Lol I typed a long a$$ reply last night to this and my pc crashed so whilst in my lunch break ill type a shorter reply I have watched a couple of UFC;s and even train with guys that have appeared both on the TUF series and on the main events (if that counts for anything) and I have seen just as many guys lose to bad conditioning as I have to a strength deficit (how many guys gas after one 5 minute round…even in championship matches, heck on the TUF show how many guys gas during the first round, and this is despite the fact the guys do all those lactic circuits over and over, how many thai boxers do you see gassing after a single round? I have lost count of the number of guys I have seen survive a beasting in the first few minutes and then win as the other guy cant keep his hands up…. it happens alot Rooney himself started doing energy system training with his guys precisely because he saw one of his guys lose in pride due to conditioning, before that all he did was strength work and explosive work (he like a lot of S and C guys came from a football S and C back ground, which is not MMA) I have never said strength or explosiveness is not important (I consider MMA to be an alactic-aerobic event, short bursts of energy followed by longer bouts at a lower pace repeated for up to 30 minutes) what I have said is that aerobic conditioning is of equal importance, and when done in moderation (ie not to the level that endurance athletes take it) its not the strength killing monster its made out to be. It allows you to go longer and stronger before going lactic and when you do have to use the alactic system it allows you to recovery quicker (due to the role aerobic enzymes play in the removal and recovery process) Now since the lactic systems cant really be improved much, most of the studies I have read and seen referenced show both a big genetic role in the lactic system and a peak from training after only 4 or 6 weeks (where after even increasing load does not produce an increase in capacity) and since its training is hugely taxing on the CNS and hormonal systems in general, not to mention a lot of MMA training is anaerobic, short rounds on the pads and bags, clinch work, takedown work, shark bate work etc then throw in the fact heavy lifting is very anaerobic, and I don’t really see the need to do too much of this type or work outside of normal classes, and when you do only for a short 8 week block. Now since the aerobic system does show a big ability to be improved: both in terms of power output and capacity; studies have shown a real ability to both drop resting heart rate, heart rate recovery and average working heart rate substantially which are all signs of big improvements in aerobic capacity, and also we can see big improvements in power outage at threshold heart rate (a sign of improvements in power outage before going lactic) , This coupled with the fact aerobic training is not as taxing on the bodies systems (indeed it can aid recovery) and can be done whilst in a calorie deficit (dropping weight) easily enough make it a good tool to use What you would see if you put your HR monitor on during sparring would be where you spent most of your time during the fight and this would show you which energy system you were using: what you would see if you were highly anaerobic in your training is that you would reach a relatively high heart rate very quickly which you would not be able to sustain over the entire fight and thus you would gas relatively quickly, and during the break between rounds your HR would not drop that quickly, meaning you would start the next round still feeling tired. what you would see as your aerobic system improved was a slower increase in HR and a working HR that was slightly lower (around your threshold) with peaks that went over it as you through bursts of punches or tried for a takedown and used the alactic system, this would then fall back into using your aerobic system and this pattern would be repeated over and over, you would see that you would be able to maintain this level for a much longer time, not to mention during your 1 minute break you would see your HR drop substantially so you would be able to start the next round fresher Now of course its not as cut and dried as all that, training for MMA is probably the most complex sport there is: and depends greatly on your strengths and weaknesses and your game plan, the length of the fight and your opponent, I just don’t think a sport that can last between 10 and 30 minutes (that’s not taking into account the pre fight warm up and the effect nerves has on the body and your heart rate) can be classed as anaerobic, its simply biologically impossible given what we know about the body
just to get back to the question of whether running is worthwhile as opposed to other things. i'm sure that the people who have posted here have done a lot of great research on modern methods. but for me, running gives me the best bang for my buck, so to speak. here's why i really like running... great cardio workout. really helps me improve my wind for martial arts, or whatever i'm into. keeps me slim. ~1000 calories an hour for my weight at 6 mph. add in interval training and faster speeds and the calorie-burning goes way up. toughens up my whole body. i feel like running toughens me up. my core, back (posture), arms, legs. just the act of running itself helps my whole body. maybe it's just the shock of pounding the pavement or something. i don't know, but i feel stronger all around when i run regularly. it's cheap. shorts, shoes. that's about it for equipment. and, you can just run outside in 99% of weather (i live in chicago, i run year round). it's easy. hey, some of the mentioned exercises look great. but i don't need to know anything about running except to get out there and do it. i don't need to worry about reps, resting, form, etc. now saying all that, are there potential problems with running? of course. i'm lucky in that i can run without effect on my rebuilt acl. but i can see that other people may have joint issues. running on a treadmill may help to alleviate. also, i've got good shoes and good feet. running will probably affect some peoples' feet more than mine. but i think overall, if i was going to give advice to someone who's obese and need to cut weight and get into better shape (as i have done, went from 230 to 190), the first thing i tell them is to watch their intake and run consistently because that has worked for me. if you factor in ease of use, simplicity, positive effects and efficiency, i don't think running can be beat. just my thoughts. i also do yoga pretty regularly so i have pretty good muscle all around.
