MMA
Mma is a power endurance sport. Increasing power endurance is always a trade-off between optimising 2 attributes that tend to stand in opposition to each other: the rate of force production and producing that force for long periods. Put simply, you must hit hard and hit hard for a long time.
The main focus of my Fight training for the last month, plus the month coming, happens to be on concentrating on my endurance. Its a quality that has lagged far behind as Ive sought to improve my maximal strength, my explosiveness as well as size of my muscle mass.
For a mma fighter, aerobic potential is amongst the most fundamentally important traits to have, very often overlooked at a time where HIIT, Tabata intervals and improving your lactate threshold is viewed as key to performance.
Upping your capability to utilise your oxidative energy system (i.e. your aerobic capacity), efficiently, is essential to creating a high work rate throughout a three round or a 5 round fight. To that end, the majority of my extra Fight training has centered on long slow distance runs, training for a moderate pace for 60-90 minutes. At these kinds of intensities, over that period of time, my body is being trained aerobically leading to a lot more efficient cardiovascular system.
Another method to improve your oxidative capacity should be to add to the ability of the muscles to utilize oxygen as a fuel. Tempo training or continuous training, was created to specifically target those muscle fibres that can be best adapted at using oxygen – the Type I slow twitch muscle fibres. These muscle fibres are much more efficient at making use of oxygen for energy in comparison to Type II fast twitch fibres, which are better at using ATP/Creatine-Phosphate and glycogen.
Tempo training method
In a six-day a week MMA training programme, including 3 sessions for increasing heart output, I have one dedicated strength session. That strength session is dependent on tempo training.
Tempo training concentrates on time under tension (TUT) to obtain the desired result. The protocol Im working on requires lifting weights of around 60 percent of my one-rep max (RM) at a slow cadence – 2-0-2-0. This simply means lowering the weight at a controlled pace for 2 seconds, no pause at the bottom, then lifting the weight at a controlled pace for 2 seconds, and then repeating with no pause at the top. The muscles are in constant tension through the entire set, regardless how many reps a person does.
My focus is on using big multi-joint movements, like the squat, bench press and shoulder press, to target the maximum number of muscles.
In his book, Ultimate MMA Conditioning, Joel Jamieson recommends picking 3-4 strength exercises and executing 8-10 reps for between 3-5 sets. Rest periods ought to be limited to 45 seconds MAX between each set rising to 6-8 minutes between each exercise.
I use the big four lifts – squat, bench press, dead lift and shoulder press, performing each exercise with a 2-0-2-0 tempo:
Exercise Intensity Reps Sets Rest between sets
Squat 60% of 1RM 8-10 3-5 45 seconds
Shoulder press 60% of 1RM 8-10 3-5 45 seconds
Bench press 60% of 1RM 8-10 3-5 45 seconds
Dead lift 60% of 1RM 8-10 3-5 45 seconds
6-8 minutes active rest between each exercise (shadow boxing)
Effects of tempo training
After only 4 weeks of tempo training, it is hard to tell what benefit this mode of training for strength has had on my muscular endurance.
Based on the scientific literature, slow twitch fibres that happen to be crucial for endurance aren’t fully recruited during rapid explosive movements. Only slow movements, which result in the Type I fibres to be under tension long enough may cause adaptation in these fibres to happen.
One article which discusses this is authored by Thomas V Pipes, entitled Resistance Training and Fiber Types. In it, Pipes takes muscle biopsies of an athlete both before and after pre-determined training microcycles.
Pipes learned that following a routine in which 8 reps (at the 8 RM) were used, the fast twitch muscle fibers of the trained muscle (in this instance the quadricep through the leg press) grew bigger.
However, he also learned that the slow twitch muscle fibres atrophied (i.e., got smaller); and he also discovered that the volume of reps the athlete could perform at 80% of his 1 RM decreased, yet his 1 RM improved. The athlete was then put on a routine using 12 repetitions (at his 12 RM). This time the muscle biopsy demonstrated that hypertrophy did in fact take place, but that this time it was in the slow twitch muscle fibres. Moreover the fast twitch fibres atrophied and the amount of reps possible at 80% 1 RM increased, while his 1 RM decreased.
What this shows is that with increased repetitions, i.e. an increase in TUT, by using a lighter weight, slow twitch fibres are targeted preferentially to fast twitch fibres. Put simply, muscular endurance increases as opposed to maximum strength.
This correlates considering the real-world example of bodybuilders. Bodybuilders have long used the principle of TUT to improve overall muscle hypertrophy. The result is muscles which are capable of an outstanding level of endurance but poor maximum strength compared to other weight trained athletes.
Another study I recently found relating to this was conducted by Dr Patrick OShea, Professor Emeritus of exercise and sports science at Oregon State University (http://cbass.com/SLOWFAST.HTM).
He used electromyography (EMG) to examine muscle recruitment order of muscle fibre types in the quads of a properly trained athlete during execution of a 1 repetition squat with progressively increasing loads.
Starting with 60% of 1 RM, OShea found that the slow-twitch muscles contributed 60% to the effort and fast-twitch fibers 40%. At 100% maximum effort, however, the percentage of slow-twitch fibres required was found to generally be only 5%, while fast-twitch fibers contributed 95%. Therefore lighter loads have been shown to target slow twitch fibres a lot better than heavier loads.
Conclusion
Thats the extent of my understanding presently. Using tempo training within your overall MMA training you’ll be able to effectively target slow twitch fibres, enhance their cross-sectional area and make your muscles able to better utilise oxygen as a fuel.
How far this improves the body being a better aerobic machine, however, I think continues to be open to debate. There could be another mechanism through which TUT leads to greater muscular endurance.
I posed this question on Joel Jamiesons forum, where I learnt of tempo training in the first place, and got the following reply:
The way I understand it, at least in theory, is that the hypertrophy of slow twich muscles reduces their oxidativeness, because mitochondrial density declines. Meaning, the same number of mitochondia have to produce energy for a larger mass of muscle. So there is less O2 energy available per unit of muscle. However, if mitochondia and capillaries also increased, which happens with aerobic training, it might not matter and O2 capabilities could potentially improve which would help reduce fatigue. Is tempo training equiv to aerobic training? Not sure!
However, generally with more muscle hypertrophy (more muscle fibre protoplasm) the same workloads lactic acid can be spread over a larger volume, and not affect PH locally as much. So performance decline should be more gradual, increasing endurance. Since muscles generally have mixed fibre composition, and faster twitch are known to hypertrophy more easily and more than slow twitch, there is a good chance this has something to do with it as well.
There are articles which Ive seen that say that hypoxia (depriving muscles of oxygen) can lead to hypertrophy, so the continuous training, i.e. sets performed with no pauses between reps, can deprive muscles of oxygen long enough to cause hypertrophy.
Finally, Joel himself had something to say on this topic:
The physiology of tempo training as Ive described Ive found pretty much only in some obscure Russian textbooks and I was first introduced to the method by Val of Omegawave. The cause of the local hypoxia has to do with the overall tempo, not pausing at the top or bottom of the rep and the overall loading. This is how slow twitch muscles are targeted, not just being youre going slow exactly.
Thats not to say fast twitch fibres arent working as well, clearly they are, but from what Ive read it is effective at increasing slow twitch hypertrophy and I cant argue with the results Ive seen so its obviously doing something. Slow twitch fibres, by their very nature, are extremely dense with mitochondria so you cant assume that increasing their cross-sectional area is automatically going to lead to a decrease in mitochondrial density. Even if this were the case, other forms of more direct aerobic work can easily increase mitochondria within these fibres anyway.