Anyone who has ever tried MMA knows that it is a very challenging sport, and any advantage is welcome.  A lot of fighters have good upper body quickness because of their boxing or martial arts backgrounds; however their lower body quickness and balance are sub-par.  This could be the difference between a win and a loss in a fight.  Jamie Hale writes that it is very important to work on a fighter’s lower body quickness, and it is not that hard to drastically improve lower body quickness and agility.  Hale reports that the factors that limit agility are lack of balance, quickness, hip mobility, coordination, and reactive strength.  Don’t worry, these factors are fairly easy to correct with the right training.  Doing cone drills along with the agility ladder will help improve quickness and agility faster than any other technique.  Some other exercises that will help are tumbling drills, non-equipped wide range drills (back petal, side shuffle, carioca,) different jump rope drills, and bag or barrier drills (jumping over or around bags or barriers,).  The agility ladder and cone drills will be the most important because they focus on the fast twitch muscles along with the brain.  Eventually your brain will be trained along with your muscles and require less time to calculate what to do; this will also help with body balance.  Basically your reaction time and balance will improve dramatically.  You may also want to take a yoga or pilates class to improve on your balance and strengthen your core.  So, if you are training to be a MMA fighter take lower body quickness and balance very seriously.

There are a lot of different ways to improve your explosion and quickness, but the best way to do so would have to be the use of plyo-metrics. Plyo-metrics vigorously train your fast twitch muscles, which in return leads to improved quickness and explosiveness.  These exercises can help you run faster, jump higher, throw a faster jab and just become more powerful.  There are upper-body and lower-body plyo-metrics, so you can train total body, or be specific with which part you want to train.  You have to make sure you stretch well when doing plyos because there’s a risk of straining muscles.  You have to do plyos at a fast speed to improve the fast twitch muscles.  Here are some examples of plyo-metrics broken down by upper and lower body...

Examples of Upper-body Plyos:

• Clap pushups- do a regular pushup but at the peak explode your hands off the ground and clap, then catch yourself and keep going for a set.
• Line Pushups- Find a line or pretend there is a line splitting your hands in push up position.  Then throw your body from side to side having the opposite hand touch the line each time.
• Medicine Ball Clap Pushups- Start in push up position with a medicine ball between your hands.  Explode into a clap push up, but land on the medicine ball.  Once you land on the medicine ball, do a close-grip push up on the medicine ball, then drop hands back on the floor to regular push up position and repeat on the opposite side of your body for your number of repetitions.

Examples of Lower-body Plyos:

• Bench Jumps- Simply stand next to a bench and jump onto it as fast as you can.  You can change it up by facing the front, back, or the side of the bench to work different twitch muscles.  Also, if you become advanced you can rotate your body in the air, or go side to side to work on agility and balance, as well as improving fast twitch muscles.
• Speed Skater- First, start with legs shoulder width apart, jump and explode out to the right as far as you can and land on your right foot.  Try to quickly make the weight transition and explode as far as you can to the left to complete the exercise.  Do this for your desired number of repetitions.
• Knee Tucks- Start out standing with feet shoulder width apart.  Hold your arms straight out with your palms facing the floor.  Jump as high as you can and at the summit of your jump snap your knees to your palms as quickly as you can.  Do this for your desired number of repetitions.

Today, Janauray 19, 2009, we will start our winter schedule for our boxing and group exercise classes!  Back by popular demand...Pilates!  Pilates is now featured on Thursday evening at 6 o'clock.  We also made some changes to the format of our boxing classes.

Boxing for Fitness is a fantastic class for beginners who want to train like a boxer without any contact.  This class will focus more on the weight loss and toning benefits of boxing using the heavy bags, speed bags, medicine balls and more!

Boxing 101 will follow Boxing for Fitness and this is also a great class for beginners.  In Boxing 101, the focus will be more on proper technique and is ideal for those thinking of getting in the ring competitively.  In this class, both offensive and defensive moves will be taught and sparring may take place.

Keep your New Year's resolutions in mind, and come check out one of our new classes! 

