This is a guest post by Derek Manuel
Before I get started explaining how to develop speed and explosiveness for mma fighters, It is important that you first know that there are different types of speed and what they are.
Perception and Reflex Speed: An example of perceptual speed is the speed of your eyes at seeing an opening in your opponent’s defense. Reflex, or reaction speed, is the duration of time it takes you to respond with a technique to execute (whether offensively or defensively) to when your muscles actually begin the movement.
Movement and Alteration Speed: Movement speed is your ability to physically accelerate any particular muscle or group of muscles, such as the speed at actually throwing a punch. Alteration speed is your ability to change directions during the middle of a movement, such as bobbing your head to the right after you dodged a punch to the left, or pulling your hand back quickly to defend after delivering a missed punch with that same hand.
What I’ll be going over is the last two types of speed: movement speed and alteration speed. This is the type of speed most people think of when they think of speed because it is something you actually “see” happening; such as BJ Penn’s hand speed when he’s throwing punches, Anderson Silva’s foot speed when throwing kicks, or Georges St. Pierre’s quick and explosive takedowns.
Although I’ll just be covering exercises and drills that primarily increase these two types of movement speed, it is important to note that increasing ALL four types of speed are crucial to developing. The reason being is, if you failed to develop the first two types of speed – how quickly you SEE and REACT to outside stimuli – it doesn’t matter how quickly you can throw a punch if you aren’t fastest enough to respond to an opening when you see one!
With that said, let’s get into some of the principles, exercises, and drills you can begin incorporating in your mma training workouts today to develop lightning speed punches, kicks, and takedowns.
Technique, Practice, and Repetition
The first and perhaps most important principle when developing speed is to learn proper technique. After that it just takes repetitions, repetitions, and more repetitions.
Just like you have to continuously do reps of progressively heavier weight if you want to increase your strength in a particular exercise, if you want to increase the speed of your punches, you have to continuously punch as fast as you can over and over. Rocket science, I know, and probably not what you wanted to hear.
But the plain and simple truth is this: if you want to sprint faster, you have to get your ass outside and sprint, day after day, week after week, month after month, with the goal of increasing your sprint speed each time. Advanced sprinters then later add resistance such as sleds or parachutes or sprinting uphill, and mma fighters can progressively add resistance to their exercises and drills as well to further increase speed and explosiveness.
One side note to always remember is to also develop your retraction speed, such as pulling your hand or foot back after you delivered a punch or kick. This not only gives the visual appearance of faster strikes, but it will remind you not to drop your hands or feet after a punch or kick, inviting your opponent for an easy counter.
Below are some drills you can add into your mma training workouts to increase the speed of your punches, kicks, and/or takedowns.
Speed Drills
Shadowboxing: Dancing around a mirror and sparring an invisible opponent is one of the best exercises you can do to increase your footwork, punches, and kicks. My favorite part about shadowboxing is that you have a lot of freedom in this drill; you can practice just one punch or kick at a time, practice combinations, or act as if you were facing a real opponent. Practice shadowboxing in rounds (such as mimicking the rounds in a fight). Later on for added resistance, you can add boxing gloves or very light dumbbells – no more then 2-3 lbs is necessary – to help develop that snap at the end of you punches.
Red Line Drill: This is a 4 part drill. Let’s say you are looking to develop speed in your leg kicks. In part 1, do 10 reps of slow and controlled leg kicks, working mainly on warming up and using perfect form. Part 2, after a minute rest, do 10 more reps at a little bit faster speed, still trying to maintain perfect form. Take another minute rest, and in part 3 you are to kick as fast as you possibly can with good form for 10 reps. In part 4, after your minutes rest, you are now to do 10 reps even faster – without any regard to keeping perfect form. The key is to really push your speed on this last one, attempting to make each kick faster then the last one. Practice this drill a few times a week with whatever punch or kick you are trying to develop.
Hanging Paper Drill: Bruce Lee used to perform this drill, and we all know how fast he was. It’s a drill where you simply hang a piece of paper by a heavy string or light chain so that the paper is hanging a little above shoulder level. Get in your fighting stance a little short of arms length from the paper, and simply practice snapping your jabs as fast as you can at the paper and back. Take your time between each punch – you’re not looking to throw punches as fast as you can consecutively like the previous drill, but rather working on really staying loose and developing quick and snappy individual punches. The key is to try to make every punch faster then the last; this is a mental exercise as much as it is a physical one. Work up to 100 punches each hand.
Focus Pads: If you’ve been involved in MMA for any length of time, you know what these are. Get a partner who knows how to use them, for they are some of the best tools in the sport to developing all four types of speed, especially in combinations.
Resistance Exercises for Explosiveness
Increase Relative Strength: Relative strength is your strength to weight ratio. In mma terms, someone who can squat 275 pounds but only weighs 155 pounds will have more potential for quicker takedowns then someone who can squat the same but weighs 185 pounds. You can increase your relative strength by either maintaining your current level of strength and losing weight, or increasing your strength and maintaining your current body weight.
Plyometrics: This is perhaps your best form of exercise when it comes to developing speed and power. Plyometrics are designed specifically to produce fast and powerful movements, so after you develop a good foundation of relative strength, it is a good idea to begin incorporating plyometric exercises to take that new raw strength and train your muscles to move those muscles quickly and explosively.
Medicine Ball Power Exercises: Medicine ball training is actually a form of plyometrics, but in the form of adding additional resistance instead of just using your body weight. Medicine ball power exercises, such as medicine ball chest passes, allow you to exert maximum power in a full range of motion, whereas with barbells or dumbbells you have to actually decelerate your motion near the end (you can’t safely throw a barbell or dumbbell in the air while doing bench presses, for example).
Uphill or Bleacher Sprinting: This is one of the best exercises you can do to develop the speed and power in your legs for shooting in for takedowns. Practice quick 10 second sets of uphill or bleacher sprints for several sets. If you want, you can make it into a hardcore cardio workout as well by training them in intervals.
Agility Latter: There are a whole bunch of drills you can do to develop foot speed with the agility latter, so I am not going to get into them here. In a nutshell, agility latter’s are one of the best ways to develop foot speed, agility, and quickness – and any mma fighter knows that footwork is the key to a good boxer as wells as grapplers who want to develop quick take-downs.
These are just a few exercises and drills you can begin incorporating in your mma training workouts. Remember to always do your speed and power exercises in the beginning of your workouts when you are fresh, otherwise you risk developing speed but with sloppy form, and remember to never lock out your joints when punching or kicking in the air, this is a great way to injure yourself.
Try these out for a while, stay consistent and always think progress, and you’ll notice your punches, kicks, takedowns will begin to take on new levels of speed and explosiveness.
About the Author
Derek Manuel is a personal trainer specializing on strength and conditioning for mma fighters. Check out his complete reviews of the top mma training workouts on the web today at http://www.BestMMATrainingWorkouts.com
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Mon, Sep 28, 2009
Conditioning, MMA