GRAPPLER BAKI- PART XIII

Baki gets ready for the fight with his father, by doing a massive 12-hour warm-up. Apparently, it takes the young superhuman a good half a day to get revved-up enough to be in high gear. He figures that his high gear should be enough to handle Yujiro's lowest gear and, thus, plans to end the fight early on. He shadowboxes, spars against both Yuri and Hanayama (at the same time, as well as separately), and just generally keeps his body moving.

His begins his sparring with Yuri and dodges all the punches of the experienced boxer quite masterfully. However, Yuri throws a low kick that catches Baki off guard and right into an uppercut, but Baki turns his head faster than the punch in order to lessen the damage. I've heard of this a few times, but I've never actually met a boxer who could do it (although, I've not met a whole lot of Pro Boxers)-- even so, I'm convinced it is possible to be able to turn your head fast enough to at least soften the blow of a punch, if not negate the damage entirely. Soon after this, Baki grabs Yuri from behind and tosses him with a wrestling throw.

At this point, Hanayama steps in, but Baki takes the powerhouse's punches to his stomach straight on, without so much as a flinch. After a while of sparring, the two fighters decide they need to join forces to fight him. This continues on into the night and, much to everyone's surprise, Baki removes 20 kilograms (about 45lbs) of diving weights from his midsection. They cannot fathom that he has been going so hard for so many hours while wearing the weights. Sparring two experienced fighters while wearing the weights as a handicap shows just how much Baki has risen above his old self. It's a humbling experience to spar against two fighters that are about as skilled as yourself, but it's an experience I think everyone should have every now and again.

Even so, the time arrives for Baki and his father to fight, and it is revealed that Yujiro has beaten Gaia and made him fly the helicopter to the fight location. An earthquake threatens to put the fight on hold, but Yujiro uses all his power and stops the quake in its tracks (yeah, right!) with a single punch. Baki doesn't really care and comes at his father full force with an undefended punch, several knees to the face, and grabbing a rear naked choke. The episode ends, and we are left to wonder if Baki's strategy of going all out from the beginning will work for him.

I know from personal experience that fitter athletes require more time to warm up before they can get into their "groove" or kick it into high gear, although I doubt anyone in the world needs a full 12 hours to reach that gear. Most warm-ups for even seasoned professional athletes last only at most 30 minutes or so. If you need an hour, I'd say you are operating at a superhuman level.

Try this for a workout, though.

The 12-Hour Warm-up

Every hour, for 12 hours, do the following exercises:

• 25 Push-ups
• 25 Sit-ups
• 25 Squats
• 5 Minutes of Shadowboxing

This will take about 6-7 Minutes out of every hour for the 12 hour period and, at the end, you'll have done 300 Push-ups, 300 Sit-ups, 300 Squats, and a full hour of shadowboxing (or shadow kickboxing). You'll start to understand about half-way through just how rough it could be to warm-up for that long. The shadowboxing doesn't have to be all-out. Try to go at a medium pace, but you can go full bore if you want to.

You'll want to do this workout on a day where you can spare the time, like on a Saturday or Sunday. Obviously, you can't do it on a workday or anything. After you've done this workout a few times, you can try to increase your intensity during the shadowboxing or you can wear a weighted vest during the exercises, starting with just 10lbs and then adding weight as the workout becomes easier to complete. I'd recommend that you not wear the weights all day; however, if you would like to do so, you need to work up to it. For instance, you could wear the weighted vest for 5 minutes after you finish shadowboxing each time and then add five minutes every time.

As in everything, progress slowly and don't rush it. Strength comes in baby steps, but if you keep taking those steps, you'll go a long way before you know it.

That's all for today. Until next time, good luck and train hard!