The Easiest Way to Increase Pitching Velocity. When I was going from 78 to 96 miles an hour, I did pull downs once a week. I also did either a mound velo day or a plyo velo day once more during the week. So why do I recommend high CNS throwing? There's a principle called the SAID principle, which stands for Specific Adaptations to Imposed Demands. Basically, the body responds to what it's exposed to. As cliché as it sounds, if you want to throw harder, you need to throw hard. And you need to throw hard often. If you're only throwing at low intent, there's no real stimulus. There's no reason for the body to adapt and start throwing harder. But when you're doing pull downs and you're able to throw even harder than you can off the mound, that provides the stimulus. You're telling your body that it needs to adapt to handle that level of intent and velocity. When I was throwing 96 miles an hour, I was able to pull down 100, 101, and 102. I was exposing my arm, my body, my muscles, and my central nervous system to those speeds. They had to adapt. And once those adaptations were in place, they carried over to the mound and helped me throw harder.