Ah, the flogging of dead horses. The one exercise we all seem to overtrain around here.
I tried to derail this with off topic posts, lets try summery instead.
Squats are GPP. GPP is good, but not sufficient, for a fighter. If given the choice between gpp work or technique work, very few of us should pick gpp. Sometimes this is a false choice, choose both. Irish engages in unnatural acts with livestock. This is also GPP.
[quote]devildog_jim wrote:
Ah, the flogging of dead horses. The one exercise we all seem to overtrain around here.
I tried to derail this with off topic posts, lets try summery instead.
Squats are GPP. GPP is good, but not sufficient, for a fighter. If given the choice between gpp work or technique work, very few of us should pick gpp. Sometimes this is a false choice, choose both. Irish engages in unnatural acts with livestock. This is also GPP.[/quote]
Whatever bro, don’t judge me.
Also define “natural”
An exercise that promotes full-body strength and stability has as much carry over if not more when it comes to punching technique than jogging or any cardio other than repetitive striking itself. It is just my opinion and the opinion of most of the top guys in the field that squatting is such an awesome exercise that most athletes will benefit from it. Most athletes also won’t benefit from hitting 1RMs all the time especially in season or in this case fight camp. I personally do not hit squats over 80% that often when training hard just because I don’t see the point but I definitely still do and my body thanks me for it.
[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:
[quote]devildog_jim wrote:
Ah, the flogging of dead horses. The one exercise we all seem to overtrain around here.
I tried to derail this with off topic posts, lets try summery instead.
Squats are GPP. GPP is good, but not sufficient, for a fighter. If given the choice between gpp work or technique work, very few of us should pick gpp. Sometimes this is a false choice, choose both. Irish engages in unnatural acts with livestock. This is also GPP.[/quote]
Whatever bro, don’t judge me.
Also define “natural”[/quote]
The same way the State of New Jersey did in the indictment?
Btw, how did you find a Wildebeest in Hackensack anyhow?
[quote]devildog_jim wrote:
[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:
[quote]devildog_jim wrote:
Ah, the flogging of dead horses. The one exercise we all seem to overtrain around here.
I tried to derail this with off topic posts, lets try summery instead.
Squats are GPP. GPP is good, but not sufficient, for a fighter. If given the choice between gpp work or technique work, very few of us should pick gpp. Sometimes this is a false choice, choose both. Irish engages in unnatural acts with livestock. This is also GPP.[/quote]
Whatever bro, don’t judge me.
Also define “natural”[/quote]
The same way the State of New Jersey did in the indictment?
Btw, how did you find a Wildebeest in Hackensack anyhow?
[/quote]
Haha, Wildebeest!!! I never Gnu he was into that.
I’m here all week!
[quote]Ckenney wrote:
An exercise that promotes full-body strength and stability has as much carry over if not more when it comes to punching technique than jogging or any cardio other than repetitive striking itself. It is just my opinion and the opinion of most of the top guys in the field that squatting is such an awesome exercise that most athletes will benefit from it. Most athletes also won’t benefit from hitting 1RMs all the time especially in season or in this case fight camp. I personally do not hit squats over 80% that often when training hard just because I don’t see the point but I definitely still do and my body thanks me for it.[/quote]
Ckenney, you’re being pretty stubborn about something that much greater minds than ours have already concluded is not an adequate exercise for boxing. I think what is happening here is you really love squats, and they make you feel awesome (just how they make me feel, FYI) and you reckon they’re God’s gift to the sporting world because they do everything a boxer could ever need in an exercise. They are not, and they don’t. They are incredible for appropriate sports. But for boxing, they are an overly taxing, inefficient route to flexibility, core strength and punching power. In fact, you will see boxers doing specific exercises to reach specific boxing goals. For example, hundreds of situps = core strength, hundreds of miles = cardio-vasdcular endurance, hundreds of pushups = greater upper body strength. Unfortunately, those are the bread and butter of boxing training. And speaking from experience, if you want to be as good at boxing as you’re telling us you are (Imma make a wild leap here and bet a Dr Pepper I can whoop you), you have to embrace that suck.
The life of a fighter is difficult and often times boring. If he’s lucky, he gets paid by an unscrupulous promoter to get the living shit knocked out of him. Trust me when I say this: If squats really made boxers better, we would ALL be doing squats.
