Focus on your strengths...

[zanaffar]

… and your weaknesses will improve in the process.

My coach gave us this bit of advice in class. He said that he always considered himself to be a kicker, but all of his knockouts came from his punches. The reason being, is that the other fighters would be so focused on mitigating his kicks that they left themselves wide open for his hands.

Since I also consider kicking my strength, he suggested I gear my training towards setting up my kicks, thereby improving my hands and footwork in the process.

What do you guys think about this advice? Gear your training towards your strengths or specifically work to improving your weaknesses? A bit of both?

 

[Bill Mattocks]

I like to work hardest on what I suck at. I don't know if that's great advice or not, but it something I try to do.

 

[Touch Of Death]

… and your weaknesses will improve in the process.

My coach gave us this bit of advice in class. He said that he always considered himself to be a kicker, but all of his knockouts came from his punches. The reason being, is that the other fighters would be so focused on mitigating his kicks that they left themselves wide open for his hands.

Since I also consider kicking my strength, he suggested I gear my training towards setting up my kicks, thereby improving my hands and footwork in the process.

What do you guys think about this advice? Gear your training towards your strengths or specifically work to improving your weaknesses? A bit of both?

As a game plan, sure, but don't neglect any training.

 

[Kickboxer101]

I think you should focus on anything because If you don't train your weaknesses they won't get better and if you train your strengths they'll turn into your weaknesses

 

[PhotonGuy]

Lots of people like to work on their strengths and make them even stronger and its something that we tend to want to do and I think its a good idea but you also have to work on your weaknesses. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link and it doesn't matter how strong the other links are it just takes one weak link to break. So it doesn't matter how strong your strengths are your one crucial weakness can lead to your downfall. So that's why you need to work on them too.

 

[Buka]

I think working on both is the best way to go. Most people tend to work on what they're good at, anyway.

I was a long time competitor and, like your coach, the other guy's people always screamed "watch his feet, watch his feet!" Regardless of the venue. Yet I scored primarily with my hands. My kicks were elaborate crowd pleasers, hence the yelling. But it was poor advice.

If you compete and knock out a couple folks with kicks, you get labled a kicker from then on. But if you knock out a couple people with your hands - you're just a fighter.

And....if I were only to work on my weaknesses - I'd be at it all damn day.

 

[PhotonGuy]

I think working on both is the best way to go. Most people tend to work on what they're good at, anyway.

That's basically what I said in my #5 post and I do think its a good idea but by the same token crucial weaknesses should not be ignored and its there where you really need work.

And....if I were only to work on my weaknesses - I'd be at it all damn day.

If its a crucial weakness though you should work on it. Some weaknesses don't really matter depending on what you're doing and those perhaps shouldn't be a concern but if its a crucial weakness where not working on it can really hurt you than if you need to work on it or, as I said, your chain will snap.

 

[Touch Of Death]

That's basically what I said in my #5 post and I do think its a good idea but by the same token crucial weaknesses should not be ignored and its there where you really need work.



If its a crucial weakness though you should work on it. Some weaknesses don't really matter depending on what you're doing and those perhaps shouldn't be a concern but if its a crucial weakness where not working on it can really hurt you than if you need to work on it or, as I said, your chain will snap.

I think it isn't something you should work on, in a fight; so, there is a logic to the OP.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

… and your weaknesses will improve in the process.

My coach gave us this bit of advice in class. He said that he always considered himself to be a kicker, but all of his knockouts came from his punches. The reason being, is that the other fighters would be so focused on mitigating his kicks that they left themselves wide open for his hands.

Since I also consider kicking my strength, he suggested I gear my training towards setting up my kicks, thereby improving my hands and footwork in the process.

What do you guys think about this advice? Gear your training towards your strengths or specifically work to improving your weaknesses? A bit of both?

There's wisdom in that in some areas. Except for skills (things you can learn) and key weaknesses (I'll define that in a moment), you'll make the largest gains in any area of life (including MA) by increasing what you do reasonably well. Working on true weaknesses (things that are part of your personal psychology) won't make you excellent at those things.

So, to define the terms as I use them:

Key weakness: an area of weakness that negates skills. In MA, this would be something like blocks. It doesn't matter how good your kicks are if you can't block theirs, so poor blocks would be a key weakness.

