# TOXO Journal



## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

ok lads im going to be keeping track of my progress here mostly so i can get advice on my training ect.

Im currantly not really training due to injuries:growl: but im hoping to start again full bore from monday (as long as im recovered).

im around 15st at the moment as i have been heavily bulking up over the last 3 years but now my focus has changed and im going to give mma 100% of my attention from now on. At 5'10" i think around welterweight would suit me best so i will be trimming down to around a fighting weight of 170lb whilst hopefully keeping most of my strength. Keeping that in mind i will only be lifting weights once a week and focusing on conditioning during the mornings and skills during the evening, im planning on doing 3 hours a night so i will need to be alot fitter.

im looking to do my first fight next year sometime.

any and all advice is welcome


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## Cha$e (Dec 11, 2007)

I would say you should aim to hit a walk around weight of 175-180lbs which leaves you an easily reachable 170lb target when preparing for fights.

As for your training obviously your diet will be a big factor when shedding pounds but keeping muscle mass, if you take things at a relatively steady and even pace you should see drastic weight drops over the first month or so and then weed out the last few pounds with a constant training regime.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

Im going to clean up my diet a bit, well i alread have really but still aim for around 4000-5000cals and let the conditioning work strip off the fat as im probably around 20%bf which puts me around 175-180lbs with 8-10% bodyfat. I will maybe need to cut coming upto my first fight but then i have a year to get into shape.

One things for sure i dont want to fighting 6' plus lads at lhw:baffled:


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## Cha$e (Dec 11, 2007)

thats true. You definately want to have no less than 6-7%bf when fighting otherwise it gets dangerous to your vitals from the heavy stirkes especially your liver, kidneys etc.

Sounds like you have things more or less sorted juts make sure that after a hard session you take in some nice lean protein, but of course you know that.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

cheers mate, i have over trained enough in the past to see the signs lol im not really sure how to train for mma but i asked some of my instructors and thay gave me a pretty good idea in a very general way of what sort of things i need to do with my weight training and sprint training.

thats what this journal is really for, hopefully you guys will be able to put any mistakes right once i have posted up a few workouts.

My gym is fully loaded with strongman kit;logs atlas stones farmers walk jokes sleds thick bars 300kg plus tyres power racks dumbells upto 90kg ect so i think most of my weight training will consist of strongman event lifts as my gym lifts are already well over what it needs to be.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

this is what i had in mind for my strength training

workout a

lunges 5 reps

change ups 20 reps

floor press 5 reps

clapping press ups 20 reps

high pulls 5 reps

medball slams

workout b

speed deadlift 5 reps

change ups 20 reps

push press 5 reps

clapping press ups 20 reps

pull ups 5 reps

medball slams 20 reps

workout c

front squats 5 reps

change ups 20 reps

incline dumbell press 5 reps

clapping press ups 20 reps

face pulls 5 reps

medball slams 20 reps

im going to finish of with 2 strongman medleys. i will be doing this in complex style so for 3 rotations of 5 mins each going up in weight every complex and alternating betwean workouts a,b&c every week not every workout.


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## elliot (Oct 28, 2007)

looks pretty good mate, sorta what im looking for aswell. can i ask what face pulls and change ups are, they sound intense

edit, also whats a strongman medley aswell, what do they consist of


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

face pulls are a powerlifting assistance exercise which mainly targets the posterior delt & traps and secondly targets the small upper back muscle medial deltiod bicep forarm. there sort of like a cross betwean upright rows and barbell rows, i do them standing infront of a low cable with a rope slihtly leaning forward and pull upto my face squeezing my shoulder blades together and keeping my elbows out. powerlifters do them to balance out heavy pressing exercise to spot muscle imbalances and thay also help with bench presses.

change ups are pretty hard to explain but any good mma coach will be able to show you.

a medley is just doing lots of strongman lifts back to back to test your strength/endurance.

if youve ever watched worlds strongest man you would of seen them do a medley thay for instance may start by flipping a tyre so far then maybe carry a heavy anker or stone and finish by loading something.


