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Breaking into M.M.A. Training Log

154K views 2K replies 38 participants last post by  KevinD 
#1 · (Edited)
Hello all, I've been mostly lurking these forums for awhile now. A little introduction: I'm 20 years old, just wrapping up doing a little world travel. While I was in Thailand I got involved with a Muay Thai training camp called Tiger Muay Thai, and trained pretty hard for a month and loved it. I decided to see where this passion can take me, and have decided to aim to fight in my first M.M.A. fight at a local amateur venue in my town called Valley Fight this coming December. This means I have a lot of work to do.

I will be training at a local M.M.A. gym called Revolution Chilliwack, as well as training with my friend who also wants to fight within the year.

I'm 20 years old, Southpaw, 6'4 about 195lbs, muscular build from years of weightlifting (I've got an enormous journal on a bodybuilding website but alas, there's no point talking M.M.A. on a bodybuilding forum, so here I am) but relatively weak cardio, other weaknesses include an occassional occurence of shin splints and contact lenses. I've only trained Muay Thai for a month and that's basically all my training besides a bit of self taught boxing.

I'm wrapping up my travels now, sitting in Bangkok for a few more days. I checked out a nearby Muay Thai gym but it was a hole in the ground with some mats and wasn't cheap, so **** it. I'm doing bodyweight exercises and shadowboxing in my room to help maintain what I can.

I go home soon so training resumes on August 1st as I enroll in the MMA gym back home and in addition begin my own training with a partner to keep the total training time to about 3.5 hours a day, 5 days a week.

Training is 4 weeks on followed by 1 week rest, each week is 5 days training, alternating between 2 days set out like this:

Day 1 - Technique
Stretch
Shadowboxing
Hit Pads
Standup Sparring
Rolling
Stretch
Go to class

Day 2 - Conditioning
Stretch
Skipping
Weight Training (Divided into Push/Pull/Leg days focusing on functional strength, explosive power, and endurance.)
Heavy Bag
Speed Bag
Stretch
Go to class

Classes are as follows:
Mon - Beginner Jiu-Jitsu
Tue - M.M.A.
Wed - Beginner Jiu-Jitsu
Thur - Boxing + Muay Thai
Fri - Boxing + Muay Thai + M.M.A
Sat - Rest
Sun - Rest

Going to ease myself into it and build momentum; first week just go to the classes, second week go to the classes and do training every second day, then by the third I'm doing the full routine. Also going to start light on my weights and build momentum over the weeks as powerlifters do.

I've also wrote up a flexible diet that I believe I can maintain pretty easily. I'll add the details once I've gone through with it for awhile in case any changes need to be made. What's important is the 6000 mostly healthy calories to exceed my maintenance level for a gradual weight gain.

Supplements are Protein/Creatine Monohydrate/Multivitamin/Fish Oil, considering a pre-workout supp like N.O. Xplode but don't really need the extra hit to the wallet or a caffeine dependency, so we'll see on that one.

I picked up all my gear to train out here in Thailand for nice and cheap. Got 16oz gloves, shin guards, wraps, mouth guard, and headgear. My friend has bought all of these things as well as some Thai kicking pads and a round timer, so we're all equipped and ready to go.

I'm aiming for December for my premier amateur M.M.A. bout. Wish me luck and feel free to pass on advice. I'm gonna tear a hole into this guy. :thumb02:

Some relevant links
Tiger Muay Thai, Phuket, Thailand:http://www.tigermuaythai.com
Revolution Chilliwack, Chilliwack, Canada:http://www.revolutionfightteam.com
Valley Fight, Chilliwack, Canada:http://www.valleyfight.com
 
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#300 ·
I slacked on Wednesday. No real excuse for this, just being a lazy cocksucker.

Today was Muay Thai/MMA. Warm up with shadowboxing, rounds on the heavybag, drilled combos with emphasis on defensive skills. Lots of parry/block/catch and counter. Did a conditioning drill at the end pushing your partner across the gym while he resists then kicking and so on for 5 mins.

