than this height, there are chances to trip and fall while landing from higher jumps. Also, the weight of the shoes will increase significantly and decreases your ability to move faster.
Although they add some height, it is not considered a big advantage. It is not a factor of choice when buying basketball shoes. You have to look out for other important factors like high tops or low tops, comfort, weight, traction, etc. Only considering these will fetch you a good shoe for the game.
Conclusion
Basketball players train hard to improve their shooting and jumping ability. But the shoes themselves don’t give any advantage to reach a higher vertical limit. Rather, comfort and lightweight will help them to train better and improve their jumping skills. So, train hard and improve your skill to achieve higher vertical jumps.
