BASIC STRENGTH EXERCISES FOR MARTIAL ARTISTS

BASIC STRENGTH EXERCISES

THE ONLY EXERCISES YOU NEED TO GET STRONGER.

EXERCISES FOR THE LOWER BODY

A balanced leg training improves your strength for kicks and punches and reduces the risk of injury.

Split your strength exercises for your lower body to have a balanced training, an unbalanced training can cause back or knee pain.

For example split equally into:

hip dominant exercises with bended legs.
hip dominant exercises with straight legs.

When you achieve an advanced level, you can include some single leg strength variations. These are perfect for training your abductors and adductors and your stability in your feet and knees.

SQUATS

Muscles involved: Quads, glutes, calves and core.

Instruction:

1. Position yourself securely underneath the barbell. The barbell should be in level with your rear shoulder muscle. Grap the barbell slightly wider than shoulder width. The barbell should now rest behind your head on the shoulder muscle area.

2. Stand with your feet roughly shoulder-width apart, keep your spine in alignment by looking at a spot on the floor about two metres in front of you.

3. Move your bottom downward by pushing the hips backward until you are at a 90° angle with the knees. The back remains straight during the entire movement. In the lowest position, the knees should still be slightly behind the tops of the feet. The weight is shifted to the heels. From this position, return to back to the starting position and push your hips slightly forward.

4. Make sure that the knees remain in line with the leg axis and do not move forward or inward.

Other variations: Pistol squats.

LUNGES

Muscles involved: Quads especially quadriceps, glutes, calves and core.

Instruction:

1. Stand with your feet roughly shoulder-width apart, with dumbbells in your hands next to your body, toes are pointed forward.

2. Tense your abdominal and gluteal muscles and pull your shoulders back and down.

3. Take a big step forward and bend your knee without putting your back leg down.

4. Hold this position briefly before moving back to your starting position.

5. Then perform a lunge with the other leg.

6. Be careful, your knees should not move inward or forward.

ROMANIAN DEADLIFT

Muscles involved: Quads, lower back, abdominal and gluteal muscles.

Instruction:

1. Stand with your feet roughly shoulder-width apart, your knees are slightly bent, your back is straight, arms are pointing down and you are holding a barbell in your hands.

2. Press your feet into the floor, tense your abdominal and gluteal muscles.

3. Slowly shift your upper body (which is always beeing kept straight) forward, pushing your hips backwards, your arms should move straight along when your are moving down, close to your shins.

4. Raise your upper body back to your starting position, repeat this exercise.

5. Make sure your core is tensed and your lower back remains straight.

6. Perform this exercise with your kneed slighty bendes not fully extended.

EXERCISES FOR THE UPPER BODY

A balanced training is important to improve your chain of motions for every fighting technique. Split your exercises in push and pull exercises.

You can divide your exercises in particular workouts. Put your focus on training these different variations equally.

Additional you can include exercises for your neck and forearms.

BARBELL BENCH PRESS

Muscles involved: Chest, triceps and anterior part of the shoulder.

Instruction:

1. Lie on your back on a bench.

2. Grasp the barbell bar slightly more than shoulder width and hold it above your chest with your arms extended.

3. Lower the barbell by bending your arms until the upper arms build a horizontal line.

4. Keep the forearms vertical at all times, never overextend your wrists or bend them! Rather, turn your hands slightly towards your abdomen.

5. Do a light arch with your back and tense your abdominal and gluteal muscles to stabilize your position, let the barbell touch your chest briefly, then lift it up.

6. Breathe out while lifting, breathe in while lowering.

Other variations: Incline barbell bench press.

KNUCKLE PUSH-UP

Muscles involved: Chest, triceps, anterior part of the shoulder, core and stabilisation of your wrist.

Instruction:

1. Clench your hands to make a fist, get down on all fours, placing your knuckles slightly wider than your shoulders, straighten your arms and legs.

2. Stretch out your body in a straight line, extend your legs, keep your back flat, your core tight, your body should form a straight line, your hands/fists are directly under your shoulders.

3. Look down to the floor, tense your the muscles in your upper body, lower your chest until your upper arms are at least parallel to the floor.

4. Point your elbows as far back as possible.

5. In a perfect push-up the chest touches the floor.

6. Move back to your starting positions, fully extend your arms.

Other variations: Knee push-up, incline push-up, feet-elevated push-up or one-arm push-up.

PULL UPS

Muscles involved: Lats, arms, shoulders and core.

Instruction:

1. Start by hanging from a pull-up bar, place your hands slightly further than shoulder-with apart, palms facing forward.

2. Tense your abdominal and gluteal muscles and pull your shoulders slightly back and down.

3. Pull yourself up in a steady motion until your chin is above the bar, as you do this, bend your elbows to your rips.

4. Hold this position for a short moment before you move back to your starting position, always keep the muscles tensed, repeat the exercise.

5. Avoid such things as gaining momentum or tightening your shoulders.

Other variations: Pull ups with resistance bands, lat pull down, high pull ups or one arm pull-up.

ONE ARM ROWING

Muscles involved: Upper back, posterior part of deltoid (shoulder) and biceps.

Instruction:

1. Stand upright, shoulder-width apart, hold a dumbbell in one hand in front of your body, tense your abdominal and gluteal muscles.

