Absolute Beginner, I need a lot of advice!

[Mlindsey]

Hello everyone!

I have made the choice to change my life. I want to begin a "system" of training with my ultimate goal residing in the area of becoming a proficient Muay Thai Kickboxer. In my opinion to accomplish this (before I sign up for classes) I need to begin eating the right diet and beginning work out habits that would be talored to my goals.

I have purchased a 100 lbs heavy punching bag and suspended it in my garage. I have plenty of road around my home to run on (and a dog who is willing to jog ) I am willing to do what it takes. What I am asking for from anyone who would be willing to offer any information, is how should I begin? I want to develop the proper stance and a few techniques long before I sign up for classes. Does anyone have a reference point that they would produce for me? Something that covers the basics of this particular school of thought? (Just a few punchs and stance?) Or even just a few techniques I should be drilling on the bag? If so, how many drills and for how long, etc?

Would weight lifting be a good idea, as I have access to a bench and some weights? I am 6'0 tall and about 180lbs. So you guys can see that I am a bit overweight. I am moderately active and walk every day. Should I jump right into a tough routine?

Thanks for you time and consideration.

Matt

[JIMI]

Sounds like a great start to me. As to the weight lifting, keep the weight low and do insane amount of reps. My first Thai Boxing instructor told me once on the bench press, "take all the weights off the bar, and do as many reps with just the bar until you cant go anymore, then when you get to the point where you can do 100 reps without stopping, start to add small incriments of weight and do that until you can do 100 without stopping, and so on." You dont want to develop huge, bulky slow twitch muscles. You want nice, cut well proportioned fast twitch muscles. Big muscles burn out fast. As a Thai Boxer, you need to be going balls to the wall for 5 rounds without burning out your muscle. Running is great for cardio, but remember to constantly be pushing yourself to go further and faster. Running is great but some people get too comfortable and get on a plateau so to speak in thier training. My instructor always pushes me to "get off that plateau" and get out of that comfort zone. If you are feeling no pain, you are not makin any improvement from the point you are at. Hope this helps. I would hope that these are questions that your personal instructor can answer for you also. Good luck, and kick that bag constantly.

[yenhoi]

Jump rope.

Lots of situps. (your going to get punched in the stomach and ribs, alot, and probably kicked and kneed too...)

Stay on your toes as much as possible - walking around the house, around work, etc.

Run.

Goto a thai class, get started now, learn proper stance and how to throw a kick, a jab, a cross, and a hook properly, then practice those on your bag.

Do a search for 'Lanna muy thai' (i think) they have a great conditioning cirriculum posted on their website. I also think this defend.net has many articles by tim et all concerning muy thai training and conditioning.

[Mlindsey]

Re

Thanks for the reply you two. The reason I am hesitant to sign up for a class now is that as I mentioned I am not a skinny rail. I wanted to get in shape and learn a few techniques first. The Lanna site is awesome and I will be refering it to it often. The only thing I don't know the specifics on now is the stance.

Thanks again! If anyone else can offer any advice please feel free!

[JIMI]

DONT WAIT TO JOIN THE GYM!!!!
Please dont wait to join the gym, go there immediately. Dont try to learn anything on your own, reason being is that you may develop improper bad habits that can carry with you for a long time. If you want to get in shape.... Go to the gym. You will learn properly and also burn fat way faster. If its a good gym, you should practically have to have someone carry you home every night. What better way to get in shape and loose weight quicker than that. GO GO GO!!!!!! It may be HELL for the first week or two but you will overcome it. This is the best time for you to go, when you are out of shape. You need to test your will and see how BAD you want it.

[Mlindsey]

The Gym

I am in the Houston area, and the only good "Gym" I have seen only offers classes once a week during a time that I cannot join it. The other classes require a very long commute for me.. these are other reasons I haven't joined a gym.. if anyone knows of a good place around North Houston to train at, please hold nothing back

[yenhoi]

If you cant join a gym then focus on all the other stuff.

Dont worry about stance, dont worry about punching, or kicking, or elbows, or doing anything with the heavy bag besides lifting it, dragging it and throwing it. Without proper instruction and supervision (for at least these basics...) you will do more harm then good, probably.

