Cardio Confusion

Q. I've been doing three cardio workouts a week and I'm still gassing out on the mat in jiu jitsu practice. On two of the days I run for three miles and the other day I run as fast as I can for half a mile after doing a good warm up. I've been doing this for almost a month now and nothings really happening. Do I need to run longer or more often? My friend's a personal trainer and he said I should run more often.

A: Tell your friend that he is wrong and he needs to read up on the energy systems. Jiu jitsu is not an aerobic based sport, it's anaerobic. There are three main energy systems. Anaerobic alactic, anaerobic lactic, and aerobic. The main one you should be focusing on is the second one, anaerobic lactic.

You're gassing out because you can't clear the build up of fatigue substrates. Your body can't remove hydrogen ions from your blood quickly enough which causes your blood PH to drop and become more acidic. This is referred to as muscular acidosis. When you train the anaerobic lactic system and progressively shorten the rest intervals you allow your bodies buffering mechanisms to adapt by increasing the removal of muscle and blood lactate concentrations and therefore post poning or delaying fatigue. Incase I lost you, this means you won't gas out as easily.

You don't have to run to train the energy systems. You could practice jiu jitsu or you can lift weights in a curcuit training fashion with timed work to rest intervals. There's many options.

Since you mentioned running, here's a great program that you do twice per week which I've done with my jiu jitsu and MMA athletes. I must give credit where it's due. I got this program from Coach Poliquin a few years ago at one of his seminars. DO NOT let the simplicity fool you. This is brutal.

Week 1:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 4 minutes.
Repeat 6 times.

Week 2:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 3:45 minutes.
Repeat 6 times

Week 3:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 3:30 minutes.
Repeat 7 times.

Week 4:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 3:15 minutes.
Repeat 5 times

Week 5:
Run for 30 minutes straight at the highest constant speed that you can sustain for the full duration of 30 minutes.

Week 6:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 3 minutes.
Repeat 6 times.

Week 7:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 2:45 minutes.
Repeat 6 times.

Week 8:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 2:30 minutes.
Repeat 6 times.

Week 9:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 2:15 minutes.
Repeat 6 times.

Week 10:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 2 minutes.
Repeat 7 times.

Week 11:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 1:45 minutes.
Repeat 6 times.

Week 12:
Sprint for 45 seconds.
Walk at a moderate pace for 1:30 minutes
Repeat 5 times.

Week 13:
No training the entire week

Now you should be an endurance machine.

Chris Grayson