As MMA grows the evolution of boxing in the sport has also evolved. With the rise of wrestlers in the sport and the chances of getting taken down as a stand-up fighter is very likely. A lot of kickboxer and muay Thai fighters games has been negated because of the strong likelihood of getting taken down. Because of this we have seen boxing become one of the most effective ways to end fights. With the size of the gloves it is easier than in a boxing match to knock someone out.
Wilson Pitts, Combat Trainer boxing expert, developed a great video on how to effectively use the jab in MMA. Before he shows us this great technique for the use of the jab, he gives a brief history lesson on how George Benton trained his boxers to use the jab. Having a love for history, I loved watching this short piece and I picked up a lot of pointers on using the jab in my training.
The technique Wilson shows will help you slow down an opponent that likes to shoot and help you keep your distance to prevent it. So check out this great tutorial by Wilson Pitts, one of the best boxing trainers.
Tomorrow Fedor Emelianenko will be taking on Giant Silva in the Strikeforce Heavyweight Tournament. Coming off his loss to Fabricio Werdum it will be interesting to see how Fedor responds. I am thinking that he will be coming out to destroy Silva convincingly.
When I though about putting up some of Fedor’s training video, I was very surprised to see that there was actual stuff out there. Thinking about how he leads a pretty much private lifestyle I though it would be harder to come across some training material. But lucky for Combat Trainer I was able to find some!!
In this video you will see Fedor using different types of training to get stronger and more powerful. By the looks of things it looks as though Fedor had an outdoor training facility constructed for him and his team. I definitely would not be surprise if they used this strength training playground year round, even in the cold weather.
If you have never done any strength training outside, then this spring you should really get on it. I began incorporating a lot of outdoors training into my own training and it has not only made me stronger but it is also a lot of fun to train outside. So if you are looking to spice up your training get outdoors as soon as possible and train like Fedor.
Coming from a Muay Thai background. I was always taught to move forward. This has led to some not so fun combos to the face. As I have been working on my stand-up game I have begun to add some more footwork into my game. This has helped tremendously in my sparring. If you are a frequent visitor to the site you have noticed that I have some other trainers from specific disciplines posting tutorial on my site. One of those trainers is Wilson Pitts.
Wilson specializes in boxing. He is a great trainer of the sport and really knows his stuff. Wilson has been adapting the boxing style to MMA and it is worth your time to take a look at what he has to offer. I asked Wilson if he could do a tutorial on adapting footwork from boxing to MMA. Wilson came through and produced the video below. I am finding more and more as I watch MMA that footwork is becoming key in many fighters victories.
So check out the video below by Wilson Pitts. If you want to contact Wilson he can be reached vis email at wilsonpitts@yahoo.com and on Twitter @pluguglyboxing. Enjoy the video!
Nerdy opening, I know. Doesn’t make it any less true, however. It’s a great way to summarize one’s entire philosophy. When you set your goals, you have to do everything in your power to achieve them. If you want to win, losing is just another step in that direction. Remember, you are only defeated when you give up. But enough of the philosophy. You came here for some fighting tips/advice/talk/whatever and that’s what you’ll get.
I did have a reason for starting this article with my take on the philosophy on fighting. The very first step I take before preparing for a fight is getting in the proper mindset. I train my mind first and my body second. I make it very clear to myself that for the next six, four weeks or even one week (yes, I’ve taken on fights on such short notice), I will live, breathe and sleep fighting. This is the time when I put in the most work in the gym, both in the weight room and the ring. It’s not that I like cramming in all my work in the last days before a fight. That would be stupid. In fact, I work hard all year round both for athletic and for personal reasons. It’s just that then is the time when I have the proper mindset to really push my boundaries and re-discover what I’m capable of. And even when I’m resting at home, I will usually watch fights of my favourite fighters, like Ernesto Hoost, Buakaw Por. Pramuk and others, so that I can maybe learn a thing or two. Sometimes I may not even learn anything but it helps get me pumped for the fight.
