warm ups

[Leigh]

is there any specific info on warming up for a fight? eg, how to prime the energy systems etc. is there any science behind a warm up, or is it ok to go in cold?

[Trendar]

Would like info on that too, atleast I have done/heard, that something like half hour before fight your heart rate should be rised to near max, I have done it with pad/sprawl work, after that upkeep a little warm with slower pad/grappling

[lylemcd]

I wrote a two part article for warming up for the weight room on the site that will have some general guidelines.

Going in cold? Bad bad idea. Good way to get very injured.

You need to warmup tissues generally for flexibility and such. Connective tissues are also more pliable when warm, less likely to get hurt. Follow a general warmup with some dynamic stretching to make sure everything is loose.

Doing some technical work for specifics is not a bad idea. It never hurts to practice some techniques.

metabolically, there is something to be said for doing a bit of high intensity work. The various energetic pathways take time to come online and doing a bit of high intensity work about 15-20 minutes out is NOT a bad idea. Joel didn't discuss it in his book but lactic acid acutally helps buffer acidosis during high intensity activity. Doing 2-5 minutes of work around your LT about 20 minutes out gets those pathways running but gives you time to clear any acid that you generate.

Some explosive work (low volume jumping or explosive pushups) would be worth considering to get the nervous system firing on all cylinders. This can and should be done closer to the fight itself since hte effects are shorter lived than the metabolic stuff.

There are also psychological effects of warmup: some athletes need to get fired up, warmups are a good way to do that. anxious athletes need a calming warmup so that they don't spazz out. Probably more important for newer competitors in their first few fights. Focusing on deep breathing and relaxation may be better compared to going int like a Viking with bloodlust.

Warmups also tend to be very individual and you have to play with stuff until you get it right. Test this out in training if possible and when you get it nailed, don't change anything.

For example, for speed skating, it took me about 4 years to figure out my optimal warmup for training and race days are a touch different than even that. But now that I have it dialed, I do the same thing every time.

Training warmup:
1. 15-20' jog (to warm up, the oval is chilly also part of some general fitness work)
short dynamic stretching session
2. a marching drill for start mechanics, also helps loosen up my hips
3. some specific skating drills that work various aspects of technique that I want to keep dialing in. I've got 3 that have been in the rotation for the past several years to keep consolidating technique
4. We usually finish with a set of turn cable (a turn drill) and then I go to the ice.

The above takes me about 30 minutes start to finish most of which is the jog.

On the ice, I get my skates on skate around the oval and do a couple more stretches. Then I move into drills, balance, sculling, corner stuff. Then we do easy 250's working on various aspects of technique that my coach will correct or note. Takes about 15 minutes.

At that point we move into warmup laps and the real workout.

Race warmup is similar off ice except that what I do on the ice is a bit different.

Lyle

[Leigh]

Cheers mate, that's brilliant

The buffering effects of lactate - is that the mechanism at work when runners get their "second wind"?

I find I have to go anaerobic in the warm up, as the first time is a huge shock and my body tries to fight it, but once I've done it, I'm not too bad in the fight

[lylemcd]

Cheers mate, that's brilliant

The buffering effects of lactate - is that the mechanism at work when runners get their "second wind"?

No

[burien top team]

Nice information. I compete in jiu jitsu rather than MMA and though I'don't really consider myself a slow starter in competition (mostly because I usually get the first points either with a takedown or a guard pull and sweep) it does tend to take me a while to get going after I get those points. I wonder if the point about getting the energy systems "online" in the beginning is part of the problem.

[lylemcd]

Nice information. I compete in jiu jitsu rather than MMA and though I'don't really consider myself a slow starter in competition (mostly because I usually get the first points either with a takedown or a guard pull and sweep) it does tend to take me a while to get going after I get those points. I wonder if the point about getting the energy systems "online" in the beginning is part of the problem.

