Our friend Ross Enamait over at Ross Training offers some sound advice for fighters, martial artists, and fitness freaks across the board in a recent interview on Expandercrank. When Ross speaks, we should all listen. Here is an excerpt:
How do you progress your fighters? Do you approach a beginner in the same fashion you approach a champion contender? Or is there something that you do differently with beginners and champions respectively, except of course for scaling weights and training intensity?
“Fighters progress through fighting more so than anything that ever occurs inside the gym. Speaking as a boxing trainer, when I consider a prospective opponent for one of my fighters, I look at what he has accomplished inside the ring. For instance, I look at his amateur background, who he has fought as a pro, and how active he has been in recent months.
No one cares how much weight a fighter lifts or how many pull-ups he can perform. We want to know what the fighter can do inside the ring. The best way to gauge progress is by observing the fighter’s sparring as well as his actual bouts. A fighter should improve with each bout. Nothing is as important to a fighter as actual ring time and competitive experience.
As for the novice vs. champion contender, beginners naturally require more work in the mental department. It is not uncommon for beginners to be quite nervous when sparring or fighting. They are dealing with anxiety and fear that the more seasoned fighters have learned to control. And it is these mental aspects which make real experience so critical. The gym will never prepare a novice fighter for the emotions that are experienced when fighting a stranger in front of a large crowd. True experience is earned one fight at a time. There are no shortcuts.”
To read the entire article click here.