2. Bend your knees, push back your buttom, bend your upper body forward, keep your back straight.

3. Pull the dumbbell up, moving the elbow along the ribs without changing the position of the back.

4. Move the dumbbell back to the starting position in a controlled manner.

5. Avoid rounding the back, the core muscles are always tensed.

Other variations: Rowing with a resistance band, one arm rowing with moving you hand inside, two arm rowing on an unstable surface, seated calbe row or barbell row.

MILITARY PRESS

Muscles involved: Shoulders, strengthening abdominal and gluteal muscles.

Instruction:

1. Position your feet shoulder width apart, grasp the barbell bar slightly wider than shoulder width (about a hand width wider), pull your shoulders back and your elbows directly under the bar.

2. Tense your abdominal and gluteal muscles and push your hips slightly forward.

3. Rest the bar on your shoulder, your elbows are now in a straight line just below the bar, make sure to tense your gluteal muscles, as this will automatically push your pelvis forward a little and give you stability.

4. Inhale as you release and exhale during the press.

5. Fully extend your arms during the push up and lift your shoulder slightly.

6. While releasing, be sure to turn your elbows inward and not extend them out to the side, your head will move back slightly.

Other variations: Military press with dumbbells, Military press with kettlebells or Pike push-up.

REVERSE FLY

Muscles involved: Posterior part of deltoid (shoulder), strengthening neck, core and back.

Instruction:

1. From an upright position, bend your knees slightly, push your bottom back and shift your upper body forward, in your hands you are holding dumbbells, palms facing each other.

2. Tense your abdominal and gluteal muscles and keep your back straight.

3. Raise your bent arms slightly in a controlled manner, elbow leading upward, perform this exercise without any momentum.

5. At the end of the movement, pull your shoulder blades together, hold this position for a short moment.

6. Slowly return the dumbbells to their starting position.

7. Ensure your core muscles are tense throughout the exercise and avoid evasive upward moving with your shoulder or neck muscles.

Other variations: Bent over on a seat or on a gmynastic ball lying prone, standing on an unstable surface or on one leg.

SHOULDER FLY

Muscles involved: Middle part of the deltoid muscle.

Instruction:

1. Have a firm and safe foothold.

2. Your back is straight and you are looking forward.

3. Take dumbbells in each of your hands, they should be at your side next to your thighs.

4. With a slight bend in the elbow (almost fully extended arms) you slowly lift the dumbbells until they are horizontal, as you do this, exhale.

5. Inhale during you lower the dumbbells sideways to your thighs.

EXERCISES FOR THE HULL

Your hull is essential for forwarding for your power, strength and energy. Train your front, back and lateral hull equally to improve your fighting techniques.

JACK KNIFE SIT UP

Instruction:

1. Lie on your back with your legs straight and lift your legs about 15 centimeters off the floor.

2. Stretch your arms vertically upwards.

3. Now slowly and in a controlled manner bring your legs, while they are streched, upwards and at the same time come up with your upper body until you can touch your toes with your hands.

4. Only your buttom is still on the floor.

5. Bring your body back to the starting positions, your legs should always remain lifted.

Other variations:

Jack knife sit up with a additional weight between your feet (medicine ball).

Jack knife sit up with additional weight in your hands (medicine ball).

RUSSIAN TWIST

Instruction:

1. Sit on the floor with your back straight, bends both knees while your feet are kept together and held slightly above the ground.

2. Keep your back off the ground at a 45 degree angle.

3. Now turn your torso to the right until your left elbow touches your right knee, then turn to the left until your right elbow touches your left knee.

4. Turn to the sides as far as you can without putting your legs down.

WHOLE-BODY EXERCISES

With this exercises for your whole body you train your upper and lower body in a sequence of movements to this your hull gets trained, because it has to stabilizes the whole exercise. By practicing these you will boost the interaction of all your muscles and you´ll get one step closer to your powerful fighting techniques.

These exercises are quite complex, which is why you should train the movements slowly and with little weight in the beginning. Do not increase your weight until you feel safe with the movement of the exercise.

SNATCH

Instruction:

1. Stand upright in a shoulder-width stance with a barbell in front of your feet.

2. Move into the deep squat position by pushing your buttom backwards, grasp the bar firmly with the back of your hand facing forward.

3. Make sure your back and core are straight, pull the barbell up along your shins.

4. When the barbell reaches a high position, fling the barbell upward with extending your arms.

5. Lower the barbell to your body in a controlled manner and then move back into a squat position, repeat this exercise.

SQUAT WITH SHOULDER PRESS

Muscles involved: Quads, gluteal muscles and calves as well as chest, shoulder and core muscles.

Instruction:

1. Start the exercice as doing a front squat with a barbell, legs shoulder-width apart.

2. Tense abdominal and gluteal muscles.

3. Move into the squats.

4. Press up from the squat and use the momentum to simultaneously extend the dumbbell straight up in the air.

5. Then lower the weight back to your chest and move back into the squat, repeat the exercise.

Other variations:

Squat with shoulder press and calf raise.

Squat with shoulder press on unstable surface.

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Good luck champ

YOUR VISIONAER-TEAM

DOMINIK DRABAND

ATHLETIC COACH