Skill: This is something you're not good at until you learn to be good at it. Most of MA falls into this category.

True weakness: An area of weakness with a biological or physio-psychological (hard-wired psychology) aspect. This would be like someone with bad hips trying to work on getting their kicks higher. They may gain a few degrees, but they'll still suck.

 

[Buka]

That's basically what I said in my #5 post and I do think its a good idea but by the same token crucial weaknesses should not be ignored and its there where you really need work.



If its a crucial weakness though you should work on it. Some weaknesses don't really matter depending on what you're doing and those perhaps shouldn't be a concern but if its a crucial weakness where not working on it can really hurt you than if you need to work on it or, as I said, your chain will snap.

My brother, I've been working on my weaknesses in the arts for a long time. And will continue to do so.
But, thanks.

 

[PhotonGuy]

My brother, I've been working on my weaknesses in the arts for a long time. And will continue to do so.
But, thanks.

Well good for you. Make sure your chain is strong in all its links.

 

[Buka]

Well good for you. Make sure your chain is strong in all its links.

I shall continue to try. It's a constant battle.

 

[marques]

It seems a comfortable and time saving process. I like it.

The ideal is training everything, which is just the [impossible] ideal. If you just train what you don't know, you will 'forget' what you know. A mix between what we know and what we want to know seems logical.

On the other hand, I was trained to focus on what I didn't know. It was interesting in the sense we have a new objectif / challenge every training session, so we cannot stuck on a few things. The down side is you don't know your strong points. You trained a bit of everything and the core skills... may not exist. Or take much more time to come up.

 

[JowGaWolf]

I train everything my weakness and my strengths. Having a weakness in a technique doesn't mean that it's useless. It just means that it's not my strength. Not training a weakness will make that technique useless for me which is the real problem that I want to prevent. Boxers don't become better kickers by only boxing and fighting with their strength.

The one thing to remember about martial arts is that a weakness is not always a standalone issue. When used in combination with strengths, the weakness becomes less of a weakness. I could have a weakness in kicking but using my kicking can create opportunities to better exploit my strengths. The other benefit is that my opponent's weakness may actually be defense against my weakness. In that scenario, I only need to have a useful weakness in order to land successful attacks or defenses. The thing that comes to mind right away when it comes to weaknesses are stances because stances are often taken to position strengths for kicking, punching, and grappling.

 

[PhotonGuy]

It seems a comfortable and time saving process. I like it.

The ideal is training everything, which is just the [impossible] ideal. If you just train what you don't know, you will 'forget' what you know. A mix between what we know and what we want to know seems logical.

On the other hand, I was trained to focus on what I didn't know. It was interesting in the sense we have a new objectif / challenge every training session, so we cannot stuck on a few things. The down side is you don't know your strong points. You trained a bit of everything and the core skills... may not exist. Or take much more time to come up.

Training everything is impossible and even if you could do it you would be spreading yourself too thin without any area of focus. What is important is training in everything that is crucial. Take for instance footwork which is crucial, if you train in a striking based style and don't have good footwork it will really hurt your fighting ability so if footwork is your weakness its something you really need to work on. On the other hand lets say you have a bad hook kick but maybe the hook kick is not a technique that you use that much so in that case you wouldn't need to work on it as you can compensate for it by using other techniques instead. So its important to work on crucial weaknesses but only if they're crucial.

 

[drop bear]

Work on your basics.

I don't have anything catchy to add to that.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Work on your basics.

I don't have anything catchy to add to that.

This is where "key weaknesses" live, so that's solid advice.

 

[PhotonGuy]

Work on your basics.

Well of course, the stuff you learn on your first few days is the majority of the stuff you will be using for the rest of your entire martial arts career.

 

[marques]

Well of course, the stuff you learn on your first few days is the majority of the stuff you will be using for the rest of your entire martial arts career.

Disagree. Some people start with Kickboxing and finish with Systema. Or from Boxing to BJJ. Not many things in common, not the same basics. Yet, same basics all entire martial career may be true for many people.

 

[Touch Of Death]

Disagree. Some people start with Kickboxing and finish with Systema. Or from Boxing to BJJ. Not many things in common, not the same basics. Yet, same basics all entire martial career may be true for many people.

I half agree. The basics should be similar, or somebody has specialized, and you just know you know a specialization.