I completely agree with the short bursts of energy surrounded by low intensity filler. I disagree that this makes a fight primarily aerobic, anymore than lifting is aerobic as I said in my last post. If I put 350lbs on the ground and lift it 3 times explosively then rest, and repeat another 5-9 sets, what would the heart rate monitor tell you? That my workouts are aerobic because they involve short bursts of energy with lots of low intensity stretching, activation, etc. in between? Wouldn't you be missing the fact that lifting weights is about the lifting of the weights, which is anaerobic? Are you not equally missing the fact that knocking the stuffing out of someone isn't about the time you spend dancing around feeling out your range and gauging their timing, but rather it's about those brief moments where someone tries to break your jaw with all the body-weight and explosive acceleration they can possibly muster? I don't care what energy system or heart rate zone someone is in while they dance around, they end the fight with their anaerobic system. It seems we place different amounts of emphasis on each aspect. I think that fighting revolves around those short bursts of energy, and everything in between is "filler" as I said. I imagine you have equal respect for someone who can knock a guy unconscious with one hit and a guy who can 'survive' for 3-5 rounds and pull off a split decision? I do not. I think one is a true fighter, the other is a little too sporty for my taste. You will not win a fight if you lose the ability to explode maximally, unless of course you last the whole fight and get the judge's points . In my opinion that's crap, and sign of a bad fighter with lots of endurance but no ability to end a fight. I imagine we disagree on this point as well? Make no mistake, I train in preparation for the real deal. When I was young, I got the stuffing beat out of me numerous times, and a real fight doesn't go on for many rounds Icefield, let me tell you. Great aerobic capacity would not have done jack for me, and it still wouldn't to this day. Not to say I don't have a great aerobic capacity, I just don't credit my fighting ability to how long I can dance around and recover. This is a bit silly if you ask me. I don't remember the last time I tried to put a training partner in the hospital. If I really went all-out in sparring, the fight would be over (for one of us) very quickly. It seems this entire debate can be summed up as Shane Carwin vs Clay Guida. Clay can dance around all night and never lose steam, but he hits like a girl. Who cares how long Shane Carwin can last? Nobody ever gets to see it because their face is beaten in by someone who is immensely stronger and more explosive than them. I imagine you would bring up his fight with Brock at this point, to which I would say that anyone, I don't care who, goes 100% for 20+ seconds and they're toast, regardless of their aerobic capacity. You see the same thing in the weight room: if you go to complete failure, it's nearly impossible to bounce back. It can be, but I wouldn't use this type. I utilize primarily eccentric-less compound movements performed for 3-6 seconds at max acceleration. This has almost no negative effect on the CNS, it doesn't induce much muscular damage, and it is not draining to the endocrine system either. It's metabolically fatiguing, and that's about it. You can do nearly as much as you can handle, and over time you can increase your explosive work capacity greatly. I'm sure those studies you referenced weren't using anything like that, but something a lot more dumb and less effective, which has no bearing on what I do or what I'm saying anymore than if I poked fun at running 10 minute miles for MMA (which you're not talking about either). All of this being said, I'd like to suggest a point that hasn't come up: more important even than aerobic capacity, I'd say that the ability to control one's nerves and avoid unnecessary muscular contraction (tensing up when it isn't needed) has more to do with how long you last than anything else. I think most guys gas because they can't handle the adrenaline, not because they didn't do enough aerobic work. Seriously, MMA is not in any danger of underemphasizing aerobic work. That's all I ever see or hear anyone doing. And then someone like Matt Hughes comes along, picks them up and slams their ass on the mat like they're a toy, and all of that endurance they built was for naught...
I read this the other day on T-Nation, and since Christian Thibaudeau was mentioned, I figured I'd share it with you guys for further discussion: http://www.t-nation.com/readArticle.do?id=1499282 In short, he suggests heavy lifting (to minimize muscle loss) as well as aerobics, sprints, and intensity training for fat loss.
