Hello from Holland.
It's been a while I know, New Country, New Goals, New Ambitions
Some of you know I have been out with injury for some time and the road to recovery has been very stop start. I feel in my self that I can finally get into the swing of things once again and I am looking towards the new year to start some of my classes again.
I have found a great gym very near to where I live and even better news is the beach is 820 meters away.
I thought I would go back to basics and came across an article that I had written for Physique / MMA Magazine several years ago. I have republished the article below and the exercises listed will be my 90 day fitness routine so I can hit 2015 running.
ENJOY
Combat sports have always had a good following, but never before has it been so popular since the introduction of Mixed Martial Arts (MMA)
So what is MMA, well that depends on who you ask, at the top of the food chain you have organizations like the UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championships) who tell us
Mixed martial arts (MMA) is an intense and evolving combat sport in which competitors use interdisciplinary forms of fighting that include jiu-jitsu, judo, karate, boxing, kickboxing, wrestling and others to their strategic and tactical advantage in a supervised match. Scoring for mixed martial arts events in Nevada, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Florida is based on athletic-commission approved definitions and rules for striking (blows with the hands, feet, knees or elbows) and grappling (submission, choke holds, throws or takedowns). No single discipline reigns.
Judges score the contest bases on Effective striking, grappling, aggression and octagon control.
Over at the WCL (World Combat League) which also uses mixed martial arts and has a huge following with no other than Chuck Norris at the head or affairs. You won’t find any jiu-jitsu, judo or wrestling here, knockouts not tap outs are what you will find at a WCL event.
Then you dig around the world of MMA and you find popular events like K1, Cage Rage, Pride to name but a few. So with all these MMA styles and rules where do I start? You can start with the one discipline that every single competitor needs regardless of what rules you are competing under or who the organization you belong to, and that discipline is called... ‘CARDIO’
To put it in simple terms your cardio has to be off the charts, but that does not mean you have to have the cardio fitness of a marathon runner, your exercise program should be designed to develop core body strength, quick recovery and focused intensity. In MMA you need to sustain explosive bursts of strength with quick recovery time. You need a routine that gives you overall core body strength, some of the early mistakes fighters made was training for strength using body building routines, only to later learn that building excess muscles mass for the sake of building muscle mass was a disadvantage. The solution here is don’t train like a bodybuilder.
Fantasy Vs Reality
There are few athletes in the world today that can do both the mental and physical training of a mixed martial arts fighter, I always knew that with the popularity of the sport it would not be long before Hollywood came in for a slice of MMA action, however a word of warning about watching films and getting all pumped up about starting MMA, one of my all time favourite films was Rocky starring Sylvester Stallone, great movies but not very realistic training guides
Most of my training drills revolve around throwing a medicine ball in one way or another, and most gyms I know don’t take to kindly to you throwing them around, so the following training routine is offered to people just getting into mixed martial arts with an understanding that while reading this they may not have access to much gym equipment. (so there is no excuse not to get started today)
Remember I said you need to sustain explosive bursts of strength with quick recovery time. Try this no gym routine; each exercise is 30 seconds long, no rest between each change of exercise.
Push Ups
Three Sided Crunch
Hyper Extensions
Free Standing Squats
Body Pulls
Plank
Once completed that is known as circuit one, do this circuit a total of five times.
This is a great way to bank both cardio and test your mental toughness.
For those readers with access to a gym, give this a try on your next visit.
Treadmills are common in most gyms today, I like to give credit where credit is due and this conditioning drill came from season one of the ultimate fighter when the coaches started to evaluate the fighters. Levels 1 & 2 are a good way for you to warm yourself up while levels 3 to 6 can be used to evaluate your current level of fitness.
Level 1: Start off with walking at 5 km/ph for 5 minutes.
Level 2: Then increase to 6 km/ph for 5 minutes.
Level 3: Increase to 7 km/ph and light jog for 5 minutes
Level 4: Increase to 8 km/ph and jogging for 5 minutes
Level 5: Increase to 9 km/ph and run for 5 minutes
Level 6: Finally increase to 10 km/ph a running for 5 minutes
Total time 30 minutes (This was only part of the fighters 3 hour evaluation session)
Next month I will get into technique, so use this time until then to boost your cardio levels, no good having an F1 racing car (technique) without a full tank of petrol (cardio)
O.K. That was the article, now lets get too it.
