Ever since my Karate instructor turned to me and said “Dave, you’ve got to get strong” I’ve known that to be an effective martial artist or, in fact, athlete of any sort, we need to do some form of strength and conditioning. This was around 20 years ago. Yet, to this day so many instructors still tell their students not to strength train, instead telling them that endless sets of push ups, sit ups and running are enough.
This is not, never has been, and never will be the case.
You need to add in a structured training program if you want to be competitive, or even if you simply want to reach your potential.
Our own kickboxer, Chris, has just come to this realisation. After taking to strength training for the first time he recently had the best fight of his career, an easy win. He told me that he never felt as fresh, as explosive and focused. He was able to recover faster throughout the round, and so able to keep his punches sharp and accurate.
Chris had been training 3 mornings a week for 40 minutes to an hour, lifting heavy weights, performing hard circuits and high-octane cardio. He put on a small amount of weight but looked leaner and harder. When he attended his regular training you could hear when he was on a bag, his strikes echoed through the building.
After 6 weeks of strength and conditioning he became the fighter he always wanted to be. He had the skill, he had the speed, he even had power. But no matter how much running and skipping he did, he coud never go the distance, until now.
The entire training program he followed is detailed over on the Wild Geese Facebook page, in the notes section (here: http://bit.ly/cmmKW5) but over the next week I’m going to spend time at the keyboard and I’m going to write out a PDF document for download detailing the workouts that we used and also how you can personalise and vary them to suit your individual fighters needs. Hopefully this will allow you as a coach help better prepare your fighters and competitors. If you’re an athlete looking for that edge, this will be just that.
We called this training program “The fighters boot camp“, but really it is for anyone willing to work hard and push themselves to the next level. Here’s some of what goes on: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwarEQPuDMY&fs=1&hl=en_US]
The next Boot Camp starts October 11th. The eBook will be ready before then. Drop a comment if you have any questions.
Regards
Dave www.wg-fit.com