Newbie questions

Hi all,

My name is Owen, Im 31 6'4, live in Merseyside UK and have just started Ju Jitsu (2nd lesson later today)

I used to swim /weightlift/bodybuild from age 15 to 20 but havent done anything physical since then till now, maily cos Im a little quite/shy but only till I get to know U ;-)

I have browsed around today looking for a forum to ask some advice and have read a couple of dozen postings on this site.

I would just like to say Hi to all here and begin with me questions and comments


Having finally decided to motivate meself to begin training I entered the local sports ctr and joined the JJ club there.

I was a little surprised to find that I was kinda just dropped in on the mat without a quick chat or intro into what goes on.

More so when at the end of the 90 min session everyone just dissapeared - no warm-downs or formalities...

After training I too (in my surprise) forgot to warm down (a habit I recall from training years ago) and subsequently have been a little "tight" since friday.

My first question is could anyone recommend a warmup/warmdown routine for me?

which leads to my second question which is since MA is a "flexible" kinda sport - and Im from a weights background hence normally inflexible, can anyone recommend some stretching exercises to loosen myself up and increase my flexibility in my legs more than anywhere, however everything suggested is gonna be appreciated.

I am hoping that either today in my session or on my 3rd visit someone is going to take time to explain about insurance, licencing etc, which I know nothing other than there is a requirement for them. (and I cant recall how I found that out)

if there is any advice anyone can offer me for training in the liverpool area I would appreciate it including any links to websites with excercises / Movie clips on etc.

Thanks in anticipation

Owen

BTW Where is this site hosted? (Country)

Welcome, Owen. I'm from the north west as well, and it's nice to have another Brit aboard, even if it is a scally!! [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG]

Firstly, you right to raise these concerns of yours, but it might be better to ask your club sensei first. He/she will be able to show you exercises for stretching etc. If they can't then I would suggest having a look elsewhere for a different club, with a qualified coach.

Insurance is usually covered by membership of an organisation, but be sure to ask. Your sensei will need public liability insurance as well (so you can sue 'em). Licences are only necessary for grading purposes, there is no legal requirement to be licensed before you can train.

Probably the best advice I could give you would be to ask your sensei the same questions you asked here, and if you aren't happy with the answers then leave and join a different club.

Hope that is of some help. Let us know how the training goes.

Budo

PS Are you from the red or blue half of the city?


[This message has been edited by Cato (edited 01-13-2003).]

Neither mate - its a question I get asked (as u can imagine) a lot and it always leaves ppl lost for words - someone in Lpool who cant stand football, Watching it at least...

Cheers for the reply, I will give it a try and see what comes back at me...

Owen

Cato..........Your a Brit? Well I am just floored. No wonder you can't figure me out, you must think I am a rogue cowboy from out west.
Owen, Cato has given you great advice, and being a fellow country men I imagine he can help more than me. By the way......what's the red/blue thing about?
Now as for stretching and stuff. I would be very leary about a school that just threw you out on the mat. That isn't fair or honestly real smart. We give all our beginners private lessons(usually about 6 weeks) before putting them in a regular class. We don't want them to feel over matched, intimadated, or uneasy about class. So we teach them enough basics so when they join the group they can keep up. I like to have my new students have a sense of "I can't wait to join the group" versus, "I don't want to go back.
we use basic Karate stretch workout, start at the Neck and work down or at the ankles and work up the body. Basically neck exercises, shoulder exercises, elbows-wrists-fingers-hips-legs ankles. On the ground legs, feet and hips. The usually the wall stretch with a partner, then gound stretch with a partner, chinese torture, hammy stretch etc.
One good Jujutsu warm up we use is get a partner to lay on top of you(the mount) and try to get him on the bottom, he in turn tries to stay on top. No, I repeat no techniques are allowed, its just reversing each other by leverage. My guys do this for about 5-10 minutes. The day we started this we could only go about 2 minutes. If you have never had anyone lay on top of you, and press his weight on you, you can't imagine how tiring and how many muscles you use doing this. Give it a try

Lou, if you think you were surprised to learn I'm actually a Limey S.O.B, imagine how shocked I am to see you're not actually a rogue cowboy from the wild west!!! LOL.

And Owen, with a name like that how can you not be a red!!!! C'mon down to Anfield and see what your missing, mate. (Lou, it's a football..sorry soccer...thing)

Well thankyou Senseilou.

The mind boggles!! I cant even imagine "the mount" does anyone have any footage of this?

It sounds like a pretty cool place U train at.

Im wonderin if Im gettin the "will he still be here in a couple of weeks" kinda attitude at present - ie is the sensei waiting to see if I am committed before he "invests" 1 to 1 training on me - I dont know - but I am considering looking around and maybe go for a 1 or 2 off training session elsewhere to compare.

Just dont know what is available round here at the mo' tho - still need to look properly I guess.

the Reds and Blue thing is football aka "soccer"
Reds are Liverpool
Blues are Everton
2 teams in the city of liverpool - its an ongoing grudge fest (usually good humoured :-P )
I have been seen in town having a couple all in support of the reds though ;-)

could I just ask if anyone has warmup / warmdown and stretching workouts they could mail / attach or again any video of stuff I am dead keen to get on and have a laugh...

Cheers Cato and Senseilou

[This message has been edited by owen (edited 01-14-2003).]

[This message has been edited by owen (edited 01-14-2003).]

Owen, believe me, the mount is nowhere near as nice a position to be subjected to as it sounds. Much to my disappointment it isn't in any way related to bedroom athletics. [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/frown.gif[/IMG]

It is that horrible thing that big kids always do to little kids, where they sit on their chest, knees under armpits and try to pin their arms and do unpleasant things to them. You get a 15 stone sweaty, fat bloke on you and it's a hell of a job to get the bugger off again. As Lou said, you should give it a try sometime.