When training for fights or just martial arts, it’s important not to let your strength training lag behind in favor of conditioning. A martial artist needs to be a very complete athlete. They need to be strong, conditioned, fast and durable. So, I hit the weights three or four times a week. However often life and recovery allow. Now, I’m in no position to tell you exactly how to train. What I can tell you is that you need to train hard but safely. And injured fighter isn’t really much use to himself. I may not be the biggest guy in the gym but I do aim to improve on a week to week basis. If I find my workouts harder than normal, I take a step back and take a look at my lifestyle. Have I had adequate sleep? Am I eating enough? Am I psychologically alright? The problem is usually something as simple as getting an extra hour or two of sleep and you’ll be fine. But don’t be afraid to seek advice if you find your strength lacking.
Another area a fighter must be fully aware of is his diet. Since most martial arts work with a weight class system, it’s to your advantage to be as lean as possible, so you’ll carry the most muscle for your weight and you won’t have unnecessary fat weighing you down. To melt away the fat is as simple as reducing your caloric intake below your BMR if you’re an amateur fighter that trains 2-3 times a week. For a more active individual, they could just eat up to their BMR and let the extra exercise take care of creating an energy deficit for the day. However, keep in mind that your mind will lead you to eat to cover that deficit. So, you have to be mindful of what you eat, how much you eat and whether you’re losing fat or not. I fight in the -74kg class because that’s closer to my natural weight and since I’m around 10% body fat most of the year, you can see how that could work in my favor in the fights. In fact, I’m usually the biggest guy in terms of muscle in my class and my opponents feel it.
Of course, what makes us fighter is the fact that we train to fight. I usually train three times a week doing kick boxing for an hour and a half each time but when I’m getting ready to fight, I’ll train five times a week for a total of 8-10 hours a week and I’ll add some more conditioning in the form of jumping rope and jogging. This lasts up to a couple of days before a fight. I don’t train the day before the fight because I want to be as fresh and as rested as I can be. Besides, an extra training session won’t make much of a difference at that point. It all becomes a mind game after that. UFC Welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre said it best : “Training is 80% physical and 20% mental but fighting is 20% physical and 80% mental”.
The most important thing to keep in mind is that everything is within your grasp. If you want to get stronger, you can do it. If you want to get leaner, you can do it. If you want to get better, you can do it. Well? What are you waiting for? Go out and get it!
About the author : Bill Pairaktaridis has been training in martial arts for the past 14 years. He found a passion for Shidokan Karate as a young boy and later for Kick Boxing as a teenager. He’s currently a silver medalist in the national level in Kick Boxing. He also has a great passion for health and fitness and maintains his blog at http://herofit.tv
By Wilson Pitts
You teach a youngster to box by teaching a set of principles and a set of fundamentals that support those principles. You give them the tools and you let them develop an instinct for fighting. They need to find their own way, hit and don’t get hit that is the game, give them the tools let them find their own process. Ultimately boxing is an art and each fighter must find a way to express himself in the course of a fight. No two fighters will do it in exactly same way.
You do not teach a cookie cutter offense and defense and have them “do ” them at each other. “Do a 1-2-3” no! A teacher shows them how to develop a flow, “don’t think feel!” The young fighter has to get out of their own way in order to enter into “boxing mode” flowing seamlessly from defense to offense and back.
A fight is like a symphony it has beginning, a middle section, and an ending. It is being written and played at the same time. A fighter must develop a sense of fight progression, have contingencies planned for each stage, and be able to change pace or tactics as the story unfolds. This requires mental focus, concentration, during the entire contest.
Inexperienced fighters don’t have this sense of the big picture, they can’t create on the fly, it is all happening too fast. It takes a lot of rounds to be able to write and conduct the symphony while it is happening and then change with the flow of the fight. This is called “ring generalship” and it really can’t be taught, it must be an instinct in a fighter. I recommend that you study early Sugar Ray Robinson fights to learn about dictating pace, rhythm, and control of the center of the ring against a skilled opponent.
