Is Cross training detremental to your Life?

[Kenpo17]

Yes, mastering all the Martial Arts you have learned, or being able to defend yourself with techniques from all the styles you have learned? I think I would, no I definetly would rather know how to defend myself, even if I have not mastered all the arts I have taken. Really, being knowledgable in a variety of Martial Arts is not a bad thing, and I am not trying to say that it is. It is good to be "well rounded" when it comes to Martial Arts, but be realistic with yourself, if you were to be attacked on the street, would you just use your primary art? I wouldn't think so, but maybe you would. If I were to be attacked on the street I would be mixing everything I have learned to get that person away from me.

 

[Yoshiyahu]

Let me speak presumptiously. But lets say I am 16 years old and never taking a martial arts. I decided I want to be more well rounded than anyone else. I have no base art so I decide to start learning several arts at the same time. My mom and dad are pretty well off finacially so they can afford for me to cross train. So I train six days a week after school for five hours a day on school days. After school I train from 4:00pm-9:00. On Saturday I train from 9pm-6pm. During the summer and spring break and Christmas break which is two weeks I train every day from 9pm-6pm Monday through Saturday. I am training in the following arts?

1.Boxing
2.Tae Kwon Do
3.Wrestling (High School)
4.Wu Shu
5.Choy Li Fut
6.Kick Boxing
7.Muay Thai
8.Judo
9.Tang So Do
10.Wu Dang Tai Chi

Now I have been training for six months. So do you think I would be a proficent fighter since I have so many different ranges for fighting? I mean cross training is better right so what about learning all these arts at once...Is that a good way to become a great fighter. Will I have a major advantage over someone taking only Muay Thai for six months? Or would a Muay Thai, Boxer or Choy Li Fut guy six months in whoop the floor with me?

Whats your opinion?

Yes, mastering all the Martial Arts you have learned, or being able to defend yourself with techniques from all the styles you have learned? I think I would, no I definetly would rather know how to defend myself, even if I have not mastered all the arts I have taken. Really, being knowledgable in a variety of Martial Arts is not a bad thing, and I am not trying to say that it is. It is good to be "well rounded" when it comes to Martial Arts, but be realistic with yourself, if you were to be attacked on the street, would you just use your primary art? I wouldn't think so, but maybe you would. If I were to be attacked on the street I would be mixing everything I have learned to get that person away from me.

 

[dungeonworks]

Let me speak presumptiously. But lets say I am 16 years old and never taking a martial arts. I decided I want to be more well rounded than anyone else. I have no base art so I decide to start learning several arts at the same time. My mom and dad are pretty well off finacially so they can afford for me to cross train. So I train six days a week after school for five hours a day on school days. After school I train from 4:00pm-9:00. On Saturday I train from 9pm-6pm. During the summer and spring break and Christmas break which is two weeks I train every day from 9pm-6pm Monday through Saturday. I am training in the following arts?

1.Boxing
2.Tae Kwon Do
3.Wrestling (High School)
4.Wu Shu
5.Choy Li Fut
6.Kick Boxing
7.Muay Thai
8.Judo
9.Tang So Do
10.Wu Dang Tai Chi

Now I have been training for six months. So do you think I would be a proficent fighter since I have so many different ranges for fighting? I mean cross training is better right so what about learning all these arts at once...Is that a good way to become a great fighter. Will I have a major advantage over someone taking only Muay Thai for six months? Or would a Muay Thai, Boxer or Choy Li Fut guy six months in whoop the floor with me?

Whats your opinion?

That's quite a fantastic spread of arts and impossible time frames! I know of not one human being that trains ten martial arts at once...two, maybe three and it is usually a boxing/kickboxing style, wrestling, and a submission/jiujitsu style.

Now, in the scenario you presented, training all them hours a day and more on off days, I would say in 6 months you have a guy that has more kwoon/dojo.dojang/gym time put into his/her arts as someone does in 3-4 years of one style! In otherwords, you are using a very unrealistic and far reaching example that is in no way relative to reality of nearly every single martial artist out there.

