Weight lifitng makes your joints weak!!

Wai Jia: The Kung Fu Forum Kung Fu Training and Health
21

Yes, I agree here.

I think that a few months of heavy basics, and memorising a number of fundementall techniques are all you need before sparring can be productive.

Some schools say sparring is only for black belts…which is arguably worse than sparring day one.

Some may argue with me, but I think going more than 3 months without some sort of free sparring is waiting too long. The only exception may be specific internal styles because they rely so heavily on thier specific body mechanics to function properly, which do take quite a bit of time to develop.

22

I believe the whole “sparring is bad” thing is based on point sparring. Sure it helps on speed and timing. But a real fight is fluid and continious and its not point sparring. When I was teaching I discouraged my students from competing in a lot of tournaments that only had point sparring matches(these were mainly “hard style” tournaments). Give bad training if you have to stop once you get a point. Continious free fighting is the was to go.

Another drill I like with my current school that the sifu makes us do, is to do our defensive manuevers/one step drill in motion. Of course this is after practicing it for months static. So rather than just step forward punch and the defender does his specified technic as in static training. We move around like we are sparring, throw either a left or right hand and the defender has to react, while in motion, with his/her specified technic. This is great conditioning for sparring. It trains you to gauge distance. Trains reflexes. Lastly it emphasizes control of technic.

Sparring is bad only on two instances in my opinion: 1. starting too early without the proprer basis. 2. doing point sparring.

23

attack anyone at their joints and you can break structure, break structure and yiou kill force, kill force and you dominate. doesn’t matter if the dude lifts weight or not.

lifting in a controlled manner is more effective than throwing weight you can’t control around. building functional strength is more valuable than body sculpting for a fighter, or for someone looking to have usefulness from their training.

but yeah, if you do anything incorrectly, you’ll not get much out o it and the possibility of damaging yourself is there. I know more than a couple of guys who have over trained and now suffer because of it. i also know people who train and have trained properly and have a better physical quality of life than others.

24

Weight lifting is a pretty vague term. Some people lift in bodybuilding methods, others in power lifting methods, others for simple strentgh training. Personally I do low weight, high reps which works well for me. It is pretty laughable and ignorant to say weight lifting is bad for your martial arts training.

25

“martial arts” is even more vague as a term in that respect. :stuck_out_tongue:

26

I agree that improper weight lifting is bad. Weight lifting in general is one of the best exercises anyone can do in my opinion. I personally have to be carefull because I am strong enough to tear ligiments.

27

[QUOTE=Iron_Eagle_76;745925] It is pretty laughable and ignorant to say weight lifting is bad for your martial arts training.[/QUOTE]

I understand what your saying, but how could it be ignorant to say that? I’m not challenging or anything. Just asking.

28

I understand what your saying, but how could it be ignorant to say that? I’m not challenging or anything. Just asking.

Reply]
This is one of those questions that IF it has to be asked in the firstplace, the asker would not understand the answer.

29

it can be bad

Me like so many others on this thread believe that lifting incorrectly is bad. However weight lifting can be beneficial to your training regiment. As for the thing on flexibility, that has to do with stretches and how you lift. I know about the flexibility issue first hand. In my high school days all I was worried about was getting stronger and the only way I thought I could do that was to lift more than I should. I did get stronger but I lost a lot of my flexbility. So much so that I use to joke about how I was so buff that I couldn’t wipe my ass. (I know that we’ve all seen those guys before) Anyway, Ive found that if one decides to lift weights they have to understand that just lifting weights will not help you in other areas. Joint loosening and stretches are key to any training regiment and more so (i my experience) in weight lifting. So, if you plan I lifting(i recommend) be safe and be smart. I hope this helps.

Have a good one.

WF

30

Back to the comment on being Ignorant. The word ignorant mwans one does not know said knowledge, so if one says that lifting wieghts is bad for martial arts, that is due to being ignorant of the facts.

ANYTHING that makes you strong is good for martial arts. now, Some things are better than others. For example, the body builder does get stronger, but he’s not going to be as strong as the guy doing weights for strength training., so the Strength training is “Better” for martial arts then Body building, but both are better than not doing anything.

As for getting tight, in extreme cases, especially with body builders that does happen, BUT those are guys who lift heavy, often and do nothing else. A martial artist literally does not have the time to lift that much. Also, martial arts is full of flexibility increasing activities, from forms, to stretching, and various other range of motion exercises. It woould be vertually impossible for a dedicated martial artists to get tight lifting wieghts.

Now, it is also Proven scientifically that anything that develops the muscles, also develops the joints (So long as you are not over training). So the comments that weightlifters have weak joints is untrue. In some cases if they are obssesive about body sculpting, thier joints may be tight, and more suseptible to joint locks, but it would take an extremely dedicate regime focused ONLY on lifting over a long period of time to develop that. You wouldn’t have time for martial arts in that case. And if you did do that, your joints would become much stronger, just as your muscles and bones do. Also, Raw strength helps one to resist against joint locks as well. It’s MUCH harder to get a joint into the rigth positin for aaa lock on a strong person who is resisting heavily, than a weak one who does not have the strength to do so.

