Practice makes perfect in muay thai

Just posted this on my Facebook page, but it's worth stating again...

Experts say that to become proficient at a technique, you have to do it 10,000 times. Try 400 round kicks twice a week over 3 months=9,600 kicks! Combine shadow and bag/pad drills. This helps develops muscle memory, but it takes time and repetition to make an kick, elbow, knee a subconscious movement. Do this for 1 year and you'll have done 38,400 kicks, or elbows, or knee strikes!

Americans demand instant gratification... that may be our greatest weakness as a society. 

Training martial arts, in our case - muay thai - is an discipline that that requires time and repetition in order to gain any proficiency. We live busy lives and it's easy to get wrapped up in the "instant expert concept" (I may have just coined a term here), but rushing through your training only defeats the original purpose you set ot to begin with. 


Take the the whole CrossFit craze for example. In the early days the daily exercises were nearly impossible for anyone to achieve, but as my friend James Merrick pointed out to me, as CrossFit became more popular and average Joe's and Jane's signed up the exercises became less straining. And today it's all about who can finish their circuits in the fastest time. It's about being on the top if the leader board. It does not help you in the long term if you can do 35 shitty pull ups faster than the other soccer moms and gym rats at the CrossFit center. Your body and technique benefits much more from doing less, but doing it with the proper technique, and eventually doing more over time. Need I mention the decreased risk of injury as well?


Same goes for your muay thai training. You can apply my concept of 10,000, but do it methodically. Don't rush through the 400 technique repetition just to get through it. You won't learn well that way. Practice the shadow of the strike, focusing on the technique and the bio mechanics that make that strike or body movement work. 


When you strike pads or bags don't think of it of an attempt to pull a Buakaw, pulling off 65 kicks in 60 seconds. Instead, I urge you to take on the mindset of making each kick, knee or elbow you throw the absolutely most powerful strike you can throw. If working on thai pads, if your kick didn't drive your partner back, then that should piss you off. Each strike that doesn't knock your partner back should strengthen your resolve to hit harder, spin faster turn your hip over earlier, all in an effort to knock the bastard down.  Then go back to the shadow technique and monitor any improvements, and keep an eye on bad habits.  


The shadow helps you perfect technique, the hard drills force you to throw under pressure and internalize the movements.  


Getting to the point where you are proficient in the key muay thai strikes and defensive movements takes time, a ridiculous amount of patience, and perpetual repetition. Yes, you can become proficient at muay thai much faster than other classic martial arts. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling you a program.  

It's not the size of the fighter or the size of the muscle that makes a strike powerful. It's recognizing the physics and bio mechanics behind the technique. It's remaining cognizant of those mechanics when practicing the technique, slowly, building speed as you become more comfortable. It's the unending repetition of said technique. It's the practice of the technique with the full intent of destroying your target (again, repetition). It's the continuous employment of the technique under simulated high stress situations. That combination of practices will work to make the movement, the mechanics, the intent of that technique a part of your subconscious. That's the ultimate goal: To throw a kick, or a combination of techniques rapidly, powerfully, and efficiently, without thinking at all about what your doing because it's become a  natural movement to you. You'll be busy processing other bits of information such as, identifying other threats, looking or escape routes, identifying witnesses, video surveillance systems, items to use as weapons if it gets heavy. 


In short: Think quality over quantity in terms of speed. But in the long run, large quantities of high quality will get you to where you really want to be. 


Donnie-

Dead Man Fighting

In a streetfight you must be able to move smoothly and quickly without hesitation on your part.

You must be explosive with your punches and put your weight behind each strike for maximum power output. You don’t want to be spending all night kicking someone’s ass; you want to get it done as quickly as possible.

So the worst thing you can do to hinder your survival in a streetfight is fight from a “Dead Stance”. A dead stance is one that lacks explosive power and is weak in movement and intent.

A streetfight can be very chaotic, dangerous and unpredictable, so when you need to move, you need to do it instantly. Your fighting stance needs to be spring loaded and ready to explode into action. If your fighting stance can’t produce this for you then you’ll be fighting and moving like you’re stuck in mud.

Now being explosive and spring loaded doesn’t mean that you should be dancing or bouncing around your adversary, never do that in a streetfight unless you have a death wish. What I am saying is learn to spring load your stance so that you only move when you need to. And that means training to “Load” your stance to make it explosive and powerful. Here are some ways to load your stance to make you more explosive when you fight.

· Squeeze your inner thighs slightly. These are the muscles that help drive power into your punch.

· Sit on your punch. Bend your knees slightly to give your legs more spring and lower your center of gravity.

· Squeeze your butt cheeks and anal sphincter slightly. This will engage your posterior chain of muscles which will help drive your body forward.

· Grab the ground with your feet. Paw the ground with your toes to help drive the body explosively.