 

[Steve]

Let me speak presumptiously. But lets say I am 16 years old and never taking a martial arts. I decided I want to be more well rounded than anyone else. I have no base art so I decide to start learning several arts at the same time. My mom and dad are pretty well off finacially so they can afford for me to cross train. So I train six days a week after school for five hours a day on school days. After school I train from 4:00pm-9:00. On Saturday I train from 9pm-6pm. During the summer and spring break and Christmas break which is two weeks I train every day from 9pm-6pm Monday through Saturday. I am training in the following arts?

1.Boxing
2.Tae Kwon Do
3.Wrestling (High School)
4.Wu Shu
5.Choy Li Fut
6.Kick Boxing
7.Muay Thai
8.Judo
9.Tang So Do
10.Wu Dang Tai Chi

Now I have been training for six months. So do you think I would be a proficent fighter since I have so many different ranges for fighting? I mean cross training is better right so what about learning all these arts at once...Is that a good way to become a great fighter. Will I have a major advantage over someone taking only Muay Thai for six months? Or would a Muay Thai, Boxer or Choy Li Fut guy six months in whoop the floor with me?

Whats your opinion?

I would say you have a kid who needs to get a life. Honestly, I don't see this as being a realistic example or representative of what people mean by crosstraining.

If I can pare your example back a little, though, to say a grappling and a striking art and a more reasonable schedule I think there's something to discuss:

How about a kid who is on the wrestling team, training 4 nights per week in wrestling but only for 5 months out of the year. During wrestling season, he cross trains at a boxing gym 3 nights per week but mostly for cardio and technique, as his coach would kill him if he gets injured.

The other 7 months out of the year he trains Boxing 3 days per week, but amps up the sparring, even working in a smoker or two. He also adds Judo 3 days per week at the YMCA club, because the grappling is a different kind of cardio and he enjoys the takedowns.

Let's say the kid keeps going through college with this regime. I think that the learning curve keeps going for most people and that this kid would be consistently more capable than, say, a similar kid who trains in only one art.

At 1 year, 2 years, 5 years and 10 years, I would say that this kid has two major advantages over a single art practitioner. First, he will have the advantage of exposure to multiple arts and a diverse group of training partners and styles. Second, he will have the advantage of having learned how to learn. What I mean is, he will be able to pick up other styles and techniques faster because he's actually trained on how to train.

 

[JadecloudAlchemist]

I train every day from 9pm-6pm

You mean 9am-6pm?

1.Boxing
2.Tae Kwon Do
3.Wrestling (High School)
4.Wu Shu
5.Choy Li Fut
6.Kick Boxing
7.Muay Thai
8.Judo
9.Tang So Do
10.Wu Dang Tai Chi

First lets group them.
Tae Kwon Do,Kickboxing,Tang So Do, Muay Thai=Kicking arts
Boxing, Choy Li Fut=Punching arts
Wrestling,Judo=Grappling arts
Wu Taiji,Wu Shu=Extra

If the person spends 5hrs a day he should train it in a catagory.
IE. Kicking arts. Alot of the kicks will overlap. So the focus on the different types of kicks would be the objective.

At least twice a week he should be pressure testing his combined skills with sparing. This means practicing his kicks,punches and grappling in sparing. This will help him know ranges and how to combine the different techniques.

that a good way to become a great fighter. Will I have a major advantage over someone taking only Muay Thai for six months? Or would a Muay Thai, Boxer or Choy Li Fut guy six months in whoop the floor with me?

The person who can pull off his techniques the best wins.

If the Muay Thai fighter is taken to the ground and is unfamilar with that area well the guy who pressure tested grappling is going to win.

This reminds me of a story where one person only practiced Kata and the other only practiced Sparing.

