Daily Training- 2/29/2012

Ippo's Basic Training
-Pressed into the wall with my big toes during sit-ups.
-During push-ups, supported myself just the tips of my big toes.
-The run went pretty well, considering I ran the day before yesterday and did horse stance training and footwork practice yesterday.
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I'm currently going through a modified Ippo's Training Schedule, but I'll be doing other Real Anime Training on two of my off days, because I get bored easy. :P

I'll keep you guys updated on my progress.

Daily Training 2/28/2012

Morning

1. 1/2 Starting the Journey Level 1
2. Pull-ups- 5, 7, 8, 7, 8
3. 3 x3 Minutes Footwork Practice
4. 1/2 Starting the Journey Level 1
5. Balance Kicking- 20 Reps of Round, Front, and Side Kicks

Evening

1. 90 Second Deep Horse Stance
2. 30 Seconds Rest
3. 45 Second Deep Horse Stance
4. 30 Seconds Rest
5. Slow Boxing Combination Work- 10 Combinations, each side
6. 60 Second Deep Horse Stance
7. 100 Ab Twists each side
8. 30 Second Deep Horse Stance
9. 30 Seconds Rest
10. 45 Second Deep Horse Stance
11. 30 Seconds Rest
12. 30 Second Deep Horse Stance
13. 30 Seconds Rest
14. 15 Second Deep Horse Stance
15. 30 Seconds Rest
16. MAX Horse Stance-- 67 Seconds (After everything else, 67 seconds sucked)
17. 10 Side Bends each side

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All the horse stance training at the end of the day is more Avatar: The Last Airbender stuff.  I don't do stance training a lot, but it has its interesting moments. If you'll notice, today is revolving around staying on my feet and is pretty balance-oriented. The morning workout was about being mobile and maintaining balance, while the evening workout was about being "rooted." 

For the record, when I say "deep horse stance," I mean that the tops of my thighs are parallel with the ground. 

Real Anime Training Reviews: Calisthenics Kingz- HIT's Solution to Getting Killer Abs

This is the second DVD I've decided to review from Calisthenics Kingz since I purchased the DVD set a few months back (man, I need more time...). In general, I was impressed with the overall feel of the DVD and for a few good reasons:

1. HIT doesn't sensationalize his stuff. He tells you up front that you're going to have to work for it. It means putting the time in for the workouts. He says this routine on this DVD should be completed 4 times a week in order to build your abdominal area and I gotta love him for that, because to get amazing results, you can't get by just being ordinary. 
2. The exercises are simple and anyone can do them. Mind you, if you are enormously out of shape, you'll have to work up to a couple of the exercises, but none of the moves on this DVD are impossible by any stretch of the imagination. 
3. If your cardio is not in the right place, the routine will kick your ass, because there is very little rest and he mixes up his ab exercises with intervals of jumping rope. 
4. He tells you that you're going to need to watch your diet. And this makes sense, because you can have the toughest abs in the world and if they are covered with two inches of fat, they'll never see the light of day. 

All in all, I love HIT's no-nonsense attitude toward fitness and I also love the simplicity that he brings to the table with his bodyweight work. If you don't know who I'm talking about in this review, allow me the refresh your memory with this.

Daily Training 2/27/2012

Morning
Ippo's Basic Training

Evening
Kamishiro Yuu's Basic Training- Level 1


Nice to have a two-a-day with some of the lower workouts.

Super Saiyans are Real (ORIGINAL)

Dude's got some serious balls to post this video. I would urge our friend to start training with our workouts, just so he can get a handle on how much work it would take to become a Super Saiyan if he actually was a Saiyan. (Disclosure: Humans cannot actually go Super Saiyan. :D)

Daily Training 2/25/2012

1. Pull-ups: 5, 6, 8, 6, 8
2. 10 Punches to Wooden Post
3. Sit-ups: 30, 28, 32, 30, 28, 28 (Used big toes to hold self against the wall)
4. Play wrestling with Isaiah
5. Chambered Balance Kicking (each side)
-15 Round Kicks
-15 Front Kicks
-25 Round Kicks
-15 Front Kicks
6. Stair Climbing with Toes Only- 14 Steps
7. Footwork Practice- C-Stepping, V-Stepping, Outboxer Footwork
8. 30 Jabs (each side)
9. 10 Knuckle Push-ups
10. 30 Chuudan Seiken Zuki (each side)
11. Toe curls against fingers


Getting really bored with this randomness. I was using this style of training as an experiment and it's not really working out the way I would like it. I'll do some writing on it another time.

