THP201: How To Make Your Tendons More Elastic
Tendons. Stiffness. Ground contact times. Bouncy. Velocity.
John:Speed jumper. Compliance. Oh, compliance. I like that one. Genetics.
John:What are we talking about?
Isaiah:What are these words? We're talking about elasticity.
John:We're talking about stiffness. We're talking about how to use, develop, get better at that quality. I think a lot of the time we talk about strength, and there's nothing wrong with that. But I I feel like it at least from what I've seen in feedback, people feel like we chase numbers. Yeah.
John:There's a number I'm chasing. It's called stiffness. No. They specifically said in the weight room, which the weight room is an easy way to test numbers. So, yeah, my name is John.
John:I coach many of the highest jump jumpers in the world. And, this is Isaiah Rivera. He's one of the highest jumpers in the world. And I had a really interesting conversation yesterday with mister JC Ditch, doc doctor JC Ditch. He actually knows Hunter and oh, Hunter's in town, by the way.
John:Hunter, Dom, they're all in town. But they, he actually knows them because he dunks at that same gym. But, yeah, he has a PhD. He actually studied post activation potentiation, which we'll get into in another podcast. But, yeah, JC's a super good super good dude and very, very intelligent and loves jumping as well.
John:So yesterday, I was talking on the phone with him. He's like, oh, yeah. I would love to see Isaiah during, like, a PAP window, which means, like, post burp. It's basically a potentiation window. Post activation.
John:Potentiation, is that what it is? Anyways, there's a window of time where you get huge performance gains. He's like, oh my god. It'd be so freaky. And he, like, just started, like, stuttering.
John:He was so, like, in awe and shock of your strength in the last. Know? Was like, oh, chill out now. Don't give him too much credit. Alright?
John:Don't make his head any bigger than it already is. So we were, yeah, we were just chitchatting, and, you know, it kinda brought to and then I saw a couple more comments yesterday about, like, people were like, oh, you talking about blah blah? I've never heard you do that before, and blast to see, like I said. So wanna cover this topic. Talking about this, we we talked about a lot of the the different elements of it.
John:But I have some some different thoughts, and and maybe what we can do is just kinda cover these topics. The first one that I think we should talk about is genetics. So, Isaiah, what do you know about genetics elasticity? Like, what's your kind of understanding of that?
Isaiah:Can you be more specific?
John:Tendons and and genetics. You're talking about genetics? Is there a genetic predisposition to like your tendons being stiffer, bouncier, or less stiff? Yeah. So,
Isaiah:elasticity, as I recall, is a materials ability to return to its original shape after getting stretched. So, I like to think of a rubber band. It's how badly does the rubber band want to return to its shape after after you stretch it and let go. The structure that has the most elastic qualities in the human body are are your tendons and elasticity is primarily determined by stiffness and how far you stretch it. And I believe it's primarily stiffness that's like very genetic.
Isaiah:Like like people have everybody has different levels of base levels of stiffness in their tendons. A lot of it can is is developed through like your upbringing. And then the there's other genetic components too. For example, how many type two fat fibers you have which allow you to stretch the tendon further and your nervous system and all those things. But yeah, that's my answer to your question.
John:No, that's good. So we definitely know that there is a genetic component to the tenon qualities that you have. And is this was explained to me by a few different people over the years, one of which was Thomas Quarton Beck. He basically said that the grade of the cross sectional area of which means, like, when you cut something in half and you look at it, if you were to cut a tenon in half, how thick that would be, and then also the volume of it. And I might be a little bit off with this explanation, but it's adding in a little bit of Jonathan's flare.
John:That's gonna be so so it's the material that it's made of, like the type of collagen that's in it. And there's different types of collagen. There's, like, five types of collagen, one through five. I believe collagen three is two and three, I think, are, like, the most functional elastic forms of collagen, but then there's also, like, elastin in there. Water plays a role in tendons as well.
John:There are a bunch of proteoglycans, which, like, are protein sugar molecules, that have, like, different components that turn into different types of collagen over time. So it's like a very complex structure, and it is a little bit of material science, but you're dealing with a lot of different materials in the tendon. So when you have a tendon that is stiffer, you have more of those stiffer elements, and you are bound together very like there's a high density of them. There's a big cross sectional area, and there's probably a really big length. There's actually in a book I can't remember if it's peak, you know, or whatever that book is that I told you, a range.
John:But it talks about how, like, the number one indicator of success in high jump is, like, Achilles tendon length or a it was, like, Achilles tendon volume or something like that. Like, they had one metric for it. I think it's probably volume because, like, Stefan Holmes doesn't have a long Achilles tendon. And, you know, it kinda makes sense because if you have more stiff tissue and you're generally more explosive, and if you're only looking at that demographic, the guy with the bigger, stiffer, longer Achilles tendon is gonna have more of a spring like takeoff, and that's gonna be good for rotation, and that's gonna be good for running really fast, which is why it's a huge indicator of success. So when we're looking at the, I guess you could call it like material science of this, you really do have to look at each of those components and how they work together to give you whatever that elastic property is.
