Whether I’m coaching soccer or training classes in kempo, I frequently recommend interval training. Many of my students / players wonder initially why I don’t insist on mile after mile of roadwork. Don’t get me wrong – it’s a great way to improve your cardiovascular fitness and is a great tool for long term fitness and weight loss – but it’s not the tool for the job when you need quick bursts of speed and power followed by a quick recovery.
Your body produces the energy you need for activity based on three different systems. At any given time all three are contributing to your energy output, but the amount each varies with the demands of what you are doing. When you sprint, there is a system that relies on one energy source (creatine phosphase) for about 8-10 seconds. If the exercise goes longer than that, perhaps up to two minutes, you use a second system primarily that breaks down the energy storage (glycogen) in your muscles in a way that doesn’t need oxygen. The third system which can work hypothetically indefinitely is the aerobic system. That’s the one you need to rune mile after mile. So if you are in a self-defense situation, or even a ring-based ‘fight’, unless the rounds are longer than two minutes, aerobic road work is the third most important system to train.
As The folks over at Bill Fitzpatrick’s dojo.com say:
A real fight is more like a sprint- short and fast. This is known as an anaerobic activity. Intense activity that taxes your muscles, labors your breathing, and recruits the muscle fibers for speed and strength. How long should a fight last? 10 seconds? 30? A minute? In my opinion you’re in big trouble if a fight lasts more than a minute. Get the job done. The longer you engage, the more chance something will go wrong.
So how do you train these systems? Is there a specific way to target these or are we stuck with our genetic predisposition? Are marathoners or sprinters born or made? (click more to read the rest of the post)
Well, to some degree olympic sprinters (and pro marathoners)are born. They have a distribution of muscle types that are well suited to these activities and contain the ‘stuff’ that produces energy efficiently for these activities. That’s the bad news. The good news is, no matter what your tendencies are in these areas, you can make your body adapt.
For good training, think specificity and overload. If you want to improve in a certain area, do exercises that are like what you want to improve in, or have similar demands for energy. Also, if you work within your comfort zone and don’t feel like you are ‘pushing beyond’ now and then, you won’t get far.
These technical terms are all well and good, but what does that mean when you get to the dojo (or gym)? Think of what it feels like to sprint. You breathe hard, and need to recover when you are done. Try drills that require energy demands like that.
For example:
If you are working Kata, do a few all out with no break until you are panting (30 seconds to 2 minutes). Then, do them at 50% to recover while you are still working for another 2 minutes. Your body will adapt to the stress and will recover while you are still expending energy.
Sparring is a great area for this if done properly. Point sparring is not particularly useful, but continuous sparring for a fixed time at ‘full out’ energy expenditure followed by a brief rest period (that still contains some movement) is a great simulation that will meet your specificity and overload needs.
Obviously, you don’t throw beginners into this. All of this advice presumes a baseline level of fitness and that you have checked with your doctor regarding your ability to exercise vigorously.
Basically, this idea is much like what separates one dojo from the next. There are many schools that have the same material and background and yet produce students of very different natures. What you do is one factor, but how you do it will bring it to the next level.