And then BJ Penn comes along and hands Matt his backside until he gasses in the second or third round ) So if a fights both low and high intensity with most of the time spent in the lower heart rates then if its not alactic aerobic then what is it? (and given the fact that aerobic system plays a large part in aiding recovery in the alactic system and that studies I have listed on this forum before show even events of less than 1 minute are almost 50/50 anaerobic and aerobic how can you say its not an important area to train?) As for the heart rate monitor and heavy lifting, unless you are sparring/clinch training between each set of lifts and not resting then its not a good analogy….and if you did do that without a good aerobic system you would not complete more than a few sets, just as in MMA if you got the change to throw a heavy combination and rest completely for three minutes before throwing again you wouldn’t need a good aerobic system, unfortunately fighting is not like that I think MMA is in danger of underemphasizing aerobic work and over emphasizing anaerobic (at least if you listen to on line trainers who have never trained anyone, like Waterbury for instance) and without that aerobic work you wont be able to recover once you have gone lactic and will get picked apart in the second round (carwin anyone) but hey we will have to agree to disagree And its not that I don’t like to see knock outs or that I love a 5 round fight, it’s simply the reality of the sport, fights might end in the fight minute, or they might go the length of the fight and if your putting all your eggs in one basket like carwin did against lesnar you might be setting yourself up for a fall
I never said it wasn't an important area to train. I thought it was clear we both agree that aerobic endurance is important as well as maximal strength and explosive work capacity. I'm sure we'd agree that mobility, tissue quality, and body composition are all important too, no? What I've been contending is that they're nowhere equal in importance. My argument has been that if you take someone who prioritizes their strength and power work over their aerobic work, and then they fight someone who prioritizes their aerobic work over strength and power work, the more powerful and explosive person is more likely to win, all things being equal. You seem to blow off my examples of Hughes and Carwin because Hughes gassed in a big fight (and some others, yes) and because Carwin gassed after nearly ending a fight (trying a bit too hard to do so if you ask me) and lost for the first time to someone bigger than him who is currently the best MMA fighter out there (not pound for pound, no). Hughes was easily one of the most dominant fighters EVER in the sport. He would throw guys around like they're nothing, and he often looked like was fighting people in a lower weight class because the strength difference was so severe. If you think that's all irrelevant because he gassed a couple times, I think you're missing the big picture I'm trying to paint. Carwin had a long undefeated streak and ended his fights within the first round in devastating fashion. Did you see what he did to Mir from against the cage? It was sick. You honestly think he would be able to do that if he spent an equal amount of time and effort developing power and developing aerobic endurance? As for heavy lifting compared to MMA, you seemed to miss the point of the analogy. I wasn't contending that they're the exact same activity on the physiological level. The point I was making is that one needs to consider the goal of the activity, not simply the distribution of energy system work. You seem to think, like a lot of runners, that the goal of a fight is to still have lots of energy after everything is said and done. Many people train tons of long distance aerobic work for races because they reason that it's an endurance event, so they just need to be able to endure. They forget the point of a race is to get to the finish line faster than everyone else. Whether you can keep going after than is completely irrelevant. You seem to forget that the point of a fight is to destroy the opponent. While aerobic endurance is important for having sufficient opportunity to do so, it's rather silly to me that you would argue it's equally important to actually being able to develop huge explosive force. So before you misread me again: both are important, but a guy who is much stronger and more explosive has an advantage over a weaker guy who can recover faster. Not always, but in general. That's why Hughes did so well. That's why Carwin's fights almost never went to round 2. And that's also why Brock was able to beat Carwin: a lesser man would have succumbed to Shane's flurry of blows, no doubt. That's why there are weight classes: these are for all intents and purposes STRENGTH classes. You don't put 150lb fighters against 200lb fighters because while they MIGHT be able to dance around and pull off a decision, it's more likely they they'll be dominated by the stronger fighter. But honestly Icefield, I'm finding it harder to take you seriously, especially after that dismissive comment toward Waterbury, who's very respected in the industry by his peers. Do you train more people than Waterbury? Have you been in the trenches longer and have the perspective from which to be so dismissive? Or do you simply dismiss anyone who doesn't agree with the articles and coaches you follow? Do you not see the irony of dismissing the "online trainers" when from what I can see you're just an online debater?