An important part of ring generalship is an awareness of what the other fighter is experiencing, is he tired? Does the pace suit him? Is he hurt? Is he frustrated? Or is he in his comfort zone? What is his perception of how things are progressing? All of this must be taken into account in real time while the fight is ongoing. While this is where a good corner helps, the personal experience of the fighter is the key.
Trainers at Stillman’s Gym in NYC in the 30′s and 40′s developed the concept of the “defensive fighter” stressing balance, footwork, head movement, and angles as well as punching. The “dean” of those old trainers Ray Arcel said that the key to this idea of the defensive fighter was the coordination of head and foot movement that he called “slide and roll.” He taught fighters like Barney Ross to bend from the waist, roll under a punch, and slide over to a punching position where you cannot be readily hit while you get off with both hands. Reduce the amount you get hit, while increasing your offensive output, this was the defensive fighter.
Charlie Goldman had an entire chapter in the book, Boy’s Book of Boxing and Body Building, co-written with Rocky Marciano, on the defensive fighter. He even used some of the same terms that Arcel used.
In the book Goldman said,” A skilled defensive fighter is usually the product of long and intensive training. Too many of the offensive boxers you see today are green, untried youngsters who do little more than throw a barrage of reckless punches. The skilled, careful boy knows that slipping punches is also part of the skill of self-defense.”
In Chapter 6, “How to Begin”, after the section on how to make your own heavy bag, Rocky Marciano says;
“When everything that can be said about boxing has been said, one fact will stand out above all the rest: the best boxers hit more and get hit the least. This refers not only to the number of punches, but also to the strength behind them.”
It is this simple fact that a beginner needs to grasp first before going on to learn the art of self-defense.
By Wilson Pitts
Boxing uses interval training. You do an exercise and raise the heart rate and then you stop or slow down and let it return to normal, then repeat. The trainer adjusts the number of intervals, the duration of each, and the intensity, and also the amount of recovery. It is a dieing art and science that has been applied to the training of race horses, greyhound dogs, and fighting dogs, as well as boxers and wrestlers.
Boxing training also uses rope skipping and shadow boxing in what today would be called plyo-metrics training. These exercises, often done on a sprung wooden floor, developed a light, bouncy step, and improved lateral movement and agility. They provide another type of interval at the same time they improve your fighter’s quickness and balance. The conditioning and the agility program work together. These basic training methods are used with the beginner along with core development through abdominal training and later bag punching.
Over training is a very real problem for fighters and the effects are just as bad as not training enough. The old trainers were able to adjust rest and recovery intervals to bring a fighter in at peak condition on a specific date. Many of today’s fighters “leave it in the gym” by over training. Overtraining is brought on by doing the same workout too many times, this is called “staleness.” The fighter does a high intensity interval and doesn’t even breath hard, he has done it too much. Make him do something he is not used to and he will gasp for breath like he didn’t train at all. When a fighter is stale he acts listless in sparring, bored in camp or the gym, and often does not sleep well. This is very similar to the effects of under training.
The old guys could detect overtraining by a change in the fighter’s body odor or by a lack of sweat when they were doing a workout. Today we look for elevated at rest heart rate, as well as irritability and the other signs, as an early warning sign of overtraining.
Not resting enough when undergoing heavy training is another cause of overtraining. Boxers need a lot of sleep, in bed by 9 at night and at least an hour nap during the day. Over eating can also bring on many of these symptoms because of too much stress put on the body from training and eating too much. The body does not get to rest between workouts because it is digesting. Often fighters try to compensate for feeling stale or bored by eating more. This is a mistake even in heavyweights who don’t have a weight limit and think they can eat anything they want. No snacking between meals, no meal replacements, and no eating after dinner. Charlie Goldman used to search Rocky Marciano’s room for food The Rock would stash and eat in the middle of the night.
So the big movie that just hit the screen is The Fighter starring Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale. The movie is based on former boxer Micky Ward and his brother and also a former boxer Dicky Eklund. As you may know Micky Ward was a warrior inside the ring and is known for his three epic wars with the late Arturo Gatti.