Have you checked out the latest poll on the Boxing Along the Beltway website?  If so, you probably noticed a familiar name, Tony “Mo Better” Jeter.  Jeter is in the running to be named Prospect of the Year in the Baltimore-Washington area, but he needs your vote to win!  So, go to http://boxingalongthebeltway.blogspot.com/ and vote for one of our Club One Fitness members to be voted as Prospect of the Year!

The unofficial word on the street is that promoters in Maryland will be able to begin having mixed martial arts events in April or May.  Regulations have been drafted and are awaiting approval, so things are moving along with mixed martial arts in Maryland!  Michael’s Eighth Avenue is advertising that they will be having a mixed martial arts event in February, but I don’t see how this will happen.  Nevertheless, the Maryland mixed martial arts community can look forward to live events in late spring, 2009!

Better Promotions had another great night of Friday Night Fights at the Maryland Sportsplex in Millersville!  The amateur bouts were all close, competitive fights!  Brian Lamb had a great performance in his first amateur masters bout!  In addition, professional boxer, Tony Jeter had another fantastic win versus Darrett Crockett of South Carolina bringing his record to 7-2!

 Congratulations to our boxers!  Thank you to everyone who came out to support the Club One boxing team!

Our friend at Boxing Along the Beltway reports that there was a boxing card in Salisbury for the first time in 11 years last week, including such boxers as Chuck "Pit Bull Sturm, Lloyd "Jabba" Bryan, Joe Fitzpatrick, Rowyan Wallace and Alston Jones.

I am not sure who promoted this boxiing car but there are a lot of new boxing promotions companies (like Better Promotions) that are creating more excitment for boxing in Maryland. I think a rising tide will lift all boats when it comes to more boxing interest in Baltimore-Washington (and Salisbury) area.

Boxing for fitness is all the rage now on the East Coast but it is worth noting that EVERY significant trend in fitness comes out of California.  This article I have attached below is 11 years old!

"Left jab, right cross, left hook . . .  " You're gonna have to
learn some new words at the old health club.

Punching bags hang over the aerobics floor and a burly
instructor is handing out jump-ropes and boxing gloves.

After some fast, furious jumping, you shadowbox to beat-driven
music.  Then the instructor tells you to tighten your belly, close
your hands tight and slide into the bag as you throw a punch.

You have entered the new world of boxing for fitness.

The latest fad...is known by
various monickers: Fat-Burning Boxing, Club Box, Jump & Jab,
Cardio-Kick or Kick Boxing Aerobics.

Some clubs are hiring professional boxers and buying punching
bags for recreational type boxing classes that feature lots of
warm-up and stretching exercises.

Others are training instructors to teach moves borrowed from
the boxing ring or, in the case of kick-boxing, from the martial
arts.   Like the popular dance exercise classes, these vigorous
forms of aerobics strengthen the heart and lungs.  The difference
is, you don't dance, and boxing is more intense, burns more
calories and strengthens muscles in the upper body.

Draws men, women

Boxing-based classes are among the top new trends to watch,
according to a San Diego-based organization that tracks the
industry through surveys of its national membership of health and
fitness professionals.

The classes are a draw for men who prefer the intensive sport
to the choreographed moves in an aerobics class, says Kathie Davis,
executive director of IDEA Inc.

But the classes also attract women who want variety, a
strenuous workout and the challenge of learning some self-defense
moves and mental training, Davis says.

"With aerobics, there's always something new to keep it alive
and fresh," says Cathy Masterson McNeil, spokeswoman for the
International Health, Racquet and Sportsclub Association, which has
headquarters in Boston.  She calculates that 10 percent of clubs
offer ultra-strenuous classes such as boxing.

Boxing-based classes are popular in Los Angeles, San Diego and
Orange counties, and have begun moving into Riverside and San
Bernardino counties.  Several Inland area clubs started classes this
month or are training instructors for future classes.

Studio Fitness Centers' Riverside location and L.A. Fitness
Sports Clubs in Corona, Riverside and Upland offer the classes.

"I've got a lot of middle-aged men who come in who may have
boxed in the service or college," says Terry Krapes, aerobics
coordinator at the Corona club.  Here they punch a bag, not a human.

