Mick Spinks
With the amazing popularity of Mixed Martial Arts fighting there has been an increase in MMA gyms which is needed to cater for the influx of students and why not, it is real, exciting and has advanced pugilism to the next level grasping the attention of fans from all corners of the Globe.
If you are a serious competitor who wants to evolve with this revolution how do you stay ahead of the field?
Well train harder, yes I agree you have to train really hard but with all the disciplines required to be a competitive well rounded MMA fighter, you need to periodise and prioritise so as to get the gains required and progress not plateau or get injured as a result of overtraining
I sometimes use the statement to over trainers, “You always train hard which is really great” Then I ask, but how hard are you training? You need to have benchmarks in your program to be able to identify over training and to know where you are.
The first area we would like to cover in these articles is structural balancing, as the senior coach of our MMA team TP. Double Dragon I need to structure the requirements of the athlete to get the maximum result in the time available. When we have a good time frame we review the balance of the body, Shannon Green our strength coach has outlined a couple of the common imbalances which strengthen and increase the overall performance of the MMA fighter.
Shannon Green
Two reasons why you should do structural balance
1. Prevent injuries - In every sport there is some form over use to certain muscles, muscles groups and/or movement patterns, and over long periods of time these imbalances can become quite significant either causing Impingement due to alignment issues, or pain from wearing of cartilage, restriction of neural output to working muscles.
2. Improve sports performance - A muscle ability to develop “force” is a direct function of the strength of its antagonists and stabilizers. In other words the more balanced your body is the more weight you can potentially lift, the more power you can exert, the more times you can exert that force.
You’re only as strong as your weakest link, If the antagonist (opposing muscle) are too weak they actually tell the brain to shut down the agonist (working muscle).The best way to think of it is to imagine metal chain and Depending on how strong the links in the chain are, the force needed to break the chain could be large or small.
If the chain has big metal links except for one link which is small plastic, then the whole chain is weak (despite the strength of the other links). So You can only improve once those weak points have been made stronger.
As fighters most of do not care how much we can lift, and as long as our conditioning improves, our punches and kicks get harder, and we can still make weight who cares right.
Well the best way to improve these things without increasing body weight is by balancing you body. Since stabilizers are relatively small muscles hypertrophying (making them larger) is going to add minimal weight to your frame.but the strength increases can be near to 40% improvement in areas. A lot of the time peoples conditioning does not improve simply because strength is there limiting factor.
Areas which need consideration – Upper body Proper Scapulae Function
Most Fighter tend to present with Pretty bad looking posture this is due to stance causing sports specific position - excessive internal rotation of the humerus, Abduction & elevation of the scapular. As you can see in the image below
What does this mean?
In technical terms . . . An alteration in the normal position or motion of the scapula during coupled scapulohumeral movements will result in the inhibition and/or disorganization of activation patterns in scapular stabilizing muscles.
The scapula plays many roles in order for proper shoulder function to occur, like providing synchronous scapular rotation during humeral motion, serving as a stable base for rotator cuff activation, and functioning as a link in the kinetic chain (If scapular motion is impaired, the forces generated from the lower extremity and trunk will not be effectively transmitted to the upper extremity).
Each role is vital to proper arm function and can only occur when the anatomy around the shoulder is uncompromised. The presence of bony and soft tissue injury as well as muscle weakness and inflexibility can alter the roles of the scapula and alter scapular resting position and/or dynamic motion.
“So If the shoulder is not functioning correctly. . . you couldn’t put a dent in a rice pudding!!”
How to fix it
The thing is its not just a fact that your muscles are weak they are also tight and you need to address this with soft tissue work aswell as corrective exercise
Here is a few mobility videos to get you started
