🧵 Muscle Control applied to martial arts.
Anonymous at Fri, 12 Apr 2024 10:55:41 UTC No. 193830
I recently discovered that during the early 20th century, a German strongman called Max Sick devised a type of training called Muscle Control, in which you are meant to learn to control each muscle in your body individually for the purpose of being the strongest in the most efficient way possible.
Point is that by having your muscles be by default loose and selectively activating only the muscles you need to for a given movement, you can both train muscles in isolation better and more efficiently execute compound movements and lifts. After looking it up for a bit it reminds me a lot of traditional Asian "internal" martial arts like Qi Gong or Tai Chi. Apparently, some successful strongmen, Olympic weightlifters and powerlifters have used this precise type of training to improve their performance.
Could this type of training be useful as a compliment to martial arts training and performance? For example, relaxing your bicep and back completely when throwing a cross and precisely activating the muscles necessary in the right order to deliver the strike with the most speed, power and the least energy expenditure.
Anonymous at Fri, 12 Apr 2024 13:42:59 UTC No. 193847
>>193830
This may get more traffic in /fit/ dude, but interesting & I could see the application being usedul in martial arts.
>like tai chi
Can confirm, took a course in it for an elective as an easy P.E. requirement. The professor moved so damn smooth, shit looked robotic. She explained that for each step, only the involved parts move and everything else is, this is what confused me, relaxed & locked in place... Like how can something be relaxed & locked in place? I think it was just lost in translation but I started to get it a little towards the end of the semster.
>inb4 you can't use taichi in a fight
No duh, but you can transfer some principles.
Anonymous at Fri, 12 Apr 2024 15:35:03 UTC No. 193857
>>193847
>inb4 you can't use taichi in a fight
Ramsey Dewey argues that a lot of empty-hand tai chi is basic wrestling. I'm a former wrestler with no experience in tai chi but if the couple of his videos I've seen of his on the topic were presented honestly it seems highly plausible.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?li
Anonymous at Sat, 13 Apr 2024 21:56:54 UTC No. 194015
>>193857
Ramsey Dewey is an incompetent idiot that thinks shadowboxing with light dumbbells is not a good idea because the resistance doesn't oppose the fist and thus won't make you punch harder.
He can't understand that the point is to build shoulder endurance.
Anonymous at Sun, 14 Apr 2024 19:22:36 UTC No. 194122
>>193830
Isometrics for the most part are bullshit, you're better of actually moving a heavy weight or causing a fast eccentric/concentric muscle contraction than just holding it in a state isometric display. You will actually engage and stimulate a muscle to put out a greater force and hold for longer for the simple fact that actually moving a muscle with intent will cause it to get stronger.
I don't know about this whole isolating muscles and trying to contract them one at a time, sounds very inefficient (just like isometrics). Your muscles are made to work in conjunction with each other. The argument of 'oh well athletes are able to recruit greater fast twitch fibers and call upon more muscle without needing as much muscle mass' is true but trying to say that isolating each muscle to achieve this flawed.
Professional basketball players, rugby players, football players, judokas, boxers, wrestlers, sprinters, olympic lifters, etc. aren't doing these retarded tai chai movements and activating their inner muscle belly chaka by trying to contract a single muscle. They're able to develop and recruit more fast twitch muscle fibers for the following reasons:
-They have the genetics to do so (also roids)
-They have put their body through intensive movements with the goal of completing them as fast as possible and usually for as long as possible
Picking up a barbell with 500 lbs. on it 6 or 7 times as fast as you can is a better way of developing better motor unit recruitment and developing fast twitch muscle fibers, not pushing a wall for 5 seconds 10 times.
Sprinting max effort two to three times for as long and as hard as possible will develop this, so will high intent or high effort olympic lifting or even calisthenics such as muscle ups or plyometric pull ups.
>tl;dr
It's all thimble rigging bullshit that doesn't even make sense in the first place, do hard shit with a goal in mind and see results.
Anonymous at Sun, 14 Apr 2024 19:27:12 UTC No. 194123
>>194122
One more thing, this concept of bodily awareness and knowing how to move your body properly around obstacles or whatever the fuck Bruce Lee talked about is a legitimate thing. Being a big oaf isn't going to benefit you, look at a lot of bodybuilders or even some powerlifters, they all big dudes but they move like someone strapped 80 lbs. of weight on to them and told them to move around. They're weighed down and don't know how to call upon this muscle mass and that's an actual thing, it's like having an army of a million fighters but none of them know what the fuck to do. However! trying to do isometric barbell squats IS NOT GOING TO DO ANYTHING. But, actually squatting with a barbell and pretty much dive bombing down and shooting back up will do something. It will teach coordination and balance and motor unit recruitment.
Anonymous at Mon, 15 Apr 2024 08:01:48 UTC No. 194205
>>193847
Not OP but I posted asking about muscles control on /fit/ and got ignored.
Anonymous at Mon, 15 Apr 2024 09:21:43 UTC No. 194208
>>193830
>>194122
I own this book by Maxick, and a few others from the early 20th century regarding physical culturists of the time.
