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Originally Posted by Joemoplata  I'm not sure that training to deal with MORE pain is the right way to prepare for a fight, to be honest. While it is important to find out if you have a glass jaw before stepping into a ring professionally, I don't think getting punished just for the sake of pain tolerance threshold is very smart. Train NOT to get hurt, that makes more sense.
Also, assume your opponent DOES have a high tolerance for pain. Making any assumptions that you can stop someone with a pure pain technique is risky. In my opinion, this is more important than training yourself to be tougher.
IMHO. |
I'm inclined to agree. No matter what training method you have to deal with pain, it will take time away from other things. In general I would say that a person would benefit most from perfecting blocking techniques and building up speed as opposed to conditioning or other mental ways of dealing with pain.
Also, keep in mind that pain exists to let us know that something is damaging to our body. It is a type of internal negative reinforcement that allows us to learn new skills (provided we don't let fear get in the way). As a result, de-conditioning a pain response and/or learning to train through certain types of pain may actually be counter productive in the long term of physical fitness and, thus, ability to defend one's self.
Now, I know the major protest that people are going to have, "But Chapel, our muscles hurt when we exercise and that is good for us, so you whole theory about pain teaching us to avoid bad things is bunk and you are an idiot." Well, in actuality exercise does damage the body in that it causes micro fractures in bones and breaks down muscles which then have to repair themselves. However, anyone who has had a good workout knows that at the end of it you feel good. That specific type of pain also releases endorphins. This is often called a "Runner's High."