If you want to get back into shape, burn away those unsightly love handles, get a strong body from top to bottom, and be a healthy person in general, it’s time to start working out, and there is no better place to start than with the good old box jump. This is why many people get their own quality plyo boxes for their homes or religiously train with them in a gym. Every time you change position, move, or jump, your proprioceptors register it and will force your muscles and your body in general to shift itself accordingly in order to stay upright. When you do a box jump you have to use your arms to make the most of it. Thank you for signing up. Of course, being strong is beneficial for a wide variety of reasons, least of which is physical performance. There is also the fact that your balance does also have to do with the strength of your legs. When you do a box jump you should be clenching your stomach muscles as you get ready to jump, and when you do jump you release your tightened abdominals in order to get that explosive strength to get you up onto the box. This type of exercise is one of the best possible things that you can do for the strength of your legs. A stronger heart also means that you will lower your blood pressure, have a lower resting heart rate, a reduction in bad cholesterol, a reduction in heart and arterial disease, and a reduction in the chances of suffering from a stroke or heart attack. When you jump up onto a box, especially when it is 20 inches or higher in height, you really need to engage every single muscle in both of your legs to get up there. Stronger, bigger, and more toned muscles are not only good because of the increased strength that you will gain, but it will also make you look really good in your swim suit too! The main reason for this is because box jumps force you to land on a small surface with both of your feet at the same time. The Skinny on Getting Lean: Low-Carb vs. Low-Fat, 10 Superfoods to Eat During Cold and Flu Season, How Sarah Apgar and FitFighter are Changing Fitness, What Other Sports Can Learn From The NBA Bubble, Ms. Olympia Returns: A Tradition Restored, Commitment to Ticket Holders Sends Olympia to Orlando, Gene Mozee: Bodybuilder, Editor, Photographer, Shawn Ray: A Pound-For-Pound All-Time Champion, Breathing Tips From Halle Berry's Trainer, Phil Heath Officially Started His Olympia Prep, Flex Lewis Took a Year Off Before — It Paid Off, Shaq Talks Mr. Olympia and Bodybuilding Motivation, The 50 Best Fitness Influencers on Instagram. Her top exercises, at left, will help with power, speed, and explosiveness to seriously boost your vertical. In other words, box jumps will actually rev up your metabolism and keep it that way for the rest of your day, thus furthering your weight loss endeavors and putting you well on track to a slim and healthy looking body. Over time you will definitely notice that your legs are getting much stronger. Yet in comparison with other jumping exercises, box jumps actually create a relatively lower impact on the joints, according to verticaljumping.com founder and pro vertical jump and speed coach Jack Woodrup. We aren’t saying that you should do box jumps for a whole hour, but just to be technical about it, a whole hour of box jumps can help you burn up to 1000 calories, which is just about half of your daily required caloric intake. So it trains your heart to utilize oxygen more efficiently to pump blood to the muscles, and it can lower your blood pressure post-workout. Simply put, it just feels great to know how high you can jump, not to mention knowing that you are improving every time that you do some more training. “The injury risks of performing a high number of reps of more intense plyo exercises like these may outweigh the benefits,” she explains. Lower Body Workout Since box jumps make your legs much stronger, they have the increased ability to keep you upright. Without further ado let’s start with the physical benefits of box jumps. “Box jumps are great for building power and firing up the central nervous system,” Woodrup says, “and are therefore perfect to add prior to weight training. With box jumps, you can train your heart to be more efficient at pumping blood around your body, especially to your muscles, and your muscles need blood and oxygen to continuing functioning properly. Ever watch a slow-mo video of someone doing a vertical jump onto plyo boxes? Having a stronger core is not only good for you because it lets you do sit ups with ease, plus it makes you look really good in the mirror, but also because a stronger core will go a long way in improving your posture. There is also the fact that they make you much stronger, they help you lose weight, and they make you physically fit. The next thing that is really beneficial about box jumping is that it helps to increase your self-confidence and the way that you perceive yourself. There is also the fact that having stronger lungs is good for you because when you train them through cardiovascular exercise, they increase their ability to absorb oxygen and process it. It takes a whole lot of strength to do box jumps, especially in your legs, and while you may not be able to jump all that high at first, you will slowly get better and better at it. While you’re jumping, rather than doing leg presses, squats, or deadlifts, your body is consuming a greater amount of oxygen (aka boosting peak oxygen intake) during this dynamic movement. One of the biggest benefits that you can get from doing box jumps is that it helps to greatly increase the size and strength of your legs, because after all, box jumps primarily involve using your leg muscles to perform the exercise..