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## elliot (Oct 28, 2007)

ah yeah i get you on the medleys but you lost me on the face pulls, im a complete novice when it comes to any sport of exercise or technique.

looks pretty good mate let us know how you get on


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

http://www.weightliftingdiscussion.com/facepull.html

there you go mate, i prefer to do them on a low pulley rather then a high pulley but thats just me. i hope it helps:happy:


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## elliot (Oct 28, 2007)

ah i get you now, i actually just tried to do a few without a pulley. my shoulders hurt :S


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

found these on youtube and im planning to start doing them along with ladder drills as my feet are heavt and slow at the moment.

http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6y0YYBUGP0&feature=related

http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pmPIuFUO9A&feature=related


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## Cha$e (Dec 11, 2007)

These drills seem okay for getting your feet loose but in order to develop good footwork you need to do rounds and rounds of sparring to develop the muscle memory and capacity to be abel to slip, side step and skip strikes and move your way out of situations.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

i normally sparr about 3 times a week if you dont include wrestling and rolling.


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## Cha$e (Dec 11, 2007)

toxo said:


> i normally sparr about 3 times a week if you dont include wrestling and rolling.


Good good, obviously there is nothing better to get your footwork prime than sparring with someone as you are having to adapt to what they are doing as an opponent. When you start getting comfortable sparring with the poeple you train with, i'd suggest bringing some other people in that you dont necessarily know so as to push yourself a little further.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

Well i havent trainined for a few months due to injury (hopefully next week i will be well enough to train again) but before i was sparring in boxing 1 day a week shootboxing another and muay thai another and there are different lads in each class.

the boxing and muay thai my foot work is ok as i did alot of wushu and karate as a teanager.

I found the shootboxing was where my foot work let me down the most as im fairly ok at take downs from the clinch as i did judo from the age of 5-15 but with 16oz boxing gloves on you cant get a grip so you have to go for single or double leg takedowns and some of the lads have mean sprawls, hence the reason why im going to be doing alot of sprints hill sprints ladder drills kettlebells medballs and other explosive type training rather then the strength training i have been doing for the last few years.


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## Cha$e (Dec 11, 2007)

Yeah fair enough. Sounds like you have most things covered and you should be in good shape for when it comes for your first fight. Traing hard, fight easy


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

i dont mind being beaten because my oponent is better then me but i could never forgive myself if i loose because of fitness, i beat myself up when we roll at the end of my mma class and i gas out even though i generaly do a 1 and a half hour of stand up and 1 hand a half hours of mma before we roll. Even if im rolling with one of the pro's which has happened a few tims:baffled:


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## Cha$e (Dec 11, 2007)

Im the same, i get really annoyed with myself if i get tired, but it drives me even more to never get tired in a fight because it makes you realise what exactly can happen when you gas. Lots of running skipping and sparring helps to keep me from getting gassed.


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## elliot (Oct 28, 2007)

we play this game at my gym, its called who can gas first. i win. alot.

btw doing those drills in wrestling shoes or whatever they are just seems stupid as you aint really guna get that traction and dont wanna train your legs to get used to it. the ones without shoes where hes actually slipping seem far better, id rather train to recover from/prevent trips and slips.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

Im feeling alot better this week, its only taken like 2-3 months so depending on how i feel tomorrow i will hoefully be starting back on my quest to be a mma fighter any day now i do feel like i have forgotten so much though :shocked:


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

I did my first lesson back training today at jackapongs and i can say i was very pleased with the quality of training.

I turned up later as the time table had been changed so missed the first half of the lesson:baffled: so i did 5 mins of skipping then then we did some pad work. The first combo was blocking a low round house, 3 streight punches a hook then a knee and finish with a round house kick we did this a total of about 10 times with both sides of the body .

The second combo was a one two combo parry a front kick and finish with a roundhouses starting with 1 and going upto 7 and then back down to 1 with both sides of the body.

After the pad work there was sparring and we finished with press ups and sit ups.

my injuries played up a little but its not a proble as im just working on technique and having to restrain the urge to go all out.


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## JayC (Jul 16, 2007)

Sounds good mate, nice one


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

Thanks, the Kru Johnny is pretty good, he picked up on some small technique mistakes that i did not even know i had and he's the say bloke who teaches at the roger gracie academy, which is good enough for me.


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## JayC (Jul 16, 2007)

Nice, it's good when you have a teacher that can pick up on every single mistake


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## Cha$e (Dec 11, 2007)

Sounds like things went well mate. Hopefully you can stay injury free and get back on track with training.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

Thank mate, that's the plan. I am still not 100% but i am not going all out which is sort of a blessing in disuse as it has forced me to work on technique more then going hell for leather when there is a pad in front of me or a arm bar.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

Im not going to be able to train tonight due to my girlfriend pottering around until 4 in the morning last night:angry: thats the last time im staying around hers on a sunday night.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

I got down the gym to night ans started with the boxing class.

The class started with 15 mins of skipping then shadow boxing and 3 or 4 rounds of sparring.

