Hey guys, just thought I would share my woes with you. This Tuesday I lost for the first time in my pro career. I fought the same Lumpini veteran I beat last month. I feel like such an idiot because I took the fight when I was sick. I had been training 6+ hours a day, 6 days a week for 5 weeks that needless to say left me very overtrained and opened up my immune system to getting a flu like infection.
I didn’t get a proper nights sleep the entire week before the fight and by fight night I was completely drained. I had to retire in my corner after the 2nd round
So now I am in bed with huge infected tonsils and I’m going over what I can do to make sure I don’t get overtrained like this again. Obviously I shouldn’t train that hard for that long without having a break but I thought I was going to be fighting on the 15th and then my manager changed the date to the 29th. I’m going to add more protein to my diet and get a massage once a week. Any other suggestions?
Bummer, Jonny. I’d recommend scheduled recovery time, otherwise its too easy to let that fall through the cracks. Best time will be after your massages, when your body will already be in that mode, so you can make the most of it. Good luck.
Sorry about your loss man, this is a good time to reevaluate and use your experience as a teacher. I wish you a good recovery.
6 hours a day seems like a lot in my opinion, its easy to get into that program as your fitness gets better: the threshold is easy to cross. I recently had a stint for a match that never happened earlier this year. I got really caught up in weight loss and being in good condition cause it was a big deal to me. I overtrained to the point of complete exhaustion, lost a lot of strength and muscle tissue without really realizing it and came down with a BAD case of broncitis. After all that and the fight getting cancelled because other guy was 20 lbs overweight I was disappointed to say the least.
Diet is a big part of training as you know. You should definitely up the protein but also increase the amount of natural fats you take in, particularly post training. The body will appreciate the refuelling time when you sleep. I found that eating a spoonful of peanut butter and a cup of cottage cheese before bed with a protein shake did wonders for my energy the next day. Whats your diet like? Carb intake? Sleep?
Also, I am interested in competing on a national level eventually and I am curious to know your path to pro. I’ve been training for 3 years with a great Kru Yai who has recommended that I go to Vegas and train with M. Toddy. Whats your opinion? What is your typical training regime? I love training and love Muay Thai enough to take the time necessary to prepare again for the next match. Thanks for your input, you’ll kick some ass next fight.
You might want to repost this in the Nutrition and Supplement section and let the comment on it as well. Some people from that place really know their shit, but don’t venture to this area so much.
Part of the problem I noticed at TMT was the lack of periodization. I wasn’t there for long, so maybe I missed it, but it seemed like the same sort of training pretty much constantly–the idea to just push yourself harder and harder every time.
I know a lot of the contributors around recommend four week blocks, with at least one high intensity week, and one deloading week.
Jonny,
Keep your head up, bro. Rarely does a fighter in this day and age go undefeated. Use this as an opportunity to learn from your mistakes and come back stronger the next time.
I agree with Parker’s suggestion to schedule in recovery time to your weekly routine. Giving yourself a day to where you’re not training and just relax. Your body will appreciate it.
Back in April I got my face broke by a guy I’ve beat twice before in amateur matches. It still hurts to think how I lost.
You may want to try reading John Berardi’s “Precision Nutrition” / 7 rules or more so “Grappler’s Nutrition” by Berardi and Micheal Fry. I use the “Precision Nutrition” guidlines as a general practice and then switch to “Grappler’s Nutrition” for match/fight prep.
Dan John wrote an article here a while back on recovery methods for old fuckers. He may have more recovery tips in older articles on his website. Its a wothwhile read.
Tough loss. I’m not a fighter so feel free to completely disregard what I have to say, but here’s my thoughts.
Don’t overthink this, evaluation is good and tweaking your training/nutrition/recovery is usually a good thing, but be sure not to re-invent the wheel because of this one incident.
What I mean by this, is it sounds like a big part of the overtraining was due to an additional 2 weeks of hard training resulting from the schedule change. If I understood that correctly, you couldn’t plan for that, but next time if something similar happens maybe you can ease off for a few days before ramping the intensity back up.
Dan John’s most recent article had some good thoughts on scheduling recovery. Give that a read. But about the loss, don’t worry man. You’re the man for fighting and I’m sure you’ll be golden in the future.
Thanks for the posts guys, some really useful stuff that I will be using for sure.
It turns out I was a lot more ill than I thought I was. I had to stay at the hospital for a week and just got out yesterday. My immune system was REALLY low and I got a severe infection of my tonsils that kept getting worse. The doctor was worried I might have HIV it was that bad but it’s all just been caused by pushing my body too hard. This has been a big wake up call to me and I’m definitely going to rest more, eat more, and mix it up more. Thanks for the support!