 

[Si-Je]

Wow! great thread! I'm been at school and missed alot!
From what I've seen when we've had people come to spar on open sparring day:
When sparring freestyle one of two things more commonly happen.
1. A practioner stays in "style" and technique to the primary art they train. They make mistakes, they get hits in and get hit just like any sparring match, But.. there is little to no hesitation.
2. When we've had students or practioners that come in to spar that have immediately cross-trained 2 or more arts from the beginning of their martial art learning: Hesitation and doubt riddle their sparring session. I've seen practitioners attempt to shoot in for a grappling takedown, stop in the middle of it and switch to striking making their entire movement a waste and usually end up getting overwhelmed by their opponent whom takes advantage of their hesitation and what I call "muscle memory confusion".

When you train any art you practice the techniques and postions over and over until your body responds the way you've trained without you having to think about what your doing. This is what every MAist strives to achieve.
Action without Thought.
There is no time for thought of strategy, and technique when in the heat of sparring much less battle. You need to have your body trained to respond immediately before your mind can comprehend what is going on.
In the movie "The Last Samori", good old Tom Cruise is jumped in the street by three or four men with swords. He has no sword. He stops to prepare himself to respond, in effect, stopping his mind from thinking, allowing his training and his body to react. When he was training the boy told him "NO MIND", that he was thinking too much in training and losing the sparring battles. Thinking too much will get you killed.
With "no mind" he defeats the attackers in seconds and afterwards his mind catches up to what just happened.

I love that scene, for that is exactly what happens in a fight. If you fill your mind with conflicting technique, principles, concepts, and approaces to fighting, your mind will interfere with the natural and trained "muscle memory" of your body. If your muscle memory is confused in the same way, you will hesitate, you will have split seconds of confusion and you will be hurt, hit, or killed.
Now, if one has a strong base in one art and it has become apart of them, of their muscle memory, then to cross train would only add to their arsenal of techniuqe. But not until those techniques have become muscle memory. And once those do, they most often supercede the old style.
Ex. my strong foundation was in JJJ three years of training and muscle memory. Then I trained WC. The muscle memory from JJJ made my transition to WC concepts difficult and took longer to learn. But, once I did get a good grip on it (about 2-3 years in training) WC/WT muscle memory now supercedes the muscle training of my JJJ completely, to where I rarely, if ever use JJJ techniuqe anymore. It's just not a reflex any longer. My sparing was total caka until a year and a half into training in WC/WT, too much conflict between the two arts and mucles memory conflicted to make me hesitate and lose windows of opportunity to attack and defend.

Just my experiences, and observations of other stylists when they spar with us, and at other schools. And by observing our students that never took other arts before we trained them WC/WT and how well they did against other MAists that took several styles for longer periods of time than our new students. They held their own against senior MAists using the very simple and even limited knowledge of WC/WT and fighting that they had because their mind was clear, and their reflexes were pure and without hesitation.

 

[Steve]

Si-je brings up something that I think it important. If a person does crosstrain and is interested in blending two discreet styles, he'll need to work specifically on synthesizing the styles to avoid what she calls "muscle memory confusion."

This is seen in MMA, where a fighter progresses to the point where they are effectively blending ranges. Guys start off and you can almost see the switches going off. "Now I'm striking. Now I'm grappling." Over time, they begin to synthesize their techniques, using striking to set up a takedown, or changing levels to feint a takedown in order to set up a high roundhouse. Etc.

 

[Jonny Figgis]

Just to throw my two cents in...

I have cross trained in various martial arts including my core system of kempo...namely muay thai, various forms of RBSD and styles of kung fu and EPAK. I have found through trial and error that some of the styles or systems that I have trained in don't share the same principles as kempo and the instructors have tried to make me into, for example, a muay thai stylist or kenpo stylist. I've found that Geoff Thompson's concept of The Fence and other self protection techniques fit in nicely with kempo so I have kept up this training. It includes grappling and groundfighting; elements of which I bring back to the kempo training as I find these compatible with the core principles that I train in kempo. I have a self defence instructor qualification and this fits nicely with my kempo.

