Direkt zum Hauptbereich

Status Update November 2nd 2015

Time for an update, I guess.



A week ago, while attending a [Luta Livre] workshop with Daniel D'Dane (watch the video above for some info on that guy. Note that obviously, it's not the workshop I've been to.), I ruptured the extendor tendon in my left pinky finger. No big deal, but then again, the doc says 16 weeks no grappling or boxing. Now that's a big friggin' deal. Especially since we're about to go fight in [Poland] again. Great. Another tournament where I'm sidelined and just attend as a coach. Well, nevermind, though, since four of my youngsters are going to compete, so there'll be quite some work for me anyway.

Ok, now what do I do with no boxing or grappling? Pout and sob - a lot. But when I'm done with that, I'll be going to work.

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are
    --Theodore Roosevelt



I can still kick, so that's what I'll be working on. No rocket science here. I can shadow box and I can work on my stepping, so low-intensity cardio is taken care of as well. Heck, I can even hit the heavy bag, as long as I use only kicks and my right hand. Also, there's a lot of ground-based skills I can practice without gripping anything - stuff like the compass drill, inverted guard, shrimping, etc, does always come in handy when things go to the ground. Watch the below video, maybe it'll inspire you to try movements you've never done before.



Strength-wise, I just went through a somewhat bastardized version of [Pavel's] [Power to the People!] program. I say bastardized because I really didn't do a pushing movement, just deadlifts and lots of core training. Sometimes, I tossed in a couple of bent presses or TGUs and I have to say, I love the TGU. The bent press, not so much. Anyway, I'll just run through another PTTP cycle, this time with [weighted Push-Ups] (just did my set of five with 45kg worth of plates on my back, and it felt medium-easy) and [hip thrusts]. I just wish I had chains to spice things up (everything's better with heavy-ass chains), but I'm fine with the basics as well. Now while I definitely prefer deadlifts over hip thrusts, being able to hip bump and [upa] somebody pays off bigtime when it comes to grappling. Hence, you could almost identify that movement as a sport specific strength exercise (as opposed to a general strength exercise). Note that I've used the word almost...


Since push-ups are much easier on the CNS than heavy deadlifts, I'll probably add some [Naked Warrior] style [GTG] with single arm push ups and pistol squats as well. Now there's quite some controvery regarding The Naked Warrior, with people [rejecting the pistol] for being too technical and the single arm pushup for being too hard. Also, there's people [questioning the whole RKC community], pointing out that most of the books may be considered fiction rather than science. This latter argument may probably be made, but then again, my personal experience shows that GTG works, so what the hell. As for the first argument about the technical demands a pistol places on the practicioner, I'd like to call bullshit on that one. I'm a fighter, my world revolves around [strength skill]. Whatever strength I cannot use in a complex situation is rather useless. On the other hand, the argument can be made that the pistol squat does not carry over well to any athletic endeavour, with the spine bent and all that. That's ok, though, as I'm rather looking for a way to restore and maintain my ankle mobility, an issue that suffered badly after my judo accident (where I basically ruptured every bloody ligament in my ankle and suffered severe bone bruise). Hence, the pistol squat it'll be.

I'll serve the next update (and some video of the fights) right after we return from Poland, so stay tuned!

So long,


don't get hurt

Kommentare

Beliebte Posts aus diesem Blog

Happy new year

I wish you all a happy new year. Photo by camera slayer, found on flickr.org For me, the year won't start particularily good, I guess. On january 7th, the doc will put my foot into plaster again. This time, it's 4 weeks. After that, we shall see further. Now on the one hand, this is significantly screwed up. Gone are my plans of doing a max strength program to begin the year. Also, as a professional trainer, not being mobile at the beginning of the year means a serious handicap to my marketing actions. Novembet through February are, after all, the best months for any sports school, finance-wise. Also, I need to make up for all the losses my second studio has produced over the last year anyways. Instead of recovering financially, I'll now have to pay an instructor to teach my classes. Great. Not to mention all my plans of offering more classes at my Dojo. They're most definately put on a halt at the moment. As you can see, from a business point of view, my situation is s...

Thoughts on S&C: Assess, don't guess - Athletics @ Shinergy[base] Vienna

  Disclaimer: This one's going to be a bit lengthy, so I tried to include as many videos as possible to keep things fresh.  Since December, 2014, I'm in charge of the athletics class we run at the Shinergy[base] here in Vienna. In a nutshell, the athletics class is pretty much a functional strength class for small groups. In contrast to other systems out there (which all have their benefits in their own sense), out athletics class follows a simple periodization and is preceded by an individual assessment of each athlete. Our assessment usually doesn't take as long as, say, a full [FMS] , but then again, we screen for the selection of exercises we're actually planning on employing in the current program. This means that, although it might be beneficial for general health or long-term improvement of a functional movement base, there is no pressing need to screen for overhead competency if the plan calls for a horizontal upper body push. We can ḱeep our initial screens...

PUT Opole Open 2015, Part I

So over the next couple days I'll post the videos of our fights at the Opole Open 2015. I have to say, the [PUT] people really did a good job on organising the event, and while international participation was a bit lower than usual, the level of competition was awesome. What I like most is the non-dogmatic approach these guys take. Most schools offer both Taekwondo and Kickboxing, some also do other styles such as MMA or even Krav Maga. As long as they adhere to the rules, everyone's welcome to fight. Contrast this with the rivalry and bad blood that dominates the martial arts world here in Austria. For example, I've once witnessed all participants of the [WKF] being barred from entrance to the [OEBFK] national championships due to inter-federation rivalry. Needless to say, the level of competition suffers from stuff like that. Now you could argue that the situation in Poland is different in that there's no competing federations from the same style involved. ...