I still think your best bet for a warm up routine is to ask your sensei. Failing that there are a number of books on MA's that include quite extensive sections on stretching etc. But remember that there is no difinitive way to warm up or stretch, everyone has their personal favourites. The golden rule is not to overdo it, particularly with stretching. Stretches should be done gradually, not "snapped" into, and you should stop if you feel any pain or discomfort. Ot is annoyingly easy to tear a muscle if you aren't carefull.

Please, ask your sensei and let us know what they recommend (I might want to pinch their ideas).

Budo

I will get back with their reply.

next session Friday evening (4th one)

I was well disappointed to rule out the mount as something I can bring home and experiment at with the missus ;-)

C U later all

How much is 15 stone? If you guys want to exchange information, then you will have to speak English! Oh that's right, you guys are speaking English, we speak, uh, uh, Rubbish?
Anyway, however you warm up, make sure your neck gets stretched. It's really important, because a neck injury will slow your training down to a crawl. You can tape a wrist or ankle, put if your neck gets tweaked, its painful and your off the mat for a bit

Lou you must forgive my Northern brothers, it would seem that they require the refinement of the South to help them. 15 stone is 210 pounds or about 95 kilos.

Haway man Judderman, man...You're giving away some of our best kept secrets, you big soft southern jessy!!!"!

And Lou, I don't think any of us would ever think what you talk is rubbish...

LOL

Owen, to answer your question. First if you lift weights you should be a good degree flexable due to the range of motion you use in lifting. Try this. Stand feet together and bend at the waist with the legs straight as possible and touch your toes. You can do this sitting and standing. Also you can put your leg out in front of you on a chair or couch and reach out and touch it. This also works if you do it from the side. You can do splits. Front and horizontal. You should start each stretch slowly so you do not trigger your muscles to flex. At first hold each stretch about thirty seconds and work up until you can ddo them for 2-3 minutes a peice. This will also serve well as a warm up/ warm down. Good luck to you.

One of the things you can do is watch how a track team stretches(please no perversion in this) because many of there stretches are ones you can use. My main cool down exercise is a light form of shadowboxing as it stretches what you used and allows for further practice

Tom Kurz's method of stretching is excellent and if you click on 'reading room' and 'Stretching' it will take you straight to a lot of good articles.

Basically:
Pre-workout: Warm up the body with a CV type exercise for a few minutes.
Do joint rotations starting at the neck working down to the toes.
Then do dynamic stretching which is swinging (with control) the arms (up/down/side) and legs (forward/backwards/side). This type of stretching prepares your body for the dynamic movements you are about to perform, especially kicking etc.

Then you are ready for you workout.

Cool down:
Bring your heart rate down to a nice pace (Marching on the spot is usually sufficient), then do relaxed stretches, and I mean relaxed, try and breath deeply, pausing when breathing in and stretching a little furthur when breathing out.

If you want to pre cool down you can do isometric stretches (this will increase your flexibility the fastest), and you can also do these at the end of your strength workouts.

There is plenty of evidence that this works and I am a part of it, I can kick cold above my head at any time of the day and can do front splits (toes up and down) and side splits.

If someone is showing you how to stretch and they can't do the splits (and have been training for a while), they are normally doing something wrong as it is unusual for a person to be mechanically unable to do the splits.

Again you are probably best looking at Tom Kurz's books for more detail.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by senseilou:
...stretch with a partner, then gound stretch with a partner,[/QUOTE]

Mark the date, senseilou actual put something in a post that I don't think is right!!

I would advise people to never use a partner for stretches.

Sorry senseilou, I have been looking for faults in your posts since I came on this board [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by UKfightfreak:
Mark the date, senseilou actual put something in a post that I don't think is right!!

I would advise people to never use a partner for stretches.

Sorry senseilou, I have been looking for faults in your posts since I came on this board [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/biggrin.gif[/IMG]

[/QUOTE]


I read somewhere recently about a guy that was ijnured by his partner doing partner stretches and years later and after all sorts of treatment he is still in pain. Can't remember the source but it sure made me think.

When you can achieve maximal range of motion in a stretch without a partner, I don't see any need to use a partner that doesn't have the instant feedback from the muscles that the person stretching does, e.g. a muscle tearing.

If you train your self into exhaustion, does the last ten minutes of motion count as a warm down? Seriously?

[QUOTE]Originally posted by joesixpack:
If you train your self into exhaustion, does the last ten minutes of motion count as a warm down? Seriously?[/QUOTE]


You shouldn't train to exhaustion, that is overtraining and will not improve your performance. Also when exhausted you are more suceptable to colds because your immune system is not at full speed, so you become ill so all your hard work is lost as you can't train because you are recovering.

If you do train to exhaustion, or may be exhausted because of a competition, the cool down is MORE important.

If you take ten minutes for a cool down, 5 of which is a light jog and say another 5 brisk walking slowing down to a slow pace this should be adequate to bring your heart rate down (the idea of the cool down) from the high pace it was during the workout to resting pace.

At this point you should not feel out of breath and your heartrate should be back to around normal (it will be slightly above because your body is starting to recover).

Then do relaxed stretches to finish, taking time, with deep breaths.

This should prevent lactic acid build up which can cause cramps and other aches and pains, as well as dizzyness from stopping workouts abrubtly.

Tom Kurtz definately!

Cato, or maybe UKfighter, could you explain to me the licensing you are talking about? the licensing for grading?

i have recently trained to exhaustion -- forgot that's a bad thing. kinda snuck up on me how tired i was getting. cooldown essential. exhaustion not necessary to call it a good workout. no need to obsess. now, if you want to be a shaolin monk, that's another story.

-LK