So I was able to get a babysitter and have a great date night with my wife and we headed out for dinner and the movie. Now usually I go to a movie and just relax and get my mind off of everything. But something happened to me as I was sitting there, I was pulled some lessons from the movie. So this is what I took from the movie and what I had read about it.
Lesson One
The first thing I learned from the movie is the way in which actor Christian Bale portrayed Dicky Eklund. From all the sources I read they said his portrayal was right on. Bale is known for really getting into the roles he plays. He actually becomes the person he is playing. For this role he had to lose about thirty pounds. Now that is dedication and it is not the first time he has lost considerable amount of weight in order to play a movie role. This type of dedication is exactly what any body trying to become a professional fighter needs to be successful. If you wan to be a pro fighter you need to act like one. You need to put in the training hours no matter how tough your current life is, you need to eat like a combat athlete and you need to act like a professional.
The dedication you put into your career will reflect what you get out of. I am sure that Christian Bale will be probably receiving best supporting actor this year. His way of being a professional actor is what separates him from many other actors out there in Hollywood. So now it’s time to assess yourself and become rededicated to becoming the fighter you want to play.
Lesson Two
Have you ever had a dream? Well I think we all have dreams of doing something and if you are on my site and reading this your dream may be to be a fighter of some type and even a world champion one day. Before I headed out to the movie I picked up the recent issue of Sports Illustrated and read about the movie. I had read about how Mark Wahlberg had been interested in getting this movie on the big screen for years. For many reasons it had been turned down constantly. However Wahlberg never quit on the idea of getting this story out. Finally he was able to find a way to get the story of Micky Ward out there. Wahlberg’s constant push and never say die attitude is what helped him prevail in his fight.
The same as in the movie Ward never quit on his dream. Overcoming many different obstacles Ward pushed through them all making many decisions along the way that helped him one day win a world championship. What you need to take from this movie is to go after your dream, make the tough decisions and stand by them. You will see never quitting and pushing on no matter how down you may feel will one day lead to big things. So if you want to be a world champion one day then be patient and your hard work will pay off.
Lesson Three
The last lesson we can all take from The Fighter is one of my personal favorites. Now during the movie Ward knocks out an opponent with some vicious body shots. At that moment all I could think about was former great Bas Rutten and his awesome liver shot. So yes the last lesson is go to the body early and often and finish it off with a LIVER SHOT!
Like with all weeks leading up to the big UFC cards I am on the prowl for some good training video’s from the fighters that are on the card. I have been on the lookout for some good George St. Pierre training video but instead came across a great interview done for UFC.com.
Since I am out to help many of those trying to break into the sport or those looking to get to the next level I pulled a few key points from this interview that will help with your fighting career. When you want to be great at something you look to the best and figure out what they are doing and how they prepare, Take the knowledge you gain from these top notch people and then tailor it to you.
In this interview with GSP for his upcoming fight against Josh Koscheck he talks about using the knowledge he gained and putting it all together. There are a couple of important messages to take from this interview. One was getting out of your comfort zone. Many fighters continue to train with the same team and with the same training ideas fight in and fight out. This may work for a while but eventually it will fail a fighter. The more often you take yourself out of comfort zone the more likely you will succeed in a fight. In a fight there is no comfort zone so the more you are used to being out of it in general the better fighter and person you will become.
Another important point I picked out is all the different people he trains with. This gives him an advantage because he is now a wealth of knowledge and he knows how to put it all together. GSP invests in himself and his pursuit for greatness. This investment in himself has made him the dominant fighter he is today. So if you are an amateur trying to make it or you are trying to get to the next level in your career, then make the investment and watch how successful you will become.
In the old days the perfect cross training for boxers was considered to be sawing wood and splitting wood with an ax. There was wisdom in how they cross-trained fighters in the past. Boxers were put to work clearing land and building fences when they were not training. General construction work such as lifting, digging, sawing, hammering was done by fighters laying off from boxing training because it kept them in shape. Outdoor work kept them in shape while not doing the repetitive movements of boxing training. It kept their weight down during off periods but didn’t over train their arms and shoulders.
