Snow Training For Mixed Martial Arts and Street Self Defense - Part 1

Weatherized training is awesome, especially if you're experiencing a day when you can't get to the gym because of weather or time (or you're lazy). You must use your environment to your best advantage, and what better environment for cardio can there be other than snow or rain. Think about it, it comes fast, and it comes frequently, and to hit one drop intentionally takes a lot of timing and speed. Keep in mind in the following paragraph, you could do the same techniques for weapons, but that's another article. Let's just talk about your basic boxing/mma/kickboxing.

One of the simplest exercises you can do while it's snowing (and let's hope not too hard) is punching the flakes as they come down. You can use your jab, cross, hook, and uppercut and take out as many of the flakes as you can. If you have a good snowfall, you can get some good cardio work in. It's important to note here that you should not be throwing Thai kicks at the snow for two reasons:

1. It's probably slippery and you'll fall. Your round house kick will definitely cause a fall, and your push kick might cause a fall. You want to stay healthy, so it's best not to test your luck. Don't throw your Thai kicks at the snow

2. You'll shear your knee to death if you throw your round kicks. Your round kick is meant to hit someone and throwing it in air and trying to retract that force will injure your knee. It's not worth it.

So what techniques do I recommend?

1. Jab

2. Cross

3. Hook

4. Uppercut

5. Overhand

6. Backfist (if you throw it, no spinning back fist though, because of falling potential)

7. Eye pokes (obliviously not for mma)

8. Anything of the above to the body (of course not the eye jab)

Lower body techniques

1. Knees

That's about it down here and I'm not talking about skip knees, or jumping knees either, unless you like concussions.

Here's how I would structure the routine:

Beginner

1 minute on and 1 minute off or a total on time of 10 minutes, you want to be exercising on a 6-8 on a scale of 10 (how hard the exercise is to you)

Intermediate:

2 minutes on 30 seconds off

Pushups 15 x 2 sets

Squats 15 x 2 sets

Advanced:

3 minutes on and 15 seconds off

Pushups 30 x 3 sets

Squats 30 x 3 sets

There you have it, get out there and get hardcore training right away.