I bet you two Dr. Peppers I could whoop you…that was a great response Pigeonkak. I really don’t think I’m a good boxer, decent at best, just really like talking about training because I’m an exercise science student that now looks at all my favorite sports from an exercise physiology/biomechanical/training aspect.
At the same time though, I just don’t see how repetitive lumbar flexion, and distance running are going to be the best thing in a sport where we are getting beat up plenty in training. Quite possibly the greatest mind in the area of back health, Dr. Stuart McGill, has made it pretty clear that crunches suck ass. This has been shown by many others as well.
For core stability it is recommended to do ANTI-FLEXION/EXTENSION, which is what proper standing strength movements will promote. Jogging sucks too. Has been shown to promote higher baseline cortisol levels (which are high enough when boxing for hours/day), stress fractures, slows athletes down, and its boring as all hell. There is a reason why sprinters look healthier than marathon runners…because they are!
BUT, I understand it’s place in a sport like boxing, where you want to be bouncing pretty much the entire fight. Different than MMA or even kickboxing
[quote]Ckenney wrote:
I’m an exercise science student [/quote]
Ahhhh NOW it all makes sense
[quote]Ckenney wrote:
I bet you two Dr. Peppers I could whoop you…that was a great response Pigeonkak. I really don’t think I’m a good boxer, decent at best, just really like talking about training because I’m an exercise science student that now looks at all my favorite sports from an exercise physiology/biomechanical/training aspect.
At the same time though, I just don’t see how repetitive lumbar flexion, and distance running are going to be the best thing in a sport where we are getting beat up plenty in training. Quite possibly the greatest mind in the area of back health, Dr. Stuart McGill, has made it pretty clear that crunches suck ass. This has been shown by many others as well.
For core stability it is recommended to do ANTI-FLEXION/EXTENSION, which is what proper standing strength movements will promote. Jogging sucks too. Has been shown to promote higher baseline cortisol levels (which are high enough when boxing for hours/day), stress fractures, slows athletes down, and its boring as all hell. There is a reason why sprinters look healthier than marathon runners…because they are!
BUT, I understand it’s place in a sport like boxing, where you want to be bouncing pretty much the entire fight. Different than MMA or even kickboxing[/quote]
You know, I completely agree with you about the lumbar flexion/extension arguement. But you do see the irony of being precious about your back while training for a sport that requires receiving and returning significant and regular blunt force trauma to the head? I do. And of course, you’re being disingenuous to say the least if you are ignoring the risks of injury that accompany powerlifting type exercises. I also do not meet many fighter with serious back problems. They have knee, elbow, shoulder and neck problems and of course brain damage. Those are the serious risks of taking up boxing or kickboxing. Were you are making a logic leap, which on the surface makes sense but remains impractical, is by referring to Dr Stuart McGill for advice on how to train for a fight. I would rather restrict his advice to a ‘how to look after you back’ plan. Remember, I told you that boxing is a war of attrition. Some body parts cannot be protected indefinitely, if at all. Such is life and the different passions that consume us and our mortal vessels.
To add, my Muay Thai trainer was a very special character. ‘Kru Pet’ was a tiny dude, 150 pounds after a shit. He was also tough as nails, as they all are. He smoked, he drank, he gambled and he slept on a concrete floor behind the gym with his wife and kid. He had 100 pro fights under his belt, of which he won about 80. He had reached a stage where he fought to make money and not in the hopes of any fame or career aspirations. When Thai fighters/trainers with as much experience as Pet are asked “why don’t you train before you fight”, they often reply “Me already know Muay Thai.” And he did. He did everything right, all the time, kicked so hard and punched like a pro boxer. And he never lifted a weight heavier than his 3 year old in his whole life. But what he did do in that time was situps, pushups, pullups, sparring and bag work. And he is not rare in Thailand. He is an example of your typical, busy trainer/fighter and he is relatively mediocre compared to Bangkok champions like Baukaw and Senchai Por Pramuk. Take your “best fighters” that you train with, go to Thailand and get schooled homie. Get schooled.
[quote]Ckenney wrote:
I bet you two Dr. Peppers I could whoop you…that was a great response Pigeonkak. I really don’t think I’m a good boxer, decent at best, [/quote]
Have you ever wondered if your obstinate refusal to doing things the old fashion way is what’s holding you back?
Not even being facetious. I even agree with you in some ways but I also value doing what works, if the best of the best do X and the mediocre or worse do Y, I might do X just because it works maybe science hasn’t figured it all out yet. At 35 I’ve seen enough science flip flop to know that they haven’t.