In other news, the consistent training I've been doing for my feet is actually coming along pretty nicely and I'm hoping to see some results of that training in the next few months with better weight-shifting and agility.

10,000 Hours to Mastery

Malcolm Gladwell wrote a book (that I have yet to read... -_-) called "Outliers: The Story of Success" that shares a very interesting idea: with 10,000 hours of practice, it is possible to become an expert at something. He goes on to expound examples of prominent figures in different areas who achieved greatness and explained just how much time they put into their work. Obviously, some of this depends of genetic predisposition and social upbringing, but those merely serve as potential head starts for people's abilities. It's quite an interesting idea. Just so you have an idea of how much time that is, that is 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year, for 5 years. That's a lot of time.

When applied to the concept of martial arts, we find some truth to ideas of the weak beating the strong or, as Rock Lee puts it, that "with hard work, even a dropout can defeat a genius." That doesn't necessarily mean that 10,000 hours of mindless practice will get you anywhere. You need mindful practice. You need to make adjustments to form and correct yourself when you make mistakes (e.g.- getting hit while sparring). But, just because you put the time in, doesn't mean you'll be unbeatable. You can be limited by your strength or speed or even your style. If you haven't trained to deal with a particular scenario, it might well be impossible for you to handle it, should you be confronted with it. However, training all aspects of your art and focusing on quick-thinking will definitely be helpful to your adaptation to new situations.

Anyway-- The point is this! If you're upset because you aren't good at something, go practice!  Work individual techniques, shadowbox, spar, grapple, hit various bags and mitts, and improve your conditioning. If you put the time in and allow yourself the necessary time to recover, you will get better and that's all there is to it!

But it wouldn't be Real Anime Training if we didn't try to take it a step further. We can see various anime characters each logging the necessary time for mastery. Even fictional characters (well, most of them) know that you can't just automatically become an expert at something. If they are going to accomplish something quickly, they tend to "cheat" the system a little. For example:

• The Room of Spirit and Time (The Hyperbolic Time Chamber) in Dragonball Z shrinks a year into a day, allowing the people inside to walk in normal one day and walk out badass the next, as long as they put in the time. 
• Naruto used kagebunshin to divide the amount of time it took him to master certain skills and develop new techniques. (Side note: This was brilliant, but so cheap and broken.)
• Ichigo stayed in the little world between Soul Society and the Real World before fighting Aizen so his dad could teach him the final Getsuga Tenshou.

It's not really fair. At some point, your body is not going to be able to train. You can only put in so many hours in a day without overtraining or injuring yourself. There has to be a way to cheat the system. Especially if you're going to school or working or anything else. How can you put more time into it?  I think a good answer for this question actually comes from Grappler Baki. 

Hanma Baki utilizes immense, immense powers of imagination to practice fighting against all manner of martial artists and creatures. In a sense, this is just really detail shadowboxing, but what we're after is the concept, not necessarily the exact method (although I urge you to really use good imagery while shadowboxing).  Actually, studies have shown that imagining an activity with as much detail as possible (that means, as much sensory data as you can manage: the feel of your muscles, skin and what not; the smell of the air; the color of the sky; etc) actually trains the brain to do those activities. Your brain doesn't realize that what you're imagining isn't real and the same parts of the brain that light up when you actually do those motions light up when you imagine doing them.  So, when our body is too damn tired to train anymore, or when we are recovering for a day or so, you can still log the time in your mind. 4 hours of week of this, 50 weeks out of the year, shaves 25 weeks off the 5 years it would take to get to 10,000 hours at 40 hours a week. This is a way, you can do a little bit more. You can practice to your heart's content or until you pass out into a coma of sleep and probably continue to dream about training!

10,000 hours to become an expert. How many hours have you put in? 

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