quick question, i want to do bodybuilding but i also want to do martial arts, theres a martial arts gym that offers classes every day that alternate between boxing and grappling, normally i work out monday to friday targeting different muscle groups each day so i was wondering should i do one week of gym and one week of martial arts or two weeks of gym and then two weeks of martial arts in terms of alternating because i know the martial arts sessions will be mainly cardio intensive, please answer thank you
Do what you want to do, it's all good. I would check out a video on YouTube where famous trainer Teddy Atlas talks about the Fury/Wilder fight. He says Wilder made a big mistake bulking up his upper body with weight training. He said weights are good for a fighter, but they have to be done right. If they bulk you up, they slow you down and they tire you out quicker in a fight. You want the kind of weight training that builds strength, but leaves you loose and fast.
As far as I understand it, if you really want to build a lot of muscle mass you need to be careful with your cardio compared to anaerobic workouts. So if you do 2 straight weeks of mostly cardio, you might actually lose gains made during the previous 2 weeks. 1 week on and off is probably going to be a bit more balanced, but that's just what makes sense to me. I'm no body builder but I definitely prefer looking a little cut, so I focus on interlace my weight training throughout the week (6 days lifting, 1 day rest) and then making sure to hit my cardio goal, which is currently at least 150 minutes per week of at least moderate cardio (American Heart Association and CDC guidelines stress this is the minimum for healthy activity). Rather than focusing solely on one thing or the other for too long, which tends I think to throw a lot of people off their goals, which is why plateauing is the thing. As far as I've always been taught, it's better to constantly mix things up, and the gains will be there as long as you don't neglect anything especially diet. If you want to build that kind of muscle, you need a metric ton of protein. I get most of mine from a relatively paleo diet combined with lots of lowfat chocolate milk. I know a lot of people who believe, erroneously in my opinion, that they can get bulk AND starve themselves because they're technically overweight according to BMI. Then they constantly stick at around the same body fat % forever because they're constantly just trading muscle and fat loss, rather than cutting the fat little by little and gaining the skeletal muscle little by little... Move More; Sit Less
So true, and extra muscle means more opportunity for muscle-related issues to crop up. Injuries, increased energy needs, and the need for constant flexibility training. You can't just have the muscle, you need to be able to stretch it and maintain flexibility. More muscle also means increased metabolic rate, which means more calories burned doing anything or nothing. The Rock has 6,000 calorie cheat meals because he needs to eat a ton of calories just to maintain all that muscle on his body, BUT he also makes sure to balance his weight training with his range of motion exercises, which are critical to not only having that much mass, but being able to wield it like the pro stunt and action star he is, not to mention a nearly ideal example of pragmatic bodybuilding. You Need to Try This Dwayne Johnson Workout
Is your goal to become really big? I’ve always just used martial arts classes as an extension of the gym. The gym I go to more, but of MA class days there’s just that extra workout period in. That being said, I will go lighter on the cardio in the gym on the days I know I had MA at night. Also, the stretching from MA class often helps with recovery. At least in my experience.
You would be better doing doing alternate days martial art training, and weight training, picking which classes you enjoy the most, and which exercises give you the most benefit, your already doing a lot of volume, so naturally you'll have to reduce that in order to fit in the martial arts training.
I would recommend this video. bit of background, Mike Israetel has a PhD in Sport Physiology and is a bjj competitor (purple belt at last check). It's just over an hour but it will answer this question in explicit technical detail.
You should first consider where you want your strength, that is how you consider what weight training you want to do. The gym can offer many forms of training, but sometimes they can steer you away getting the strength in the needed areas. Think of this, you want to have more powerful punch's, someone may tell you to do curls, bench press, and so-on. Now consider these exercises, put sand bags on your wrists and practice moving your arms around and throwing punch's. Start out using a light weight, light enough to where you can do this exercise between 1/2 hour to an hour. Moving your arms around will help keep your muscle loose and fit for many directions, practicing short style and long style with a 6 foot metal weight bar weighing about ten pounds will also help. Trust me, these two exercises will show you how to choose the correct way to strengthen the areas you need, if you want more old traditional exercises, I am more then wiling to give you a list of them. The weight bar will also help you with the iron hand technique. I would first start practicing with a standard wooden staff that is your height, when you can do the exercises for hours at a time, for many weeks, then move to the weight bar. Learning the staff can help with smooth and graceful movements, and you will find that when you can move gracefully, you will be able to move much quicker and accurately.
Missed this first time round, good video I like the idea of MRV, I think I could program this into my spreadsheet, apply load values to sessions to determine MRV across BJJ, lifting and cardio
