The Perfect Warm-Up

What is in the essence of a perfect warm-up? Essentially, it is important not to over-strain your muscles that will impede your performance during the actual training. Perfect is in striking the right balance in warming up all your various muscle groups. To me, warming up exercises can be divided into 3 parts – running/skipping/bouncing on old tires, shadow boxing and bag work. The idea is to prepare your body for the vigorous exercises that follows. It is not necessary to spend an excessive amount of time during warm up – the bulk of your training time should be spent on the techniques and strength training – an ideal estimate should be approximately 30 minutes.

Running / Skipping / Bouncing on old tires

Running

These exercises are substitutable. Running is essential for the development of leg muscles and stamina and while many say that it is most ideal to run in the morning, do note that the peak time for running is definitely not the first thing in the morning. Due to daily fluctuations in our body temperature, scientists have found that our temperature is the lowest in the morning and peaks in mid afternoon. And wholly from a running perspective, athletes perform better when their body temperature is higher and thus many prefer to run in the late afternoons and evenings. And because our body’s vital functions peak at the same time, it is found that our lungs work best in the evenings too.

I have broken down the pros and cons of running at different times of the day from a survey conducted by Running Times.

Early Morning – The Mental Hurdle

The peak time for running is definitely not first thing in the morning. Virtually all bodily functions are at their worst at this hour. Body temperature is low, which means that muscles will feel stiff, lung function is poor, and not having any substantial food intake for the last ten hours significantly depletes your energy stores. All these means the same level of exertion is likely to feel much harder at this time of day than later on. To top things off, exercising early will leave you more prone to injury or worse. Research has also shown that this is the most common time of day for heart attacks and strokes.

Just because nearly everything physical is against you at this time, however, doesn’t mean the early morning session has no benefit. The very fact that it feels harder means it’s good for building up mental strength.

Mid-Morning – Muscle Booster

Lung performance and body temperature are much improved from the early morning, plus if you’re training at this time you should have had a good protein and carb-filled breakfast, meaning your energy levels will be much higher. However, although most of your physical functions will be improved from the early morning, they are still not as good as later in the day. Furthermore, if you work normal hours, a mid-morning run is likely only to be possible on the weekend anyway. If you do put in a mid-morning run, on a Saturday for example, you might want to make it a speed or hills session in which building up your calf and quad muscles is the aim. The reason is that most scientists agree this is the best time of day to boost muscle. “There’s a strong argument for doing weight training in the morning if you’re interested in building muscle,” said Dr. Stephen Bird, from the School of Human Movement Studies in Australia. “This is because testosterone, the hormone most responsible for muscle-boosting, is at its highest around this time.”

Lunchtime – The Convenient Substitute

The lunch-time run is extremely popular with all those who work normal hours. Getting out of the office and breaking up the day with some running seems like a great idea. And indeed there are positives to training at this time, but mostly they have to do with your work performance rather than your running performance. "Many people choose to exercise at lunch because it doesn’t eat into their free time," said workplace psychologist Mike Clinton. "Plus it perks you up and is likely to make you more productive in the afternoon."

In fact, nearly all bodily functions experience a lull in the middle of the day, particularly those such as lung function and body temperature, which are crucial to running performance. Like the early morning, this doesn’t necessarily make it a bad time of day to train; just make sure you save those time trials, or sessions where you’re looking to run your absolute best, for later.

Afternoon and Evening – Score!

It has been known for some time that most physical activities are best performed in the mid- to late-afternoon, as this is when body temperature peaks, meaning the muscles are at their most supple and running at speeds that feel tough in the early morning will feel much easier. Recently this has been bolstered by a study by Dr. Boris Medarov of the Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New York, which found that lung function was more than 6 percent better in the afternoon than at other times during the day. So this is definitely the time of day to run if you’re going for a personal best.

If your gym trains in the evening, you’ll probably want to sweat out your personal best before class starts! A short 10 min run should be sufficient.

Skipping / Bouncing on old tires

Skipping is an intense cardiovascular workout, more tiring than running I would say. Skipping strengthens the muscles in your upper and lower body and also promotes the hand-leg coordination that is much needed in most Muay Thai techniques.

