Blending Practice with Conditioning

OK, so since my last few posts have been of the "Matt on a soapbox" variety, I figured it was about time I gave you some practical training advice.

I recently purchased a set of training DVDs by strength coach Dan John. Most people who are into heavy strength training, powerlifting, and/or Olympic Weightlifting have probably heard of Dan. Dan is a former competetive weightlifter and track and field athlete, and currently competes in the Highland Games (you know, that thing where the guys all wear kilts and see who can throw a heavy rock or log the farthest?). Those familiar with Dan John know him for his sense of humor, his salt of the earth personality, and his ability to very simply coach and convey seemingly complex skills like the Olympic lifts, particularly the barbell snatch.

Anyway, long story short, the DVD's were a steal at $39.95 for the set of three, and the content was excellent. I came away with a better understanding of lifting technique, learned some cool new exercises to play around with, and also some different ways to combine training methods into the same workout.

One such method that Dan talks about in one of these DVD's (can't remember which one) is something he stumbled upon when training for a competition. Wanting to both "practice" a certain throw (let's say, shotput for example), and also do some conditioning, Dan brought out his shotput and a kettlebell out to the field with him. He decided to alternate practice throws with sets of a kettlebell exercise. Throw...do a set...rest....throw again...do a set...rest...and so on. While the concept of mixing modes of training in the same workout (such as lifting and sprinting, or heavy bag work and calisthenics) was nothing new to me, the way Dan explained this concept definitely struck a chord.

As both a martial artist and someone who's passionate about working out, I often times am in a dilemma when it comes to making time for all of the things I want to practice or do for a workout. For example, here's a short list of the things I currently have on my list to practice:

(JKD) wooden dummmy sets, (Grappling) escapes from cross body, (Thai Boxing) clinching and kneeing, pistols a.k.a. one legged squats, handstands, muscle-ups on the gymnastic rings, kettlebell snatches, .........

Trying to prioritize and work all of these skills in to a training schedule is a difficult task. But, using Dan's idea of mixing skill training with conditioning work led me to come up with the idea of picking a few skills and exercises from my list and put them together into a circuit. Here's the one I did last Saturday after class:

5 Goblet Squats with a 70lb kettlebell (standing near the mirrors)
Shrimp down the mat (until I'm at the heavy bags)
5 curve knees each leg (on the teardrop bag)
5 round kicks each leg (on the 1st Thai heavy bag)
5 teebs each leg (on the 2nd Thai heavy bag)
fall down
1 Turkish get-up each arm with a 53lb kettlebell
jog back to start

REPEAT A TOTAL OF 5 TIMES

Here are a few ground rules/tips when trying this method of training out. The general idea here is to manage fatigue, not seek it. The point here is to practice, not to exhaust yourself:

1. Keep your reps low. You'll notice I kept the reps here at 5 or less per skill (even the "exercises"). The point is practice, not conditioning. That means, strive for perfect technique on every rep. Even strength exercises can be viewed as skills that need to be practiced, and you're more likely to do 5 perfect squats in a row than 10-20. Again, we're trying to manage fatigue, not seek it.

2. Take your time. As stated above, the more you hurry, the more your technique will suffer. The circuit above took me about 20 minutes to do 5 times. Given the number of reps of each exercise, that's not a very fast pace.

3. Limit (somewhat) the number of skills/exercises. The more skills you try to practice at once, the more confused your body/nervous system gets, and the less likely you'll make progress on all those skills. However, part of the idea here is to get practice on multiple skills in the same session in the interest of time. So, you might decide to pick skills that are simliar to each other (such as three different types of kicks, three ground movements, or three trapping combinations), or at least keep the number of skills low. I used 6 skills or stations in the above example, and I probably wouldn't want to go much beyond that. If the skills are particularly complex, I'd err on the side of practicing fewer of them in the same session. The above skills weren't all that complicated, so it's ok to do 6 different ones in one circuit.

