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Coaches Corner: The Heart of the Athletic Experience (part one)

January 29, 2015 by Greg Leave a Comment

In the quest to be the best that you can be, it is all too easy for us to fall into tunnel vision in which new ranks, techniques and victories become the goal of training; but if we focus too much on striving, we may forget what we’re ultimately striving for – to feel good about ourselves, for recreation, to experience happiness, to reach our potential in the physical and mental arena. It is important that everyone understands you should not dedicate your life to your training but dedicate your training to your life.

Train vb 3a: to form by instruction, discipline, or drill b: to teach so as to make fit, qualified, or proficient 4: to make prepared (as by exercise) for a test of skill 5: to aim at an object or objective: DIRECT <-ing every effort toward success>

Training n la: the act, process, or method of one who trains b: the knowledge or experience acquired by one who trains 2 the state of being trained

These are the definitions as given by “Websters Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary” it is indeed satisfactory and includes many key words such as discipline, drill, make prepared, and aim to name a few. When I use the term training I refer to an intensified quality of attention, along with a consistent and sustained commitment to refine and improve our chosen endeavor. This type of training approach, if truly applied, will cross over to nearly every area of our daily living. There is an old Japanese saying that embodies this mentality, “A master will show himself in every action.” We continually practice our martial arts, but how many of us still practice our handwriting? How often do we fully jump into our everyday activities showing ourselves in every action?

Training, the heart of the athletic experience, can be represented by a cross country journey. The final destination represents our “best that we can be.” Wherever you are on your road, it is wise to have a map of the trip ahead of you – a way of seeing where you are compared to where you want to be – a view of the potential detours and road blocks and the effort that will be required to reach your destination. A realistic vision and a deep
understanding of your potential will allow you to choose the wisest course and the best way to train for it. It is most important to know that from a good beginning, all else flows.

Just Do It
In Judo, he who thinks is immediately thrown.

Victory is assured to those who are physically and mentally nonresistant.

– ROBERT LINSSEN

Most athletes/martial artists commonly resist the natural way the body works by trying. In everyday simple activities like walking around, taking a shower, driving a car; we don’t have to try to do these things, and we perform them easily and naturally. But when we are about to begin something that we feel is quite challenging – we begin to try. To illustrate how trying too much changes the way we look at things consider walking across a balance beam a couple of inches off the ground. Easy, right? Now put that same beam up at about fifteen feet with a lot of jagged rocks under it. Suddenly you begin trying very hard, you get tense, and the same balance beam becomes very difficult to walk across.

Whenever we start to try, we tense up too much, we fight our own bodies, tense the wrong muscles, think too much and therefore go against what we want to accomplish.

Filed Under: Coaches Corner, JKD Kali, Mixed Martial Arts, Muay Thai, The Academy Pulse

The Heart of The Athletic Experience: CONDITIONING

December 3, 2014 by Greg Leave a Comment

Conditioning is by far one of the most important attributes that a martial artist can possess. The most proficient martial artists spend a lot of time training. No athlete has ever become an expert without investing time and energy.

Unfortunately, in most martial arts schools the most important element of the martial arts is neglected – attribute development. Too much time is spent developing skill in techniques and not enough in actual development of the attributes that will make those techniques actually work.

Practicing your technical skills is important, but so is the development and maintenance of your over all physical conditioning. Training is a skill of disciplining your mind, practicing proper technique and developing a conditioned body.

Stamina and endurance are the primary benefits of good conditioning. Stamina is a natural response to training; therefore, it is not necessary to spend time developing it before you begin training in the martial arts – it will be developed. In its own way, stamina- or the ability to work over a period of time – is a natural product of your training, so just let it happen.

To get into shape takes time, but not as much as some of you may fear. Lawrence Morehouse, a UCLA researcher, along with other colleagues found that in six weeks of inactivity, you can lose 80 percent of your conditioning – and in six more weeks of progressive training, you can also regain 80 percent of your peak condition. That is only a month and a half of smart, consistent and progressive training.

