Why Picking The Right Training Equipment Is Essential

Sounds kind of simple, doesn’t it? Pick the right martial arts training equipment or lose out. Well, like most true things, that little nugget of wisdom is as simple as a person wishes to make it – and true for a set of reasons slightly more complex than one might initially suppose. Mostly, that has to do with the types of fighting style one uses training gear for, in martial arts: that peculiar combination of flexibility and rigidity that makes the fighting arts so unique.

The problem with martial arts training is this: most fighting styles, while they appear fluid and adaptable, are actually pretty regimented. A person either gets the correct combination of body moves, and lands an effective blow – or doesn’t, and gets beaten. Martial arts training equipment is designed to encourage the practitioner into the right series of movements – which means, of course, that training kit suitable for one discipline is entirely useless for another: and training gear that can really help in MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) is so specific that buying the wrong stuff can actually cause injury.

Let’s look at an example. A person training for Mixed Martial Arts may actually be prevented from using some of the training gear one would usually associate with any one of the disciplines he or she is mixing. Why? Because training equipment that has enough restriction in it to teach a student the right moves for, say, jeet kune do, may actually be too restrictive to allow a transition from a jeet kune do move to a tae kwon do move. And so on. A practitioner of MMA needs to find MMA specific training kit, rather than trying to use kit that would work for just one of his or her disciplines.

Similarly, one needs to remember that training kit and fight kit, for any martial art, are completely different things. Martial arts training equipment is designed to allow a user to practice moves – that is, to get them a little wrong before they get them right. As such, it’s minimally flexible – just enough to guide a limb through the right series of passes without restricting its motion. Training kit for any martial art will support key joints and tendons, so a practitioner can make some wrong moves without injury. Fight gear, on the other hand, is loose – allowing a full range of motion, so a fighter can cope with the unpredictable situations of actual combat.

To use martial arts fighting gear as training equipment is extremely dangerous. There’s no restriction there, which means injury is far more likely – and a mastery of the right set of moves for any blow is very unlikely. When buying training kit, one must be very careful – don’t end up with gear designed for fight situations, or all that training will be for nothing.

Like everything this delicate, the right thing to do is ask the experts. Online stores like the excellent CrouchingTiger (a UK site dedicated to martial arts kit) will have plenty of advice on what training equipment to buy for what discipline. Don’t buy without that advice – or training could lead rapidly to injury.

By: LTW Supplies.

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Martial arts training equipment is designed to allow a user to practice moves – that is, to get them a little wrong before they get them right.