John:There's probably like an actual value that explains this. The stiffness constant is probably the problem is that tendons are different stiffnesses for different levels of energy going through it, and that makes it a little bit more complicated. For example, if you palpate your tendon right now, it's soft, and that's because it's viscoelastic. And I'm sure that there's gonna be people in the comments that will say, oh, you're you don't know anything about biochemistry or physics. And I'm gonna be like, you're right.
John:I'm doing my best in terms of biomechanics. But so, yeah, it has different stiffnesses at different levels, and then the amount of force that you put through it gives it more or less stiffness. And that curve or shape is going to also be different depending on the individual. So there's a lot of variables that impact that. And then also how you use it is going to be mega different.
John:So genetics play a major role in this for all the reasons that you just said, right? Like if you have more type two fibers, you have more alpha motor neurons, you have more stiff tendon tissue, more volume, cross sectional area of that tendon, you're probably gonna have a more elastic takeoff. So type B fibers allow you to use those better, and then you pair that with the fact that you've practiced jumping, in your case, a bajillion and a half times. I think a lot of people don't realize, like, I mean, maybe they do, but I think it kinda hit me the other day how trained that capacity is. You see it all the time with these young kids that we coach coming up.
John:Like Dylan McCarthy is another one I've been coaching. I mean, dude, the kid jumps, like, infinite times a week. I'm not kidding. It's, like, 500 times a week of jump like, dunk attempts. And I know this because I've been running his training.
John:That's a secret, but I have. And, another another one is, like, Hoop and Nate. Like, Hoop and Nate is finally at the point where he's about to dunk. It's been a long time. He's still, like, five six or something like that.
John:Like, five five. He's tiny. He is gonna get taller. Think he's gonna be a late bloomer. He'll be, like, six one six two by the time he graduate or probably, like, freshman year of college.
John:Hopefully, he still loves dunking. A lot of kids during that, like, development just fall out of love with it after you get the first dunk, but I think Nate will stick with it. Anyways, so he's developing that skill. Nate is not, like, crazy strong. He's getting way stronger, especially for his body weight, but he's not crazy strong.
John:Nate is, like, the perfect example of someone who is on a good long term athletic development trajectory. Like, we have pretty much set him up for a perfect long term athletic development, and we didn't overcoach him. We didn't over cue him. We let him learn through experience. He's very driven, so he took the time to, like, do it himself.
John:He enjoys it a lot. And he's someone where you might look at him and say, well, you don't have, like, you know, the best connective tissue, like or you don't have the best nervous system or you don't have, like, the best genetics or whatever. But because he's trained so effectively his entire life, he his ceiling is so high. Like, I think his ceiling is, I I can't I can't hypothesize because I don't know, but I can tell you for sure it's really, really high. He's got a very, very, very high genetic potential.
John:He's got perfect technique. His outputs are still relatively low, and he's not even fully developed yet, but he has perfect technique in his lifting as well. Like, dude, that is a recipe for success in building one of the most insane jumpers you possibly can. So when we talk about elasticity, I think a lot of people think that it's just this genetic innate thing, but it's not. You look at someone like Nate, and you can quickly see that he's the result of thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of jump reps.
John:And people oftentimes wanna just attribute that to plyometrics and say, well, if you would run, you know, plyos or whatever, he would have gotten there. Right? And on paper, you're the same weight. Right? Like, so is Dylan McCarthy.
John:None of those guys did playos. But if you put them on a force plate, every scientist in the room would be like, he's so freaky. He's the most elastic jumper ever. And then five years later, when I get your lifts all up to, like, 320 pounds and a clean, and in Nate's case, let's say it's, like, two seventy in a clean and backswatting three fifty. And in Dylan's case, it's something similar.
John:People are gonna look at that and say, wow. Like, he he's he's so strong and and, you know, he could like, he's strong and elastic. That's that's pretty unheard of. Some of this is inspired by JC's conversation. And no, this isn't JC.
John:This isn't me saying anything negative. It's just You're explaining why. You're explaining interest. It sparked interest in in the conversation. So all of that stuff does lead you to become and there was other comments too that also inspired this because people are like, well, you only chase numbers like why?
John:Because that's how you get better attendance too. Right? Like, the numbers I'm chasing in the weight room are not just for the sake of chasing numbers. And oftentimes, I don't even necessarily care about the number on paper with a squat or power clean. I'll post it as a win or something like that because I think it's really productive and good, and it's an indicator of progress and increases motivation and intrinsically.
John:But at the end of the day, what's happening is we're getting tendon adaptation from strength work. Like, that's the number one way to get tendon adaptation. And then we're actualizing it, you know, in in other forms, whether it's in the sprints, could be jump circuits, could be tempo running, could be whatever dynamic in the warm up, it could be in the actual jumps themselves, the actual takeoffs on the weekend. It could be plyos when I put the plyos in, but I use it very sparingly because I understand the cost of doing that. And it's very, very dependent on the person.
John:In Nate's case, he's a high school basketball player. Like, he's playing basketball and dunking a couple times a week, he's but getting a bunch of elastic contacts and lifting very little. In McCarthy's case, he's doing everything a lot, but not sprinting at all. Mostly just dunking, like, 500 times a week and then doing a ton a ton of other stuff. And then in your case, it's like, you don't do any plyos.