After the sparring there was about 5 rounds of calistetics mostly lower body stuff and then onto 3 or 4 combos with the pads and finally another 5 rounds of callistetics this time mostly upper body and abs.

Most of the lesson was pad work though proably about 45mins.

After the boxing and eating an apple i moved onto the mma class, which started with some pummelling and then fighting for hooks, which i did well at considering i was fighting one of the advanced guys there.

The first sequence we did was shooting for the double leg off a jab and to my delight i finally got the double down as i had been struggling with the technique but this time it all just clicked.

We did 2 more sequences which where tying up the arms from guard against an oponent who is gnp'ing and getting a triangle and then going for a kumira from the same position, thats one of the things i like about where im training all the grappling is done with strikes.

The end of the class was 5 rounds or rolling where i tapped out a beginner about 20 time and then got chucked in with the big guns as im around 15st but dispite this i didnt do to bad as i only got tapped out twice by one of them and not at all by the other.

I feel the main mistakes i made in rolling were trying to get subs from in the guard and turtling up rather then spinning round and taking his back when he had my back.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

i have had to take a few months of training completely to allow a few injuries heel.

i did a few classes on monday (wrestling and grappling) and im as stiff as a board at the moment.

im going to try and do a few fights in around 6 months so im pretty much going to be training like its a second job.

i will have to leave all the strength and conditioining stuff out until i get my recovery level high enough to be able to do 2 workouts a day.

im upto around 15st im fairly solid but as im around 5'10" i really need to fight at ww so im planning on getting down to 13st then depleting to ww.


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## DragonStar (May 3, 2008)

look 4ward 2 reading ur progress mate, what will you compete in?


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

im looking to compete in mma in about 6 months if im upto scratch.

at the moment i need to get my cardio up alot aswell as my flexiblity and footwork.

im still score with doms from monday so it looks like i will have to be getting back into it next monday.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

I did shootboxing and mma last night. Shootboxing started with the double leg off a jab and then we went onto switching to the single i f your oponent gets one leg back and finally getting out and taking the back if your oponent manages to sprawl and get both his legs back, we also did breaking the wrestlers headlock.

In sparring i managed to get hold of a few of the the top guys but couldnt mangae to take them down or if i did i ended up on the bottom lol, i did sparr with one of the students who is at the same level as me and i totally dominated him so that makes me feel better as i normally get stuck with the advanced guys due to being a bit of a lump.

In mma we worked on getting the wrestlers headlock from a sprawl then breaking him down and taking the back, we moved onto the amaconda choke from the same postion and finally some weird reverse anaconda choke, personally i dont think alot of these advanced chokes are much use unless your at bjj black belt level but i guess its good to learn just from a defence stand point, i take the marcelios garcai point of veiw that it is better to be good at 1 move then semi good at 2.

i didnt get subbed at all in rolling, my flexiblity is really off from months of iddleness so my guard game was prettg useless, i did invent a new month sort of, which is a wrist lock if you mess up an arm bar and your oponent gets on top of you.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

Did thai boxing 2 sessions a beginners and the advanced class, i always like to do the beginners classes whenever possible as thay have a slower pace and you can work on ironing out any bad habbits. The thai boxing was your normal shadow boxing combo's on the pads and conditioning stuff aswell as some leg sparring and clinch sparring.

After the 2 thai boxing sessions i did mma, we worked on taking the back from a double leg if our oponent leans his weight on you then a takedown, after drilling the take down a bit we moved onto taking the back when your oponent is loose and also when he turtles up before moving onto the rnc and short choke.

I was paired off with a huge giant of a man to do the drills with and he almost crushed me, how fedor and couture can fight those giants is beyond me.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

my tendonitis is playing up from doing thai boxing :no: im going to probably give training a misstonight and maybe do some sub mma on fri and maybe start taking judo on sat and then start training properly from monday without boxing and thai boxing for 3 weeks to so if it gets better.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

so i did the boxing and mma last night anyway.

the boxing started with about 15 min's of skipping and then about 2 rounds of shadow boxing. next we did combos, the first was step in hook,cross for a round then jab body cross for a round the next round we put the 2 combos together and in the last round we added a slip and pivot to get an angle.

the class finished with 3 brutal rounds of pure conditioning.

in mma we first worked on the jab to double legs and then moved onto groundwork where we started drilling tying up your opponent from guard and then moving onto getting the triangle and finally we practised the omoplata from the same position.

i ended up paired with the giant bloke again which isnt fun when your drilling omoplatas and triangles.

i had a quick chat with one of the main coaches and he reckons i would be best fighting at mw and i should try to drop all the fat and replace it with muscle so by the time im cutting weight i should be about 90kg solid, at the moment im 95kg not very solid lol


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## ~BDC~ (Aug 9, 2009)

hows the cutting weight going to get to MW, its been a few months did you have your first fight? sounds like a good routine you had going...

