Shnappley's Road to Getting Pounded

[Shnappley]

Literally.

I'm an independant. Three "gyms" in my city - two karate mcdojos, and the third (where I'm at now) is a Powerhouse Gym with a "mma sectionz!!!" upstairs (some heavy bags and wrestling mats, and a ton of conditioning tools). So while I train at this Powerhouse, there's no real coaching or anything. Mostly I'm just there to use their equipment.

Fact is, is I want to fight. I plan to fight amateur MMA before year's end (or early, early next year, worst case). Figure I'll have my license by July/August, put in an application with the local promotion by September/October, hopefully fight in Novermber/December. That's the plan, anyway. I've been (on and off anyway) studying martial arts for a handful of years now, but I've pretty much decided, that if I don't fight by year's end, in convincing manner, then I probably wash my hands of the whole undertaking. I'm getting too old to chase a dream. This is it, or this is it. That's the preface.
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Didn't do piss for skillwork today (a really subpar start to a log, I guess). Today I hit the weights hard.
I'm not exactly settled on a specific routine, so decided to max my bench today.
Flat Bench: (Not counting warmups/low ramp up sets)
175lbs@1x1
205lbs@1x1
215lbs@1x1(PR)
225lbs@1x1(PR)
235lbs@1x1(Hit this PR, punched the hole in the drywall, called the bar a phaggot, and then started dancing to Katy Perry)
205lbs@1x5 (rep PR, technically)

Push Press
135lbs@2x5

Did a few reps of close grip stuff, plus some rows and hammer curls for reps. Nothing impressive.

Today was a day utterly devoid of skill work. That seems dooming for me. Tomorrow I'll be meeting up with a training friend who is in the same position as me. We'll do probably a lot of fundamental boxing work (on the mitts) plus work on my takedown defense. Hopefully that makes up for today's lacking.

[Shnappley]

5/17 Got a lot less done than I had hoped. Just did mittwork, working strictly on boxing. Ran threw a few basic combinations, focusing on staying in motion throughout the combination. Then worked on slipping the jab and throwing the left hook, slipping a jab-cross and throwing a right straight. I know I'm forgetting something, but it's late and I'm blanking.

5/18
(weightxsetsxreps)
Barx8x2 Power Snatch
95lbsx7x2 P. Snatch
135lbsx1x1 P. Snatch (felt bad, really bad. almost lost it backwards, then forwards, then had to press it out cause I started to cave)
135lbsx1x2 Snatch Pull (seemed to immediately help)
135lbsx3x1 P. Snatch (tweaked a few things, these went up better)
135lbsx3x2 Snatch Pull
135lbsx3x1 P. Snatch (felt good)

135lbs - P. Cleanx1 + Jerkx3
135lbs - P. Cleanx2 + Jerkx1
135lbs - C&Jx1
135lbs - P.C&Jx2
185lbs - P. Cleanx1 + Jerkx0
185lbsx2x3 Clean Pull
185lbsx2x1 P. Clean (held each single for about a minute, tryin' to build a lil more strength in the midsection)

Wasn't really planning on doing any cleans/jerks, but was finishing up the snatches and figured I should hit some C&Js to keep it fresh. Unhappy that I missed the 185lb jerk, but I did get 185 for a handful of singles, which was my previous 1rm so, that's cool. I think trying to tackle some heavier weight was good for me today, though I will probably dial back the weight next week and up the total volume. We'll see though.

After I finished the actual lifting, I did some box jumps. Height was only like 2ft, maybe 2.5, dunno, wasn't high though. Did a few singles that I wasn't really counting, then rapid fired three triples. Then knocked out some high-knee stair sprints real quick. Did these for a while in the past, and felt really light on my feet at the time. So hopefully working them in will bring about the same results once more.

Skillwork today: Put in some time with a slip line. Worked on moving up and down the line, crossing under (so, diagonally) with each advance/backpedal. Did a bit of shadowboxing as I went, jabs and left hooks here and there. Also did a little bit of side to side without forward or backward movement, as well as some forward and back movement without lateral movement, but not too much of that. Worked on my footwork some without the line, just trying to get better pivots/turns - didn't actually do much shadowboxing with this, just focused on the movement.