It can be either metabolic or nervous system (or both) and people show massive variability in how much warmup they need. For example, I generally warm up relatively quickly. ONe of my trainees may take 30 minutes to really get clicking in the weight room although she can vary day to day in this regards. One of my teammates (our sprinter) needs much more warmup to get everything working. Which is bad because he's lazy as hell and 'forgets' to warm up appropriately. And then bitches for 30 minutes into the start of workout about how awful he feels.

My general rule is this: if you find that you do better later in the workout (or on the second or third set of a given exercise in the weight room), you need more warmup. Because what's happening is that the first half of your competition is acting as the final bit of your warmup. Which is a waste. You want to be 100% when you start the competition, not halfway in.

So in practice play around with some different stuff (I know know enough about jiu jitsu to say whether the issue is metabolic or neural in this case) and see what gets you ready to go at second one when you spar or whatever. When you figure it out, do that in competition.

Lyle

[burien top team]

My general rule is this: if you find that you do better later in the workout (or on the second or third set of a given exercise in the weight room), you need more warmup. Because what's happening is that the first half of your competition is acting as the final bit of your warmup. Which is a waste. You want to be 100% when you start the competition, not halfway in.

So in practice play around with some different stuff (I know know enough about jiu jitsu to say whether the issue is metabolic or neural in this case) and see what gets you ready to go at second one when you spar or whatever. When you figure it out, do that in competition.

Lyle

Thanks. You hit the nail on the head. Even though I don't have the greatest "cardio" (it has gotten better by leaps and bounds since getting Joel's book), I always tend to do better "later in the workout." I can roll for 10-15 minutes at a pretty good pace. But those early minutes from about 2:30 to 4:30 are often very stiff and awkward or even weak-feeling.

[lylemcd]

Thanks. You hit the nail on the head. Even though I don't have the greatest "cardio" (it has gotten better by leaps and bounds since getting Joel's book), I always tend to do better "later in the workout." I can roll for 10-15 minutes at a pretty good pace. But those early minutes from about 2:30 to 4:30 are often very stiff and awkward or even weak-feeling.

So do this the next practice you're going to roll. About 10 minutes before your first sparring match, do 2-4 minute of a fairly hard effort after the rest of your general warmup. I have no clue what that might entail but I imagine it will be something technical and related to the art. Then go pretty easy for 10 minutes to let the fatigue dissipate. See what happens when you start sparring.

[Joel]

Our pre-fight warm up routine is mostly a mixture of pad work and rolling/technical drilling. About an hour out from the fight, we'll generally start with some calisthenics/movement and shadow boxing type drills for 10 minutes or so to get the blood flowing and joints loosened up. After that, we'll start doing some pad work at a moderate intensity for about 5-10 minutes.

Then we'll start spiking the heart rate up into the 170s and then let it come back down into the 130s. We'll do that maybe 3-5 times or so. From there, we'll have the righter rest about 5 minutes while we do some passive stretching of their hips and shoulders.

After that, we'll progress into some simulated rolling drills, basically just going through the specific drills that were a part of the training camp specific to the opponent. We'll spend about 5-10 minutes going through those drills and having the fighter mentally focus on what the opponent is likely to do and what his reaction is going to be.

After that's done we'll take a break and let the fighter relax and get some water. What we do from this point on really depends on the timing of the fights. That's the difficult part of warming up for MMA is that you don't always know exactly when you're going to fight because it depends on the timing of the other fights. When we're the main event, you have a pretty good idea of what time it'll end up starting, but if you're in the middle then you're just estimating and adjusting as you go.

If there ends up being a long delay we'll have the fighter do some more drilling to stay warm and loose. Overall, you definitely want to spend a good amount of time warming up and drilling prior to a fight, but you don't want to do so much that you become fatigued. You do want to get the HR up pretty high, but you don't keep it there for very long. A lot of the work should be very technically focused to the fight strategy/game plan specific to your opponent. I will also agree that there is some individuality to the whole process. Try different strategies and see what works best for you.