Cricket Fitness Training: Jumps and Lifts with Chinmoy Roy

Cricket fitness training videos, this week featuring jumps and lifts as instructed by Chinmoy roy.

Check the cricket itinerary of any webpage. It would illustrate dates of myriad T-20 and even T-10 leagues across the globe at national level. What it can’t flash is the state or province run local t-20 competitions. This slam bang format, notwithstanding the purist’s flinching eyebrows, has been a boon to the upheaval of the quality fielding. Mind boggling catches are clicked at monotonous regularity taking the uniqueness away from the once vaunted series of classic catches that Kerry Packer’s Channel Nine used to brag for in the 80’s.

An airborne Andre Russell gives a glimpse of the Michael Jordon’s once epic “Hang time” that is regarded as the ultimate leap in the basketball court. The work behind the spectacular fielding are often not recognized. A candid Andre Russell revealed how a regimented fitness routine has literally made a coup in his cricketing skill, inclusive of fielding, bowling and bludgeoning the ball.

The stunning leaps in the air is a product of explosive power of the leg. The entire lower extremity in unison with the core, the deeper abdominal muscles make one jump to great height. In modern era plyometric training, in common man’s work, jumps such as depth jump involve a rapid deceleration and subsequent explosive movement. The whole process is called stretch shortening Cycle (SSC), a three step process in which the muscle generate the explosive power to propel the body to great height.

A strength and conditioning coach would use a step box of varied height ranging from 24-36 inches for plyo training. Having said that, one must ensure that before embarking on the plyo training he got to pass through the strength periodisation, which is progressing from hypertrophy to maximum strength. It takes about 3 months of quality strength work for an average fit cricketer before he can jump on the box.

According to Strength and Conditioning guideline, a maximum of 75-150 ground contacts can be made in a single session. But that is for a top flight athlete. Usually 2-3 jumps are picked according to a cricketer’s level of fitness. It can be mixture of vertical and horizontal jumps. Jumping to a high box is a vertical jump.  A long jump that Carl Lewis, the US legend used to do is a horizontal jump. 4-6 reps and 3-8 sets for one jump choosing 2 jumping exercises a day are practiced 2-3 times a week. As the power of the lower limb grows it enhances the ability to master those breathtaking great leaps off the ground.

This apart, the Olympic lifts, nothing as close to the Olympic game has also added to the big hitting ammunition of the batsmen. Once upon a time heavy lifting was literally a taboo in the training of touch artists. Now even a wristy Rohit Sharma doesn’t sulk doing the barbell lift, say a Mark Waugh or V. V. Laxman may have loathed.

Virat Kohli’s lifts comprise of jerk, hang clean and snatch, which are names of exercises that has set the cats among the pigeons in Indian fitness circuit. Even a Mitchel Starc, Kagiso Rabada or Jasprit Bumrah lift around 50-60 kgs overhead with as much ease as they extract lift out of a docile track. These lifts enhance the force generating capacity of the muscles at great velocity. The resultant factor is the speed gun consistently flashing a Starc or Rabada hitting 150 clicks or an A B Devillier’s  pull going into orbit clearing 100 metres. 3-5 exercises a day consisting of 3-6 reps and 4-6 sets is a staple template. The rules are same. One must go through the strength periodisation before launching Olympic lifts.

Remember, you can’t drive a Formula One racing car at lightning speed of 250 km/ hour without the accelerator. Similarly you can not match the speed of the shorter version without power training.

© cricket World 2019