Love At First Strike

Woke up and raced down to meet up with Tony to do a few rounds of sparring.  I did about 15 minutes of jump rope to warm up and then we rolled to warm up as well.  After that we did about 4 rounds of 4 minutes sparring.  Good work, way to start the day.  If I could do that all day everyday I would be in heaven.

My next workout was at Next Step Conditioning with Coach James.  Myself and about 10 other Bainbridge Island Fire Department members worked for an hour doing lots of kettlebell work, snatches, cleans, swings, wood chops, and combination of all of those together.  We also did some wind sprints with resistance bands and an ab workout using the kettlebells.  Lots of sweat.  I will go heavier next time.  I used 20KG kettlebells for 90% of the workout.

I ended my training day with a great MMA workout at my adult class at Bainbridge MMA.  We worked pummeling, pummeling for position and then shooting for the double underhooks and takedown into mount and side control.  We also drilled 4 out of the 5 moves we drilled last week from the guard.  Guillotine Choke, Triangle Choke, Kimura and Hip Bump Reversal.  We first just went through the motions.  Then added some resistance and finally tried to attack them live.  I played in my training partners guard most of the night because I am trying to get better in the guard.  I did really well.

Today I rocked out the CrossFit workout solo and then went to MMA training right after.  Here was the WOD for today.

Warm-up:
1000m row

WOD:
5 rounds for time of:
2 muscle-ups or 15 pull-ups
20 wall balls
8 Sumo dead-lift high pull (115 for men / 52lb KB for women)

When I got to class we were working with the Thai Pads on some kicks.  We worked a series of 9s and 10s/ lefts and rights both mid and low.  All in all we did about 115 on each side.

We also drilled a few combos:
single knee/double knee/jab,cross,knee/jab,cross,knee, right round kick.

After those drills we did some light sparring.  We sparred the combos we learned as well as a few 4 minute rounds of full kick boxing.

I love MMA.  I had such a good time at practice.

Today was a double dose workout day today.  Tabata WOD at Bainbridge Family Mixed Martial Arts and then MMA class where we trained stand up and boxing techniques.  The Tabata WOD consisted of the same exercises we did earlier in the week but we did the entire workout in Tabata fashion.

Tabata consists of the following (4 minute round, 20 seconds work, 10 seconds rest till 4 minutes complete)
The exercises:

Push Ups
Walking Lunges
Bent Knee Crunches
Burpees

I was sore from doing the same exercises the day before as well as falling from some takedowns.  We still rocked the WOD pretty hard and everyone got a great sweat.  This is my last day of doing that particular Tabata workout.

Adult MMA class was also a good workout.  We worked the first six strikes or moves in the 18 point Muay Thai system.  I will get the entire run down and post it Monday when Rick gets back.  It is basically the following steps:

Right low kick to opponents left thigh
Check left inside leg kick from opponent
Left inside leg kick bringing left leg all the way back
Left mid kick to opponents torso area
Right cross
Left hook
Right mid kick to opponents torso area

The workout is pretty intense.  I am really working on my balance, especially with my left kicks.  When you see the entire sub set in motion you realize how good the drill is.  It utilizes different strikes, blocking and covers many hits to different parts of opponents body.  I am planning on setting up a kicking post in my garage (futon around a beam, if anyone has an old futon they want to donate let me know) so I can train the combo at home.  It was a great sweat and I felt a bit more comfortable then when we first trained it a month ago.

Thank you again MMA for a great day, great workout and something truly great to focus on in my life.