To Kill Or Not To Kill

[sanjuro_ronin]

It's also somewhat relative

Of course, intensity is 100% relative.
But to what?
Balls to the wall is intense for everyone and no one can do it for hours, even double digit minutes.
Hit the bag as fast and as hard as you can non-stop and IF you can do 5 mins you will be lucky.
That is, IF YOU DO IT that way.
I've seen people's idea of intense and it is pure, unadulterated, ****.
People naturally pace themselves, they can't help, and those are the ones that get so little of of those so called "intense" workouts.
If you can talk while training it is NOT intense.
If you don't have to stop to breathe, it is NOT intense.
People speak of Tabata's but very few have ever truly done them.
People speak of HIIT, but very few every do it.

[Lucas]

It's also somewhat relative. A 30 minute free roll session will be more intense for those who rely on brute force vs those you relax and use technique.

I can say, I'm usually spent after class. The "intense" part is the warm up usually. That will last for 30 mins, roughly. With about 7 to 10 of us switching to stations of various exercises for a certain number of reps.

Or we spend the time running laps but then bear crawl, crocodile crawl, jump, roll, etc. across the matt. Followed by circling and sprawls (burpees).

Then a water/**** break.

Then an hour of drilling. It's not intense. But an hour of arm bars, sweeps from half-guard, etc, being thrown... there's strenghth and conditioning involved there too.

Water/****

30 mins of free play.

On days with crushing warm ups sometimes we take it easier in free play. Sometimes we don't. But not exaggeration: all of our gis are soaked. When it's no gi. There's puddles on the floor.

Granted, this is training in Puerto Rico with no A/C. Full Gi, even in July and Aug.

this is pretty much just how we do it.

thats why i like the way our coaches run the warmup/conditioning. its all skill specific conditioning. not doing pushups or sit ups or what not, and its just enough to get your body ready to work hard. backrolls to handstand, shrimps, bear crawl, etc. and each drill is just from one end of the dojo to the other. but at the same time, the warm up drills change, depending on if we are doing that day, as in stand up or ground or working specific throws, escapes, etc. etc.

on a side note can i still be a kungfu guy if i dont train in a cma school anymore?

[Pork Chop]

Physical conditioning/exercises should be optional in MA class.

There are 3 different things we're talking about here:
1. pure strength & conditioning
2. live drills
3. learning new skills.

I think what I was trying to say in my rambling posts was this:
I can understand strength & conditioning being split from the martial art skills class, on the other hand, if I'm paying $150 a month for a 2 hour BJJ class consisting of 15 minutes of warm up, an hour and a half of learning technique after technique, and maybe 15 minutes of actual rolling, then it's a bit of a waste.

Strength & conditioning I can get that on my own time.

Live drills really do need to be done in class and they should somewhat simulate a live environment as far as intensity. This includes both refining technique (heavy bag, shadow) and refining application (sparring, defense drills); pad work tends to be a bit of both.

Learning new skills is the least physically taxing, and there are hard limits on anyone's ability to retain & apply new skills. Personally, I subscribe to the rule of 3s - as in 3 defenses/counters to each technique. Any more and you face a situation of having too many options, which slows your reaction time. That would cut down on the total number of techniques taught. As far as limiting the number of techniques taught at once, learning three new techniques at a time is more feasible than 10.

[Pork Chop]

People speak of Tabata's but very few have ever truly done them.
People speak of HIIT, but very few every do it.

I may be guilty of this, but I don't think so.
I mention tabatas in my blog, but the truth is, in the fitness classes I've been doing, we don't stick to a single protocol throughout the whole workout.
Sometimes it's tabatas (20seconds on, 10 seconds off), other times it's more like Taku's general fitness recommendations (30 seconds sprint, 1 minute active rest), other times I don't see any method whatsoever; it just hurts.
Usually I'm so burnt after 1 hour that I can barely drive home.
It makes me laugh at the idea of spending so many hours in the gym before.
Used to pride myself on being able to do things in conditioning that the people around me couldn't.
Now I know better.