Ben


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

~BDC~ said:


> hows the cutting weight going to get to MW, its been a few months did you have your first fight? sounds like a good routine you had going...
> 
> Ben


im down to round 90kg at the moment but havent done and training this week due to really bad doms in my back largely due to grappling 4x a week


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## ~BDC~ (Aug 9, 2009)

Good work you hit the 90Kg you was looking for keep up the good work have asked about the strength and endurance workout in your other reply

Keep Rolling....

Ben


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

talked to one of my coaches and he said im to heavily build to fight at ww as i would be to drained. he suggested that mw or lhw would be better siuted to my frame. i roll and wrestle with the hw and lhw and being out strengthed has never been a problem for me so im thinking about lhw. taking all of that into account im going to be training my weight training to be more geared to adding some clean mass so i can compete at 105 lean.


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## temeura (Oct 29, 2008)

105? What, are you going to a LHW in China?


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

so i pressed 1 instead of 2 :no:


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## temeura (Oct 29, 2008)

My pendantry knows no bounds. :happy:

Anyway, so how much lean muscle do you have to out on? How tall are you?


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## temeura (Oct 29, 2008)

Just saw the front page, at 5 ft 10 in, do you not fancy MW?


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

im 5'10" and 90kg so if i could put on 5-10kg it would give me a good walking around weight which is alot but shouldnt be to much of a problem as when i was really into my strength training i was like 110kg (granted at a much higher bf level)

strength wise im hanging with the lhw and there slower and have smaller gas tanks so i would rather rumble with them then the mw.


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## temeura (Oct 29, 2008)

Fair enough!

I'm 6 ft and aroud 105 kg at the moment and I want to get down to MW. It is going to take a while.

Good luck with all your training.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

thanks


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

its getting really hard to wrestle with the big lads now that i have lost some weight. im still as strong but its knocking the wind out of me when i get taken down and im getting stuffed more now as i dont have the weight to drive the bigger lads back so im deppending more on sit throughts and reversals.

did thai sparring for the first time in about a year and my left leg is dead today as in my first round i completely forgot to check kicks but on the bright side i got some really good counter crosses in aswell as some 4-5 hit combos in aswell. taking some time of sparring to focus on technique seems to have help bar the ring rust.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

new year and a new start:thumb

im going to be focussing on building my strength back upto were it was before i got heavily into mma.

im not going to bother with cardio or anything like that as im planning on training a lot!

my strength training will be once of twice a week and will look something like this

WORKOUT A

squats

push press

bent row

face pulls

WORKOUT B

deadlift

bench press

pull ups

i will do 8 sets of 3 reps trying to lift explosively as possible on all lifts bar the face pulls which will be 2-3 sets of 6-16.

im aiming to reach or even supass my previous personal bests of

squat 180kg

bench 160kg

deadlift 240kg

before i start prepping for my first fight

mma wise im hoping to train as fallow, although its highly unlikely i will make all the classes.

monday

wrestling with strikes

gnp

nogi

tuesday

boxing

thaiboxing

nogi

wednesday

wrestling

thaiboxing

thursday

boxing

wrestling

nogi

friday

bjj

saturday

bjj

wrestling

gnp

as you can see its mostly focussed on grappling as im not built to be brilliant at stand up.


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## rsp84 (Dec 9, 2008)

im tired just reading all that lol, your really going for the training, how'd u find the time to train so often? but looks like youve got a good scedule set out.


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

well its train or watch tv in the evenings and i hate eastenders lol


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## toxo (Mar 11, 2008)

i tried to do some weights yesterday but had to give up half way through due to being dehydrated from the day before when i sparred for like 20-30mins solid.

i have decided to focus on grappling so i will be training bjj,judo,wrestling and nogi only as i have a few injuries that striking seems to make worse but are ok during grappling type stuff.

i found an old powerlifting routine that made me really strong in the past so im going to use it. i will start hitting the weights on friday.

my new routine will look like this

squat/deadlift day

heavy squats or deadlift

speed deadlifts or squats

rack pulls or front squats

heavt ab training

bench day

heavy bench press

speed bench press

o.h press

floor press

face pulls

pull ups or rows


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