Squatting may help but people seriously underestimate the amount of leg strength running gives you. It also helps your cardiovascular system, and most important it helps you stay limber able to move. If you have 20 min to train wouldn’t you want to work on as manyenergy systems as possible in one shot? If you do 20 minutes of running would you want to wear out your legs with squats too?
x2 on leg strength gained from running. Hill sprints in particular do make you strong. Not internet forum strong, admittedly, but strong none-the-less. I would not say I was a particularly physically strong fighter, for example,and I have bad levers for squatting, but after 12 years of hill sprints I hit a little over 300lbs on my first time squatting. Clearly, that isn’t strong for serious weightlifters, but I don’t know many people in the real world who could lift more than me even before I started doing recreational weight training. A lot of pushups, dips and chins will also make you damn strong compared to most people.
“Take your “best fighters” that you train with, go to Thailand and get schooled homie. Get schooled.”
Quoted for absolute truth.
[quote]Airtruth wrote:
[quote]Ckenney wrote:
I bet you two Dr. Peppers I could whoop you…that was a great response Pigeonkak. I really don’t think I’m a good boxer, decent at best, [/quote]
Have you ever wondered if your obstinate refusal to doing things the old fashion way is what’s holding you back?
Not even being facetious. I even agree with you in some ways but I also value doing what works, if the best of the best do X and the mediocre or worse do Y, I might do X just because it works maybe science hasn’t figured it all out yet. At 35 I’ve seen enough science flip flop to know that they haven’t.
Squatting may help but people seriously underestimate the amount of leg strength running gives you. It also helps your cardiovascular system, and most important it helps you stay limber able to move. If you have 20 min to train wouldn’t you want to work on as manyenergy systems as possible in one shot? If you do 20 minutes of running would you want to wear out your legs with squats too?[/quote]
This is such a great post, people act like they can reinvent the wheel. It’s fairly common knowledge how you should train for combat sports. The only thing I will add is that if there is a wrestling component to your style of fighting then you should consider lifting weights unless you are very naturally strong. It doesn’t mean you have to squat, or do heavy maxes but in my opinion lifting is beneficial there.
[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:
[quote]Pigeonkak wrote:
[quote]Ckenney wrote:
Squats are a must for any MMA fighter, grappler, boxer, etc. They boost natural hormone levels, increase contractile strength, increase core stability, increase tendon/ligament strength which helps prevent injury, and much more. This means that force transfer from the floor to punches is going to be higher as well as improved kicking power.
This is due to the increase stability and control of the pelvic girdle that squats will help develop. In general, unless you have a mobility issue/injury, squat and dead-lift. Only going to help the cause. If worried about size, keep the reps to less than 5. Also, Olympic lifts are fantastic for developing explosive force, full body coordination, and powerful lower limb extension. Really no arguing that squats will increase kick power, just gotta look at it from the bigger picture.[/quote]
It will absolutely help the cause, but I wonder if Squats and deadlifts will truly result in practical and noticeable improvements in things like punching power. I mean, drastically more than the fighter could be achieving with heavy bag work, and improved technique training. I still consider the Olympic lifts superior to standard squats and deadlifts in this regard. I’ve seen it other athletes and fighters. I personally haven’t tested the O lifts on myself in a fight prep training log, but I do know that Squats made me much stronger, but also much slower. I was moving more leg around and I wasn’t necessarily getting explosive enough or as explosive as typical fight training achieves. Also, Squats burn your legs out. If you’re training for a fight, you can’t afford to wreck your quads with less than half an hour of squats when you’ve still got all your roadwork, rope jumping, bag work, more roadwork, sparring… no. Oh, and I forgot roadwork.
[/quote]
They don’t. The hardest punchers in the game never squatted and punching power has as much to do with your leg strength as car color does with a quarter mile time.
If you’re an MMA fighter or grappler, it’s worth it because all kinds of strength is only going to help you, but if you’re a competitive boxer or striker it ain’t worth the time you spend on it.
If I was competing, I would not be squatting like I do.
[/quote]
I dont know where you get the info that the hardest punchers never squat, but I dont think the benifit of squating has a lot to do with the extra leg strenght. Heavy squats increase your hip/posterior chain strenght.
Most sports, especially boxing/mma/kickboxing benefit from the extra power output from the hips/pc.
