Although most coaches agree on back-off periods for strength training, confusion still exists when it comes to conditioning. Many fighters have been brainwashed to believe that rest is for the weak. These athletes follow a more is always better approach. It can be very difficult for them to accept the idea that scheduled periods of reduced training can actually lead to performance improvements.
After all, many of these athletes grew up with a coach whose only known solution to a performance problem was more hard work. I too am all about intense training, but hard work without smart work often leads to overtraining and poor performance.
If you have experienced any of the symptoms below, you may have been victim to overtraining.
Constant Fatigue – You should wake up feeling fresh and rested each day.
You should not wake up completely exhausted, struggling to get out of bed. It is not normal or healthy to suffer from constant fatigue. If your energy tank is always running on empty, there is a problem that must be addressed.
Lack of Enthusiasm – You should be motivated to train and eager to compete. For example, have you ever missed a few days of training (ex.
you go away for a holiday weekend and miss three days). When you return to the gym, you are itching to train. You feel like a hungry animal that needs his training fix! This is how you should always feel. If you are suddenly indifferent about training, it could be an early sign of overtraining. Losing interest doesn’t mean that you no longer care about your goals. On the contrary, it could be a signal that the hormonal and endocrine systems are drained.
Can’t Perform When It Counts – You are not training to perform at the gym. Gym work should prepare you for competition. If you always perform better at the gym and then feel worn out during actual competitions, changes must be made. Many fighters mistakenly train hard all the way up to the fight. The mind starts to play tricks on you.
You actually begin to believe that a rest day will give your opponent a chance to gain ground on you. So, rather than backing off the gas pedal, you push hard all the way until the fight. When fight night rolls around, you are overtrained and unable to perform at your best. Your best work took place during a sparring session two weeks earlier. Unfortunately, you never gave the body a chance to supercompensate from this strenuous work.
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Ill and Injured – Many fighters are healthy all year, yet always get sick or injured during training camp. If you find yourself in this situation, it could be a sign that your immune system is under excess strain. Intense training certainly affects the immune system, which is just one more reason why recovery and restoration are so important.
I once worked with a professional boxer who would always get sick once we started picking up the intensity of his training. I then found out that he was only getting 4 hours of sleep each night. He could handle the limited sleep when he wasn’t in full training mode, but his body simply could not recover from any serious work with such limited (and erratic) sleep habits. Once we corrected his sleep problem, he suddenly began to recover much faster and never suffered from illness during camp.
Performance When You Least Expect It – Have you ever had an amazing performance in the gym when you least expected it? For example, you were training regularly, but had no fights lined up in the immediate future. An athlete from your gym needed some sparring, so you were asked to put in a few rounds. You then spar as if you were the pound for pound champion of the world. You never feel this good when you are actually training for your own fight however. How could this be? The answer is that you are usually overtrained when prepping for your own fight. When you felt great in the gym, you were well rested thus able to use the tools that you’ve worked so hard to develop. The lesson to be learned is that your body is much more capable when it has given the chance to rest and supercompensate from strenuous training.
In the next section, I will discuss a simple way to avoid these problems, thus remain fresh and strong throughout the year.
Tapering
Tapering* is often used by endurance athletes to produce peak fitness before competition. Load is systematically reduced so the athlete can recover and then peak for the specific event. Tapering is not limited to competitive athletes or pre-event circumstances however. Regularly scheduled tapers allow the athlete to maintain intensity throughout the year, without burning out. The taper enables the body to make optimal gains without overtraining.
* Please note that this discussion will focus on tapering in regards to conditioning, not strength training
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Tapering is certainly a useful concept for the modern combat athlete. As for specific protocols, it is useful to analyze various strategies. Contrary to popular opinion, resting a few days before your fight is far from the ideal taper. Many fighters unfortunately make this mistake and consequently compete without ever reaping the benefits of their intense work. Think about it for one moment.
If you have busted your ass through a six week training camp, how can two or three days of rest before the fight allow for full restoration? It simply is not possible. To effectively peak, a more strategic taper must be used.
I. Variables
Most tapers involve adjustments to one or more of the following:
Intensity
Volume
Frequency
These variables should not come as a surprise, as it is somewhat obvious that we would adjust how hard the athlete trains, how much he trains, and how often he trains. Unfortunately, what appears obvious is not always correct. For example, research suggests that intensity should actually be maintained to optimize the taper. With this approach, the athlete would maintain intensity, while reducing volume and frequency. Yet, despite sound scientific backing, this tapering strategy is still underutilized and often completely ignored. Many combat athletes actually do the opposite of this approach. They reduce intensity (often drastically), while maintaining normal volume and frequency (ie. continue to train with the same drills, but with much less intensity). This approach is a mistake, which has been verified through extensive research.
Research regarding ideal tapering strategies made leaps and bounds in the early 1980’s. Dr. R. C. Hickson (and colleagues) from the University of Illinois at Chicago performed several tapering studies. Their research got the ball rolling by understanding the need for intensity throughout the taper. Starting in 1981, researchers tested a protocol where athletes who had been training six days per week, reduced training frequency to just two sessions per week. Intensity was not adjusted (ie. remained high). After 15 weeks, the group who exercised twice per week shocked researchers when tests revealed that their endurance and maximal aerobic capacity were perfectly preserved. It was quite a surprise that athletes could maintain fitness after 15 weeks of training with volume and frequency reduced by approximately 67 percent (6 workouts per week vs. 2 workouts per week).