MMA warmed up with a couple guard passes, practiced some new ones, had a crash course in toe locks, knee bars, heel hooks, etc. We were careful the whole time but my knee feels kind of sketchy right now. I think it'll be fine. Muay Thai + MMA tomorrow.
 
#301 ·
Muay Thai

3 Rounds skipping. A few rounds shadowboxing. Then rest of the class was rounds on the bag. Today's theme was using the lead hand. Tons of double jabs, body jabs jab + lead hooks, lead uppercuts, fakes, and combos putting together the lead hand. Major shoulder soreness on the one side.

MMA

Warmup runs and tumbling. A few techniques for standups from guard. A new one that I liked was come up reach around head as if for a guilotine, hip out, come up and give a hip bump to create space and then pull your legs out into a sprawl on top of him. Rolled 3 rounds from guard and I did very well again. I made sure to do lots of light striking and in similar fashion to tuesday, I spent alot of time in mount and got an americana and an arm triangle. Kajan had some good things to say about my improvements.

One more day tomorrow. Heading to the gym to hit the pads with my partner then BJJ classes right after. Then glorious rest.
 
#302 ·
Lifting

Squat 6,6,6 @ 205lbs
Bench 6,6,6 @ 70lbs
Deadlift 6,6,6 @ 205lbs
Chin Up 6,6,6 @ B/W + 5lbs


BJJ

Chill day, learned a cool new way to take mount called 'goat mount' see if I can work it in. Don't know how applicable it is to no gi. I did pretty well in rolling, spent lots of time in mount on one guy and had a good back and forth one with the 300+lb blue belt. Popped my shoulder and my gimpy knee was hinting at a comeback. Resting up tomorrow and they should both be alright. Still no opponent...weak.
 
#305 ·
MMA Class

Excruciating warmup with lots of running jumping pushups. Shadowboxing. Then everyone just broke off in pairs and practiced combos on eachother. I rolled the first round and had a pretty good one with a fighter that's better than me but smaller. I stayed between side control and half guard for most of the round. Unfortunately I also irritated my old knee injury. Nothing terrible, just a bit of pain. This is shitty timing because I really wanted/needed to get some more sparring at the pro gym. Will improvise and make do with something else instead.
 
#307 ·
Muay Thai

15 mins skipping, 3 rounds shadowboxing, 2 rounds pads, 2 rounds heavybag, 2 round speed bag, 3 rounds heavybag.

MMA

Warm up run

Techniques were two escapes from back control, armbar from side control. I got sharktanked 4 rounds between Kajan and the girl training. Did full MMA sparring with Kajan and started on the ground with her on my back/mount/guard.

My knee hurts. BJJ is off tomorrow, I'll likely be doing some sort of conditioning.
 
#309 ·
BJJ

Pumelling, armbars, guard passes, tecnique was a collar choke from guard with one foot on the hip and one foot creeping up the back, one hand in collar and other gripping shoulder. From there as they slip their arm out you can kick your leg over their head and finish the choke there, and also an armbar from there as well. I had alot of tought rolls. I rolled 3 blue belts and a purple belt and got submitted 2-3 times. Suprisingly the knee feels okay today.
 
#310 ·
Barbell Complex (75lbs, 6 sets, 6 reps)
Good Morning
Overhead Squat
Deadlift
Bent Over Row
Reverse Grip Curl
Military Press
Skullcrusher

Another 5 lbs. Did 6,6,6,3. This is going to be a hard one to break through.


Ab Circuit

Twisting Crunch 20,20 @45lbs
Reverse Crunch 15,15 @20lbs
Cable Crunch 20,20 @65kg
Ab Plank 1:55,1:55

10 seconds on the ab plank. Next week I'll do a third set or increase a few of the weights. Excellent workout. MMA class in a few hours.
 
#313 ·
Mostly lower back exercise, some hamstring involved.

