Explosive Training
Intro
Explosive training is a great way to target your fast twitch fibres and become more… Explosive.
When we use the term ‘Explosive’ we refer to being powerful, or the ability to produce a high force over a short duration of time. There are a number of situations inside the gym environment where explosivity is beneficial, any fast bodyweight movement or olympic lift will see great benefits from higher explosivity as they require a large force to be produced very quickly.
What?
Explosive training is based around quick bursts of maximal effort so when performing this workout you should think of this and try to approach the movements in a way to maximise the effort and speed of the movement.
5 RFT
18 Box Jumps (24/20in)
9 Sandbag Over Shoulder (60/40kg)
Why?
Explosive training primarily works your Type 2/Fast Twitch muscle fibers, these are larger than tye 1 fibers and are capable of producing a greater force and more quicklys but fatigue faster. As a general rule these fibers are dominant in strength and sport based athletes that need the instantaneous force production.
So why train them…? The same reason you train anything, to improve them. Most of crossfit is designed around being fast and explosive with the majority of workouts being sub 20min, therefore most of the workouts are short duration, anaerobic and fast twitch orientated, purposely focusing on explosive training therefore will directly improve a large part of your crossfit
For this weeks workout we need to take into account the aim of quick bursts of maximal power, for this we should aim to keep the box jumps snappy and try to get the sandbag up and over the shoulder in 1 motion where possible, explosive lift from the bottom straight over the shoulder, generation most of the power from the hips.
5 RFT
18 Box Jumps (24/20in)
9 Sandbag Over Shoulder (60/40kg)
This workout is lookin at less than 10 minutes and isnt isolating any bodyparts in particular but instead it is aiming to be more full body movements.
The main stress accumulation from this will likely be in your legs and glutes form a combination of the explosive jump onto the box followed by the deficit deadlift required to get the sandbag up from the ground (larger the defecit of a deadlift the more leg based it becomes).
Pacing on this workout should somewhat be determined by the training aim, to keep this explosive it may require more resting and resting earlier than you may usually. We are wanting the box jumps to stay snappy and the sandbag over shoulder to be done fast and in 1 movement, to achieve this you might have to take micro breaks between reps, for the box jump you can do this at the top of the box before dropping off and rebounding back up, for the sandbag you will do this while it is on the floor. Micro breaks are just a second or so, just enough to stop you over fatigueing and offering tiny recovery sections for your body.
Good luck and let us know how you get on!
Workout
5 RFT
18 Box Jumps (24/20in)
9 Sandbag Over Shoulder (60/40kg)
