Customer Rating: 
Summary: It served its purpose for me
Comment: My complaints about this book would be the technical/sports science explanations of how plyometric training works and benefits an athlete left me feeling like I have attention deficit disorder when trying to read and understand them. Many of the exercises featured even if done with perfect form look like injuries waiting to happen and I won't ever bother even trying them. Also there is nothing on plyometric pushups and for that matter there are no upper body exercises except those involving the core and those for the most part all require a medicine ball. The good points are they do a good job of explaining the exercises and how to do them properly both with pictures and text. But the bottom line here is I found about 10 new exercises that I will be adding to my repetoire for explosive conditioning, which was what I was looking for when I borrowed this from the library.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Better than the Donald Chu book
Comment: I was disappointed with the Donald Chu book Jumping into Plyometrics. High Powered Plyometrics by Radcliffe and Farentinos is the real deal as far as I'm concerned. More complete. More detailed.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Beware Beginners
Comment: I purchased this book because I am familiar with plyometrics, having done them years ago in high school athletics. But, I am an adult now, and wanted to reacquaint myself with some plyometric exercises to give me an edge in my running.
I found this book was a bit too inaccessible for me, and ended up returning it. It's very technical and scientific, even to me-- and, I consider myself pretty knowlegeable in terms of exercise, running and fitness.
If you already use plyometrics and are looking for some new ideas, this is probably for you. It relies on several props that may not be avaialble for someone who is a fitness enthusiast, but is not a full time athlete. If you are just taking up an interest in plyometrics, I would not buy this book as my first. (For the novice, I would recommend Chu's "Jumping Into Plyometrics," instead.) The book boasts "77 Advanced Exercises" on the cover, and the key word here is indeed, "advanced."
In short, this book is for professional athletes and coaches, not for someone just getting his/her feet wet in this very beneficial form of training.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A great introductory plyometric book
Comment: This book is worth the price ($14) alone just for the plyometric routines in the back of the book. The description and science behind plyometrics are excellent and easy to read. My only complaint about the book is that some of the exercises are hard to grasp from the given instructions.I knew of several lower body plyometric moves, but the amount of upper body ones in the book are impressive. You will need a medicine ball for most of the upper body ones, as well as plyo boxes for some of the lower body ones, but in the book they show you how to make them. This is a definite plus. I also like the suggested readings in the back, which will help if I ever need to go more indepth into a certain aspect of plyometrics.
Overall, this book is worth the money, and will help you in any sport, to become more explosive. Just make sure to study the instructions on the moves carefully, to make sure you are doing them right.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great Start to Plyometrics
Comment: High-Powered Plyometrics is an excellent book for those striving to achieve maximum power from their fitness program of choice. This book gives plenty of information about the human physiology, necessary to understand how the body reacts to physical conditioning. It then smoothly incorporates a detailed outline of the how's and why's that make plyometrics work. The authors of the book share their accumulation of research with the reader to grant him the ability of self-evaluation. This book is amazing, it even gives you outlines for building your own jump boxes from scratch, should you be inclined to do so.You can learn a lot from this book, since there is a wealth of research thrown into this book. Though, I'd also recommend getting Jumping into Plyometrics, by Dr. Donald Chu, in addition to this book. Chu's book, in my opinion, is no better or worse than High-Powered Plyometrics. Both books have their advantages over the other. The main advantages: High-Powered Plyometrics has a lot more routines already outlined for specific sports; Jumping into Plyometrics has outlined routines involving complex training (basically, Plyometrics + Weight Lifting).
Good luck in your quest for power.