The other thing to think about. if you are faced with strength of muscle, and you plan to attack the joints, wouldn’t someone who is muscualrly weak be even easier to attack the joints? The answer is of course yes. Why? Because the guy who has done weigth training has much stronger joints than the guy who didn’t, and if HIS joints are attackable, then the weaker persons are even more so.

31

No one has really mentioned a nice side effect of bodybuilding besides the vast amount of physical data one can find on the net.

Aesthetic Intimidation.

32

I’m glad you made the comment about weight training on the net. If you Google strength training you can find quite a few sites with great information on weight training for strength. I’d also google Pavel, and Kettle bells too.

This is a subject every martial artist should be well researched in. Especially since many schools do not teach the weight and strength training methods of thier systems. We really have to fill that hole ourselves by looking at the physical demands we are required to perform, and the various strength development methods avaliable to us that would work to fill the gap.

33

The problem with lifting weights for internal martial arts is that it creates incontinuities in the body’s musculo-skeletal system. That means some muscles get short/tense and some get elongated/stretchted as a result. Its not weightlifting per se but any exercises that has discontinous tension.

If you look at the human body, its not the muscles alone that hold it upright. The body is a big biotensegrity structure. There must be tonus in the muscles but the tonus must be continuous throughout the structure to maintain the tensegrity.

The bones, water and connective tissue are the compressive elements in the tension network and the muscles are the tension elements. So you have a balance of forces pulling in and down (muscles) and up and out (connective tissue, water, bones). If you start introducing extra tension in a certain point in the network you start messing up the balance.

I think doing whole body exercises can be helpful though and if done with the right intention and structure. For example, I do Hindu pushups and Turkish get-ups. Those involve the whole body and you can distribute the tension across the body.

Here’s a picture on this cover of a xing yi guy doing what look like Hindu pushups:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0865681740/ref=sib_dp_pt/104-2485349-8455140#reader-link

Just the perspective of a future science journalist who happens to study Taiji.

FP

34

If you are an internal artists, then you need to devise a weight lifting system that loads your internal mechanics and works the whole body in unison. Then you don’t have those issues.

The bones, water and connective tissue are the compressive elements in the tension network and the muscles are the tension elements. So you have a balance of forces pulling in and down (muscles) and up and out (connective tissue, water, bones). If you start introducing extra tension in a certain point in the network you start messing up the balance.

Reply]
I am not even sure what you are saying here. Muscles contract, that is all they do. Connective tissue, water and bones do not create anything let alone up and out movements. They just connect stuff, or support the surrounding tissues that rest on them. Water is just wet, and doesn’t do anything in relation to movement.

35

[QUOTE=Royal Dragon;746684]If you are an internal artists, then you need to devise a weight lifting system that loads your internal mechanics and works the whole body in unison. Then you don’t have those issues.

The bones, water and connective tissue are the compressive elements in the tension network and the muscles are the tension elements. So you have a balance of forces pulling in and down (muscles) and up and out (connective tissue, water, bones). If you start introducing extra tension in a certain point in the network you start messing up the balance.

Reply]
I am not even sure what you are saying here. Muscles contract, that is all they do. Connective tissue, water and bones do not create anything let alone up and out movements. They just connect stuff, or support the surrounding tissues that rest on them. Water is just wet, and doesn’t do anything in relation to movement.[/QUOTE]

It’s not up and out movements, its the opposite force that the weight of your body generates in the field of gravity. It travels up through your CTS, water, bones. Your muscles provide the tension the holds the whole thing together.

FP

36

Ah, i got it now. It just the way you worded it before made no sense to me. Thanks for the clarification.

37

[QUOTE=Fu-Pow;746690]It’s not up and out movements, its the opposite force that the weight of your body generates in the field of gravity. It travels up through your CTS, water, bones. Your muscles provide the tension the holds the whole thing together. [/QUOTE]

Complete and utter B.S.

Take an anatomy and physiology course.

38

Respecftully disagree.

No one can really argue about the ground reaction force. For every force generated there is an equal and opposite force generated. I believe Newton said that. Anything in the field of earths gravitational pull that is also in contact with its surface is going to generate a downward force ie F=ma, in this case a=gravity. Therefore an upward force is generated up through the body.

Whether you do IMA, MMA or EMA this much is true.

What differs in each case is how one channels that ground reaction force. Is it primarily through the bones, water and connective tissue or is it by “holding on” with the muscles.

FP

39

I believe the term you are searching for is tensegrity…google it

40

[QUOTE=Fu-Pow;746680]The problem with lifting weights for internal martial arts is that it creates incontinuities in the body’s musculo-skeletal system. That means some muscles get short/tense and some get elongated/stretchted as a result. Its not weightlifting per se but any exercises that has discontinous tension.
[/QUOTE]
The problems you are talking about are only a problem for those who never use thier body the way a martial artist would. Even hard core lifters are starting to get the message. If you brouse the medical help forums at most body building sites, you’ll find discussions of yoga vs. tai chi for help with muscular recovery and joint wellness. :slight_smile: