B.J. Penn's Training Regimen
by Luke Thomas on May 22, 2008 1:26 PM EDT
in MMA News
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PrintI realize it's been "The B.J. Penn Show" around here in the run-up to UFC 84, but I find him to be enormously compelling. To that effect, I found this interview with Josh Gross which sheds some light on how hard Penn was training for this fight:
Gross: A wrestler with excellent cardio -- would a fighter with that kind of style give you trouble?
Penn: That might give the old B.J. Penn trouble. Not really the wrestling part, it just depends on what kind of shape I came in and how serious I took the fight. I don't really feel that that style gives me trouble, and if Sean Sherk is going around saying that my style gives his style trouble, it's just because he's scared and he's trying to make himself feel comfortable about the fight. But it's not going to be fun.
Gross: How did Rudy Valentino treat you during training camp?
Penn: "Rudy V." was just telling me not to over-train. He knows how hard I was pushing and how hard I was doing everything -- every aspect of the whole game. We were sparring six rounds over six weeks out. Rudy V. was on top of me saying "don't over-train, you've got this already."
Gross: So you wanted to train more and he had to pull you back?
Penn: He just keep letting me know, kept talking in my ear that Sean Sherk isn't the best person I've ever fought. There's no reason to treat it like I'm fighting Fedor [Emelianenko] or something. It was like "OK, you can do this already. Let's go and kick his ass."
I read a biography of Penn a few months ago and in it, Penn himself describes the extent to which he became obsessed with jiu-jitsu when he first encountered it. All he could think about day and night was jiu-jitsu. Whether he was eating, showering or sleeping, somehow jiu-jitsu played into his mind. He literally became clinically obsessed with the sport. And with that obsession came the burning, unquenchable desire to conquer it, to unwrap its mysteries and flatten out its wrinkles. With respect to jiu-jitsu and Penn, we know how that story ends.
In my mind, this is the Penn who we see before us. Between maturity as a person and singular obsession with an identified goal, Penn is reverting into the young man obsessed with jiu-jitsu. The object of obsession has changed as has the person, but the result and effect are still the same. I, for one, believe Sherk is deeply underestimating Penn's ability, drive and focus. Sean Sherk is in trouble and come Saturday evening, I believe all of that will be revealed.
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Misnomer
With his seeming natural ability and his nickname of “The Prodigy,” it’s become standard internet blowhard operating procedure to talk about BJ as a guy who is lazy and never works. But I don’t care how naturally talented you are: you don’t achieve the levels of excellence that BJ has in BJJ without some serious hard work. This is a guy who knows a lot about hard work – he’s just chosen to focus on the fun parts of training in the past: sparring.
But it’s not as though anybody can look at BJ and think, “Oh, that guy’s just a natural fighter.” Whither the physique? Whither the giant size of unbelievable strength? This is not some genetic freak of nature we’re talking about. It’s a guy who has taken the time to become incredibly well-rounded in MMA. Sure, he might not have worked hard on his cardio in the past, but the rest of those skills came from hours and hours in the gym.
I fully expect him to devour Sean Sherk. And that could mean LITERALLY devouring him if the ref doesn’t pull him off in time.
Don't believe a word I say, I don't train BJJ.
Has BJ Penn put in countless hours to achieve the success he has? Yes, that is true. That said, is he a freakish athlete? Completely, probably one of the 10 most athletically gifted athletes in mma. When you can take your leg and pin someone’s arm with it when you have his back that my friend is a gift, not something you can pick up in the gym.
When you can take your leg and pin someone’s arm with it when you have his back that my friend is a gift, not something you can pick up in the gym.
Actually any people use active, passive and dynamic stretching in martial arts. Ryan Hall is a big proponent of Pilates and he’s even made a special training DVD for grappling.
Even though most MMA competitors dont’ develop it as a tool don’t let that fool you. Flexibility is an important base for striking as well as grappling since It improves dexterity, speed and explosive muscle contractions. If you wanna be able to pin that arm back, you can too! Even if you don’t practice martial arts it can reportedly help overall fitness, health and can help prevent injuries.
Sorry, can you tell I’m a fan of stretching? :) End Infomercial.
dude
I’ve rolled with Ryan Hall personally many times. He, like Penn, is naturally flexible. Yes, he stretches regularly to increase his flexibility (or even to maintain it), but he’s also naturally VERY VERY flexible.
I understand the power of stretching. Playing higher levels of football and hockey as a kid and weight training for quite some time, the power of stretching is very real. However, some people are born with dexterity that you just can’t all of a sudden train for. Training does help, a lot to be quite honest, as working on many factors allowed me to lower my 40 times. But as much as I trained, there was no way I was going to catch our running back at the 40. So do you see where I am coming from?
My point
...wasn’t that BJ had no gifts. Just none of the obvious gifts (size, strength, speed) that are directly useful in MMA. Flexibility is great, but there are a TON of people just as flexible as BJ: most just haven’t done the work that he has to make that a part of his arsenal. He isn’t just naturally finding techniques like when he had taken Joe’s back and was pinning down his left arm with his legs – he worked, and trained and practiced that stuff.
So yes, flexibility is a gift, but he’s made a skill out of it.
Don't believe a word I say, I don't train BJJ.
The fact that he generally has quite often not cared enough to be prepared to last more than 3 minutes in the ring is the reason he’s been labeled as lazy. I think that’s a fair assessment—if what you do is focus on the stuff you “enjoy” at the expense of the stuff you really “need to do” to be the best you can be when you step in the octagon, that’s lazy. It’d be like a wide receiver in football who really enjoys lifting weights, but doesn’t like to practice running routes or studying defenses. He’s lazy if he isn’t willing to put in the time on all crucial aspects, no matter how many hours of hard work he puts in doing bench presses.
I’ve never cared much for Penn, myself. I respect his crazy abilities, and I can’t imagine for a minute that he will come into the octagon for this fight in anything less than the best condition he’s ever been in. I have a hard time imagining any way Sherk wins this fight. But I think the criticisms of Penn for being “lazy” in the past have some merit, and I’ll be interested to see how Penn keeps his motivation up for future fights where he isn’t being driven by this motivating hatred that he has for Sherk right now
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