John:You dunk very minimally. And in the weight room, we push really hard. Like, those are three very, very different scenarios. One guy doesn't lift at all. The other guy, you lifts a bunch, and the other guy does a bunch of both.
John:Right? And it's like and then you have me. I sprint and run tempo and do a lot of long warm ups and do general work and things like that, and I don't really push the lifting up too too crazy. So you you have to kind of identify, and we always say this, but it does depend. You need to know what time of year you're at, what your goals are, where that athlete is in their progression, and then you blend that together to come to a conclusion that makes the most amount of sense to make them get the outcome of being elastic jumper.
John:Like, in ten years, we're gonna get the same results, you know, with with Nate. He's gonna get he's gonna be a freak athlete, like I said. And people are gonna say, they're gonna look back and be like, woah. Woah. He's just so genetically gifted.
John:No, dude. He freaking jumped every day for ten years. From development all the way through high school and was obsessed with it. Like and then we built on top of that. And you and I have kind of identified that, that that is a really important key factor.
John:Donovan's another one. Right? Like, everyone sees Donovan now, like, hitting it a minute or a second in the air, And they're like, oh, he's always been like that. And I'm like, he, yeah, he jumped for years and years and years, and then I we built on top of that. Like, that's that's kind of what we identify in guys.
John:And oftentimes, we work with they come to us when they're 22, 23, and they're plateaued. Like, that's when people reach out to us. They don't reach out to us when they're, like, 15. Why would they need to? What they're doing is probably working.
John:They're getting better every day. That's a big, big realization I've had. So, yeah, that's a big rant about it. Do you have any thoughts about some of the things I said?
Isaiah:Is that what you would recommend to somebody is jump every day till you break essentially and then come
John:on bust? Yeah. I think it depends on health. But, yeah, generally, I mean, not every day, but if you're a really light kid and you're, like, 12, 13, 11, whatever, and you're light. I'm talking you are light.
John:Just make it fun, dude. Go out and just have fun. Like, it's a weekend, and you don't have anything to do, and you're playing your PlayStation. Like, I was playing GameCube or whatever, and I would just go out with my cousin. We would have dunk contests on a low rim.
John:Do that. Go do that. Like and if you like it, do it more. You know? And learn the lifts.
John:I think that's the other one is just get proficient at moving. Learn how to run. Be a part of a track team. Do a lot of sports. Learn the lifts.
John:If you wanna you don't have to stick to the program perfectly. Just go have fun and enjoy it because that's what's gonna give you the greatest amount of buy in, and that's what's gonna help you develop those elastic qualities that will help you later in life.
Isaiah:Alright. So now now you have
John:We don't get a lot of 14 year olds, by the way. Like, we basically have none of those kids. We have some, but not really many. They're all hurt. All the ones we get So are
Isaiah:now you have somebody in their mid twenties to mid thirties. They don't have a a background of jumping every single day as a kid, but now they wanna try to jump higher. Would you recommend that to somebody else or would you recommend a different approach?
John:I don't think in Webster.
Isaiah:Like, someone like Webster.
John:No. I don't I actually don't think so at all. I think oftentimes what happens is your window's gone and your risk of injury is so high at this point. Like Yep. You will probably get hurt.
John:Defend like, almost certainly, you're gonna get hurt if you try that. I've I've don't think I've seen anyone successfully do it. The only one I can think of is Ryan from California that dunks with the that dunks with the California group. I think he did it for a period of time, but even then, he plateaued very quickly from it. That's my personal opinion.
John:I haven't seen him, like, east bang on 10 feet or anything. Right? I mean, he still lifts and stuff like that, but, like, he basically stopped lifting completely and just started jumping. And he was a distance runner. He's very robust.
John:He's very light. He doesn't create as much absolute force as other guys because he is light, and that's more forgiving on his body. Whereas, you know, someone like me, I'm not gonna be able to do that because my outputs are really high, and I leak a lot of energy. So that's a and I'm and I have a history of injury. Right?
John:That's that's a big red flag. If you're there there are certain, like, indicators that I would tell you to be aware of, you know, that you should avoid doing everyday jumping, and I'm a good example of someone that should not jump every day that will quickly get hurt and regret it. So no, I don't think that's a good solution. At that point, you have to take a pretty balanced approach. I think you have to be really, really young.
John:But, yeah,
Isaiah:I think this is By the way, guys
John:Oh, go ahead.
Isaiah:Yeah. We forget we always forget to do this. Go to tsbstrength.com if you would like our input on what you should do with your training. We are pretty good at what we do. Have a discount going on.
Isaiah:Just go to thptraining.com at discounts right there on the front of the page. So Yeah. Just an aside, I'm trying to be better about about plugging THP on these because we always forget.
John:Well, I feel like this is a good place to to close this out. There's lot of information here, but Isaiah said he wanted more information. Was like happily brother. We saw a funny comment the other day. Made me laugh, so I hope we get that comment again from last year, but thanks for watching guys and we'll see you guys tomorrow.
John:What's up bro?
