Fitness/Conditioning (?)

[superfoot]

I find the first form very useful for developing my "inner strength" (?) and the other forms useful for training ging and explosive power blabla. However I find them lacking for cardio/fitness/conditioning, am I plain wrong or do you guys do additional 'exercise' routines in your own time, or go to the gym.

I personally like body weight exercises and do funky varieties of press-ups and like to do squats/ hardcore ceilings to floor and suchlike for my legssss.

Do you train specific muscles/muscle types and why?

I generally try to train my core muscles and the 'fast twitch' muscles.

How do you think exercise time can be best utilised?

Do you think taking hits and conditioning the body is a productive use of ones time?

Do you think traditional forms of conditioning etc are outdated and inferior to new scientific methods?


Lets discussssssssssssssssssss...

[Dan]

Since iv been working i haven't been doing as much Wing Chun as I had hoped but i do try to go to the gym at work most days. I run 1-2 miles each day which isn't much but im still working on developing my regime. i do that in 7-16mins. I then hit and kick the punch bad as much as my body/punch bag can take.

So from the obvious health point of view its good to exercise and the more fit you are the longer you can last in a fight if u need to (hopefully you shouldn't need to tho). But for me i have the extra motivation of wanting to be a good climber as well as martial artist.

I think sitting in stance (sil lim tao stance) is one of the best and quickest ways to train you legs. Which everyone should do for kicking power and to give them a strong stance.

Wing Chun dosent require strength or a large amount of fitness but i think it helps, toning your muscles will make them better at punching whether you do that but punching lots or doing a few press ups is up to u i guess.

[Tom]

Whilst we're on the topic, I really need to start getting in some sort of shape. Anyone recommend any particular exercises I should do in terms of cardio fitness?

[hpclub]

Hi guys,

There are some great ebooks you can download by Ross Enamait. Although specific for boxing his workouts are well reviewed and make a great deal of sence. Essentially he suggests that your workouts should include:

interval running
strength/resistance training
plyometrics for explosiveness
conditioning (circuits)
Skill Traing

He suggest that 5 mile steady jogs dont prepare you for fighting but you should focus on 800m, 600m 400m interval sessions - this gets your anerobic zone rather than aerobic.

Strength Training he suggest should focus on functional strength suggest and clean and press, and snatches which focuses on you using your whole body to rather than isolating muscle groups. Again this makes sense for fighting.

Plyometrics to develop fast twitch muscle fibres ie those used by sprinters rather than long distance runners. Plyometrics can use weights or med balls etc.

Conditioning is like circuits and can be like a circuit of burpees, press ups, squat jumps, fast skipping, bagwork again targetting your anerobic zone.

So the emphasis is on power and fitness preparation for fighting.

Anyway take a look - the best one to download is the boxers guide to performance enhancement. It's about 157 pages and gives examples of exercices routines, nutricion advice. If you cant download it I can e-mail it to you.

Hope this helps.

[hpclub]

Oh and by the way the interal running is

4 x 800m sprints (1 min rest in bewteen each sprint)
6 x 600m Sprints (1 min rest in bewteen each sprint)
8 x 400m sprints (1 min rest in bewteen each sprint)
10 x 100m sprints (1 min rest in bewteen each sprint)

try it - will have your heart bursting out of your chest but gets you fit.

[Dan]

cool ill try that in the morning, my current running method is warm up to about 10kph (on a treadmill) then sprint at 18kph for as long as i can then slow it back down and then when im rested sprint again etc. It will be interesting to see what just sprints with rests does, although i doubt ill be able to do all of the above its an enormous distance to be sprinting overall.

Also do you know what website to download the ebook from?

[rosenrot]

Ross Enamait is the shit: if you want to get in great shape follow his routines, but they are devastating if you push yourself, which as he states is half the battle. Ross also makes the importance of 'intensity' clear. As was said earlier, running at a steady pace for an hour won't be as useful as 20mins hard exercise. This is especially true for fighting.

Body weight exercises are as good as lifting weights, but more difficult to use to bulk up due to high reps/lower weight. If anyone knows different please tell me I'm wrong, but this is my observation from doing a lot of body weight stuff and gaining little weight compared to when I started going to the gym.

I don't do too much these days which is really nagging at me. I need to make the effort again. That said I do go through phases where I'll do a lot, plus MMA and training keeps me fit.

My routine when I can be bothered is to go to the gym and work on a muscle group (shoulders, chest legs etc.) then do a cardio routine followed by calisthenics/plyometrics on the next day. Continue alternating gym and cardio days, working a different muscle group each day in the gym. Do this for 6 days of the week and rest the spare day. It is very important to have a rest day, as without it your body won't be able to recover sufficiently (over-training). This routine builds muscle and burns fat on the alternate days producing good athleticism, fitness, strength and Spartan physique. You will see a visible difference in yourself after a couple of weeks doing this.

Also important in achieving good health are sufficient sleep - for recovery - and diet. I eat very healthily so even without a hard exercise routine I still stay in good shape (although metabolism plays a part in this). Eating well can also affect you mentally, as I will feel generally grumpy and lethargic after a week of eating badly and I'm fairly sure this is true for others as well. At the end of the day even if you do loads of exercise if you eat badly (or smoke) then you might as well not bother. A balanced diet is also important if you want to put on muscle. When I was lifting weights regularly two years ago I was eating 4 meals a day plus two protein shakes, but I saw that my friends who did not eat well did not put on the muscle that I did. Protein shakes did not help them as they are only really effective if taken with a good diet. Even with these excessive calories I didn't become fat as I burnt off the energy and utilised the protein, putting on 10-11kg (ridiculous I know, but seriously no roids...) from Sept '05-March '06. I have lost a lot of this now as my exercise has decreased and I eat less. This latter point is important: there's nothing wrong with eating lots when your burning it off, but be sensible and cut your intake when your routines decrease.

