Last Updated on November 18, 2014.

Training and Lifestyle

Sempai Inoshima & Anthony Chouloute

Intense cardio can be your best friend or your worst enemy. Your workout can be an hour long, fully focused, relentless, get away to red and black matted paradise. Or, your workout can be an hour long session where you plead for mercy every minute. Your leg is heavy but you’ll have to lift it. Your arms, back, and shoulders are begging for a nap, but you have 30 seconds left until round #4 starts. In these moments gravity takes over. Once that happens you my friend are officially “dragging”. We’ve all been there. Some days are better than others. Ultimately, what is it that causes you to go from having the eye of the tiger one class to having the eye of a raccoon  that was startled during the day?

 The answer is Bad Training. I hate to tell you this but Bad Training occurs at home.

You can be in the best shape of your life but training while exhausted…is well…training while exhausted. It’s difficult to function on lack of sleep let alone perform x amount of knee kicks, punches then strength training. Even if you manage to stimulate your mind & body enough to get you through the day, your crash is imminent. I was once so tired I fell asleep while eating. NO Lie. The fork was in my mouth with the food on it. My stomach said, “chew”. My mind said, “sleep”. In between nodding out and chewing it took me twenty minutes to eat a bite of a biscuit.

If you know you have to train the next day, make sure you get enough rest.

Will power is an amazing asset in all facets of life. Proper preparation assists your confidence level and doesn’t force you to rely only on your will power. There is a certain sense of security in knowing, what comes next, has been prepared for. Once you condition proper preparation and planning into your training, you have officially incorporated training into your lifestyle. At the “lifestyle level” you never dread your next work out: you’re eager for it. When your confidence level is high you embrace a challenge opposed to running from it.

 “You can’t expect your confidence to kick in when you can barely stay awake.”

My Recommendation:

8 Hours of Sleep!

 No tossing and turning. No waking up in the middle of the night. I mean a full relaxed 8 Hours of active sleep.

It’s important that you feel ” rejuvenated” when you wake up. Good energy is a great way to start any day. If you don’t want to get out of bed, and you subject your alarm clock to verbal abuse or worse, than you’re not starting your day properly.

Instead of Carpe Diem! I say Carpe!..(what is sleep in latin?)…Sleep! Carpe Sleep!

You get home and attack that bed at a set time. Punch it like you would the training bag. Once  you’ve sapped away your aggression and child-like resistance, sleep. Knock out! Leave a streak of drool that acts as a do not disturb sign on your lips (Who wakes a drooler, honestly?).

In the coming weeks I’ll put up another post on what you can do during the day to have blissful sleep at night. Till then sweet dreams. 

Bad Training at home also makes it easier for doubt to set in.

Bad Training at home leads to poor technique in class, which can get you hurt. 

Rest, be careful, and reach your goals.