Arent there other gyms in your area that do maybe another type of martial art? There is probably a boxing grm or a bjj school somewhere near. Houston is a big city, Im sure you can find someone that teaches a martial art and trains hardcore.



Get your diet together, get a workout routine, get some protein powder, and workout hardcore until you can find some proper instruction.

[Mlindsey]

Another Martial art

I am certain that there is a BJJ or boxing school in my area. But I am not interested (for now) in BJJ or boxing without my legs. I was thinking of purchasing a book.

[kh_s]

I was thinking of swimming, wouldn`t swimming be good also? I am thinking of taking up swimming, should get me more fit right ?

[Crouchtig]

a book?

im sorry to disappoint you but you cant learn muay thai from a book. the book cant look at your technique and tell you what slight changes you should make, a book cant even properly show you how to do a technique (diagrams and step by step instructions arent good enough). if you start boxing you will learn basics such as jab, hook, cross etc. by the way why are you so obsessed with muay thai training?

"You want nice, cut well proportioned fast twitch muscles. Big muscles burn out fast"

im not sure i understand. could whoever said that explain it a bit more, ive just been lifting a high weight for a maximum of about 15 times then increasing it and doing less until i just do 1 of my maximum. is this goping to improve me?

[JIMI]

I agree completely about the book training. I am sorry if i came off wrong on the weight lifting thing. Of course you are going to be benifited by lifting that way and doing " burn outs" with the weights. Thats a good way to get ripped. I should have clarified more on that subject. What i meant is there are a lot of guys out there that go in and do like 3 reps with 500lbs, get the rip, and go home. I believe that your muscles will react the way you train and teach them to react. Some body builders have different goals, then we thai boxers do. I think if you go a little lighter on the weight and do many, many reps, then your muscles will last longer and wont build lactic acid as quickly as say someone that goes in just for the 3 to 5 reps of an insane amount of weight. They develop a muscle memory that will act the way they have been trained. One example im gonna use ( and i know i will get flamed for this but) Ken Shamrock. I completely respect Ken Shamrock and see him as one of the forefathers of mixed martial arts. However he got so heavy into body building that i believe if you watch his last few fights, you will see that he burned out fast. This can also happen from having poor cardio workouts too, but i believe that he just tries too hard to muscle his opponents. When we first saw Ken in the original UFC's he wasnt quite the body that he has now. Now of course that is just my opinion so please take whatever i say with a grain of salt. Hope this better explains the weight lifting issue

[Crouchtig]

i see

my muscles will behave the way ive trained them. to get my muscles to last longer and be more efficient i should do many reps at a low weight. you confused me with the fast-twitch slow-twitch thing:

"You dont want to develop huge, bulky slow twitch muscles. You want nice, cut well proportioned fast twitch muscles. Big muscles burn out fast."

i thought that fast-twitch burnt out fast and slow-twitch lasted longer. would big muscles really tire more quickly?

[JIMI]

Fast twitch is developed when you are lifting and pushing the weight out on each rep as fast as you can. Slow twitch is developed by the slow drawn out rep. Common sense would suggest that as a fighter you would want fast twitch muscle memory. However i am not a certified weight trainer, nor do i have a degree in any type of field pertaining to muscles. I am simply repeating what my first Thai instructor told me. Also, what part of the big muscle burning out faster theory do you not understand? Ask any weight trainer and they will tell you the same ( unless they have huge ego's from thier own big muscles ) it doesnt take a rocket scientist to see or know that big muscles tend to develop lactic acid quicker, hence it becomes much harder to move your muscle. Look i can see where this is going, but quite simply in regards to Muay Thai fighting, you do not typically see a lot of big ass bulky guys in the ring. And if you do i think you can clearly see that they do not go the distance that the smaller proportioned guys do.

[jcolvin]

Re: The Gym

Originally posted by Mlindsey
I am in the Houston area, and the only good "Gym" I have seen only offers classes once a week during a time that I cannot join it. The other classes require a very long commute for me.. these are other reasons I haven't joined a gym.. if anyone knows of a good place around North Houston to train at, please hold nothing back

The MSDA, the sponsor of this website, offers classes on the North side of Houston. Check out the schedule under the school link.