periodization for MMA

[saboudian]

WSB = West Side Barbell, a style of powerlifting.

GPP = General Physical Preparedness, includes just about anything but lifting, sled work(dragging), cardio, playing football with your friends, etc

I wouldn't suggest a standard BBing routine for fighting cuz it doesn't make sense, but HIT doesn't make sense either.

I'm struggling with words on how to explain this because you're not familiar with WSB, so you should read up on it.

Maintaining a split year round where 95% is devoted to skill work is probably not the best way to go, if a fight is close approaching than that might be your best option. What I'm trying to relay to you is, what if say in the offseason you cut down the sparring/ skill work stuff down to 4-5hrs a week plus your cardio, what if you could do that and then as you built your skills, you increased your bench to 400 and your squat to 600. Then say 6 weeks or so out from your fight you just maintained those lifts and then went back to your 95% skill work split. Can you imagine how dangerous you would be?

IF you look at alot of olympic athletes, you would find that its hard to get them out of the gym, because they don't do much skill work at all in the offseason.

[octagon]

WSB = West Side Barbell, a style of powerlifting.

GPP = General Physical Preparedness, includes just about anything but lifting, sled work(dragging), cardio, playing football with your friends, etc

I wouldn't suggest a standard BBing routine for fighting cuz it doesn't make sense, but HIT doesn't make sense either.

I'm struggling with words on how to explain this because you're not familiar with WSB, so you should read up on it.

Maintaining a split year round where 95% is devoted to skill work is probably not the best way to go, if a fight is close approaching than that might be your best option. What I'm trying to relay to you is, what if say in the offseason you cut down the sparring/ skill work stuff down to 4-5hrs a week plus your cardio, what if you could do that and then as you built your skills, you increased your bench to 400 and your squat to 600. Then say 6 weeks or so out from your fight you just maintained those lifts and then went back to your 95% skill work split. Can you imagine how dangerous you would be?

IF you look at alot of olympic athletes, you would find that its hard to get them out of the gym, because they don't do much skill work at all in the offseason.

thanx saboudian, where is a good place to look up WSB? tho i have to admit, i'm not sure if it's right for my sport: my sport has no off season...you're ALWAYS about 6 weeks or less from your next fight. i can definitely see olympians in attribute-driven sports spending all their time in the weight room...they've mastered the basic motions they need to accelerate the luge sled or whatever...but MMA is the most skill intensive sport in the world. it's like trying to learn 4 skill intensive sports at the same time, boxing, wrestling, muay thai, and jiu-jitsu. look at the ages of some of the guys in the sport. the top fighter in the world, randy couture, is 40 years old...it took him 34 years of intensive training to make him a master of every aspect of his game.

also, non endurance athletes often under estimate what goes into having world class endurance. it's not just a matter of getting into shape before a fight...it takes YEARS of hard work to develop the kind cardio you need to go all out in a long title fight.