You're standing with a barbell on your back as if you were about to do squats. You keep your legs straight (straight but not like locked in at the knees), then you slowly bend forwards at the waist, keeping your lower back straight and your head looking upwards. Basically going to parralel, and then back up. If that doesn't make sense, google will help you. :thumbsup:
 
#312 ·
MMA Class

Warm up run, tumbling, technique was all ground and pound from guard. A few arm traps and quick striking, stand up and strike and jump back down, elbows to the body. Then from the bottom of guard we practiced tying people up and evading the strikes. Drilled that for awhile, did pretty good. Then we rolled I think 4 rounds. I did pretty well against everyone, one of the blue belt from BJJ class that historically puts an ass kicking on me was in class and I was able to be more competitive and establish and trap him in my mount by the end of the rolls.

Forgot to mention, I got my fourth stripe in BJJ yesterday. Next promotion is a blue belt.

It's only tuesday and I'm feeling beat up, at least there's no more double days for awhile.

Tomorrow I'll see if my partner is up for hitting pads, otherwise I'll figure something else out solo.
 
#315 ·
Wednesday
Did something a little different day. 6 rounds of 3 minutes alternating between sprinting up and down a flight of stairs and pulling/pushing a car back and forth. Not too fun in this weather, nor was it very fun having 3 or so hours of sleep in me. Catching up on sleep today.

Thursday
Muay Thai

Heavybag, shadowbox, knees across the gym, practice catching and countering push kicks, practice missing a lead leg kick + spinning back kick, and missing a lead leg kick + spinning heel kick.

I felt like absolute garbage today. The weather's kicked in and it's ******* hot. My allergies are worse than ever before. I took like 4 extra strength reactines to get through the day and still felt miserable. Also had a blast of diarhea right before training. Fun times. Should've just rested today, I need to get some prescription allergy meds or something.
 
#317 ·
Rest this weekend. Eat lots of food, sleep 8-12 hours every night, and sit around on the couch all day. I would probably suggest doing some stretching if you feel the need to do something, though. Even going on a long walk is good for active recovery as well.
 
#318 ·
Burpees (5x3 minute rounds, 1 min rest)
1 - 32
2 - 23
3 - 20
4 - 18
5 - 18
Total - 111

Weak performance. I don't know what the **** is wrong with me. I had 3 days off, and I couldn't properly sleep at all. Appetite is gone. Motivation is weak. There's so many shitty things going on that I can't point out which is a cause and which is an effect. I almost fainted today during the workout.

Nothing really to do but rest some more. Fight is supposed to be in 10 days but with no opponent still, it looks doubtful that I'll get matched. There's a chance of getting matched all the way up to the day of, but I'm not feeling too optimistic. There's another amateur event in Bellingham in July that I'll be looking to get on if this one falls apart. If there was a chart as far as mood goes on this journal, this would be the low point. Bah.
 
#319 ·
Rested up for close to a week.

Came back today for MMA class.

Warm up run + tumbling. Technique was a bunch of good stuff in guard working against a wall. I felt good today, but still not a 100% I'd say I'm still not quite over being overtrained. Still held up alright though.

It's confirmed that there is no fight for me. Just a complete lack of opponents at 205, I guess. Looks like my debut is delayed.

I just heard that there's a grappling tournament happening tomorrow morning, was thinking I'll go down and register last minute. It's a unique one that should be pretty difficult but fun. It's a round robin tournament where you're rolling up to 10 times. You only win a round by submitting someone, in which case you receive a few points, if it's a draw, both people receive one point. Points are tallied at the end for the winner. I won't win but this sounds like something really cool to take part in. Hopefully a friend will be down to come along and film it.
 
#320 ·
A few more days off for the weekend. I went to the BJJ tournament but unfortunately I felt like crap that morning. Allergies were kiling me. I didn't enter, just watched. I wish it happenned today or later on or something, but that's how it goes. I'm in the next one fo shizzle, I think I could have placed 3rd or 4th out of 8 at this one, in the 200lbs+ division.