Now a days? No fighter wants to work at all, and almost none of them have done hard work, physical labor, before they begin over training in the gym. They do not have that foundation built by doing daily hard work outdoors. During World War II Rocky Marciano served as a combat engineer. “We were the Army’s ditch diggers.” Rocky declared in an interview in Sport Magazine. This was his conditioning base when he turned pro after getting out of the Army.
Charlie Goldman once trained Marciano for a fight for six months. Three months of heavy lifting, farm work and walking. Rocky Marciano wanted to walk/run five miles out and five miles back after EVERY MEAL! Then they did three months of regular boxing camp. Goldman did not have him lift at the same time he boxed, he didn’t punch anything for the first 3 months while he lifted stones and split wood. In the famous book Training for Boxing by Nat Fleisher there is a picture of Marciano down in a pit throwing 40lbs stones up out of it. That work provided a deep training base for the boxing training which was much more aerobic, consisting of running and punching but no lifting. This creates deep reserves to fall back on during the hard training to come. Rocky never seemed to get tired in fights that was because he trained hard but did not leave it in the gym.
Goldman had strict discipline in camp, Rocky only spoke to his wife and reporters through a chain link fence, lights out at 9pm, no food between meals or after dinner. Charlie Goldman said that the only trouble he ever had with Rocky in camp was that he wanted to do too much roadwork. He had to reign him in to prevent him from over training.
Now fighters go to camp for only a few weeks and they routinely lift and then go the gym and try to spar when they can hardly use their arms right. The type of strength training that a boxer needs is not the same as bodybuilding at all. The legs and core of a fighter have to be trained to perfection. The desired result is a lightness and quickness on his feet.
Pop Foster was an old school trainer who managed and trained welterweight champion Jimmy McLarnin through his entire career, from age 16 fighting in five weight divisions. In boxing training he had McLarnin train speed of hands and feet, and there was an emphasis on not over doing it. Though he was criticized for his methods in the New York press of the time, Pop brought McLarnin in on weight and in peak condition time after time.
Foster had McLarnin row a boat and pull fishing nets during planned lay offs from boxing training. He used to have McLarnin fast on juice for a week after big fights and take off six months at a time after several fights in a row. This was to prevent him from muscling up from too much repetitive training. Too many of the same workouts would have caused him to go up in weight and lose his snap. Foster had him row a boat and run and not do any boxing at all when they would go back to Vancouver during the summers.
Reaction time in sport can be the determining factor in winning or losing. Split seconds and the reactions of the athletes in those moments have made many champions in all sports including MMA. Hell reaction time won me a few touch football games back in my younger days. Hey even the time I flipped over my handle bars going down a hill my reaction time was necessary as I need to find a way quickly not to let my head smash into the pavement. If that were today I really would not have needed to learn how to fall cause I would have my mandatory helmet, kneepads and elbow pads to protect me.
I have been incorporating some gymnastics into my training and seeing how it transfers to combat sports. While doing some of these drills I found that my equilibrium as well as my kinesthetic awareness was a little off after performing forward rolls and cartwheels. After watching some MMA fights and seeing that some of the fighters end up rolling around in a scramble just to come up and get rocked I decided to add a dimension of fighting to the gymnastic drills. In the Brock Lesner, Cain Velesquez fight you saw Lesner get rocked a bit and do a backward roll into the cage. As he came up you could see that he was uncertain of what to do. This drill may help aid in that kind of fighting situation.
Now you will need another person to really get the reaction time training as well in this drill. The second person will call out punch combinations as you come up to your feet after performing the specific gymnastic move. The key is some simple punch and kick combo’s. The reason behind this is because in a fight the basics are the most important especially when you are tired and or rocked from a punch. Remember do not have the combinations predetermined. As you will see in this video I will mess up one combo a bunch of times. Do the same combo until you get it right so the basic become second nature. Plus these are some good outtakes, watch as I almost crash into my daughter. Another key is to have the partner call out the combo either as you are getting up or in the last rep of the specific gymnastic move you have chosen to do. Go give these a try and see how you improve in kinesthetic awareness as well as reaction time.
