austaph

I live in the Central New York area and am having a bit of trouble finding any MT centers/trainers. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

I like to break my strength training into 3 parts; pushing (mon.), pulling (wed.) and legs (fri.)... abs on all 3 days. Muscle endurance on tues. and thurs... cardio every day with weekends as downtime (yeah, it's a sin). Pushing involves chest; straight and wide bench press though I haven't done incline or decline in a while... it's a good idea. 3 sets of 10 reps so that you're really grinding teeth on that 10th one, add 10 lbs. for the 3rd set. Make sure you rest adequately inbetween sets. Days when I have a lot of steam to blow off I like to up it so that I'm struggling on the 6th or 7th rep... make sure to give yourself some extra rest though. Triceps. 3 sets of 10 just like chest but once I'm done with my sets I'll drop 5 pounds and rep until I can't anymore, drop 5 more, rep until I can't, and continue until I do 20 reps without dropping weight. *THIS WILL BURN YOU!* (but the results are incredible) Shoulders. Dumbell shrugs: 3 sets of 20 (don't let your shoulders fall too hard, ease them down... otherwise you're cheating) Military Press: 3 sets of 10. Pulling. Back. Bent Row, 3 sets of 10. Make sure you're bent forward far enough (I'm still confused about what "enough" means... I usually use a stationary machine anyway) and that you're primarily using your back and not your biceps. Seated Row, 3 sets of 10. Pulldowns: 3 sets of 10, same technique as with triceps (decreasing til you can do 20 reps). Biceps. 3 sets of 10, same technique as triceps and pulldowns. Keeping your back against the wall is good. Throwing the weight with your hips is bad. Keep that up. Legs. For my legs I just work on squats and shins, 3 sets of 10 and then a high-intensity bike or stairmaster routine. For abs I do 4 sets of 25 curls so that I can barely pick myself up off the floor after the 100th. Endurance involves heavy bag hitting and speed training. Jump rope, leg raises, jogging in place, that sort of thing. I have no aerobic routine, I just do whatever I feel like doing that day. Mostly biking and running. Sometimes swimming. I dunno, I hope this is helpful to you in some way. As a final note I just sort of feel like mentioning that it's good to push yourself and bend your limits until your heart pumps gasoline and you're breathe fire but it's stupid to take on more than you're ready for. You'll be lifting the world one day but for the next month you won't be lifting anything heavier than a fork. Patience is key along with self-control, knowing your limits and knowing when there's room for improvement. Knowing when to push yourself and knowing when you've gone too far. Be smart, don't hurt yourself.

Shapeless, who cares what Bruce had to say? Who cares what your teacher had to say? What do you have to say? Anything other than a few one-liners from some old Bruce Lee movies? Watching television never made anyone a martial artist. It's not that people don't "get it" as far as JKD is concerned. It's not a very difficult concept to grasp. It seems what you're failing to understand is that JKD, without the style and technique as an applied subset, is nothing more than a bunch of axiomatic wisecracks. The idea is to mix and match. The footwork of Tai Chi with some Boxing punches and Aikido takedowns, etc. Whatever suits your particular need. To be limitless with your horizons. This isn't to say you're purely confined to styles and techniques. You are allowed to improvise. But only once you have a firm grasp of what it is you're tweaking. You are shown a way to throw a kick and you train yourself day and night to throw that kick without a hitch and eventually you notice that if you alter some of your footing or shift your bodyweight just right then you can execute in a quarter of the time with twice the power or whatever... you get it. If you're simply looking at someone throwing off moves and you say to yourself "well gee, that looks like a style to me, I think I'll pass" then you're not only stating the obvious but you're lazy and undriven. The bottom line is... if you think you've got something better than prove it through adaptation and application *INSIDE* the system rather than sitting on the sidelines mumbling sweet nothings to your ego. I may be wrong but it sounds like your cup is full of "JKD" and you're refusing to empty it. (Sorry, I was browsing and I just had to register and post on this topic because it was erking me a bit.)