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Archive for July, 2008
Muslim Girls Practice Wushu
Thursday, July 10th, 2008‘Fight club’ training for martial artists
Thursday, July 3rd, 2008There’s only one real way to train to be a fighter and that’s to fight.
Bermuda’s San Shou team have been preparing for the regional championships for the brutal full contact Chinese fighting art – with full-on, no holds barred fight sessions.
Garon Wilkinson, president of the Bermuda San Shou association, said the four fighters who head to Brazil on July 13 and their sparring partners had been slugging it out at regular Wednesday ‘fight club’ sessions to prepare their bodies and brains to react under the extreme pressure of fight conditions.
“You can do all the running, skipping and jumping in the initial stages but the only way to truly prepare cardiovascularly for a fight is to actually fight.
“Ordinary sparring doesn’t really prepare you for the sort of oxygen debt you experience when you get hit so we’ve introduced weekly fight sessions to our training regimen.
“Basically we just warm up and then go at it as hard as we can.
“We find our fighters are getting nervous before Wednesday fight sessions. We want them to be nervous because that’s what they will have to deal with in a fight.”
The full programme is actually extremely sophisticated, incorporating plyometrics, mitt work, boxing training, strength and conditioning, spinning and beach work as well as fight techniques and tactics.
The team Sentwali Woolridge, Wilkinson, Jermal Woolridge and Leroy Maxwell, all of whom competed in the World Championships in Beijing in November last year, have been in training since January, a minimum of five times a week.
Despite the heavy sessions on Wednesday there is no let-off on Thursdays, one of the toughest days of the week.
“You need to prepare your body for back-to-back fights. My fight in Beijing was at 11.30 at night.
“If I’d have won I’d have been fighitng again at 7.30 in the morning. You have to be able to take a bruising and a battering and still get up the next morning and do it all again, so we’re training hard on Thursdays too.
“In some sports you can not train and the worst that can happen is that you are going to get a bad result. If we don’t train, well….”
The team have adapted their programme over the past few years, incorporating features from the other countries they have met at past tournaments.
“Our programme has become pretty developed over the past few years. Every time we go to compete we learn something new.
“Going to the World Championships was just amazing. We got to see how our style of fighting in the west measures up to the European and Asian styles.
“We tend to use more of a boxing/kick boxing style. They really use their martial arts skills more.
“There’s a lot more straight knockouts with kicks.
“Our basis is in traditional martial arts so we have the skills to fight that way. It is just a matter of being able to blend everything together, which is really tough.”
Wilkinson believes that, though the competition will be tough at the PanAm Wushu Championships, it will not be as competitive as the worlds.
And he believes that Bermuda, who picked up two silvers and two bronzes at this event last year, has genuine medal prospects.
“All of us are experienced fighters now. We have had at least five fights. If everything goes well I don’t see why we shouldn’t come away with gold.”
Pan Am Wushu Championships
San Shou section
Campinas, Sao Paulo, Brazil
July 13 – 20
Bermuda team: Sentwali Woolridge (Under 70kg), Garon Wilkinson (under 75kg), Leroy Maxwell (under 85kg), Jermal Woolridge (Over 90kg), Oscar Lightbourne (judge), Damion Wilson (coach), Khalid Pitcher (coach) Talia Iris (manager).
Wushu players look for arena
Tuesday, July 1st, 2008PUPUL CHATTERJEE
Ranchi, June 27: Wushu practitioners are in a fix. They have the finest quality of carpets and mattresses to practice on and coaches to help them but no proper place to train.
Fenced arena of at least 8×8 dimension is a basic requirement for the game. But aspiring practitioners for the 34th National Games are being forced to make do with the hockey stadium. As the construction of the indoor stadium is still on at Hotwar, the practitioners have no choice.
Chief coach L. Pradeep Kumar from Manipur said: “Among the other options available, we opted for the hockey stadium as we have proper lodging facilities here. Also, the Morabadi grounds are nearby and players can use it for outdoor exercises. We will adjust with the facilities till the new stadium is ready.”
Besides Kumar, coaches from Uttar Pradesh and Ranchi are helping the practitioners improve their skills.
Joint secretary of Jharkhand Wushu Association Shivendra Dubey said the issue of indoor stadium would be solved before the third camp begins.
“The lack of an indoor stadium is a minor problem and will be solved by the third phase of the camp. In fact, the government has promised us Chinese coaches for the last camp before the Games. As of now we have been successful in training players. They are undergoing proper practice sessions and are also being given nutritious food.”
About 45 participants, including 11 girls, have come together for the camp, which is going on since May 12. This is the second wushu camp and after rigorous practice, some will be selected for the third session. Later, 27 will be selected to participate in the 34th National Games in December.
Apart from lodging, participants of the 45-day camp are also getting the best diet possible, said a wushu practitioner.
“We get food as per the diet charts from (the National Institute of Sports) Patiala. Fruits, vegetarian and non-vegetarian items are on the menu and in good quantity. The government has also given us tracksuits. The only thing missing is an indoor stadium,” said a participant.
But the coaches are confident that Jharkhand team would perform well at the National Games.