well im naturally fast so i can't really help yah there but driving i might.

ok a good way to realize when driving is that when you are about to, don't put your body in the motion as if you were about to drive. You want your defender to think that you are calm and the exact opposite of driving. The instant he lets his guard down, you drive by pushing the ball forward, not so much as a carry but a push for you to get the ball ahead of you and a slight bit ahead of your defender. At this point you need to sprint to the basket but not all the way. what you need to do when going for the lay-up is you need to stretch you 2 steps as far as possible but still be able to jump and make the basket. Ths is a way to avoid being blocked, because if you just run to the basket. more or less likeley your going to have another defender waiting to block you ,but if you jump farther away, it will be harder for him to block you and for you defender behind you to steal the ball. Another thing you should work on is while taking 2 steps is to weave the ball to prevent pick pocketing from defenders. Also shooting you should try driving but just trying putting a jump shot up quicker and less convincing of such an action.

The way i usually practice is simple. All yah need is one of those white plastic chairs or something to symbolize a defender, a ball, and sense of patience cause this will take time.

1. place the symbol (defender) any where on the court usually on top of the circle, or right or left of the circle.

2. after placing the symbol, determin which side of the symbol you will practice driving upon. know how far you'll stop your dribble. ( a good way is to take a peice of tape or chalk and make a mark)

3. After clearing all of step #2 up, play as if it were a game and your defender is guarding you. practice different ways of passing by the defender(or exploding)but keeping in mind of the mark you set to stop your dribble.

4. just as the tips say, when you pass your defender you want to sprint to the basket and jump as far as you can toward the basket but (important part) when doing such you need to act as if a real defender is in such place. also pretend to weave the ball in your hands while driving.

do this about 5-10 times a day

the problem w/ this is, when your driving the problem ussually isn't getting by the defender guarding you but the help defense that comes in the paint so its kinda hard to practice this on your own....the best way is to just play pickup games to get experience of doing it............or atleast thats the case for me

vert programs, believe it or not, improve ur speed and explosiveness just as much as ur vert

hit up VJB my friend...

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I like Cross'n U's method... i think that will really help and i'm going to use that in the future. It is good in the sense that you will get away from your check but you can never really anticipate for the big man to step over to get in you face, and sometimes all you can do is play games to get used to taht and read their body movement

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what i normally do to increase my speed and driving which are both similar is just do Suicides on a full court up and down the court until i am #$*!ed.... and for driving just work on your foot work.

What sucks about suicides is when you do them, I get real tired, and after I get real tired, I can't shoot in a pick-up game, when I can't shoot I give up.

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Lol man i guess for you but its a really good way seriously to improve dribbling speed and fitness Lol but its your choice works 4 me.