Shocking news! Elite jumpers are not FAT!

For those of you following my blog (thank you!) and my apologies for the lack of posts. Things have been extra busy lately but I am ready to get back to posting updates and videos of my vertical jump training.

My last post talked about how I'm WAY TOO FAT! My bodyfat as of a few weeks ago was 17.9% at a bodyweight of 173 lbs which equates to 31 lbs of fat. As a comparison, I looked up the bodyfat % from the NBA combine for each player with at least a 38" max vertical. This includes 46 athletes over the last several years. I decided to crunch the numbers and figure out the average bodyfat % for these athletes. Not surprising, the average is very low -- only 6.33%! In addition, there were only 2 of the 46 athletes who had a bodyfat % over 10%.

So I'm absolutely going to get much leaner and stronger. My goal is to be 8% by August 5th. To help achieve this, I started Intermittent Fasting (IF) a few days ago. I first heard about IF from Jacob Hiller (creator of Jump Manual). He was posting before and after pictures on his facebook page and I was amazed at the results he was getting.

For those of you not familiar with Intermittent Fasting, it is pretty simple. You eat during a 8 hour window each day and the rest of time you don't eat (water is ok). My eating window will be from noon to 8:00 pm. It is also recommended to take BCAA (branch chained amino acids) as a supplement before, during, and after your workouts. I didn't think I had taken this supplement before but it is included in many protein powders including the one I take (Optimum Nutrition). But, I have not taken BCAA all by itself before. I got watermelon flavor by Scivation. You just add it to water and it actually tastes really good. 

I won't go into all the reasons why Intermittent Fasting seems to be an effective way to get very lean and strong but read up on it if you are interested. It actually contradicts everything I and most people believe about nutrition (eat every 2-3 hours). But, I have an open mind and am willing to give it a shot. I will be sure to post updates on how it's going.

To wrap up this post, I want to leave you with this amazing video I saw yesterday. This is a high jump competition in Kenya with some high school athletes who are absolutely unreal. I hope these guys get access to some better resources and a shot at the Olympics. They absolutely deserve it. BTW, I bet these guys bodyfat % is also just a little lower than 17.9%! :-)

On my next post, I will let you know what tweaks I've made to my training. My vert has increased a little over the past few weeks and will share what I've been doing different.

Happy Summer!

I'm Too Fat!

Whoa! It's been a month since my last post. I think that is my longest hiatus since I started jumpmanual training just over 2 years ago. It was nice to have a break but it's time to get back on this!

Last Thursday, I got my body fat tested again using a bod pod which is supposed to be the most accurate test out there. If you have been following this blog for a while, you may recall I also did this in January 2012 and was shocked to find out I was 18% body fat (was expecting to be around 12%). Well, nearly 18 months has passed since my last bodyfat test on the bodpod. And I thought for sure with all my training that surely I would be down in the 12% range this time. Nope! I was able to drop a HUGE .1% in bodyfat. My test came in at a disappointing 17.9%.

So, it is painfully clear that I've got to drop some bodyfat. I currently weigh 173 lbs and 31 of those lbs are fat! That is just way too much! My best jumping days were when I was 29 years old and was in probably the best shape of my life. I weighed 169 lbs and was just 7% bodyfat which means I had only 12 lbs of fat. Today, the scale says I weigh only 4 lbs more than I did 12 years ago but I'm carrying 19 more lbs of fat. It also means I have 15 lbs less muscle. That is a pretty substantial difference in the wrong direction.

So the bad news is I am too fat! At least in terms of maximizing my vertical jump. Of course, I'm not saying I'm obese or anything like that. But, I'm too fat to be an elite jumper. And I want to be an elite jumper!

The good news is I am jumping really well right now. I actually had of my best dunks and best misses ever last week. And, if I lose 20 lbs of fat that should surely help me jump a few inches higher which would be two hand tomahawks all day long.

Today, I started another 12 weeks of training. I have made some changes to my workout and diet that I will tell you guys more about in a future post as this one is already quite long and unlikely many people are still reading this. :-)

Have a great summer! Keep workin hard!

And...if you haven't had your bodyfat tested recently, get it done. Maybe you are like me and need to drop some lbs.