my comment abouts waterbury is a result of him writing a programme for MMA over at T nation yeas ago and validating it by claiming to be rickson gracies strength coach , and then it coming to light that all he ever did was hold a free training session at ricksons gym when rickson wasnt even there No irony its not that i have a blinkered view, i trained that same way for years before switching to the way i currently train, i find the sceitific rational behind it compelling, not to mention the fact that its how fighters have been getting into shape for decades and i find it hard to believe that they are training incorrectly but just dont know any better......i personally think theres a reason that fighters from different combat sports all ended up training in a similar fashion because through a process of elimination they found it worked I'll leave the thread how so others can have some fun One last comment by example was not of hughes, who has great skill explosivness and stamina, but of his opponent Penn, who had great skill and explosive striking but found he lacked the conditioning to make it count in his fight with Hughes past round 2, that was all
I didn't intend to chase YOU off Icefield, but I make no bones about wanting to chase off those dismissive comments toward a very respected coach who has contributed much to the field for many years. I see now I misunderstood your comment about Penn vs Hughes, my bad. I would say that Penn really isn't that explosive though, at least he wasn't in that fight. Had he been more so, I think he wouldn't have needed to find out if he could last 2+ rounds. His last fight with Hughes is what I mean: when he truly went in for the kill, endurance wasn't even a factor. One shouldn't put ALL eggs in the strength/power basket, but it can only help to take a few out of the aerobics basket and put some extra into being able to hit someone so hard they have to ask their corner "What happened?" like Hughes, who thought that Penn kicked him he hit him so hard!
no problem its just i think we will have to agree to disagree about this, i cant see either of us changing the others minds and i think we both have posted enough for others to make up their minds (probably too much lol) As for waterbury well we will have to disagee on his worth, I remember his hammer down articles that he wrote in 2006 where he stated it was what he used to train top level MMA fighters, and then when the likes of adam singer, Liam Bauer (guys who train fighters for a living) pointed out his programme was not written by someone who actually trained fighters because they were so unrealistic (like saying a 3 x bodyweight deadlift was a good starting point for a fighter), alot of stuff came out in the woodwork as far as i remember, like his claims of being ricksons school offical S and C coach being called bull by guys who actually trained at ricksons school (who pointed out all he ever did was turn up and offered to run a free fitness class which was cancelled pretty quickly), to his list of fighters actually coming down to 1 named mid level fighter who he met in 2007, after writing the said articles. Note im not saying he is a useless coach, what i am saying is guys like him who jump on the MMA band wagon without actually training fighters are the problem, alot of coaches come into MMA from a football background and assume the same goals are needed, increase strength and power and you are done, then alot of them come to realise its a different sport to football with different needs, this happened to rooney, to jamison and to others as well As for Penn in his last fight endurance wasnt a problem for penn, and thus he managed to finish hughes quite easily, as he did jens as well, since not much had changed in Penns training other than working on his endurance i wonder what role that played in his being able to display power in the later rounds for the first time ever, who knows Anyway thanks for the fun debate
I agree, and I think that's an important point you make here. I couldn't help but point out the irony of you misquoting a section from Chad's article that he said himself he was sure would be taken out of context You'll notice in those articles you mention that he states very clearly that even if you can lift a double wide trailer, you're dead if you step into the ring without sufficient endurance & mobility. Not exactly the "Strength and power only!" that you seem to infer from both his and my statements. Out of curiosity, have you tried any of Chad's programs in earnest, ever? Not necessarily just his MMA ones. Aside from the misquoted 3x BW Deadlift, is there anything else you find "so unrealistic" about his programs? Do you write programs for people for a living? I have enjoy discussing with you very much Icefield, and I hope I didn't give the impression otherwise.
lol sorry i referenced the wrong article as i say it was a long time ago and my memories not that good, here is the original quote form his first mma over at t-nation yes i tried some of his stuff, i personally like working strength, explosive strength and strength endurance on seperate days and i sued his article to this effect a few years ago, i just dont think he actually understands the needs of MMA guys because he has not trained any (even though he implied he did) his endurance stuff was i remember alot of anerobic work (which as you know i dont really agree with!) Right im off this thread now (god how many times can i say that!)
so, the verdict: should we all go back to running in the mornings, stretching before exercise, doing jumping jacks and pressups, or not?
ooh burn. You know, I've yet to see a single criticism of crossfit that wasn't essentially based on character clashes (read: people being childish).
It was an interesting debate. I guess in the end it all depends what your goals are. Either train for maximum KO power or mix it in with better cardio so you can outlast stronger opponents and defeat them once they are winded.
i have a question....seeking some advice... i've put on a bit of baby weight again. by that i mean i've had a second child and haven't worked out as much and been eating out. just started bjj too. so i need a few things....drop ~25 lbs., get stronger and more explosive. yes, i have to control my diet. that i can do myself. but any advice on a training regimen for a busy guy? normally, i'd just start running and doing yoga again like normal. i've looked through socrastein's old posts too. but anyone else have any advice? thanks!
if thats the case you need to get out more because crossfit has been pulled apart more times than i care to remember
