Heavy Lifting and Jump Training
How do we build strength, explosive strength, size, and jump performance?
Three training approaches, 58 people, 8 weeks, and the verdict: if you want to get stronger and build explosive force against any meaningful load, lifting heavy is the way to go. But if all you care about is jumping higher, doing the jumps themselves works just as well as squatting with a barbell. That is the finding of a new study published in the European Journal of Applied Physiology, and it offers a useful framework for training the lower body.
The study, led by Glenn Trane and colleagues at Nord University (Norway), explored how training fast makes you faster, and whether getting stronger does the job just as well. The short answer, it turns out, depends entirely on what you are trying to improve, and by how much load is on the bar when you need to express that speed.
Aim
To compare the effects of three distinct lower-body strength training methods on squat strength, rate of force development (how quickly a muscle can build force) at various loads, and jump height, while also tracking changes in leg muscle mass. It was the second paper from a larger trial that previously examined the same questions in the upper body (bench press), and the researchers wanted to know whether the lower body would follow the same pattern.
Methods
58 moderately trained, recreationally active adults (29 male, 29 female) with an average age of 27 years and an average squat of 1.32 times their body weight were randomly assigned to one of four groups for 8 weeks of supervised training, three sessions per week. The four groups were:
Maximal Strength Training (MST): 4 sets of 4 reps at 85% of 1RM or above, lifting as explosively as possible
Hypertrophy Training (HT): 3 sets of 8 to 12 reps at 70 to 80% of 1RM, with 1 to 2 reps left in the tank for most sets
Explosive Strength Training (EST): 4 sets of 6 to 7 unloaded squat jumps, focused on maximum speed every rep
Control (CON): No structured lower-body strength training; performed sprint sessions only
MST and EST were matched for training volume (workload in joules), while HT performed roughly 1.5 to 2.5 times more total work than the other two. All groups also completed twice-weekly 6 x 25-metre sprint sessions, which were designed for a separate (unpublished) study on sprint performance.
The key measurements taken before and after the 8 weeks included:
Squat 1RM (maximum load lifted for one rep)
Rate of force development (RFD) during a squat jump at 50%, 30%, and 0% of squat 1RM
Squat jump (SJ) and countermovement jump (CMJ) height
Leg lean mass via DXA scan
Results
Maximal Strength (Squat 1RM)
MST increased squat 1RM by 20.7% and HT by 18.2%, both significantly more than EST at 10.9%. The control group showed no meaningful change. All three training groups improved their strength-to-bodyweight ratio, but the heavy lifting groups did so by a considerably larger margin.