You don’t have to hurt in order to develop stamina.

We have a creed that we use in our training – Don’t Train Harder, Train Smarter. Always start your training slowly, learn how to develop stamina gradually. You’ll inevitably reach whatever level of fitness you want, depending on how smart and consistent you continue progressive training – not how fast you do it. Doing the martial arts and “getting into shape” is thoroughly invigorating and fun when it is done right. It will require some adjustments and even some discomfort as your body adapts to the increased demand, but if you are hurting a lot, you’re not training smart. Remember, proper training is for the purpose of building your body and avoiding activities that will deteriorate or injure it.

Filed Under: Coaches Corner, JKD Kali, Mixed Martial Arts, Muay Thai, Nutrition & Health, The Academy Pulse

Coaches Corner: The Mental Edge

July 21, 2014 by Greg Leave a Comment

Developing yourself to your potential in the martial arts, or athletics is the sum total of many physical attributes, techniques, and training methods. The deciding factor in reaching your potential primarily revolves around one factor– “mental attitude.” This is often the missing piece in many people’s lives, even highly talented athletes and martial artists.

As an athlete for most of my life,I have seen extremely talented individuals fail when they were faced with less talented, but highly motivated and mentally tough adversaries and/or teammates. One of the major themes of training in any program at The Academy is self-defense and developing the mental edge and attitude that can be built through the physical demands of hard training and conditioning. The tough training sessions are not simply to develop strength, endurance, speed, power, flexibility, and overall conditioning, as much as it is to develop a strong mental attitude. Hard physical training over time begins to develop a person’s mental attitude and in time the mental control we have over ourselves.

You will find that the physical aspects of training are relatively temporary. Take time off and see what happens to your endurance, flexibility, and strength. These attributes will stay with you as long as they are maintained through training. Your fitness level rapidly declines when your training stops. Your endurance and strength will drop back to the level of when you started your first class in a matter of weeks when your training stops. However, what does stay with you is the mind set of winning, that “no quit” attitude. This is the reason behind our physically demanding classes and tough testing standards. I read and watch many things that center on success as a teacher, coach, and competitor (all are very different in function). One of the greatest no-nonsense football coaches of all time has to be Vince Lombardi.

Pic from http://www.vincelombardi.com/

During the 1960’s; the Green Bay Packers, under the guidance of Coach Vince Lombardi, were unrivaled in professional football. Lombardi was successful because he understood what the difference was between winners and losers. It wasn’t skill, physical talent, strength, or speed, but rather it was his players’ mental attitude. He built a desire and a will to win. The team’s training developed a positive” attitude that showed in every game. He said, “All the rings and all the money and all the color and all of the display, they linger only in a memory. But the spirit, the will to win, the will to excel. These are the things that endure and these are the qualities, of course, that are so much more important than any of the events that occur. I’d like to say that the quality of any mans life is a full measure of that mans personal commitment to excellence and to victory, regardless of what field he may be in.”

It’s all about a healthy attitude to be the best you can be. One of the main ways to develop the “mental edge” is by the constant reinforcement of succeeding at hard training sessions and tests. Training is not about easy workouts and pampering our students-it’s about physically demanding workouts that tests not only your physical capabilities, but, really your mental toughness and fortitude. The bottom line is that a coach or instructor can guide you by telling you what needs to be done and how often to do it. But you have to want to do it. Only the positive mental attitude to succeed will allow you to go to the Academy when you think you’re too tired to go to class, and help you avoid or bash through the many obstacles and distractions that will get in your way.

Being in shape and fit is about NOT GIVING UP, and this is key to your success in everything worth your time. The winner of any event, be it a self-defense situation, competition, your next rank test, or a personal goal, is not necessarily based on talent and not always the fittest or strongest, but the one with the strongest mind, the mental edge, who is committed to excellence.