MMA Training Log

[Makesh1ft]

A little background on me:

I'm in the Air Force (stationed in England), I'm going to school, finally taking MMA classes, and I have a girlfriend that requires at least SOME time during the week lol. What I'm getting at is that my schedule's pretty full, and my physical performance has suffered a lot in the last 8 months or so. About 8 months ago I was on a normal gym routine that switched focus between strength and endurance, but then the holidays came around (anyone in the military understands what that means lol) and I also took a few weeks of leave immediately after. When I got back I had orders to go to England, which meant a lot of out-processing rather than getting back into the gym.

Now I'm all settled in and finally taking my interest in MMA a little further, but I'm almost completely new to it. As I don't have much time to get into the gym outside of my MMA classes, I'll use my Air Force PT results to track my progress, and I'll also list some goals as well as what my scores/stats used to be (from 8 months ago). The AF PT test consists of how many full-form push-ups you can do in one minute, how many sit-ups you can do in one minute, your waist measurement, and how fast you can run 1 1/2 miles. I'll also include some pictures later on when I have time to upload them. This log is more a way for me to keep track of my own progress, but if anyone finds it interesting/helpful, then way to go me lol. So let's get started:

Former PT Scores:
Waist: 33.5"
Push-ups: 62
Sit-ups: 62
Run: 10:15

At this time I weighed around 186 with a bodyfat percentage of roughly 14% (I'm 6'1")

PT Score Last Week: (I did this on my own time, so it wasn't official)
Waist: 35"
Push-ups: 55
Sit-ups: 64
Run: 11:48 (ugggh... lol)

My official PT test is due by September 23rd, so with that in mind...

Short-term Goals:
Waist: 34"
Push-ups: 62
Sit-ups: I'm fine with this category as it is
Run: Anything under 11 minutes is fine, but I'd like to see 10:30

Long-term Goals:
Waist: 33.5" (I have a big frame, so that's about as low as I can get without dehydration etc.)
Push-ups: 67
Sit-ups: Fine as they are
Run: 10:00 or less
Weight: 185 lbs (I'm about 198 right now)

Due to how busy my schedule is, doing PT at work and attending my MMA classes are the only real sources of exercise I get at the moment (this will change once I get more comfortable with my schedule). I'll track what we do for PT at work as the weeks go, as it changes from day to day, but here is my MMA schedule:

Monday:
Boxing: 7:30-8:30
Kickboxing: 8:30-9:30

Tuesday:
Muay-Thai: 7:30-8:30
MMA: 8:30-9:30

Thursday is the same as Monday, and Friday is the same as Tuesday. I do PT at work Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings. Aside from PT, my goals for MMA-- the more important reason for this log-- are to work on footwork first and foremost; I have good balance naturally, but that doesn't account for footwork when you're new to MMA. I also need to work a lot on my technique. I seem to be picking up the stances and general movements of boxing and muay-thai in good time, but there's a lot of room for improvement with some of the more subtle movements, particularly where my feet should be when beginning/ending combinations.

The gym I'm going to (Fighting-Fit, in Banbury, UK) teaches a mix of wrestling, jiu-jitsu, greco-roman, and judo as their "MMA" class. I need a LOT of work here. I have a small amount of experience with brazilian jiu-jitsu, but it only extends as far as basic positioning and minor submissions/sweeps. I'd really like to work on my flexibility (which would help greatly with kickboxing-- I can only throw awkward kicks for the most part, and even those are only good off one leg or the other). Flexibility would also help me a lot in my general positioning and submission attempts.

That's all I have time to post for now. I'll add a starting picture within the next day or so, and I'll explain a little more on what I'm capable of now, as little of an explanation as that will be lol

[Makesh1ft]

PT was cancelled this morning due to a Commander's Call, but I have boxing and kickboxing tonight. Here's a general breakdown of them:

Boxing:
3 min jump rope
1 min push-ups
1 min squat-thrusts
1 min mountain climbers (single-leg squat-thrusts)
1 min v-ups
1 min leg lifts
1 min burpees

Repeat for 3 rounds. (Some of the exercises change from class to class, but push-ups, v-ups, and mountain climbers are pretty much always there-- and jump roping, of course. Also, it's encouraged to do these exercises on your fists rather than with your palms flat-out. I can't quite complete the first round on my fists yet.)

