The main goal of any MMA workout is to improve your body’s output performance both in the gym and in the cage. Not just any old set of exercises will do. You need to use exercises that are very specific to mixed martial arts. The result should be an MMA fitness routine that increases your power, endurance, flexibility, balance and coordination in a functional way for striking, grappling, clinching, etc.
If the conditioning exercises you use have no crossover to MMA specific movements, you are wasting a lot of time. So first and foremost, make sure your workout complements your MMA training and grappling training. Your workouts and your mixed martial arts training can be performed separately, but they should still complement each other.
MMA Exercises and Workouts
A simple and great exercise for MMA is called “Shrimping.” It is a movement that is very specific to grappling, obviously a very important piece of MMA. Shrimping is taught in every grappling gym I have ever been to. This is a great exercise or drill to improve your movement on the ground (where you will find yourself very often in your mixed martial arts training). Shrimping is not a high resistance exercise, but when performed fast and explosively, it will greatly complement your training. You can make a quick workout by performing several consecutive repetitions for a few minutes without resting. This is a perfect conditioning drill that is very specific to grappling, fighting and MMA.
Take this basic workout one step further and combine Shrimping with some different exercises and perform them back to back without any rest. An example of another good exercise for MMA is the Hindu Pushup that Rickson Gracie performs and is one of the conditioning drills he teaches to his students.
If Rickson thinks this exercise is worthwhile, you better bust your butt doing it too. My grappling instructor used to say “If you can’t shrimp as good as Rickson Gracie, then you still need to practice shrimping every day.”
By combing conditioning drills like these together without resting, your workout now mimics MMA. In an MMA fight, you need to perform for five minutes straight without any rest. Thus, it makes sense that if you want your workout to improve your mixed martial arts performance, one of the major aspects is to teach your body to perform for five minute periods at a time. I just showed you one very simple way to do that. Take five MMA-specific exercises, and perform each one for one minute. Then rest and repeat, or mix up your workout with something else.
Five-Minute MMA Workouts
Another powerful approach is to use jump rope training combined with high intensity calisthenic exercises. For example, try the following five minute workout:
- 1. Jump rope x 1 minute
- 1. Explosive pushups x 1 minute
- 1. Jump rope x 1 minute
- 1. Reverse situps x 1 minute
- 1. Jump rope x 1 minute
This gives you a very quick, explosive, five-minute workout to complement your MMA training. It will condition your body for a five minute round of MMA. You can do it in the gym or even at home in your garage or back yard.
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Then the next step is to combine several of these five-minute MMA workouts together. This is similar to the training the former UFC champion Tito Ortiz performs at Big Bear. He sets up several workout stations, each with a different drill. The drills are usually some sort of bag work or shadow boxing or something along those lines. You stay at each station for five minutes at a time and then rotate. In the end, it is very effective for mimicking an actual MMA fight with five minute rounds and one minute of rest between each round. If you workout this way, your cardio has to improve.
Resistance bands are another workout tool that several professional fighters are using for their mixed martial arts workout and strength training routines. Rickson Gracie, Fedor Emelianenko, and Jeff Monson just to name a few.
Resistance bands are hands down the number one MMA workout tool you will find. You can perform very dynamic combat specific movements. This is demonstrated by Fedor’s workout in the Pride to the Top documentary. Fedor uses a resistance band to mimic a Judo throw while training for the biggest MMA tournament at that time.
There are several other professional fighters using resistance bands effectively in their MMA workouts. Some examples are Mario Sperry, Renato “Babalu” Sobral and Royce Gracie. Not to mention resistance band exercises were employed by Alexander Karelin. While Karelin was not a fighter, he was arguably one of the greatest Olympic wrestlers ever. And we all know that wrestling is a combat sport and is very closely related to MMA.
What About Weightlifting Exercises For Your Mixed Martial Arts Workout?
My opinion is that weightlifting, especially in the traditional bodybuilding sense, is not a necessary part of your MMA training. Yes, lifting weights works well for some athletes and has been used in many mixed martial arts training routines with good results. However, it is obvious that you can achieve absolutely phenomenal conditioning without the weight training.
Just look at Fedor Emelianenko’s decision to give up weightlifting for a routine of bodyweight calisthenics, resistance bands and conditioning drills. Has his performance suffered because he doesn’t lift weights? Does he get overpowered by anyone? Not at all. And despite the fact that Fedor has superior technique, I believe his power, explosiveness, body awareness and conditioning are leagues ahead of other mixed martial artists. Even the ones that utilize a lot of weight training. Fedor’s incredible conditioning and power are not the result of him spending hours and hours lifting weights or using other super heavy resistance training.
So, just to clarify, I do not use weightlifting or bodybuilding as a part of my MMA workout routines. I have done so in the past, and I have chosen to exclude them. In fact, the first workouts I ever started doing for grappling were based on bodybuilding principles. Even though I found myself 20 or more pounds heavier, my grappling did not improve one iota. Again, lifting weights works well for some athletes and some trainers. However, if you are going to use weights, forget about bodybuilding and instead use a circuit style weightlifting routine. This will probably work well, but I still feel there are better approaches for training mixed martial artists, fighters, grapplers and other combat athletes.
More Mixed Martial Arts Workout Pages:
Quick Mixed Martial Arts Workout,
Mixed Martial Arts Workout Routines,
Running for MMA?,
How to Increase Your Agility,
No Equipment Workout for MMA,
Simple Workout Routines,
Mixed Martial Arts Conditioning Workouts,
Workout Tips for Mixed Martial Artists,
MMA Training Workouts,