I think for beginners it has less value than for experienced fighters. Beginners should focus on improving technique. Competitive fighters who have good/very good technique will benifit from squats/dl’s bc they will become stronger.
Heavy lifting, cycled correctly will benefit the fighter.
[quote]drainbamaged wrote:
I dont know where you get the info that the hardest punchers never squat, but I dont think the benifit of squating has a lot to do with the extra leg strenght. Heavy squats increase your hip/posterior chain strenght.
Most sports, especially boxing/mma/kickboxing benefit from the extra power output from the hips/pc.
I think for beginners it has less value than for experienced fighters. Beginners should focus on improving technique. Competitive fighters who have good/very good technique will benifit from squats/dl’s bc they will become stronger.
Heavy lifting, cycled correctly will benefit the fighter. [/quote]
I’ve read shitloads about the workouts of the greatest fighters - none of them squatted except for maybe a few in more recent years.
Ali, Foreman, Marciano, Sonny Liston - these guys were not in the weight room.
And I work out with plenty of guys who punch hard as fuck at 147 and never squat heavy weight.
It’s a great exercise, to be sure, but if you’re boxing the payback ain’t there. And heavy lifting just beats you up for when you should be doing skillwork.
Again, you guys can offer all the internet forum/textbook proofs you want, but in the boxing gyms, guys ARE NOT doing this. And there’s plenty of reasons for that.
[quote]FightinIrish26 wrote:
Ali, Foreman, Marciano, Sonny Liston - these guys were not in the weight room.
Again, you guys can offer all the internet forum/textbook proofs you want, but in the boxing gyms, guys ARE NOT doing this. And there’s plenty of reasons for that.
[/quote]
Ka-ching! On the money.
Strength can absolutely help someone be a better grappler, for the simple reason that grappling (forgetting technique for a moment) involves using your body’s musculature to move around an external object. In this case, obviously, a person.
However, something you are missing here is the fact that things such as positioning and leverage come in to play.
All of the wrestling/judo/jiu jitsu/what-have-you moves negate the opponent’s ability to use their musculature. It doesn’t matter how much you can curl, if your arm is caught in a arm-bar, you will not be able to get out. Doesn’t matter how much you can deadlift, if I have you off balance over me, I will hip throw you. You can squat a lot? Great. If i’m in the perfect position to high crotch you, prepare to eat pavement.
As for stand up, the idea is somewhat the same. Technique, timing and so forth are the difference between a winner and a loser. A properly placed punch will knock out anyone, regardless of how much that person squats. You can not argue that if I hit you first, and knock you out, that it does not matter how strong you are. Correct?
That being said, while doing strength training may help because a person does become more athletic (assuming they were limp wristed to begin with), this is simply doing what punching would do anyway: teach coordination and athleticism.
For strength training, there is a point of diminishing returns. An individual has only so much time in a week to do any activity. You can either train to become better at timing, technique and form, or you can train to lift weights in a perfectly controlled environment under ideal conditions.So I can train someone to become athletic by moving weight, and then at the same time, train them to fight…or I can train them to be athletic, athletic for fighting and how to fight…by making them fight!
Weight training helps grappling because sometimes technique is not perfectly applied, and you can “muscle” your way out, or in to, certain situations and moves. That isn’t the case for punching. In any case, weight training or sport training: both will take up tremendous resources: recovery, food, time, etc. You need to allocate the resources you have in the best manner to acquire your goals.
As for squats helping you punch harder: no. As a sport science student, you can, I hope, see why you benching does not improve your ability to throw a punch.
Punching is a full body action. Rotation of the legs, hips, etc and extending the fist towards the target. You can actually take out all the rotating stuff, and simply look at extending the fist towards the opponent. That gives you a very weak punch. You get the idea how important rotation is.
Now take a look at an Ass To Grass squat. Where, exactly, do you see any similarities? At what point during the squat are you rotating? At what point during the squat are you extending your arms out? How about a punch?
At what point in the punch do you squat all the way down and up? When are you completely squared up with your opponent?
The answer to both is never.
In a punch, you barely squat down at all. The only squatting you do, if any, is a quarter quarter squat. Punching is pretty much entirely rotational force.
So how, exactly, is squatting supposed to help punching?
I can drum my fingers just as fast as anybody, and being able to drum them faster than anyone else does not mean I can play piano faster or better than that someone else. Playing piano is harnessing the neuro-musculature connections and using them to create music. Punching is the same.