Sad thing is, the ability not to gas in a fight is much more dependent on having the mental capacity to stay relaxed than anything I'm doing in the fitness classes. You're right, experience is cardio - it's knowing that truly good cardio is all about efficiency. I'm mostly doing these workouts for weight loss.

[Ray Pina]

Really good points by Pork Chop and Sanjuro regarding nerves, outside factors and conditioning.... pretty good thread. Interesting to read everyone's take.

Also, age is a factor. I was training balls to the walls up to about a year ago. Now with getting married and a shoulder injury that just won't go, I've slowed it down. But if I had an 18 year old son, he'd better be on the matt breaking his a$$.

There's no feeling like that spent, peaceful zone after training when you just sit back against the wall, too tired to even put water in your mouth right away.

Anyone have kids? When did you introduce them to training? How did that go?

[Indrafist]

Really good points by Pork Chop and Sanjuro regarding nerves, outside factors and conditioning.... pretty good thread. Interesting to read everyone's take.

Also, age is a factor. I was training balls to the walls up to about a year ago. Now with getting married and a shoulder injury that just won't go, I've slowed it down. But if I had an 18 year old son, he'd better be on the matt breaking his a$$.

There's no feeling like that spent, peaceful zone after training when you just sit back against the wall, too tired to even put water in your mouth right away.

Anyone have kids? When did you introduce them to training? How did that go?

I started my son with Judo aged 8 (away from training with me) and then he went on to do Muay Thai. Now at nearly 17 he wants TCMA.

[sanjuro_ronin]

I may be guilty of this, but I don't think so.
I mention tabatas in my blog, but the truth is, in the fitness classes I've been doing, we don't stick to a single protocol throughout the whole workout.
Sometimes it's tabatas (20seconds on, 10 seconds off), other times it's more like Taku's general fitness recommendations (30 seconds sprint, 1 minute active rest), other times I don't see any method whatsoever; it just hurts.
Usually I'm so burnt after 1 hour that I can barely drive home.
It makes me laugh at the idea of spending so many hours in the gym before.
Used to pride myself on being able to do things in conditioning that the people around me couldn't.
Now I know better.

Sad thing is, the ability not to gas in a fight is much more dependent on having the mental capacity to stay relaxed than anything I'm doing in the fitness classes. You're right, experience is cardio - it's knowing that truly good cardio is all about efficiency. I'm mostly doing these workouts for weight loss.

Tabata's , to get the fabled fat buring effect, at BALLS to the WALL for 20 sec and rest fro 10 for 8 cycles and IF you cna do all 8, you are NOT going balls to the wall.
Fact is that ANY HIIT that you do that lasts from more than 20 min is NOT HIIT and IF you can compete the WHOLE cycle, you are NOT doing them intense enough.
A typical Tababta is sprinting full out, full speed, hold nothing back, or 20 sec ( think trying to break the world record of the 200 meters) then walk for 10 seconds, then Sprint again( trying to run even FASTER, which is of course not possible) for another 20 seconds, walk for 10, etc, etc.
The thing is that IF you do it right you CAN'T do the 8 cycles and if you can, you are pretty much DONE for the day.
A correct Tabata is 5 min of moderate cardio to warm up, 8 cycles of 20 x 10 sec and then 5 min of very LOW cardio to "cool" down.
That is it, you are done, buried and probably puking.
You will also be "hot" for about 30 min AFTER your workout as you body is STILL burning calories.
Most people do HIIT like this:
they pace themselves at a higher pace than normal, rest 50% of the time it took to do the first set and repeat to what ever time frame they came up with.
The thing is that, the moment you PACE, you are NOT doing HIIT.