Skip in sets, usually 3 sets of 3 mins each should be sufficient but if you feel that it is not warming up your body enough, bring it up to 3 sets of 5 mins or 2 sets of 10 mins. Do not skip with both your feet bouncing off the ground at the same time. Alternate between legs, for example, tap 3 times on your right leg and then switch to your left. It might not seem easy at first but you’ll get used to it.

The same goes for bouncing on tires.

Here’s a good video on jump rope: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvEnee4rF4k

I’ll update a bit more on shadow boxing and bag work for warm up in the later part of the day.

Proper Shin Conditioning - DON'T KILL YOUR NERVES!

When I first started Muay Thai about a year ago, my coach introduced himself by knocking his knuckles on his shins. This knock produced a hollow sound followed by a gasp amongst the class and him jokingly saying, "These nerves are dead."

After that, this idea of shin conditioning was rooted in my head - shin conditioning was killing your nerves. Subsequently during classes, I witnessed some of the seniors rolling bamboo sticks on their shins, applying pressure as they did. Some of them even tied a couple of thin sticks (the kind you used to make cane) into a bundle and began hitting their shins with it.

As much as I wanted to have shins with extreme immunity to pain, I never dared to venture that far. At first I was afraid of the pain and then, I began researching on shin conditioning and I realised that shin conditioning in these methods kills the nerves in your shins! What is wrong with killing the nerves in your shins? What are the consequences?

Your Nerves are Damaged for Life!
Nerve's are your body's form of communication. The nerves are free ended in a deep layer of the skin called the dermis; they pick up any pain or other senses from the environment and send these messages to the brain (via other nerves), which in turn reacts to the stimuli in an appropriate manner. Nerve damage are usually accompanied by pain, numbness, weakness or paralysis. Some me may feel these symptoms in areas far from the site of damage (referred pain) and this occurs because signaling is defective from all parts of the area which the nerve receives input, not just the site of the damage.

Proper Conditioning of Shins
I would say proper conditioning of shins should come in the following methods:

• Kick heaving bags and / or Thai pads at least 100 times a day and gradually increase the number of times as your shins get used to the impact. Start by kicking the bag lightly and then slowly increasing the impact as you go along.
• Stop every so often and massage your shins vigorously, allowing the circulation of blood to return to normal. This promotes faster healing of any damage to the flesh or bone. Remember, if you have a nasty bruise on your shin, stop for a while and waiting for it to heal.
• DO NOT "beat" or "tap" your legs with sticks, boards, metal, ironing boards, baseball bats whatever. Worst still, DO NOT try kicking bamboo or coconut trees. Even the Thais don't do that. They kick baby coconut trees that have soft trunks. These will cause bruises, knots, bone damage to your shins and will stick with you for a long time.
• Optionally, you can use soft plastic bottles or rolling pin and toll it up and down the length of your shin lightly. Do this for maybe 15 mins per shin.

One of the more traditional methods still in practice is hitting your shin with a wet cloth. I suppose this will not have that great a damage on your shins as the material is soft. Kicking pads and heavy bags will as well do some damage to your nerves but they repair themself after some time. So instead of working towards creating dead nerves, you are conditioning your shins to take impact.

Shin conditioning is a gradual process, you cannot rush it. The above idea of proper shin conditioning are just my thoughts on the matter. Of course, some Muay Thai practitioners find it better to kill the nerves, especially female fighters as they're shins are less hardy than guys. I personally feel that dead shins are just empty shells attached to the body.

The Tao of Muay Thai

It is common knowledge that Muay Thai training is one of the toughest in the world of sport. Some sports physiologists even feel that it is too stressful for the nervous system to go through two sessions of anaerobic training a day like Muay Thai practitioners do.

I believe that it is not the physical alone that makes Muay Thai such a formidable art. Muay Thai’s prowess lies in the unique combination of physical strength and mental power. Most people and even the athletes themselves often overlook the mental training or psychological aspect of Muay Thai.

Muay Thai has a long history and is an integral part of Thai culture. Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam have influenced the rituals and traditions of Muay Thai. From the Mong Kon, Ram Muay and Wai Kru to the recitations before the fight, there is a very spiritual element to this sport. During my training and study of Muay Thai in Thailand, I noticed that many elements of these traditional practices actually mirrors closely with modern sports psychology, especially in the theory of optimum arousal and visualization.

