You fight like you train so why not train like you want to
fight?
Whenever your teaching anybody to punch harder it’s got to
be available under pressure for you to use it, and has to be trained to the
point that it’s the most familiar thing to you almost a natural reaction, you
fight like you train but are you training for the fight or result you want?
You can’t train one way and then expect to fight in a
different manner, I have full control over this when I’m teaching privates for
self defence, you have to its goal orientated, and this is no different to
fighting in the cage. It’s one thing learning something new in minutes, but
it’s another thing totally using it in a fight. I see this sort of mentality a
lot in traditional martial arts were people are always looking for that new
move or Holy Grail rather than focusing on the basics that at the end of the
day will get them safely through a fight. You see a significant drop in this
mentality when people actually spar properly, like up at the hustle gym. When
you do hard sparing you realise that its hard enough just to land one flush punch,
let alone the huge list of fancy techniques you can collect when training a
more traditional art. In fact lots of traditional arts have changed
significantly because their techniques simply didn’t work in the cage! Hard
sparing lets you know what you’re capable of in a situation and how you will
fight.
This brings me to some observations of two types of
fighters, now everybody I've taught the kinetic punch to has seen a significant
improvement up to 50% with some in the first lesson. And it’s usually the more
experienced that gets it more and realises the possible potential. Like the
Edwards brothers, Mac and Nathan. When i first walked in to the gym i noticed
Mac practising a boxing hook over and over again, in between teaching others,
that’s the mentality you want training all the time, because there’s always
someone you’ll face who trains harder. Now with Mac, from the moment I taught
him the kinetic hook, every single time after that when he was practising hooks
it was a kinetic hook same with his cross, once he realised the power level and
it was taken on board instantly! And still out of all the guys I've taught then
I’d say Mac and Nathan have the most chance of using it in the cage. It may
seem obvious that you would start training a much more effective strike
straight away, it is to me, but this is where you get two different types of
fighters
The other type can have just as much of an increase in speed
and power from their lessons ,but every time i see them throw a punch after
that its same old version, perhaps it just comes down to each individual
person’s ability to learn?or just each persons level but I've not had this problem
teaching self defence when testing in the suit. I think this comes down to
still training old styles as well, and not altering your sparing gloves so you
can train the kinetic punch in fight or on the bag and get an understanding of
the full effectiveness of this type of striking. the effect the kinetic punch
on the human compared to a normal punch thrown in ordinary boxing glove has to
be practiced in fight/sparring ingrained to make yourself fully aware of the
real differences and the advantages, one guy who had been sparring with Nathan Edwards
mentioned how he was hitting harder than the other person he was sparring with
who was twice the size, this is what happens when you refine your punch with
kinetics.
So while Boxing and Muay Thai are at the core of mma training, If
you’re not using the kinetic punch on the end then you’re not throwing the strongest
punch in training it’s like drawing with
a blunt pencil, Rather than a sharp one.you can draw with a blunt pencil but all you will make is impressions,with a sharp pencil each line is clean,precise and leaves a much more permanent mark.You can’t expect it to come out all of
a sudden when you’re in the cage and you wish you had more power in your hands.
If you’re training for a knockout finish and that’s your game plan you have to
train the strongest punches all of the time, every punch counts to add up to
hurt someone and in the ring, punches are the single most often thrown strikes.
One punch knockout power is available in mma but you have to train for it. If
someone shows you how to punch significantly harder you take that on board,
train out the bad habits and take on the new. Learn from your mistakes. Don’t
keep hold of them just because it tradition or there your favourite .if your
shown something much more effective, then you should immediately start to use
it and train it in every way, because if you’re not, your opponent probably is.