BJJ

Warm up run, pumelling, technique in first class was collar chokes, armbars, switching to armbar the other arm. Just did one round of guard passes, I passed after a bit of a battle. I caught my partner in a triangle during his pass.

Then we shark tanked a new blue belt. Passed guard and into mount, went for americana, he rolled and then sunk a rear naked.

Advanced class, learned a few cool new techniques that I'll go over with a bit of detail. First was guard passes working outside the legs. Open the guard with knee, one arm slips under the back of their knee, then other arm, then simply dump them to the side and turn your hip onto them into side control. Next is get into that same position, stack, slide your wrist to their throat, other hand grabs pants at the but then spin them at the back and compress wrist for a choke/neck crank. A counter for the guy guarding is to grab at the sleeves, drag them down to outside your thighs, push their hips back with your feet, then put them under into butterfly guard, stretch them way out, then bring one foot over to the other side and then spin into back control.

Then we just rolled. First roll I was stuck between half guard and side control, I got smothered to shit but was never really threatened or tired. Still stuck the whole round regardless.

Next rolls was with a big brown belt that I really enjoy rolling with because he's super chill and coaches you. Started off giving him problems tying him up in my guard. Threatened the omoplata and kimura but nothing came out of it. He eventually got to half guard where we battled for quite awhile. I eventually reguarded, threatened the kimura, then hip sweeped into mount and grapevined out. He gave me his back, but escaped my control pretty easily. That was the extent of the roll. Best roll I can think of in awhile.

Next was a really small blue belt girl. She's ******* good though, kept me busy and I barely contained her for most of the round.

Next was a small but good purple belt. I spent most of the round on his back but could not submit.

Awesome class. The overtraining is gone and I'm in incredible shape right now. Focus was crystal clear all class and I feel ******* good. I could tear some motherfucker up in a match this friday. Unfortunately my time isn't yet. Striking + MMA Tomorrow.
 
#321 ·
Good shit. It's really cool that you get to roll with purples and even some browns on a pretty regular basis. Also really cool that the brown belt doesn't have an ego and is willing to teach/help. Keep up the hard work buddy.
 
#322 ·
Today I did a workout like I haven't done in a year. It was full of egotistic exercises that have very little practical use, but are fun to do. Considering that it's been at least a year since I've done these exercises, I was pleased to see that my working weights were mostly only 5-10lbs off what they used to be.

DB Curl 6,5,5 @ 50lbs
EZ Bar Curl 6 @ 95lbs
DB Bench 6,5,5 @ 80lbs
Dips 9 @ bodyweight + 20lbs
Military Press 6,5,3 @ 115lbs
BB Shrug 8,8,8 @ 225lbs
DB Rows 6,6,6 @ 100lbs

Left a bit earlier than I wanted to because I was tiring out and had worked up a cold sweat. Fun but mostly useless workout.
 
#323 ·
BJJ..Going to skip the details. Had a couple good rolls but was probably on the losing side of most. I did however get a guy in a SICK triangle and his ear bled all over me. Awesome. I'm starting to get a bit of swelling in on of my ears myself, going to get it drained, likely on monday. Don't want that cauliflower ear.
 
#324 ·
Went to a walk in clinic yesterday. Doctor had actually never done anything like this before and was kind of puzzled. I just explained it to him then he wiped it with some rubbing alcohol, jabbed it with the syringe and sucked a sizable amount of blood out of my ear. Just told me to keep pressure on it.

Burpees (5x3 minute rounds, 1 min rest)
1 - 30
2 - 24
3 - 21
4 - 22
5 - 23
Total - 120

Improved on last week quite well. Though I felt like I didn't do well, turns out I'm just 4 off from my current best.

I'm not liking the beta alanine anymore. I feel nauseous as hell.

Going to try to hit up Muay Thai + MMA Classes tonight, see how the day works out.
 
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