Skip to main content

Old School Combat PT: Training Template Precis by Mark Hatmaker

 


We shall cover a bit of old School Training Packaging here.

But first, a wee bit of background.

For the new Black Box direction, we have chosen all old-school, all effective, zero-sport, if it ain’t what the old-timers espoused I ain’t doin’ it,

This dictum holds for armed and unarmed combat as well as for the physical training.

[This also holds true for the “interior” training, see The Suakhet’u Program for this esoterica.]

This hard left turn has worked a bit of a wonder on this Old Man’s body. If you minus out all of the accrued bumps, bruises, breaks, lost-teeth, knee surgeries etc. I’m in the best shape of my life at 55 years-of-age.

I re-iterate, it is done with…

·        No weights.

·        No “other sport” cardio, that is, no running, biking, treadmills, or any other “cross-training” activity of that ilk.

·        No repetitions higher than 20 on most challenges.

·        On most exercises no sets higher than 2.

·        No dieting—I kid you not, last night’s meal was Grilled Chicken with Rustic Mustard Sauce, three servings of ultra carby potato salad, a huge salad covered in cheese, bacon and copious bleu cheese dressing, and two big honkin’ servings of Halloween ice cream cake.

[For more on this see Old-School PT: The Negative Injunctions.]

So, what exactly comprises such an Old School PT Program?

Sorry to disappoint, I will not go into specifics, just as with all things Black Box related, we will make that proprietorial to the pony-uppers who join our RAW Subscription Service.

What we will do here is to give a broad general outline of how the Old School PT Program is laid out.



The Program in Precis

Training Days: 3 days-on/1-Off. Rinse-wash, repeat.

Daily: A 3-minute synovial fluid wake-up call I do outside with the morning sun [It’s part of The Suakhet’u Program.]

Followed by 1 minute of flexibility training. [That’s right, I said one minute.]

Locomotion Round: Each training day uses one unusual “travelling” or “stealth walk” skill to wake up Old Man joints. There is a rough dozen of these that are run on a revolving basis.

Three Days Per Week: A revolving menu of strength exercises in all 12 Domains of Strength as prescribed by the Old Timers.

Gear Required: You, a wall, a bar/branch/sailing boom, or the like.

The Strength Days are alternated with…



Three Days Per Week: “Shock Training.” These are the explosiveness, balance, fear-testing and agility days. A revolving progressive template of 6 Broad areas to keep the whole animal engaged.

Added into the mix are 6 Classes Old School Bracing Exercises that temper the joints and provide a bit of structural support for fragile areas.

Combat Cardio

I do not do any additional “cardio.” The Old School PT huffs and puffs the system enough as it is.

But…

I do perform the following each training day.

A Minimum of One Round each [BTW- No round is sportive]

·        Street-Dentist Boxing to the keep the hands alive and on-point.

·        “Low Dog” Kicking for Rough ‘n’ Tumble “Dogfights” or “Kwip’u su’anir’u” which loosely translates as “smoke-kicking” in reference to its hard to see coming nature.

·        Down & Dirty-A round from the Frontier Rough ‘n’ Tumble arsenal that is pure OD killin’ or maiming material. No prep strikes, just the spikes.

·        Wrestling-Both on the feet and on the ground, all quick kills or vicious counter-grappling or anti-grappling rips.

·        Tomahawk/Trade-Knife—I hit a round here on a revolving basis.

·        Frontier Firearm—I rotate through six-gun, lever action rifle, and double-barrel stagecoach gun.

Round duration is 5 minutes for some days, 3 for others, and some days are 1-minute sprints. Just what the Old Man feel like that day.

If we minus out the rounds, no training day exceeds the 30-minute mark.

I repeat. No dieting, no weights, no pounding the pavement, mindless hours on a fake bike, pretending to row, hours in the gym, and all the other noise that we’ve been led to believe that are musts.



I bought that noise myself for decades.

I was wrong.

The Old Timers were right.

The Old Timers are right.

[We’ll be laying out these exercises and progressions in The Black Box Project.]

In The Black Box Project we provide old-school combat nitty-gritty straight from the historical record.

For skinny on The Black Box Project

[For techniques, tactics, and strategies of Rough and Tumble Combat, Old-School Boxing, Mean-Ass Wrestling, Street-Ready Frontier Scrapping & Indigenous Ability culled from the historical record see the RAW Subscription Service, or stay on the corral fence with the other dandified dudes and city-slickers. http://www.extremeselfprotection.com

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Apache Running by Mark Hatmaker

Of the many Native American tribes of the southwest United States and Mexico the various bands of Apache carry a reputation for fierceness, resourcefulness, and an almost superhuman stamina. The name “Apache” is perhaps a misnomer as it refers to several different tribes that are loosely and collectively referred to as Apache, which is actually a variant of a Zuni word Apachu that this pueblo tribe applied to the collective bands. Apachu in Zuni translates roughly to “enemy” which is a telling detail that shines a light on the warrior nature of these collective tribes.             Among the various Apache tribes you will find the Kiowa, Mescalero, Jicarilla, Chiricahua (or “Cherry-Cows” as early Texas settlers called them), and the Lipan. These bands sustained themselves by conducting raids on the various settled pueblo tribes, Mexican villages, and the encroaching American settlers. These American settlers were often immig...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Empirical Fighter: Rules for the Serious Combatant by Mark Hatmaker

  Part 1: Gear Idealized or World Ready? 1/A: Specificity of Fitness/Preparation If you’ve been in the training game for any length of time likely you have witnessed or been the subject of the following realization. You’ve trained HARD for the past 90 days, say, put in sprint work and have worked up to your fastest 5K. Your handy-dandy App says your VO2 Max is looking shipshape. You go to the lake, beach, local swimmin’ hole with your buddies and one says “ Race you to the other side!” You, with your newfound fleet-of-foot promotion to Captain Cardio, say, “ Hell, yeah!” You hit the river and cut that water like Buster Crabbe in “ Tarzan the Fearless ” with your overhand stroke….for the first 50 yards, then this thought hits as the lungs begin to gasp for air, “ Am a I gonna die in the middle of this river?” This experiment can be repeated across many domains of physical endeavor. ·         The man with the newfound Personal Reco...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Original Roadwork by Mark Hatmaker

  Mr. Muldoon Roadwork. That word, to the combat athlete, conjures images of pre-dawn runs, breath fogging the morning air and, to many, a drudgery that must be endured. Boxers, wrestlers, kickboxers the world over use roadwork as a wind builder, a leg conditioner, and a grit tester. The great Joe Frazier observed… “ You can map out a fight plan or a life plan, but when the action starts, it may not go the way you planned, and you're down to the reflexes you developed in training. That's where roadwork shows - the training you did in the dark of the mornin' will show when you're under the bright lights .” Roadwork has been used as a tool since man began pitting himself against others of his species in organized combat. But…today’s question . Has it always been the sweat-soaked old school gray sweat suit pounding out miles on dark roads or, was it something subtler, and, remarkably slower? And if it was, why did we transition to what, and I repeat myself,...
Post a Comment
Read more