Note: The weekly mettle maker supports all of the Heritage Arts programs — Heritage Self-Defense, Heritage Wildwood, Heritage Fitness and Heritage Spirit.
Seasons: Mettle Maker #276
Self-Defense: Grappling/clinching skill and fitness. The upcoming week’s focus is grappling/clinching. Near-perfect technique and real fitness are required to overcome a taller and/or heavier adversary. Constitutionals are the answer. Here’s a grappling-specific one. Work it with perfect form: 25 reps each of Bag Lifts, Russian Squats, Shoulder Rolls, Duck-unders, Shots, Sprawls, and Bodybuilders. If you don’t know what these exercises are, watch the video below. Want more martial arts? Join our free distance learning program or come train with us on Tues and Thurs nights from 6 - 7 PM at West End Manor Civic Association, 8600 Lakefront Drive, Richmond VA 23294.
Fitness: What’s your prehab plan? Many folks have recurring flare-ups, re-injuries, and syndromes, such as ITB pain, various types of tendonitis, and so forth. As discussed last week, overtraining is common and is a leading contributor to these recurrences. Have you reviewed and analyzed your training journals to see what you were doing in the weeks leading up to your injuries and find the causes? Have made changes to your program to prevent future recurrences? Perhaps most important of all, have you put a prehab plan in place to address the underlying strength deficiencies? I just put a prehab plan in place after my second flare-up of wrist pain in connection with martial arts weapon training — see below. If you need assistance with doing this kind of analysis and implementation, sign up for the Heritage Fitness program. It’s totally free (we’re a non-profit, remember?).
Wildwood: Fall is coming — do you know what that means? A silly question? Not really. Do you know what date marks the beginning of fall? Do you know which trees are the first to change color in your area? Do you know which edible nuts are the first to fall, roughly when they’ll drop, and how to harvest and prepare them? Do you know how long they’ll keep in the shell? Watch the video below for more info, and if this sort of thing is your cup of tea, sign up for the free Wildwood program.
Spirit: Seasons come and go, ever-repeating. Are you stuck in an endless loop just like the seasons, or are you moving forward in your spiritual practice? “That which hath been is now; and that which is to be hath already been; and God requireth that which is past.” That’s Ecclesiastes 3:15, and if you can come to an understanding of its meaning perhaps you can make a huge spiritual leap forward. Meditate on this scripture. And if you get stuck, watch the video below, and consider joining us at Heritage Spirit for weekly online church.