Have you ever had your vertical measured?

I did this today! It was by accident - I was lifting weights and the trainer came out with these older ladies. They were testing their vertical as a part of their fitness plan, so they asked me if I wanted to do it. The trainer said it's just another good way to test your fitness improvement.

Anyway - my vertical is 23". They were all impressed, but they were short, overweight, older ladies with 13" verticals. What's a good vertical?

That is impressive! I know a lot of guys, young & in OK shape, that can't do that. Maybe indicative of the kind of working out you do?

As a short guy who tries to do well in basketball I've had to try to make this an emphasis of mine. When I was younger I was at around 38-39". Now probably 32". Aging sucks!

Well, I'm glad to hear it's good! I can't tell you why it's good - I do a little bit of everything, but it might be because I run a lot...I don't know. It makes me want to work on improving it though - maybe that will become a new challenge of mine.

Your vertical is REALLY good.

Picture me rolling on the floor, laughing my butt off.

I could probably acheive about 4" of air trying a vertical jump. and, I'd hurt myself landing.

Wow I'm outta shape...

You'd be surprised! You should have seen these cute ladies working on theirs this morning.

Are you allowed to bend your knees etc first? and how do you measure it? from the tips of your fingers before jumping to the highest pt you touch?

Yes on bending your knees, but jump with both of your feet. You're exactly right on how you measure it.

I just found this - interesting: I guess 23" is good!

Among this group, this is how the numbers broke out (Patterson, 2004, p. 33). Please note these are mean scores, but they do give the range and it is not huge, so they should be relatively close to the median (all scores in inches).

Men, 21-30: 22.1 +/- 3.4, average Body Mass Index, 25.4
Women, 21-30: 14.1, +/- 2.5, average Body Mass Index, 23.5

But that’s just average. Want to know if you’re really good or really bad?

To be in the 95th percentile for men, meaning better than 94% of the men out there, aged 21-25 (essentially in their prime), you would have to jump 28 inches. To be in the 95% percentile for women, you would have to jump 19 inches. On the other hand, if you just want to make sure you’re not in the bottom 5%, you must jump at least 16.5 inches for men and 10 inches for women (Patterson, 2004, p. 38).