"It's a nice noncompetitive environment," says Krapes.  "We can
have all levels of fitness.  They all work at their own pace. "

A heavyweight boxer and a Golden Gloves boxer teach classes
and train instructors at L.A. Fitness.  This creates a different
atmosphere in boxing aerobics than in aerobics, Krapes says.  In
aerobics, the instructor leads participants in a high-pitched
"whoooooooooooooop! " says Krapes.  "In boxing, we yell 'Knock out! ' "
 
Good workout

On a recent evening, instructor Leonard Salstad of Moreno
Valley, a former boxer who has a seventh-degree black belt in
karate, handed out jump-ropes to the 10 men and three women for a
vigorous warm-up at Studio Fitness Centers in Riverside. (Studio
Fitness has not yet added boxing to the classes at its other
location in Toluca Lake.)

Then Dennis Murphy of San Bernardino, who has a black belt in
karate and experience in boxing and aerobics, led the class in
floor exercises designed to warm up and stretch muscles throughout
the body.

When the time came for punching bags, both men gave students
individual instruction on footwork and punching.  Move properly and
you'll get a better workout, have more fun and avoid injury, says
Murphy.

To protect the back, students tighten their abdominal muscles
before throwing a punch.

Once they've achieved some mastery in the jab, cross-punch,
uppercut and hook, they get a good workout in their entire upper
body.  Because they're moving on their feet the whole time, legs and
buttocks get a workout, too.

"That's why we do so much stretching - we're going to hit so
many parts of body. "

So far, the class is mostly men familiar with boxing, but not
with aerobics classes.  "Guys get a rude awakening," says Murphy.

"They're used to hitting the bag a few times and walking away.  This
is more aerobic. "

Women are more familiar with fast cardiovascular workouts
during aerobics class.  They may feel awkward with the boxing moves,
but they catch on fast, he says.

Beginner Patty Valdivia, 29, of Corona looked tentative, but
determined when the class began.  By the end of the hour, she was
laughing, sweating and punching with increased confidence.

Valdivia, who usually does cardio kick-boxing and machines at the
club, says she's always been interested in boxing.  "I heard this
burns a lot of calories. "

Two bags over, Bill Feigen, 17, and his father, Mel, 55,
punched at their bags, occasionally feigning a punch at each other.

The Riversiders consider themselves veterans, since they've been in
class since it began the first week of December.  Bill Feigen likes
learning some self-defense techniques.  His father, like Valdivia,
is counting calories.

"I'm losing weight in just a couple of weeks and I'm eating
about the same," he says.  Instructors verify that the class can
knock off more calories than regular aerobics.

"You sleep well at night," says Feigen.  "The first week was
unbelievable.  I said, 'Pick me up off the floor, son. ' Now it's
coming along."

Good fights to look forward to in Millersville this Friday. In a six-round junior welterweight bout, Bayan Jargal (7-0-1, four KO's) will take on Sung-Dae Gang of Seoul, South Korea (6-1, two KO's). This is the pro debut in this country for Gang.

Heavyweight Kevin Johnson will fight Joe Blasini of Brooklyn, New York in a four-round matchup. Johnson made his pro debut in May in a bout in Michael's in Glen Burnie, MD.

In women's boxing, Severna Park's own Shelly Sievert (2-1, one KO) will battle Carinne Hamlett of Mount Vernon, NY (0-2-1) in a scheduled four-rounder.

Also on the card are Columbia middleweight Tony "Mo Better" Jeter (5-2, five KO's), Arlington, VA's undefeated junior welterweight Todd "White Lightning" Wilson (4-0, one KO), undefeated Eldersburg, MD light heavy Mark "TNT" Tucker (4-0, four first-round KO's) and Waynesboro, VA cruiserweight "El Guerro" Juan Carlos Robles (9-2, four KO's) are all slated to be on the card. Tucker, by the way, has been training in Tampa, FL with IBF Light Heavyweight champ Antonio Tarver.

Buy tickets while they are still available by calling 443-844-8865.

    Congratulations to Ron Gamble!  Ron Gamble, after a year out of the ring, made a fantastic return to the ring of boxing!  Ron won the heavyweight division of the Mayor's Cup held in Washington, D.C. on August 16th and 17th.  Way to go, Ron!