I'm planning on instituting this type of training once a week and I'll let you know how it goes. Understand that this is not a replacement for training in class nor is it a replacement for my conditioning workouts. It's a great way to inject some variety in the training, recover from harder workouts, and get some worthwhile practice in a short time.

Give it a try.

What Size Fish Are You?

There is a lot debate going on in the martial arts on the virtues of competition-type training versus "traditional" training methods. For clarity, let's define competition-type training as sparring, especially high speed and/or heavy contact sparring. Let's put everything else: hitting pads, double stick patterns, trapping drills, etc. in the other category.

One of the virtues stressed by proponents of sport/competition style training is that, by continually testing your abilities against various other opponents, whether in the gym or in competition, you become aware of "where you're really at," which has great benefits for your character. These same folks would argue that, since most traditional training is "cooperative," you don't get the same feedback, which will inevitably will lead you to believe that you're "better" than you really are.

I'm not going to argue the values of one type of training versus the other in this post. My perspective is, as long as it's fun and you're improving, why not do both? Also, remember that improvement and success are not always measured by the number of trophies on your shelf or whether you tapped this person or that person out on a given day!

What I'd like to discuss is the supposed connection between training hard in a sport-type environment and developing character. While some would argue that the two go hand in hand, I would disagree, and I'll give two reasons for this:

1. I've met just as many, if not more, competitive martial artists (read "fighters") that were complete @$$holes as I have traditional martial artists who were @$$holes. And for the purpose of this article, I'll define an @$$hole as someone who you actually feel worse for having been around, rather than being uplifted or happy to know them.
2. If competing automatically ensured you'd become a person of higher character, then every NBA and NFL star would by that rationale be a model citizen. And we know that ain't true!!!

That being said, I do think that sport training does have beneficial aspects to one's character, and develops real-world skills in a way that pretty much no other single type of training can ilicit. But these benefits, in my opinion, are subject to the following caveats:

1. Sports are beneficial to character only in an environment wherein coaches, high level competitors, and less-experienced competitors value each other more than they value "winning." I won't elaborate on that one, I'll just let you marinate on it a while.

2. Using the "Big Fish in a Small Pond" analogy, unless the training group/team/school holds to the first caveat, you can pretty much guarantee that only the "big fish", i.e. the most genetically gifted folks, will improve at a high rate. The "small fish," on the other hand, will at best suffer frustration and the occasional humiliation, and at worst, they'll get injured and/or give the training up completely.

Having been a "small fish" in some circles and a "big fish" in others, I think I can lend a little insight into the best practices for each. Think about which one you are, answer each of these questions, and consider whether your behavior inside the gym accurately reflects your answers.

Big Fish:
What matters to you more? Winning or having good friends and healthy training partners?
When it's time to spar, do you look at it as a competition or a learning experience?
Do you only feel good about your training if you're "winning" at sparring? (i.e. tapping other people out, taking them down, hitting them without getting hit)
Do you typically feel crappy about your training if you aren't "winning" at sparring?
How many people have been injured sparring with you?
How many times have you been injured during sparring?

Small Fish:
What matters to you more? Winning or having good friends and healthy training partners?
When it's time to spar, do you look at it as a competition or a learning experience?
Do you only feel good about your training if you're "winning" at sparring? (i.e. tapping other people out, taking them down, hitting them without getting hit)
Do you typically feel crappy about your training if you aren't "winning" at sparring?
How many people have been injured sparring with you?
How many times have you been injured during sparring?

Now, if you're particularly observant, you'll notice that the list of questions were the same for Big Fish and Small Fish. And there is a reason for that.

The fact of the matter is, we all swim in different ponds in life (not just including the martial arts school). We're guaranteed that in some we'll be Big Fish, and in others, we'll be Small Fish. Whether we're a Big Fish or Small Fish in the pond, for that reason, really doesn't matter at all.

What matters is the experiences we have, how we treat each other, and the lessons we learn along the way.