After a quick water break we get out the pads and work combinations/movements for the rest of the class. Sometimes we also switch between stations that include a low mounted pad for body combinations, a high mounted pad for upper-body combinations, a tire (we practice switching stances and throwing combinations on them for footwork), and a heavy bag for continuous combinations. All stations and/or focus pad sessions are done for 3 min in orthodox stance and 3 min in southpaw before rotating/switching pads.


Kickboxing:
Only a few people stay for this class as it's taught primarily to be semi-contact (quick strikes/pull-back strikes.) It's meant for speed and flexibility more than power. (The gym also teaches a full-contact kickboxing class, but it conflicts with my schedule.) The people that do stay are those from the boxing class, so the instructor usually skips over cardio/warm-ups.

We start with a LOT of stretching, and this is something I need a lot of work on. Afterward, we practice single strikes or kicks then string them together for a few simple combinations. By the end, we're usually doing 5 or 6-strike/kick combinations, and we're kept to a semi-fast pace to keep our heart rates up.
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I'd like to point out/remind myself that I didn't mention weight in my short-term goals since I have a friend coming to visit in a couple weeks. As bad as I want to be back around 185, it's not everyday someone flies to another country to see you, and I know I won't be eating/exercising the best for the week that she's here.

[Makesh1ft]

Boxing went a little different Monday night. We focused more on stamina with combinations than usual, and we kept the usual emphasis on accuracy and defense while fatigued. Instead of one of the regular warmups we did a quick one (jogging in place, high knees and punches, etc) and went straight into stations that involved throwing different combinations repeatedly. This was done for the entire duration of the class (very tiring). I did notice that my footwork during combinations is getting better, particularly the subtle pushing and twisting of the shoulders, and my combinations themselves are much faster and more technical than when I started (and stronger in comparison to trying to throw them with that kind of speed when I first started the classes.)

Unfortunately, they're cutting back the kickboxing classes until sometime next month (apparently, most of the kickboxing students tend to take holiday/vacation this time of year, which would explain why I've only seen a few of them.)

Muay thai went pretty good Tuesday night. My clinch stance has improved a little, and I'm getting a little better at the quick turns and setups. Using my right leg for rear kicks is still all but useless (I'm a southpaw), but I did notice that I'm getting a lot better at using short combinations to setup my left for knees/kicks, especially the knees. I'm quick to recover my balance in comparison to first starting too.

I can't say much for the mma class yet since work's been a pain lately and Tuesday night was only the second time I was able to make it. All I can really say is that I'm better at the bridging warmup lol. I at least had the feeling that I was spinning to my right a little easier than the first time when attempting the armbar drills, but I'll have to make sure of that next time.

All in all, I'm pretty happy with my progress in the two short weeks that I've been at it.

On an exercise note, the weather hasn't been compliant at all for running (typical August in England apparently.) At least I got a decent ab workout at PT:

1 minute of each exercise broken up as 20 seconds of the exercise, 20 seconds of rest, and then 20 seconds of exercise and straight into the next exercise:

Push-ups
Banana sit-ups (1 minute on each side)
Elbow up-downs (moving from a plank position to a push-up position and back, one arm at a time)
Flutter kicks
V-sits (a.k.a. "in-and-outs")
Bicycle crunches
Full body crunches
Extendos

There were two others, but I can't remember which ones they were... (That's pretty bad considering I'm the one that comes up with them as the "physical training leader" lol) We repeated this twice.

I finished with 3.2 miles on an exercise bike set on cascade (simulates steep, rolling hills) with the resistance level set to 15 for 2 minutes, and 10 for 8 minutes.