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In 1982, Hickson’s group altered the study by maintaining exercise frequency with 6 workouts per week. Total volume was reduced however, as workout duration dropped from 40 minutes to 13 minutes. Intensity did not change. The 13 minute exercise group trained with the same intensity used during their previous 40 minute sessions. After 15 weeks of this protocol, researchers were once again surprised to learn that fitness had been preserved, despite the sharp reduction (also 67 percent) in total volume. This second study supported the findings of the first study, once again identifying intensity as the integral aspect to an effective taper.
In a third study, Hickson maintained training frequency and volume, but instead reduced training intensity. As mentioned earlier, a similar protocol is often used by combat athletes. Unfortunately, after reducing intensity, Hickson’s athletes experienced significant drops in maximal aerobic capacity (1985).
Therefore, the lesson to be learned from Hickson’s work is that during periods of reduced frequency and volume, intensity must be maintained for fitness preservation.
II. Taper Length
Although Hickson’s research was monumental, more information is needed to devise a tapering strategy for fighters. Clearly, a fighter cannot devote 15 weeks to tapering. The athlete may have multiple competitions during this time. If a 15 week taper was required for each event, the athlete could only fight a few times each year.
Fortunately, additional research has shown that shorter tapering periods can be even more effective, and not only preserve fitness but actually improve it. Well known researcher Dave Costill found that a 15 day taper with reduced volume led to significant performance improvements (1985). More recent experiments also suggest that a two week taper is ideal. For example, Kenitzer (1998) found that a two week taper allowed for recovery, but noted that extending the taper further could potentially lead to detraining. Kubukeli et al. (2002) also suggested that an optimal taper should last approximately two weeks. It was also noted that taper duration should decrease if intensity dropped during this period (to avoid drops in fitness).
QUESTION - Ross, to taper effectively, should we just reduce volume and frequency for two weeks, while maintaining intensity?
After analyzing modern tapering research, most will agree that intensity must remain, with significant drops in volume, and slight drops in frequency. Clearly,
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the primary adjustment occurs with volume. Training sessions will be only slightly less frequent, short in nature, and intense.
In a recent (and detailed) study on tapering, the following advice was provided (Mujika et al. 2003):
“The aim of the taper should be to minimize accumulated fatigue without compromising adaptations. This is best achieved by maintaining training intensity, reducing the training volume (up to 60-90%) and slightly reducing training frequency (no more than 20%).”
A combat athlete can apply this general model to his pre-fight plan, with the addition of a brief rest period (complete rest).
III. Complete Rest
Complete rest can be useful when applied in short doses. For example, a combat athlete will often welcome a day or two of complete rest before fighting. This rest period is perhaps more mentally beneficial, than it is physical. It is your time to relax, concentrate, and prepare yourself for the upcoming battle.
Don’t get carried away with complete rest however. As mentioned earlier, lengthy breaks from training will lead to an imbalance in motor abilities. Time must then be spent restoring past fitness. You do not want to be in this position before a competition. The taper is designed to peak the athlete, not ruin motor abilities. Therefore, complete rest should be minimal. Research supports this notion. In one noteworthy study, regularly trained runners ceased training for fifteen days. When the group was tested after five days of rest, no major changes in fitness had occurred. Following this five day period however, noticeable drops in fitness began to appear (ex. drops in aerobic capacity). When these runners were tested after the 15 day rest period, running times had significantly dropped.
The 15 day cessation from training led to considerable drops in physical performance (Doherty et al. 2003).
The lesson to learn from this study is simple. A few days of rest will not hurt you. There can be mental benefits to complete rest prior to competition. Do not extend this period however, as it does not take long to begin losing fitness.
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IV. Summary
The bullet points that follow will summarize this tapering discussion. The material outlined below applies to competitive and non-competitive athletes.
Tapers should be used regularly, whether or not you have a competition planned. Scheduled reductions in volume and frequency can help you stay fresh throughout the year. Do not limit your tapering plans to pre-competition times. Tapering every one to three months (the frequency will depend on the intensity and volume of your training) can certainly prove useful. Think about it, after three months of intense training, a two week taper will not only preserve the fitness that you have worked hard to develop, but it will also allow your body to rest and recover (more than it would if you continued to train normally).
If you are a combat athlete prepping for a fight, come to training camp already in shape. A six week camp can then start with approximately 4 to 5 weeks of intense and voluminous training. You can then taper down towards fight night. You will not lose fitness during this time, as your body and mind are given a chance to rest for the upcoming event. You can also continue to practice skills and strategy, but conditioning drills will be brief (volume is reduced during the taper) and intense. Don’t leave all of your hard work behind in the gym.
During a taper, train specific to your event. A runner should run during his tapering period, just as a swimmer should swim. A boxer should box, a grappler should grapple, and a kickboxer should kickbox. Do not suddenly shift gears to a new set of exercises during the taper. Stick with what you have been using and what you are specifically training for.
Maintain intensity during the taper, while cutting back significantly on volume and slightly on frequency. Don’t be alarmed that the intense training will compromise your recovery abilities. Assuming your work capacity has been developed (as it should be), recovery will not be an issue, considering that volume has been reduced so drastically. The brief sessions performed during the taper will have nowhere near enough volume to compromise recovery prior to competition.
If tapering is new to you, experiment with a taper when no competitions are planned. You can then experience the benefits firsthand without risk.
When your next competition rolls around, you can apply the taper with confidence (rather than the uncertainty that often exists in those who are new to this concept).
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