Sport & ContestGreek → English
Plyometric
/ˌplaɪoʊˈmɛtrɪk/adjective
Of training that uses fast stretch-then-contract movements, such as jumps and bounds, to build explosive power.
The Greek roots
πλείων
pleíōn
more, greater
μέτρον
métron
measure
Literally: “measurable increase”
The story of the word
The American coach Fred Wilt named the method in 1975 after watching Soviet athletes bound and hop before races, and the Greek he had in mind is usually read as πλείων, more, plus μέτρον, measure. Others argue the first element should be πλήσσω, to strike, which fits the exercise better than the coinage does. The training is older than the word either way: Yuri Verkhoshansky was publishing on the shock method in the 1960s.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → modern coinage → English
- First recorded
- 1975
Same family
pleonasmplethorametricsymmetrygeometry
In a sentence
Two plyometric sessions a week, and never on tired legs.
Depth jumps are the plyometric exercise most often done badly.