Home-Based Fitness Training

''Most people who have trained in a martial arts club will have noticed the wide variety of abilities of the students who train there. These differences are not simply attributable to the students’ length of training, their age or their natural abilities. Often, they cannot even be explained by the instructors’ teaching standards, because some students progress very well while others do not. Sometimes the differences in ability cannot even be related to how hard the student trains or how dedicated the student is to his/her training.

Usually, these ability differences relate to the way a student has decided to train outside club hours (if the student trains at all outside normal classes). Unfortunately, in many cases this means that improvement is on a purely ‘lottery’ basis.

Home training is usually unsupervised. Some students instinctively do what works well for efficient development. A few have a very high natural aptitude for the training they do and will continue to develop well, even when following very poor training methods (which would fail to benefit less talented students).

However, the average student needs to train correctly in order to show the type of improvements many desire. The consequence of the ‘lottery’ system of training outside classes is that the students who fail to show progressive development often quit the sport prematurely. This is as a result of lowered self esteem and dissatisfaction. Progress is a great reward for anyone training in a martial art and without it many will feel that the time invested may be more usefully invested elsewhere.

By following simple routines between classes, the average student will be able to achieve a high standard of technique.

All able bodied people are capable of mastering the basic techniques of a martial art, regardless of genetic predisposition. Any self limiting beliefs students have often stem from a lack of knowledge about the physiology of training and adaptation.

This is an unfortunate consequence of the age of the majority of martial arts, which date back well into early human history. In ancient times training physiology was not well known and a great deal of trial and error was used to develop training and conditioning methods. Because of the traditional nature of martial arts training, these methods have been rigidly handed down until present times, with little variation or adaptation. The assumption is that if they have worked for one student they will work for all. In practice this is not the case. Hence, the high drop-out rates in martial arts schools.

With extreme dedication, or the assistance of youth - or both - even inappropriate training methods will yield reasonably good results. But a lot of students are unwilling, or indeed unable, to put in the time and effort required for this sort of progress. This necessitates a simplified form of maintenance training for continuous improvement purposes.

Regular basic training enhances adaptation and improves the student’s ability to master new techniques. It makes techniques ‘second nature’ to the practitioner.

Most good instructors will tell their students to do additional training outside class to master the techniques taught in the class. This basic philosophy carries over to all types of learning. The university student does his/her own private study in order to find a personalised way of making the training received in the lecture hall more permanent or easier to remember. The same holds true for most other types of learning because different individuals are receptive to different training methods. This is true even when two individuals are learning a similar skill.''