Running helps the cardio vascular system, and all combat sports involve moving around with your legs. When you get tired, or are recovering, the conditoned heart and lungs will help you recover faster. The carry over is obvious. There’s another aspect, too. That is rotation. When you take a step forward, your body wants to pivot in the opposite direction of the extended foot. So if you extend your left foot, your body will pivot to the right. Extending your leg/foot applies a moment/torque on your body.
Now, your body counter acts this by applying another moment/torque: your arms swinging. If you have never noticed, if you kick your left leg out, your right arm comes out. If you bring out your right leg, then your left arm shoots out. This keeps your body going in a straight line. What helps do this, is your core bracing. The exact same anti-rotating function that you mentioned.
Not only that! When you kick your leg out, you are also rotating your hips.
So we have bracing of the core to minimize energy loss from motion, and we have hip rotation. Holy shit. That sounds just like punching. Now do that in a way that requires tremendous amounts of power/force, such as sprinting and hill running, and you can see how it’s more applicable to combat sports than squats are.
Now, just like with the example of piano, what’s the point of having all this strength if you don’t know how to use it? If you focus on perfecting the way you recruit your CNS recruits motor units, you perfect the position of your body, in relation to your opponent and the efficiency of your movements, then you will be a better fighter.
So why not become super strong and then train to fight? As mentioned before: resources. Also, the weight training you do may not necessarily correlate directly to whatever it is you want to excel at. As I’ve demonstrated, squatting, while it may train the same muscles as punching (doesn’t really), does not equate to the same muscle firing pattern or movement as punching.
Strength does not necessarily correlate with proper movement. If my squat goes from 225 to 500, will I be able to jump much higher? Not necessarily.
Why is that? Could because not only is the firing sequence of the muscles different, but it could be the way in which they fire. You are what you repeatedly do, excellence is therefore not an act, but a habit (- Aristotle). You want to become better at throwing punches? Throw punches. Squatting could help, but that’s all it is…help.
So to sum it up:
The most important:
If an individual does not have high enough levels of strength, power output, speed, and other physical attributes, he/she will not be able to perform the sport specific movements to his/her maximum potential. Once the athlete hits a certain point where the benefits of increased physical attributes are not necessarily significant, then the focus can shift almost completely to sport-specific movements. Obviously this depends on the individual, level of play, etc. , but it is fair to say that most individuals are not going to reach their physical peak within their sport. While I agree that training movements is extremely important, so is training the physical attributes that the athletes possess. Like I said before, most fighters train plenty of movements that may not be used within a fight.
Blaze, I think your point (which has been repeated by just about everyone in this thread) about time, and energy being limited resources, and therefore spending a large portion of it training squatting rather than skills specific to striking is not the best course of action is a good one.
But, in regards to your comment about strength training in regards to grappling, actually I know a couple people (father and son, so it’s definitely a genetic freak thing, not normal) who can actually curl their way out of a correctly applied arm bar. Also, being able to squat big weights will make for one hell of a powerful sprawl which would make a high crotch much less likely to succeed. Of course, without developing the skill of sprawling it wouldn’t do much good, so I’m not suggesting just strength training and not developing technique when it comes to grappling.
Also, like I said earlier in this thread, increased strength from squatting (and benching to be honest) CAN actually increase the absolute amount of force that someone can generate with a punch. But that is not the same thing as being able to actually land that strike on a thinking, breathing, skilled opponent. If you just want to show off on a heavy bag, then yeah putting some time in under a bar and practicing your power punching technique can get you there. If you want to be an effective fighter though, that’s not the best use of your time.
[quote]Ckenney wrote:
If an individual does not have high enough levels of strength, power output, speed, and other physical attributes, he/she will not be able to perform the sport specific movements to his/her maximum potential. Once the athlete hits a certain point where the benefits of increased physical attributes are not necessarily significant, then the focus can shift almost completely to sport-specific movements. Obviously this depends on the individual, level of play, etc. , but it is fair to say that most individuals are not going to reach their physical peak within their sport. While I agree that training movements is extremely important, so is training the physical attributes that the athletes possess. Like I said before, most fighters train plenty of movements that may not be used within a fight. [/quote]
I was gonna write a reply but it’s obvious that you’re being utterly blind to everything we are telling you. A properly executed "movement’ requires very little force.
Sento, believe the key word in your last paragraph is ‘can’. I agree that it can. Didn’t say otherwise, was just trying to make a point.
That being said, I’m bowing out of this thread.
Peace.