 

[Yoshiyahu]

Okay what I am alluding to is. Someone training multiple arts at one time oppose to someone who trains three different arts over different time periods.

I would say you have a kid who needs to get a life. Honestly, I don't see this as being a realistic example or representative of what people mean by crosstraining.

If I can pare your example back a little, though, to say a grappling and a striking art and a more reasonable schedule I think there's something to discuss:

How about a kid who is on the wrestling team, training 4 nights per week in wrestling but only for 5 months out of the year. During wrestling season, he cross trains at a boxing gym 3 nights per week but mostly for cardio and technique, as his coach would kill him if he gets injured.

The other 7 months out of the year he trains Boxing 3 days per week, but amps up the sparring, even working in a smoker or two. He also adds Judo 3 days per week at the YMCA club, because the grappling is a different kind of cardio and he enjoys the takedowns.

Let's say the kid keeps going through college with this regime. I think that the learning curve keeps going for most people and that this kid would be consistently more capable than, say, a similar kid who trains in only one art.

At 1 year, 2 years, 5 years and 10 years, I would say that this kid has two major advantages over a single art practitioner. First, he will have the advantage of exposure to multiple arts and a diverse group of training partners and styles. Second, he will have the advantage of having learned how to learn. What I mean is, he will be able to pick up other styles and techniques faster because he's actually trained on how to train.

 

[Steve]

Isn't that what I said?

 

[Yoshiyahu]

Personally I believe training various arts at different times will more beneficial than say a beginner to MA's starting off fresh with three arts.

Isn't that what I said?

 

[dungeonworks]

Personally I believe training various arts at different times will more beneficial than say a beginner to MA's starting off fresh with three arts.

I can agree with that statement, even if it took 151 posts just to get confirmation on the intent of the original question! :ultracool

...but I have never met anyone that started off taking 3 arts as a begginner. It's kind of common sense that it would be awful hard to study 3 styles of anything....cooking, dancing, knitting, airbrush....ect. Barring MMA or JKD where ranges are taught instead of styles so to speak, I don't see where anyone has said they did train 3 arts as a green horn newbie.

 

[Si-Je]

We had a kid training WC with us a couple of years back that was on the wrestling team in high school. His coach told him not to drink any water to keep his weight up for the match that week.
Everytime he came to train with us he was getting faint and almost passing out. We had to make him drink water. His training in wrestling and with us was conflicting to the point of being very unhealthy. He had to stop training WC until wrestling season was over.
Just an example. I have many.

 

[Eru Ilúvatar]

Wow didn't know that! I thought you should drink water when you want to gain weight. Bodybuilders drink alot. Especialy when you're eating Kreatin(don't know how to write it in English) you should drink alot becouse one of its functions is to make muscles absorb more water.

 

[Steve]

We had a kid training WC with us a couple of years back that was on the wrestling team in high school. His coach told him not to drink any water to keep his weight up for the match that week.
Everytime he came to train with us he was getting faint and almost passing out. We had to make him drink water. His training in wrestling and with us was conflicting to the point of being very unhealthy. He had to stop training WC until wrestling season was over.
Just an example. I have many.

If true, his coach was an idiot. Telling a kid to not drink water over an extended period of time is criminal and very dangerous.

Typically, if you're cutting a ton of weight, you drink loads of fluids all the way up to the 24 hours prior to the weigh ins.

 

[dungeonworks]

If true, his coach was an idiot. Telling a kid to not drink water over an extended period of time is criminal and very dangerous.

Typically, if you're cutting a ton of weight, you drink loads of fluids all the way up to the 24 hours prior to the weigh ins.

Keypoints:

1. If True.
2. Coach is an idiot.

Some people here really grasp hard to argue against cross training.