[Shnappley]

5/19
No strength training today, despite how much I wanted to work on my broceps for some of dem aesthetics.

Skillwork:
Spent -maybe- ten minutes warming up. Dynamic mobility stuff, some static stretching cause I was so fookin' tight, light jogging in place, so on.
Spent another ten to fifteen just doing some shadowboxing, mostly just jab 'n' jog stuff. Trying to stay mobile while getting punches off. Little bit of in and out movement, but mostly lateral movement because I don't feel too good about that right now.

3x3min Double End Bag w/14oz Gloves
1st round - Just kept popping off the jab, moving around the bag, and keeping my hands up. Later in the round I started playing with my head movement with the bag a little bit.
2nd round - Spent the round pretty much just tossing the jab and slipping the bag, and trying to keep my hands up.
3rd round - First 30sec+, continued just working on not getting tagged in the grill when the bag rebounds. Later in the round, I worked more on flowing combinations (most jab/cross, jab/cross/left hook, left hook/jab/cross).

3x3min Double End Bag (No Gloves)
1st round - Focused mainly again on just popping off the jab, tossing a few crosses and occasionally a few L hooks, while moving around the bag.
2nd round - Like the first "set", I worked on using head movement to evade the bag. I really tried to tighten it up here, and cut inefficient movement. Felt good about this round. Figured that if the bag was scraping my forearm/fist as it passed, then that is probably pretty close to efficient.
3rd round - Kind of started working more combinations here. jab/cross/left hook/right hook/jab, left hook+backpedal, left hook+jab/backpedal, jab/overhand right, jab/lead shovelhook. Did some flurries that I can't recall off hand.

During the first "set", I thought I was pretty good about keeping my hands up. In the second "set", I was pretty good about keeping my right up to protect myself, but my lead kept dipping low, especially in the third round. It was particularly bad when I back pedalled off the bag, then the left came basically all the way down like I was going to use the shoulder roll. I've just got to try to remember that I'm not good enough to be dropping hands or playing like that. Didn't do it too much, but still.
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Been having hip problems for a couple weeks now, really just in the right hip flexor it seems. Tonight I really put a ton of time towards mobility work after my skill stuff. Did a ton of rolling with a pvc pipe, plus some static stretching, and some rolling with a tennis ball. Then I hit this stretch that I use to do back in kung fu (when I was stupid flexible), where you feel the stretch on the inside of the knee. Did it for the left side, and it wasn't bad at all. Then I did the right side, and holy hell. It hurt, so unbelieably. Not even, "oh wow, this is rough but it's good to be stretching". But like, "i can't even do this stretch with full rom cause I'll snap my sht up". I think I found what can and probably is a large contributor to my hip pain, but I guess time will tell as I keep doing this stretch again.

Also, think I really need to try to shorten my entries. Nobody wants to read this much crap, if anybody is reading.

[Shnappley]

5/21
Did skillwork in the morning for a change. Friend helped me work on some defensive wrestling stuff. At first worked on sprawling double legs. And after a while decided to switch it up, and start them from an already bad spot (for me) rather than doing the full shoot. After a while of that we did a lil drill where I gave him my leg, as if he'd caught a body kick; at first I just tried to stay up as long as I could while he tried to dump me, then started working on trying to break his hold on my leg before he dumped me. Followed that up by defending some hip tosses. Finished with me trying to get out from under him and off my back while he mostly just focused on keeping me down. Ran that maybe five times or so with him in guard, and twice from side control. This all went on for loosely an hour.

Was completely spent after all the wrestling work, and frankly didn't even want to do any strength training (and really, I should've just pushed all of my S&C one day out instead of wasting today). Midsection was really burnt out, so decided that instead of c&jerking today, I'd bench and do some other light work that I would've otherwise done on Wednesday. Ended up flat benching and working up to 2x5@205lbs, following it up with some seated rows for a handful of sets of about 8 reps at 'bout 125lbs. Then just tacked on some barbell curls and hammer curls. Overall crap work, really phoned it in cause I was tired. Maybe if I'm not feeling too busted down tomorrow, I'll try to tackle some heavy deads.