Adult Student’s Corner
by Sifu D’Arcy
Fu For You Summer 2025
Before we dive into the meat of this article, I have a question I’d like you to consider. Taking a look at your weekly physical training regime, how much of it is made up by your Kung Fu training? The calculation to do so would be something like: I exercise 10 hours per week (average), and 8 of those hours is Kung Fu, therefore Kung Fu makes up 80% of my training. Using that formula, you can find out exactly what percentage of your physical activity is devoted directly to martial arts. Without doing a formal survey of the student body, it’s probably safe to say that many students devote a large percentage of their physical exercise time to the practice of Kung Fu, and that’s great! There are, however, some very real benefits to devoting some portion of your time to the practice of cross-training.
First off, what exactly is cross-training? Simply put, it is the action or practice of engaging in two or more sports or types of exercise, with the goal of improving fitness or performance in your main sport, in this case Kung Fu. By adding in a variety of training methods alongside your normal training regime, you can realize gains in the form of cardio, strength and/or flexibility without the fear of overworking your body by overtraining in one format. As you climb through the ranks at the academy, the need to be in better overall shape to successfully complete gradings climbs at an exponential rate. If you only focus on the training we do at the academy, you’ll find that: 1) the training you do won’t be enough, especially when preparing for a grading, and 2) your body might wear down by doing the same activities over, and over again. Enter the concept of cross-training.
By adding additional forms of exercise, you can zero in on specific areas of your fitness that you are looking to improve. You can add a resistance training day to improve strength, making your push-ups stronger, your stances better, and your technique more powerful. Adding Yoga to your routine can improve your breath control, your flexibility and your balance. Running, biking, or swimming will enhance your cardio capacity allowing your body to power through those longer grading days, extending the time out before you hit that wall. Looking to get your kicks higher, or your splits lower? Add in some mobility/flexibility training and see the results isolated training can bring. The best part of this type of training is that you can do it anywhere, making use of the equipment you have around you.
Cross-training is a great way to improve your overall fitness and really allows you to target elements that may be missing from your Kung Fu training. Interested in learning a bit more about it? I’d be happy to chat, but the Internet is an incredible resource and has a ton of solutions.