OPTIMUM AROUSAL

Arousal is closely related to anxiety, attention and stress. One finding with respect to arousal is the Yerkes-Dodson law, which predicts an inverted U-shaped function between arousal and performance.

A certain amount of arousal is necessary in order to perform at your best. But too much or too little would most certainly work against you. In sports, a player who is playing great is at the optimum arousal point and is said to be "in the zone."

Many inexperienced fighters may suffer from pre-fight jitters causing their anxiety to increase. Instead of bringing down their arousal level in order to control anxiety, they get even more aroused by psyching themselves up with some sort of aggressive ritual such as slapping their own faces and shouting out loud. These fighters usually allow anxiety to get the better of them resulting in silly mistakes and tiring easily.

I remember my first fight in Thailand. Physically, I was at my peak. I trained twice a day for almost six weeks. All the physical conditioning came to nothing when I allowed adrenalin to take over. By the end of the second round, I was too exhausted to even lift my hands up! Sure enough, I lost my fight.

I observed that many of the more experienced fighters seemed to be in a meditative state when they are fighting. They seemed to have so much time to react to almost anything that their opponents threw at them. Fighting in the ring seemed almost like a walk in the park.

Ring experience definitely contributes to their mastery but when I began paying more attention to the rituals and practices associated with the sport, I came to realize that mental training plays an equally important role as well.

Note: There are also fighters who need to have a higher arousal level to perform well. So this arousal level actually differs in every athlete. Ultimately, the athlete has to find his/her own “magic number” – optimum arousal level.

Meditation

Meditation is often defined as “a state of relaxed concentration on the reality of the present moment.” Many Muay Thai fighters meditate regularly and some even go on temple retreats where they shave their heads and eyebrows and spend their days meditating and doing mundane chores. They hardly speak to each other and are discouraged from making eye contact. Apparently, these practices help them to cultivate their minds and spirits.

It is indeed a challenge to remain alert and relaxed during a fight. You are put in situation of real threat where you could be injured or knocked out anytime, yet you have to remain calm and composed. Meditation actually increases alpha wave activity in the brain, which is responsible for a calm and relaxed state of mind. This in turn helps one to bring down the heightened arousal levels during a fight to the optimum level.

Distance Running

Professional Muay Thai boxers typically run an average of twelve to fifteen kilometers everyday. Long distance running and other repetitive and rhythmic exercises such as swimming and rowing increases alpha-wave activity in the brain as well.

Wai Kru

A dance-like routine performed by the boxer before the fight, the Wai Kru’s movements are slow, focused and controlled. (Almost like a form of Taiji) It is performed to the almost meditative and trance-like sounding music from traditional Thai pipes and drums. Not only does the Wai Kru serves as a warm up, I believe it helps to control the boxer’s arousal levels and gives him some “private space and time” to focus before the fight begins.

VISUALIZATION

Visualization involves the training of the right brain, which is closely linked to athletic ability, creativity and relaxation. The right hemisphere is also associated with emotional and subconscious learning. In other words, visualization helps to train the subconscious which has been repeatedly proven to be an effective and powerful strategy for athletes seeking to improve their sporting performances.

The power of visualization can be best illustrated by a famous and well-documented experiment conducted by an American psychologist, Dr. Alan Richardson.

Dr. Richardson divided a team of basketball players into three groups. They were tested on their accuracy in free throws, and each group’s results were recorded. The first group practiced free throws in the courts everyday. The second group skipped training altogether and the last group stayed in their rooms and mentally “saw” themselves taking free throws.

After a month, the three groups were tested again and the results were astonishing. The second group’s (They did not practice at all) results did not improve at all while the third group who had only practiced in their minds improved as much as the first group. (Practiced shooting everyday)

Shadow Boxing

Two keys to successful visualization are to practice regularly and to practice it as if it is in the “now.” Shadow boxing is actually a form of “active” visualization. When shadow boxing, we should behave as if we are in a real-time “now” event. Be focused and relaxed- exactly how you want to feel during a real fight. Imagine yourself actually sparring with a real opponent-you lean back to avoid a punch and counter with a combination of your own. You see an opening and throw a big elbow at your opponent!

