Squat Carryover To Tricking?

So I'm getting back into tricking and acrobatics after a 4 month hiatus, and I've always felt somewhat weak jumping off of one leg, which seems like 90% of tricking. My question is, what would be the best way to improve this weakness? Front squat or Back squat come to mind, but would SLS work have more carryover to this type of movement?

im no expert in this arena (GtGB) but I am going to say ALL of the above! focusing on explosive power movements. I personally quite like the Deck Squat variations for this

Robby, can I suggest that you have a read through the articles by Kelly Baggett at Higher Faster Sports.  Plenty of good info there about how to identify your own personal weaknesses and how to address them.  You might find something useful to your situation.

For example, you might find that you get all the jumping, landing and plyo work you need simply by practicing your tricking.  Replicating that in your training probably won't be as effective as supplementing with heavy squats and deadlifts to build your max strength.

Definitely don't neglect single leg work though as if you think that you're only weak in one leg jumping then perhaps your stabilisers just aren't up to the task.

In terms of raw power, you're probably going to get the best results from proper front squats and deadlifts.

I think that Craig's suggestion is the best for you right now. Read up, and identify where you're weak, or lacking training. Then fix those weaknesses.

You probably already know that no amount of weights will make you a good trickster by themselves. They are to be used to build the raw power aspect of what you need.

The single leg stuff will help you with balance and stabilizer recruitment/conditioning, and of course strength as well, but without actually tricking (and preferably learning some legit tumbling technique) you'll never see any benefits from the strength or stability training.

Thanks everyone, I'm definitely not under any delusion that squatting is going to make me a good tricker (just to clear that up). There are certainly issues with my technique that take away my height as well. I feel very comfortable jumping off of two feet, as an example, standing back tuck has never been an issue to me. I'm trying to design a routine that will benefit me most now that I'm back into tricking, as my focus has been mostly upper body for the last several months.

It's interesting though because I know a few exceptional trickers and they've never done a weighted squat in their life... definitely makes you think.

My tumbling has gotten a lot higher since implementing front squats. My vertical jump went up noticeably, and I was able to tumble on non spring surfaces better.

On a side note, and I don't know if this will apply to you, I began to notice that I much prefer jumping kind of tricks instead of punching tricks after squatting a lot.

 If you can already do a good standing back tuck, strength isn't really the problem; your technique off one leg is. More than likely you are initiating the skill early rather than upon full extension of the knee and hip and ankle.

 I guess it gets down to how much height is required for said trick.

 Squats in general would be good as would be deadlifts. Even SLS but I prefer step ups or "Bulgarian" Split squats with load as it's easier to scale them. Yes, you can load SLS but it gets tricky. You can do them off a height but it becomes an issue of getting onto said height and squatting with substantial weight.

 Of course, you can work just jumping SLS besides plyometrics, even possibly plyo SLS (carefully).

Alex Chubb said:

My tumbling has gotten a lot higher since implementing front squats. My vertical jump went up noticeably, and I was able to tumble on non spring surfaces better.

On a side note, and I don't know if this will apply to you, I began to notice that I much prefer jumping kind of tricks instead of punching tricks after squatting a lot.

That's pretty interesting, the bit about punching. What do you do for your lower legs?

Alex Chubb said:

My tumbling has gotten a lot higher since implementing front squats. My vertical jump went up noticeably, and I was able to tumble on non spring surfaces better.

On a side note, and I don't know if this will apply to you, I began to notice that I much prefer jumping kind of tricks instead of punching tricks after squatting a lot.

Fascinating, that certainly makes sense though. I'm curious to see how this works for me.

Joshua Naterman said:

That's pretty interesting, the bit about punching. What do you do for your lower legs?

For what it's worth, nothing leaves my lower legs burning more than spending some time on my slackline! 

Joshua Naterman said:

That's pretty interesting, the bit about punching. What do you do for your lower legs?

It feels like I have a lot more control. I know exactly how high my legs will take me on any surface. Not sure how much I can get back when I punch though.

I tumble a pretty decent amount so I let that take most of my work. During actual strength sessions, stiff leg jump rope, senders, and a lot of tibialas strengthening.

Here's a slightly different but related take on this subject that helped me.

Your jumping endurance is pretty important as well as your maximum jumping ability. The more fairly high effort jumps and other movements you can make in a given time (e.g. during a training session), and the faster you can recover between sessions, then the more quality attempts you can get at each skill per day/week/month. With skills that are involving sort of new movements then my attempts in a session get worse as I get physically tired, so as time wears on I come to perform worse, and have to rest longer.

I took to performing high-rep exertions mimicking components of the move (e.g. for a back tuck many hard tucks while lying down, or jumping up lots of times) and quickly found that my max-effort hurls at the gym weren't so tiring and I could get more good training done.

I suspect that this is more relevant to beginners and may not be of use to the OP, but I thought I'd post it as no doubt other beginners like me are reading this thread.

Besides what Blairbob has already added I just want to say that gymnasts and power tumblers are pretty far from having amazing verticals when compared to other athletes. Tumbling certainly has a strength requirement and having a good vertical also helps but from your descriptions it seems that you have fulfilled those requirements and need more technique work.

I would say at this point your leg strength would carry over a lot more to injury prevention than actual tricks improvement. Obviously injury prevention is a pretty important thing though.
 

Alex Chubb said:

My tumbling has gotten a lot higher since implementing front squats. My vertical jump went up noticeably, and I was able to tumble on non spring surfaces better.

On a side note, and I don't know if this will apply to you, I began to notice that I much prefer jumping kind of tricks instead of punching tricks after squatting a lot.

Sorry, newb here... what's the difference between jumping and punching tricks? 

Punching is where you will run or hurdle into a skill, stay right, and rebound out of it. It involves a lot less bending on the legs and mostly just a push with the calves. It works well for gymnast since they have a floor with springs. Think of when you see round off, back handspring, back tuck. Lots if punching.

Jumping skills are where the legs will bend and lift off. They do all the work. Think of a standing backflip.