 

[Steve]

The following is a quote from one of my favorite grappling websites, Grapplearts. The parts emphasised are by me:

Fluid Restriction
The simplest and most effective way to begin the weight cutting process is to decrease or stop fluid intake. Your body is constantly losing fluid by breathing, sweating and urination. Every minute and hour that this goes by without replacing the fluid, you will lose weight. This process takes no extra energy from a fighter to complete, and you can lose up to 5-6 pounds in 24 hours without drinking. My athletes never go over 24 hours without fluid, and we usually start the fluid restriction exactly 24 hours before the weigh in. Before beginning the fluid restriction, there are some tricks to losing the maximum amount of fluid over that 24 hours.

For the fifth, fourth and third days before the weigh in, I have my athletes consume 2 gallons of water a day. They carry the gallon jug around with them so they know how much fluid they are taking in. At this time, the athlete also can be more liberal with sodium in his diet (we don’t go heavy on the sodium, but a little increase can help later as you will see). This increased water intake triggers hormones in the body to excrete more urine than usual. This response will be essential in losing fluid the day before the weigh in. Two days before the weigh in, the fighter cuts the fluid intake to one gallon of water, and cuts out the sodium from the diet. Finally, the last day before the weigh in, the fighter takes in no fluids, no sodium, and only food that I will describe later. This process is effortless, and only requires a little discipline and tolerance of a dry mouth.

 

[Si-Je]

Coach is telling him that drinking water will make him drop too much weight.
We told him, stay hydrated, eat more carbohydrates to keep weight. He still wouldn't drink water.
Alot of coaches do this. Water trims you down, but you do retain water weight. But, it will trim you down and drinking alot will help you lose weight.
Coach was old school.
I've seem them do weird stuff on the Ultimate Fighter reality show to lose weight in short amounts of time. Scary, unhealthy stuff. All to stay in a 10lb. range weight class for a fight.

 

[Steve]

You're right, Si-Je, there are a lot of unhealthy ways to cut weight. I'm not disagreeing with you there. And I don't doubt that there are some dumbass coaches out there endangering kids with "old school" means of cutting weight (or in this case... gaining weight?).

I did presume you were talking about cutting weight. Usually, people WANT to be in the lightest weight class they can acheive. It's never a bad thing to be the biggest guy in your weight class. I can't even fathom dehydration as a means of maintaining or gaining weight. That's ridiculous to me.

The best ways to cut weight usually take at least 2 months and involve very strict diets. Often, the "fighter's diet" involves simple concepts like no carbs after noon, little to no sugar, no simple carbs, lots of light protein like chicken or fish and/or adherence to a dietary plan, such as the Zone diet. Depending on who or for what purpose, supplements are used as well to help with recovery and the like.

The main point being, only an idiot would suggest that dehydration is the best way to lose or gain weight. The best way to lose weight is and will always be healthy diet and exercise. The best ways to cut weight are a little different but don't involve dangerously dehydrating oneself. And the best ways to gain weight involve adding lean muscle... or if you're a kid, just waiting until you hit your natural growth spurt and/or puberty, for christ's sake.

Si-Je, I want to be clear, I'm not angry, upset or arguing in any way with what you said. You just hit on a topic that irritates me, which is when people in a position of authority abuse that position, either intentionally or through gross incompetence. Kids on steroids, kids doing permanent damage to their bodies and minds... because "coach" said it's the way to do it.

 

[jks9199]

We had a kid training WC with us a couple of years back that was on the wrestling team in high school. His coach told him not to drink any water to keep his weight up for the match that week.
Everytime he came to train with us he was getting faint and almost passing out. We had to make him drink water. His training in wrestling and with us was conflicting to the point of being very unhealthy. He had to stop training WC until wrestling season was over.
Just an example. I have many.

That wasn't a conflict in training -- it was lousy coaching on the part of the wrestling coach. It's a pervasive problem (a very surprising number of wrestlers develop eating disorders) given the emphasis on making and maintaining weights to compete. The martial arts training wasn't causing him problems, from what you've said.