[Pork Chop]

Tabata's , to get the fabled fat buring effect, at BALLS to the WALL for 20 sec and rest fro 10 for 8 cycles and IF you cna do all 8, you are NOT going balls to the wall.
Fact is that ANY HIIT that you do that lasts from more than 20 min is NOT HIIT and IF you can compete the WHOLE cycle, you are NOT doing them intense enough.
A typical Tababta is sprinting full out, full speed, hold nothing back, or 20 sec ( think trying to break the world record of the 200 meters) then walk for 10 seconds, then Sprint again( trying to run even FASTER, which is of course not possible) for another 20 seconds, walk for 10, etc, etc.
The thing is that IF you do it right you CAN'T do the 8 cycles and if you can, you are pretty much DONE for the day.
A correct Tabata is 5 min of moderate cardio to warm up, 8 cycles of 20 x 10 sec and then 5 min of very LOW cardio to "cool" down.
That is it, you are done, buried and probably puking.
You will also be "hot" for about 30 min AFTER your workout as you body is STILL burning calories.
Most people do HIIT like this:
they pace themselves at a higher pace than normal, rest 50% of the time it took to do the first set and repeat to what ever time frame they came up with.
The thing is that, the moment you PACE, you are NOT doing HIIT.

puking... check
hot.... check
can't finish... check

I mentioned that we don't stick to any single protocol the whole workout, and I wouldn't say that even half of the 1 hour workout involves the high intensity intervals.
We do have portions of the workout where we got ballz out for 20 to 30 seconds, followed by either 10 seconds of active rest, or up to a minute of more-active rest.
i'll freely admit it's not pure tabatas, more like tabata-inspired.
The high intensity portions of the workout are definitely definitely high intensity though, some of the hardest workouts I've ever done - harder than crossfit.

[sanjuro_ronin]

puking... check
hot.... check
can't finish... check

I mentioned that we don't stick to any single protocol the whole workout, and I wouldn't say that even half of the 1 hour workout involves the high intensity intervals.
We do have portions of the workout where we got ballz out for 20 to 30 seconds, followed by either 10 seconds of active rest, or up to a minute of more-active rest.
i'll freely admit it's not pure tabatas, more like tabata-inspired.
The high intensity portions of the workout are definitely definitely high intensity though, some of the hardest workouts I've ever done - harder than crossfit.

Don't talk to me about crossfit *spits like angry russian*.
HIIT is a great protocol and Tabata's the the extreme version of them and while they work great, for most HIIT is more than good enough.
Throwing them to break up monotony of "moderate cardio" is what most people do and that is probably the best way to work them.
Besides, they work BEST when used by guys who have "hit the wall" with moderate cadio rather than for those that want to used them instead of moderate cardio.

[Frost]

Don't talk to me about crossfit *spits like angry russian*.
HIIT is a great protocol and Tabata's the the extreme version of them and while they work great, for most HIIT is more than good enough.
Throwing them to break up monotony of "moderate cardio" is what most people do and that is probably the best way to work them.
Besides, they work BEST when used by guys who have "hit the wall" with moderate cadio rather than for those that want to used them instead of moderate cardio.

please lets not talk about tabata's, (or crossfit come to that), almost no one actually understands what Tabatas study was about how he did it or the results he got (it had nothing to do with fat loss), going balls to the wall and making yourself sick is not doing what tabata did, its just being stupid (ronin this is not aimed at you i know you know the study) just a general statement

[bawang]

exhaustion breaks down peoples mental defences. this is kung fu scamming 101.

[sanjuro_ronin]

please lets not talk about tabata's, (or crossfit come to that), almost no one actually understands what Tabatas study was about how he did it or the results he got (it had nothing to do with fat loss), going balls to the wall and making yourself sick is not doing what tabata did, its just being stupid (ronin this is not aimed at you i know you know the study) just a general statement

There is NO way to immulate the Tabata study without the proper equipment and the only way to get close to the 120% of the VO2 max in such a short period of time is, "balls to the wall".



And yes, I know I am JUST being argumentative but I am in one of those moods !

[Frost]

There is NO way to immulate the Tabata study without the proper equipment and the only way to get close to the 120% of the VO2 max in such a short period of time is, "balls to the wall".



And yes, I know I am JUST being argumentative but I am in one of those moods !

120% would be bad enough, he went for 170%.........try getting close to htat without a gun to your head

Well theres no point being here if your not going to be argumentative , maybe you should start an arguement about the differing effects aerobic training has compared to anearobic and why you shouldnt train both at the same time...that should be fun