Pic attached, second paragraph of the preface. I believe Maxalding, the art of muscle control, was primarily developed as a gimmick of the day, for Maxick to showcase his physique in a way that was different from Sandow or Hackenschmidt, etc. It garnered some popularity as it was a way of muscular exercise anyone can do, from the bedridden to the labourer, and did not require anything more than one's own body.
As far as the claims for increased strength, increasing neural pathway efficiency is never a bad thing. I don't know of any studies regarding this phenomena beyond the "noob gains" ones, but it makes sense that this can be reinforced further. A lot of modern trainers yap on about the "mind-muscle connection" for isolation weightlifting exercises, which is effectively the same thing, except you're contracting the muscle in a dynamic motion, "feeling" the contraction of the muscle, as opposed to a static contraction of Maxalding.
>Tldr: Maxalding is a gimmick, with some, although limited, benefits when compared to traditional weightlifting or calisthenic exercises. Consider it in terms of muscular meditation.
Anonymous at Tue, 16 Apr 2024 02:39:37 UTC No. 194331
>>194122
>Isometrics for the most part are bullshit
Opinion discarded. No it's not, and it's well fucking documented. Faggots that say they don't work guaranteed did it wrong.
Anonymous at Tue, 16 Apr 2024 17:00:53 UTC No. 194397
>>193830
>traditional Asian "internal" martial arts like Qi Gong or Tai Chi
Yes, but only if you learn the real stuff from a teacher that knows what they're doing. One missing link in the chain of transmission, one cluelessly ignorant teacher, and all of his student-lineage is doomed to practicing wishy-washy spiritual mumbo-jumbo with no physical or martial substance.
>relaxing your bicep and back completely when throwing a cross and precisely activating the muscles necessary in the right order to deliver the strike with the most speed, power and the least energy expenditure.
It's called fajin - there's a bit more to it but it's confusing to explain without in person demos and a basic understanding of the fundamentals and terminology. You can probably find fajin demonstration videos on youtube, just be warned that when done very well it looks "fake" because of little visible effort, and that there are many, many actual fakes that lacked the skill/practice or tutelage to learn how to do it for real - fakes like the aikido (& kungfu) guys that throw people without touching them.
>>193847
>relaxed & locked in place
Yeah that's extremely confusing for a beginner but it is an accurate description of what's going on. Another way to describe it is relaxed but with intent (yi). It makes very little sense unless you get an in-person demo and you can press on a teacher's arms and feel the difference between
>relaxed, limp, & loose
>tight, muscles flexed, stiff
>relaxed w/ intent, "locked in place"
When done right you have the structure to resist forces while maintaining fluidity of motion. Idk how to explain concisely solely through text
>lost in translation
It's hard to explain because many of the concepts are foreign not because of language but because people don't normally move that way. The chinese terms are used instead of trying to co opt english words, but ppl have tried ex. "kinesthetic sense", "neural pathway programming" etc.
t. yiquan practitioner
Anonymous at Wed, 17 Apr 2024 23:27:30 UTC No. 194551
>>194122
You clearly missed the point if you think Muscle Control exercises were ever meant to substitute resistance training or increase neural drive like high intensity weight lifting does. Before you write 5 paragraphs, think about what you should type.
Anonymous at Wed, 17 Apr 2024 23:35:38 UTC No. 194553
>>194122
>I don't know about this whole isolating muscles and trying to contract them one at a time, sounds very inefficient (just like isometrics). Your muscles are made to work in conjunction with each other.
Many people struggle throwing a punch because they keep certain muscles tight when they should be loose, like a bicep that tightens and slows down the fist by the end of it's trajectory. You don't need to be a genius to understand how the ability to contract muscles at will can help you refine a technique and the timing of everything involved.
Also,I hope you are aware that when you throw a punch you are not meant to tighten all your muscles at once. You are meant to "whip" it by contracting and then releasing the muscles in order. First your legs, then your core, your torso after that, shoulder next and lastly your triceps. The move should move like a "pulse", otherwise the body basically absorbs the energy it released.
Anonymous at Thu, 18 Apr 2024 04:14:19 UTC No. 194568
>>194551
I didn't mention Muscle Control one time. I was talking about isometrics and the whimsical fantasy some people will try to sell you with them by saying how you can develop physical strength and maximum power output the same, if not, better than conventional resistance training.
Next time, read through the entire argument before coming to a conclusion.
Anonymous at Thu, 18 Apr 2024 06:03:31 UTC No. 194581
>>194568
Ok dyel.
Anonymous at Thu, 18 Apr 2024 14:41:12 UTC No. 194612
>>194581
Post body.
Anonymous at Sat, 20 Apr 2024 14:18:02 UTC No. 194864
>>194568
Then why did you bring up isometrics being pointless nigga.
Also isometrics can literally enhance your short term strength powerlifters sometimes push on a fixed bar before benching to increase their output.
Anonymous at Sat, 20 Apr 2024 14:45:56 UTC No. 194866
>>194864
>Also isometrics can literally enhance your short term strength powerlifters sometimes push on a fixed bar before benching to increase their output.
That's retarded and I reject that completely.