MMA for Beginners: A Concise Beginners Guide To Mixed Martial Arts
A Beginner’s Guide to Mixed Martial Arts
MMA has grown in hype over the past two decades, particularly due to the rise of the UFC.
The company has given a platform to the world’s best MMA practitioners to use their knowledge and experience to batter each other.
However, it is more than just blood and guts- it also induces qualities like discipline, self-confidence and respect.
In this article, we will discuss everything you need to know about MMA for beginners!
What is MMA?
Before you start googling “MMA training for beginners near me”, you should understand exactly what it involves.
A martial art is a complete system of training, aimed at teaching self-defence techniques. There are many martial arts practised throughout the world, and MMA largely takes the best bits from all of them!
MMA is any system that combines two or more martial arts. Fighters who get into MMA usually take up the best that each martial art has to offer.
Take wrestling and taekwondo for example, the former teaches fighters how to take down opponents and the latter teaches how to strike them while standing up.
There are many lethal combinations of martial arts in MMA. Fighters try to learn arts in order to improve their striking, such as Muay Thai, Karate and Krav Maga, or grappling, such as BJJ, Sambo and Judo.
Some of the world’s best martial artists have achieved success due to knowing a bit of everything.
The Key Benefits of Practising MMA
The primary benefit of being well-versed in MMA is that you’ll be able to defend yourself when the going gets tough!
Each martial art teaches you its own version of self-defence. However, there are several other benefits of learning MMA, detailed below.
Improved Health and Fitness
There’s no doubt that MMA training requires a lot of hard work, no matter the discipline. The training procedures help you burn a lot of calories and improve your cardio.
According to Evolve MMA, a single hour of MMA training can help you burn up to 1000 calories.
Furthermore, MMA also makes you a lot stronger. Drills and spar sessions require you to use all of your muscles, as opposed to a regular gym workout, which only focuses on certain muscle groups.
Training in MMA regularly will help keep you in shape, but don’t sleep on supplementation, which can help you get an edge in performance and recovery!
Improved Mental Strength
As advanced MMA training sessions can be so gruelling, you also need a lot of mental strength to keep going.
This improves the amount of punishment that your mind can endure to keep your physical body going. However, the mental health benefits aren’t just limited to endurance.
Training in MMA also helps make your mind free from all sorts of stress.
You can either use it to get your mind off the difficulties in your life or you can channel your negative thoughts and energy and turn them into something positive.
You can do this by slamming, kicking and punching your heavy bag during training.
Enhanced Thinking Capabilities
Winning and excelling in MMA is not just about strength and skill- it also depends a lot on your strategy.
You have to react very quickly to every single move that your opponent makes and you have to decide on how to evade the move or deliver a counter-attack.
As a result, your next decision could make or break the fight. After training in MMA for a while, you will be able to enhance your problem-solving skills.
MMA teaches you how to deal with high-pressure situations, stay calm, think and then make your next move.
Increased Confidence
MMA can improve your self-esteem and confidence massively!
After training for a certain period of time you will become fitter and more capable of defending yourself and you will start to feel much better about yourself.
This makes you more confident in carrying out any non-MMA activities.
Increased Socialisation
You’ll meet many new people at your gym, many of whom will often have the same self-improvement goals as you do.
You’ll likely befriend several of them and as you train for a longer interval of time, you may even start to see them as family members.
Interacting with fellow MMA students will also make you more confident.
What equipment do you need to begin MMA?
As discussed above, MMA doesn’t just require you to train in one discipline.
Due to this, you’ll have to get the gear that’s standard for more than one martial art.
Some common MMA essentials include the following:
MMA gloves: These are different from boxing gloves, as they allow grappling too
MMA clothing: You need to wear shirts and shorts that keep you cool and allow flexibility
Mouth guard: Mandatory for striking protection, as you only get one set of teeth in your life
Headgear: Also a must when striking, since it allows you to spar hard without any brain damage
Groin guard: For protecting your sensitive privates, which can be seriously injured
There’s a good chance that you may need a punching bag. There are several types of punch bag, including:
Heavy, speed or standing punching bag
Uppercut bags
Dummies
There are several disciplines that require weapon training.
The combat aspect is done using toned-down versions of traditional weapons- your regular gym won’t allow you to spar with sharp katanas or knives.
However, there are some weapons that are still used for training, including:
Nunchakus
Staffs
Wooden swords
How to get started with basic MMA training
Looking to get into MMA? There are 3 steps you need to follow.
1. Know what you want to learn
In order to receive UFC training for beginners, you should first decide on the type of MMA you want to get into.
You can choose between the various forms of stand-up fighting or grappling. After gaining some prowess in one of these categories, you can cross over to the next.
But what is the best MMA for beginners? This depends on what you want to learn.
If you want to improve your stand-up fighting skills, then experts recommend going into Muay Thai. If improving your clinching abilities is the goal, then Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) will build the best base for you.
2. Know where to learn it
You should then do a bit of research on the gyms in your area, and what is taught there.
You may not be able to find the art of your choice there, but you can still train for it at home.
After joining a gym, you should learn everything that you can and later apply it to all of your sparring sessions.
3. Know what to improve
The sparring sessions will tell you all that you need to know about how good you are.
You and your coach(es) should be able to identify any gaps in your abilities so that you can work on them. The important thing is to give yourself some time to grow and get better.
