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MMA Strength Training: Weighted Pull-ups

November 24th, 2009

Derek Manuel

15 Comments »

MMA Strength Training: Weighted Pull-Ups

In a MMA fight, fighters often use more of their upper body pulling muscles rather then pushing muscles. Pulling your opponent in the clinch,

pulling your opponents head down, pulling your opponent while in your guard, pulling and defending from an armbar, applying the several choke holds,

are all scenarios mma fighters frequently find themselvs in.

One of the best ways to increase your upper body strength that I rarely see people do in the gym is weighted pull-ups. I have seen this exercise

in every mma strength training program I have ever recommended, and there is a reason.

“But I do lat pull-downs, isn’t that the same thing?”

Quite frankly, no. If you have ever read any of my previous stuff you know I am a strong advocate of free-weights over most (99.9% of the time) machines.

The reason being is that with free-weights you are developing more functional strength, such as your stabilizer muscles and balance. With machines, the plane

of motion is guided and assisted, limiting your stabilizer and supporting muscles.

Am I against machines? No, not by any means, but if you are looking to build real world, functional, and raw strength free-weights are your best bet. There’s

a time and place for machines, but I’m getting off topic and we can discuss that later.

Back to weighted pull-ups. By progressively increasing the weight tied around your weight in your pull-ups, you will build some real back and arm strength

that most other back exercises don’t quite match. You get the FULL range of motion, you are pulling your body weight (which is always a good idea for mma

fighters and combat atheletes) along with an addtional load, and their are a million different variations you can do.

In terms of your mma strength training workouts though, I would suggest you focus more on progressively adding more and more weight with just good old

fashioned pull-ups with your palms facing away or chin ups where your palms are facing towards you.

As you start to develop a good base of pull-up strength, such as reps of 5 with 50+ lbs tied around your waist, then you can start adding variables to your

pull-ups, such as different grips, pull-ups with a gi or towel to target your grip strength, widening or narrowing your grip, etc.

See below for a great example of 19 different variations for pull-ups.

[video here]

One last benefit with weighted pull-ups is that in my personal experience there is no pulling exercise better that carries over to all the other

exercises that involve your pulling muscles. When you continuously add weight and and can do regular pull-ups with heavier and heavier resistance,

you’ll also notice a huge improvement in strength with exercises like lat-pulldowns, t-bar rows, bent-over barbell rows, dumbbell rows, seated rows,

curls, etc.

Start included weighted pull-ups in your mma strength training workouts. If all you can do is 3 regular pull-ups without additional weight, then keep

at it until you can do 8 or more. Then slowly increase the weight just like any other resistance exercise and before you know it you’ll be

the only guy in your gym doing pull-ups with a 80lb dumbbell around your waist.

But more importantly, your next opponent in the ring or cage will have the fight taken out of him as soon as he feels the strength and power in your

upper body in the clinch.

Weighted Pull-ups In a MMA fight, fighters often use more of their upper body pulling muscles rather then pushing muscles. Pulling your opponent in the clinch, pulling your opponents head down, pulling your opponent while in your guard, pulling and defending from an armbar, applying the several choke holds, are all scenarios mma fighters frequently find themselves in.

One of the best ways to increase your upper body strength that I rarely see people do in the gym is weighted pull-ups. I have seen this exercise in every mma strength training program I have ever recommended, and there is a reason.

“But I do lat pull-downs, isn’t that the same thing?”

Not exactly. If you have ever read any of my previous stuff you know I am a strong advocate of free-weights over most (99.9% of the time) machines; at least when it comes to raw strength.

(more…)

Posted in MMA Strength Training

Tags: MMA Strength Training

15 Comments »

MMA Conditioning Workouts: How to Save Time While Developing Strength And Cardio Simultaniously

November 18th, 2009

Derek Manuel

2 Comments »

One obstacle even the most motivated fighter in world will often face is the inability to realistically sacrifice the time it takes to elite levels of mma strength and conditioning.

I mean, the average person has a job, a family, school, or some other major obligation that simply cannot be comprised for putting the time it takes to become a mma fighter.

If you aspire to become a fighter with a chance to compete with some of the best, you have to develop a certain level of mastery in three different categories:

Martial Arts Skill

Plain and simple, if you want to be a good fighter, you’re going to have to put in the man hours it takes to learn how to fight.

This includes striking, kicking, the clinch, throws and take-downs, grappling, and everything else in between; not to mention putting these altogether so that you can harmoniously transition from each of these distinctive techniques and their respective styles.

This alone can take YEARS to develop and requires a minimum three to five days a week of consistently improving your technique and skill.

There is no short-cut in regards to time when it comes to developing the skill it takes to become a mma fighter.

Strength and Power

Fortunately, because of the nature of the human body, developing strength and power doesn’t take several hours a day to develop. On the contrary, it shouldn’t take more than 4 hours a week to constantly improve your strength and power, and in many cases much less.

This is something most people can fit into their schedule without making any major sacrifices of time in their daily life.

Cardiovascular Conditioning

Developing your cardiovascular conditioning, like strength and power, doesn’t have to take too much time out of your day, but still requires consistent effort.

No more then 20 – 60 minutes of cardio 4 to 5 days a week is needed to develop maximum levels of cardio conditioning.

Again, developing your cardio doesn’t take too much time in your day by itself, but once you begin putting all three of these together, it can add up to several hours A DAY that many people simply don’t have.

Saving Time with Circuit Training in your MMA Conditioning Workouts

Once you factor in your strength, power, cardio and overall conditioning in, the hours start to really pile up.

Like I stated above, the average busy person just doesn’t have an extra 2 or more hours a day to dedicate to strength and conditioning, especially if they are heavily engaged in attending a mma school to develop their skill daily.

There is a way, however, to save time by combining your strength training with your cardio in your mma conditioning workouts. This is through circuit training, also known as complexes.

A circuit is moving from one exercise to another with little to no rest periods in between each exercise, not stopping to rest until one “circuit” is complete.

With each workout, you can either increase the weight you do for each exercise, or decrease the time it takes to complete a circuit.

The great thing about circuit training is that compresses the time it takes to develop strength, power, AND cardiovascular conditioning into one mma conditioning workout; and the best part is that circuit training normally doesn’t take longer than 25 minutes a day to complete.

Don’t assume that with circuit training you’ll work any less hard or get any less of a result. In fact, this type of training is one of the most physically demanding things you can do if you really push yourself, and is a staple in every fighter’s mma training workouts.

To learn more about circuit training and complexes for mma fighters, or to get started on proven mma conditioning workouts developed specifically for aspiring fighters who have little time but still want the results, the top two programs I would recommend are

circuit-training-room

One obstacle even the most motivated fighter in world will often face is the inability to realistically sacrifice the time it takes to develop elite levels of mma strength and conditioning.

The average person has a job, a family, school, or some other major obligation that simply cannot be comprised for putting the time it takes to become a mma fighter.

If you aspire to become a fighter with a chance to compete with some of the best, you have to develop a certain level of mastery in three different categories:

(more…)