This is just a random collection of thoughts related to some of the posts, a bit off topic, but I hope it was interesting.

[hpclub]

Yeah Ive been doing his routine for 4 weeks now and its shifted the weight and increased fitnsess like never before. Sounds like a cheesy advert doesnt it.

His website is www.rossboxing.com/

But the ebook can be downloaded via file sharing application such as Bearshare or another similar one Limewire or Kazzaa. If your having probs I can e-mail.

[Togo]

I have a very strict routine which - with the exception of this past month due to a shoulder injury and work being a pain in the arse - i stick to religiously.

Mon - Weight lifting focusing on the upper body, this is mainly for strength and power, not got much if anything to do with wing chun but it comes in handy for a lot of other things, mainly preventing injuries in other sports.

Tuesday - Wing Chun, not apaticularly brutal training session in most classes if u don't count the horrible stances.

Wed - My favourite night, i mix things up with tons of different bodyweight exercises, and an amazing test known as the "body blast challenge" check it out on youtube folks, conditions ur core pretty damn well, and not a crunch in site. On weds i usually focus a lot on my core with crunches, planks etc. then the usual press ups, pull ups, body squats etc. then i'll do a couple of rounds of skipping and shadow boxing before pulling out the old bag and tearing into it till i either collapse or want to vomit.

Thursday - Wing Chun

Fri - Weights But this time focusing on the legs and lower back, squats, deadlifts, bulgarian squats, weighted calf raises etc. I stick this on at the end of the week because it usually takes a few days for the legs to recover.

Sat- usually my day off, will go to the pub and allow alchohol and takeaways to ruin all my hard work and deplete my testosterone levels ;D

Sun - Either run 10K aiming to beat my previous time, or will hit the track and do 10 sets of 100 m sprints, i rarely make it to 10 without puking or giving up.

I've been out of training for a month so i'm going to have to take at least another month to get close to pulling that lot out my ass but thats half the fun

[Tom]

My routine is generally as follows:

Wake up at 2

Get out of bed at 3

Think about doing some situps

Lie down for a while

Play on the Xbox

Eat something

Go to bed at 3am

Repeat.


Truthfully though, being unemployed has led to me getting into a really poor daily routine. I'm not eating like I should be (I'm not eating particularly badly, I'm just not doing enough to burn anything off), and not having any money (at this point in time, literally, hence why I won't be at training on Sunday...) has stopped me from being able to join a gym. The only real excercise I get is doing Wing Chun at weekends, and even that isn't particularly good for burning calories off.

Phil, you said pushing yourself is half the battle, and I agree, but I find the other half is motivating myself to actually do anything at all....

[Togo]

I know how you feel mate, motivation is hard, its always easier to continue a routine than to start one as well. All the motivation i need is a quick look around glasgow, there's enough fat balding breathless 30 year olds to do every city in the world their fair share. I don't want to end up like that. Nor do i want to end up with cancer or something sucky, which although exercise doesn't totally prevent it slashes your chances, plus heart disease and tons of other ailments. Also from a self defense point of view being relatively fitter than your average joe can help a lot, even if it's just having to outrun some wankers outside the local kebab shop on a friday night

As sad as this may sound i find buying a copy of men's health is kind of motivating, it lists tons of benefits etc to having a basic healthy life style, and shows you loads of good exercises as well as some not bad articles and recipes for some cheap and healthy food, and after a quick read of that i usually can't wait to hit the weights when i get home. It's nothing to do with the buff macho men throughout the mag. Honest...

J

[superfoot]

try adding it to your other routines, like do your exercises when your watching jeremy kyle or whatever (which i imagine you must do if your unemployed!!)

[Tom]

Yeah, I usually do a few sit ups whilst I'm watching TV. Jeremy Kyle or otherwise.

I think another problem I've got is that I don't really have any friends where I'm living at the moment, and it's always going to be harder to get motivated when you're on your own than it is when you've got someone you can train with.

Like you said Togo, it's easier to maintain a healthy routine than it is to start one. I think I just have to get over that initial hurdle of the first few weeks, until I start feeling (and seeing) an improvement.

[bigtouch]

ive gone to the gym since i was 11 and found that was a really good way to build up. for wing chun id deff recomend speed trainin with weights, not just throwin them around, lol, but treat each rep as more of a twitch for the speed muscles. i find that weights can only take you so far and can realy neglect your core muscle groups so boxing (especilt thai boxin as it used the whole body) is very good. as your tryin to build up strength with boxin make every hit as hard and as fast as you can.

lots of people go to the CV room in gyms and run for 30 mins or more but i find that this isnt the best way to use those machines, long distance running only builds up your heart and lungs and changes your leg muscles into slow twitch which isnt good for what you want to do, its much better to sprint train, high intencity short duration workout. this strips fat of if you have any, makes your legs much more powerful, fast twitch, and works your lungs and heart. i kno which sounds betta, lol.

thats bout all i can think of atm, as for morivation theres nothin i can recomend more that somone whos realy good at holdin boxin pads and workin out in genral, good competition and a regular gym buddy.

yay i did a long post, effort

Ez.

[Tom]

Yesterday I went on a 15 mile bike ride, and spent the rest of the evening doing push ups and sit ups whilst playing on the Xbox. I'm a bit sore today (although not in the places I was expectign to be), but feel all the better for it. This morning, I did another 50 situps, then rode another few miles, before walking to hospital for a physio appointment, which is about 4 miles round trip.

I have to say, I do feel a lot better for having done it. I just hope i can keep it up.