Russian Box

[biff44 0]

Anyone have any experience with plyometrics using the "Russian Box", ie. two tilted panels around 5 foot apart that you bounce one-legged from one to the other? It looks pretty easy to build one with a little plywood and a few 2x4's. Does it help develop explosive lateral movements like it looks like it would? Are there any specific exercises you do on one, or just jump back and forth. Thanks in advance.

[JR Boucicaut 3805]

I'm not touching this one.

[mack 44]

No crap, I saw the title and the sub-title and was ready to answer but I was horribly misled.

[Chadd 916]

Damn, I was expecting at least a couple of Anna posts or a link or two by now.

[Juice_Slowjamz 0]

Crap, last night in my summer allergy/Halls Menthalyptus/Nyquil/Tylenol Cold/Samuel Adams Summer Ale-induced drunken stupor I must have missed this one.

[JR Boucicaut 3805]

Damn dude, that can't be good...

[biff44 0]

Man, I must have been sleeping when I posted that title.

[mack 44]

And the answer is still "no" in my books.

[Cavs019 710]

I was going to say something along the lines of...ask Mr. Fedorov, but thankfully I was able to restrain myself.

[goodtimes1919 0]

In all seriousness, if you have the wood or whatever, try to build it. It will help your skating.

my friend tried to build his own,(he is a bit heavy) but anyways he didn't reinforce all that well and he broke it, it was pretty funny but so sad...

[Neo5370 132]

Any idea how much this thing costs?

[Chadd 916]

The key in building your own is to reinforce the backside of the landing area. If you put pressure on the back of the landing area, you won't put your foot through it.

[Cavs019 710]

basically you would have to build a solid cube, or at least have beams inside the box to support the top.

[Chadd 916]

basically you would have to build a solid cube, or at least have beams inside the box to support the top.

2x4s on the back with a post touching the floor will make it durable but heavy. The pressure of the post touching the floor will make it very hard to break.

[hocckey77 0]

http://www.fitnessedgeonline.com/festore/p...&pf%5Fid=LPT22&

That one's like 160 usd.

[biff44 0]

Well, I made one yesterday. I made two separate boxes. Used 2X10's cut at an angle for the two sides, and a 2X12 for the end. Used 3/8 plywood 4' X 4' for the tops. In trying it out, it was a little tippy if you landed on the top edge, so I added two more 2X4 legs that run parallel to the ground, but stick out another 8" or so toward the far side. I wanted it to be a little bouncey, so I did not reinforce the center of the plywood--to minimize the plyometric shock. Held together with Gorilla glue and some decking screws. We will see how sturdy it is with time.

We are going to try it all out tomorrow. Will let you know if it was worth it.

[biff44 0]

Alright, we tried it and works fine, but it tends to move laterally. Put 95# of weight on each box and it still moved. I am working on some way of having it dig into the weight room rubber mats.

[hip check 0]

Why not join the together with a 2x4 or something, then you have them as a unit? You could just notch the bases and the joining 2x4 so that they are removable, or fasten it in a more permanent manner.

You could also make spurs (like on a bass drum) to keep it from sliding. Two or four lag bolts (or similar) on each box would anchor it down, without attaching it directly to the floor.

[biff44 0]

Well, putting 6 steel nubs on the bottom of the boxes only succeeded in chewing up the rubber mats. I put some antislip sand covered paper on the bottom. We will see how that works.

If that is not enough, I got a flat 1" wide perforated steel piece around 6' long. I will tie the two boxes together with that. I was worried about the height of the 2X4 twisting an ankle is you land on it by accident.

[biff44 0]

If both boxes move the same way, it is not much of a problem. So you do not have to bolt them to the floor, just tie them together somehow. It is when the two boxes are moving apart from each other that is annoying.

[Puck You 25 0]

It's just like Theo said a couple posts back... you gotta have wood for the box to work correctly. :)

[LarrieNation9 0]

OK I built the boxes now I need info on how to properly use them. Do you jump trying to get higher in the air or distance between boxes .

[biff44 0]

I bought a really good video that shows all the drills. I have to run, but will dig it up and post the info tonight.

Basically, DON'T DO ANY one-legged drills until you are well practiced in it.

Warm up A LOT before you start.

You don't do too many hops, maybe 20 - 50 in a session.

Strive for powerfull explosiveness, rather than sheer numbers of repetitions.

[biff44 0]

http://www.power-systems.com/Categories/Cl...1371&c=8&sc=131

20 bucks, worth it.

This is a very good video on all the different exercises.

Basically, the idea behind the russian box (or lateral plyometrics box), is that if you try to jump explosively side to side on a flat surface, you will land with your ankle bent severely. This will eventually blow out your ankle.

If you use the russian box, you move your legs left or right from the hip so that when you land, your foot, ankle, and leg are all in alignment and perpendicular to the angled surface you are landing on. You have much less trauma to the ankle. So make sure you are not landing with your ankle bent too much left or right.

One good starting exercise is to stand on one box with both feet, and explosively land on the other box with both feet. Always facing forward.

Another good one, you start with both feet on one angled box, facing forward, and jump to the other one while rotating 180 degrees. You land facing backward. Then you immediately jump to the other box while rotating, and you land facing forward again.

The video really stresses warming up first! Like 1/2 of the video is warm up exercises, but then it gets really good.

[biff44 0]

Sure. The boxes I built are two different pieces. You can land in the middle where there is no box. Some of the prefab boxes have a pad in the middle to land on.

The video shows tons of drills. One is a one-foot drill where you start on the left box/left leg, land in the middle on the left leg, and jump to the right and land on the right leg, jump back to the middle and land on the left, etc. Something like if you were doing a quick feet/agility ladder drill.