Big tourney in exactly one month...plz leave advice.

[AdamKralic]

My son's first non-closed school tourney was last year in Indiana. He got crushed. Simply had no idea how much harder people fight in ranked tournaments. He got pushed around badly and was visibly upset.

He has done other ranked tournaments since and even placed a few times in them. He still however is better in class than in tournament. Confidence is the main reason imo. He believes that he is going to win everything in class...he fights at 100%. In tournaments? The belief seems lower...the skillset becomes much more limited.

September 1st marks one year later. So if anyone is going to the 31st annual Northwest Championship in Indiana...well we'll be there!

I want to make sure he is better prepared this year...ESPECIALLY mentally. IDK how to help him there other than very typical Dad advice. Mental exercises? Advice?

I've been reading in the exercise logs and we are doing light weight/body weight exercises together 3x a week. (good for both of us!) Any "explosive" exercises that you'd squeeze in 4 weeks before a tourney? (We do stretches, box jumps, hopping back and forth over a line, sideways medicine ball tosses to partner, barbell curls, tricep rows, situps, leg lifts (the core working kind), pushups, squats and light bench.) We typically do 2 - 3 sets of each. Reps are low. (5 - 7) We've been doing this for about two months now and it IS helping his speed without a doubt. Would you add suicides to this? (running to a point returning, back but further each time)

Thanks so much for any and all help that you can provide.

[yamesu]

I assume you are talking about continuous sparring and not point style sparring? (If its the latter I dont really know as do not have experience and my fighting style does not cater for point sparring rules, sorry).

Cardio, plyo and endurance is good, but I would also be focussing on rounds of intense bagwork.

Hold a kick shield for him, and get him to go hard for the duration of a tournament round plus and extra 30seconds without a break.

To break it down further, do one round of punches only, followed by a round of right leg kicks, and then a round of left leg kicks.

This should be designed to exhaust him. If he can go hard for three "tournament" rounds on a bag, then this will prepare his body (in some way, minus the getting hit of course) to keep pushing forward for timeframes needed.

Mentally, get him to visualise he is pushing around someone (that the kick shield is his opponent). This has always helped me.

Good luck to you and him!

[AdamKralic]

Thank you for your advice...it is point sparring but the bag idea is a very good one.

[sensei8]

I assume you are talking about continuous sparring and not point style sparring? (If its the latter I dont really know as do not have experience and my fighting style does not cater for point sparring rules, sorry).

Cardio, plyo and endurance is good, but I would also be focussing on rounds of intense bagwork.

Hold a kick shield for him, and get him to go hard for the duration of a tournament round plus and extra 30seconds without a break.

To break it down further, do one round of punches only, followed by a round of right leg kicks, and then a round of left leg kicks.

This should be designed to exhaust him. If he can go hard for three "tournament" rounds on a bag, then this will prepare his body (in some way, minus the getting hit of course) to keep pushing forward for timeframes needed.

Mentally, get him to visualise he is pushing around someone (that the kick shield is his opponent). This has always helped me.

Good luck to you and him!

Solid post!!

[Harkon72]

At this level the Cliche "Its all in the Mind" is very true. It depends on his maturity, but to fight each opponent as if he is only fighting his own fears is the best philosophy. Tell him to keep throwing the combinations, make the opponent block then the points will come. Good Luck.

[DWx]

To be honest, I personally think it's a less about skill and more about pressure testing him.

He has done other ranked tournaments since and even placed a few times in them. He still however is better in class than in tournament. Confidence is the main reason imo. He believes that he is going to win everything in class...he fights at 100%. In tournaments? The belief seems lower...the skillset becomes much more limited.

I think I'd try to get him better sparring partners and get him doing as many lower level tournaments as possible. You need people who are going to push him and who are going to make it hard for him and he needs to be used to the competition environment. It is common for a lot of fighters to revert back to basic sparring when on the mat; the adrenaline's going, the nerves are going, you can't think straight, the crowd is too noisy, you're up against some who is equally as good if not better than you. Nerves are good but you do have to try to counteract them. From personal experience you just have to make competition seem about as routine as class is. Lots of lower level competition and go to different dojos / meet up with people to spar as many other fighters as possible. Lots of pad work, working his combos over and over again will also help as you'll programme his responses to be automatic.

[AdamKralic]

good advice...thanks.

I totally agree on the mental front. His bag of tricks gets condensed into the two things he can do in his sleep due to nerves.

We are upping the pad work for certain. Not sure how to get more fighters in front of him. He fights at two different schools within the organization but all the fighters are kinda blah. He is also working with the traveling team but due to karate politics (power struggle) they haven't met all summer. They have better fighters for Zach to spar when they are going on. Was supposed to meet with them today as a matter of fact but it got cancelled at last minute.

[tallgeese]

Check out a book called "The Art of Learning" by Josh Waitzken. It spends a good amount of space discussing how to handle approaching things like this and making sure that children, or anyone, develops a healthy outlook and create a long term learning experience from competition.

I can't recommend it enough.

[AdamKralic]

Excellent. Thanks so much to everyone. tallgeese: you had mentioned at one point that we could meet; do you have any kids that fight under you?

I ask as the one thing all people need is more opponents. Perhaps you know of a child that needs an opponent to spar in a naska type rule set? Perhaps not. Never does hurt to try.

[bushido_man96]

When you guys train, focus on drilling some of those things he wants to do but freezes up on in the tourneys. Do drills that set up what you want, so he learns to recognize those moments in the ring. That way, he becomes more comfortable with them.