I normally try to do a 3 mile run on Fridays for PT, but everyone else has the day off tomorrow. I have to be somewhere else kinda early, and I doubt I'll have enough time after before I go to class. I used to do 5 mile runs on Fridays, but I was diagnosed with compartment syndrome in my shins when I first got to England. It's hereditary apparently, but the doctor said I could ignore it as long as it didn't give me any problems and didn't get worse (which it hasn't.) However, I am following the advice he gave me on limiting my runs to 3 miles and avoiding treadmills (which isn't easy when the weather hasn't been allowing outdoor runs.)

[Makesh1ft]

I bought a book titled "Mastering Jujitsu" by Renzo Gracie and John Danaher for a little help with my clinch and ground game. I'm about halfway through it. This book is mostly for beginners considering that even I know most of the techniques/strategies discussed in it. However, it is very detailed in the use of different strategies and combinations of movements. I already knew the basic movements and principles behind them when it came to ground fighting, but I've found quite a bit of supplemental information in here that I think will help me greatly when it comes to grappling. Of course, I'll still need to practice these concepts in class before I can say it helped me to any specific degree, but I would highly recommend this book for anyone getting into any sort of grappling art for the first time, particularly jujitsu or brazilian jiu jitsu.

I have another one on the way that details the basic concepts of muay thai kickboxing for beginners. Not sure how much that one will help me, but I'll make an update in a few weeks after it gets here and I've read a bit into it.

[Makesh1ft]

Time for a much needed update:

My friend has come and gone back home, and I recently got back from a TDY to Germany for work. I'm also out of school until November, so I can really focus on training. I did a few runs/workouts over the past few weeks, but they weren't significant enough to mention. I'm taking this week off mma classes since my PT test is Thursday morning, so I'm focusing mainly on cardio this week. Here was my workout today:

100 meter sprint - 30 pushups at the finish
100 meter sprint - 30 situps at the finish
100 meter sprint - 30 squats at the finish
100 meter sprint - 30 jumping jacks at the finish
Repeat the exercise once for a total of 2 miles and 60 repetitions of each movement.

After about an hour I went back to the track to pace someone for their PT test. Normally I wouldn't have run prior to doing this, but this person isn't particularly good at the running portion of the test and was only aiming for a 12:00 mile-and-a-half. He ended up getting a 12:26, but that was still about 30 seconds lower than his average.

I also have some pictures to put up later when I have the time

[Makesh1ft]

My results on my pt test weren't entirely what I was hoping for:

Waist: 33.5 (great here)
Push-ups: 54 (not too good)
Sit-ups: 60 with some time left over (great)
1 1/2 mile run: 11:10 (10 seconds off from my goal, which is a bit disappointing. However, I did shave 30-40 seconds off since my last test, so I won't get too down about this)

Also, while I only did 54 pushups on my test, I did around 65 in one minute last week at boxing class. I had to do them on my fists because I was wearing handwraps, and I'm not sure if it was that or just feeling particularly good that day that gave me the energy for that.


I'm reorganizing a few of our workouts for PT at work to be better suited for individuals in my workcencter and, in particular, their PT tests. I'm trying to work some tabata exercises into the mix that are scaled down a bit for some of the subpar performers at PT. (A tabata exercise means doing rounds of "20 seconds of exercise, 10 seconds of rest". In a full tabata workout this would be done for 8 rounds before moving to the next exercise.) Here was Friday's workout:


Tabata upper body exercise (all exercises done for 4 rounds; process repeated 3 times):

Plyo-pushups

Bar Presses (everyone had either a 12 or a 15 pound bar. Someone tried using a 20 until the second round lol)

Triangle Pushups (these were substituted for reverse push-ups after the first round)

Sit-ups


It doesn't seem like much typed out like that, but the beauty of tabata exercises are how effective they are in a short amount of time; only getting 10 seconds of rest in between rounds takes its toll pretty quick!


On a more MMA note:

My footwork's continuing to improve. I've been working a lot on a simple combination that requires pretty concise footwork: cross, backstep-jab, stepping cross. I'm still a bit awkward with punching on a backstep and immediately switching to a stepping cross, but I'm getting better at it a little at a time. This combination is usually meant to end an already progressing combination (i.e. jab, cross, hook, cross, backstep-jab, stepping cross), but working this small section alone is great for improving your footwork