· Push off with the big toe of your foot. This powerful muscle will help get you moving.

· Drive from the hips. Explode from your center to bring your whole body into the movement.

· Raise the rear foot slightly off the ground. This will help to propel you forward more quickly. Just make sure you push off the ground as you move.

Use this information to load your stance and become a more explosive fighter. But a word of warning; while being explosive in your movement is very important, so is being able to control it. But that’s a subject for another time, just be aware of it.

In closing I’ve given you enough information to resurrect your dead stance and make it more dynamic and explosive. It’s up to you now, add these skills to your streetfighting arsenal and don’t ever get caught being a dead man fighting.

Daniel Sambrano

www.SuperHeroSystems.com

What's your martial arts motivation?

I've been pondering that question a lot lately. What motivates me to continue training and teaching? What keeps me coming into the gym 3 to 4 times a week to teach muay thai to people, many I hardly know.

With 10 years of marketing experience you'd think I'd have been monetizing the crap out of the current MMA / muay thai craze, but I haven't. The google ad revenue from this blog covers the hosting fees for my domains. I haven't tried to sell DVD courses, and I haven't tried to start a clothing line like a lot of other people. Maybe I should.

Logically, money should be major motivator. However, every week I keep coming back to the Muay Thai Academy International where all of us instructors teach for free. Muay thai is a part of who I am, the school is my Cheers, and I'm it's Norm.

I love the feeling of satisfaction when a concept 'clicks' for a student whose been struggling with a certain technique, or the beam in a new student's eye when I show him something he's never seen before.

I love sharing what I've learned from my experiences with others. If I can find a way to make a living off of it, bonus. But my passion for the unique style of combat oriented muay thai is what truly motivates me to give what I can to who I can, without hesitation.

Boiled down: Enabling people to protect themselves and their loved ones from multiple assailants without reservation, efficiently, through overwhelming, destructive force is my motivation - and perhaps my mission statement.

Enough self-serving banter from me. I challenge you to examine your training and explore the internal drivers that motivate you. I encourage you to look beyond the ego and really be honest with yourself as to why you're doing what you're doing. You may be surprised with what you find out about yourself.

Hand wraps for muay thai, boxing, and MMA...my way.

Everyone has their own way to put on hand wraps. Hell, most fighters have their own favorite type of hand wrap, it all depends on the style they practice. I used to train with boxers who swore by old school gauze hand wraps. There are Mexican hand wraps, standard boxing hand wraps, and muay thai hand wraps (which are longer than the typical Everlast wraps you'd find at Sports Authority). Muay thai hand wraps usually come in lengths of 180 inches, where are western boxing wraps come 107 - 110 inches in length.

A lot of people use hand wraps to protect the knuckles, I prefer to use my hand wraps as wrist protection. Since I train for street combat, my emphasis is on wrist protection, as I'll most likely never wear boxing gloves for a night out on the town.

There isn't really any one single "silver bullet" method, but there are some best practices in regards to protection. Here are some things to consider when it comes to wrapping your hands:

1. Keep the wrap tight, but not so tight to where you're cutting off circulation to your hands.
2. Make sure you maintain good wrist coverage. Wrist injuries have longer lasting effects than knuckle injuries.
   
3. Listen to your instructor, but it's alright to try different methods of wrapping.
4. MMA gloves do not provide better wrist protection than well wrapped hands. If you're going to do more than a couple rounds of striking on the heavy bag, wrap up!
5. Hand wraps, like boxing gloves are for protecting you during training, and there's a huge difference between striking wrapped up and striking bare knuckled.
   
6. If/when you ever get into a fight out there in the real world, remember this: if you throw punches, don't aim for the face - it's the best way to break your hand. Hard weapon to soft tissue.
   

In the video below I goof up. I think I said that I use 107 inch wraps. WRONG! I use muay thai wraps in order to get extra wrist protection. Whoops-a-daisy.





Here's another way to wrap up, however, I do not in any way approve of those lame, seriously lame shorts.

RUMOR ALERT: California to Allow Elbows in Amateur Muay Thai Bouts

Last week California Muay Thai blog let it out that elbows will soon be allowed in amateur muay thai fights. The California Athletic Commission currently allows elbows only in sanctioned professional muay thai fights. Unfortunately, most pro muay thai fighters in the US rarely use their elbows in fights, and it shows. The elbows I've seen in fights stateside, they're usually thrown from way outside their effective range.

If this alleged easing of the regulations does come to pass then I'm optimistic about American muay thai fighters' and the overall improved quality of elbow use in future fights. This should also create a ripple effect in how muay thai camps and MMA schools throughout the Golden State treat the elbow as part of a fighter's arsenal. My hope is that there will be a widespread improvement in regards to attention paid to technique and an increase in time spent training & instructing the elbow strike and all of its variant angles and applications.

Please comment if you have any news on this subject.