Also, put lots of feelings and details into the practice. For example, actually feel your gloves knocking back an opponents head as you deliver a knockout punch and literally feel your opponent fall onto the canvas as you are sweeping him off his feet with a low kick!

Shadow sparring is an integral part of Muay Thai training but many boxers do not seem to take it seriously. It is more than just a way to warm up; it is an awesome form of mental training. Each time you practice, you are programming your subconscious and the images become clearer and more potent. Eventually, these images and actions will be internalized and you will react instinctively during a real fight.

In addition to shadow sparring, we should also practice “passive” visualization at least once a day. See your thoughts and actions being put into practice at night or when you wake up in the morning.

MIND, BODY and SPIRIT

Many non-practitioners of the sport perceive Muay Thai to be purely aggressive and a no-brainer. We cannot blame them for having such perceptions as aggression is more blatantly displayed in this sport as compared to say Table Tennis for example.

However, I reckon most practitioners of the sport will agree with me that Muay Thai is not purely about aggression. It is about controlled aggression and patience. You hardly see any boxers chasing and brawling at his opponent when his initial strikes fail to find the target. He will most probably go back to his fighting stance and wait for another opportunity to strike.

I believe that the practice of Muay Thai helps to simultaneously refine one’s mind, body and spirit, which I personally refer to as The Tao of Muay Thai.

Written by Hansen Bay with Grace Yip, Sports Psychologist

If you think you'd let a bruise heal by itself, think again.

I have a friend who once accidently bumped her thigh into the edge of the window sill. Thinking it was just a small bruise, she left it alone. After an hour or so, she felt an aching sore at the injured area and as she inspected it, the bruise swelled to almost palm size.

A few days later, she went to see a doctor and was diagnosed with kidney failure.

We often pay no attention to our bruises and think they can be rubbed off or healed with some cream from the pharmacy. But some bruises can be life-threatening. Below are a few questions on bruises:

What is a bruise?
A bruise is caused when tiny blood vessels are damaged or broken as the result of a blow to the skin. The raised area of a bump or bruise results from blood leaking from these injured blood vessels into the tissues as well as from the body's response to the injury.

Why do some people bruise more easily than others?
Age - an elderly person will tend to bruise more easily than a child because blood vessels become more fragile as we age.

Medications that interfere with blood clotting, causing more bleeding into the skin or tissue. Examples - non-steroidal anti-inflammatories (e.g., ibuprofen/Advil, Nuprin and naproxen/Aleve), over-the-counter medications (e.g., aspirings), Warfarin (Coumadin), Cortisone medications (e.g., prednisone) promote bruising by increasing the fragility of the tiny blood vessels in the skin.

How long will it take for a bruise to heal?
2 - 3 weeks for the skin to return to normal.

What if the bruise doesn't go away or starts to swell?
There are two cases for this. The first case is known as Hematoma (a large collection of blood is formed under the skin or in the muscle, instead of trying to clean up the area, the body may wall the blood) and the second is know as heterotopic ossification or myositis ossificans (occurs when the body deposits calcium). These two conditions have to be diagnosed by X-Ray.

What are the different types of bruising?
Petechiae - very small, one to three millimeter, accumulations of blood beneath the skin. These can appear like multiple tiny red dots on any part of the body (most commonly the legs). These are often multiple and can suggest a serious health problem. Examples of these are an infection of the valves of the heart or abnormal function of the blood clotting elements.

Bruising around the naval - bleeding in the abdomen

Bruising behind the ear - can suggest a skull fracture

Raised, firm bruises - can be multiple. Can be a sign of various types of "autoimmune" diseases (diseases in which the body attacks its own blood vessels).

The most effective way to treat bruises is to ice it. Pack some ice into a bag and wrap it with a towel. Do not apply the ice directly to the infected area as this can cause frost bite. Apply the ice (wrapped with a towel) to the injured area and repeat this two times a day. If possible, elevate your leg to above the heart level. This will reduce the bleeding and swelling. Apply pressure to the area by hand while rubbing cream recommended by your local pharmacy.