A week off...

I've had a rather quiet week this week, because I had some minor surgery done on Monday and wasn't supposed to do much sports.
Just after the operation was finished, the medical assistant told me to remember that I shouldn't do any sports for the next 24hrs. I nodded and made an understanding face. I had already been at a MMA HIIT -class in the morning, so no problem. And Tuesday was supposed to be my recovery day anyway. About 20sec. later my surgeon came into the room and told me no sports for the next seven days. Whoa, weird dude say what?! I still nodded and made an understanding face, but when he left I threw a desperate look at the assistant. She came a little closer and told me to listen to my body, keep the stitches clean and dry and be careful. And that's what I did. I surprised myself a little, I didn't know I could be this sensible. On the other hand... had I ripped the stitches open, I'd probably have to spend a few weeks longer without doing sports.

But: we got a new practice model at our club. It's called MMA HIIT and is actually a normal HIIT (high intensity interval training), but the ingenious thing about it is that the warm up consists of MMA moves or moves that assist MMA training. I really like it, because not only do HIITs challenge your physical boundaries, but your mental boundaries, too. It's a little like running a (half) marathon: your head is screaming that you can't go any further (or do more reps) but your body is actually still good. So you need to step over the mental boundaries your head is setting. You give it your all, and by all I mean EVERYTHING you got. The aim is that you could not do a single rep more, even if your life depended on it. You don't save any energy, you go all in. And that's the beauty of it. By breaking these mental boundaries you actually achieve this athlete mindset that you can do everything even if it hurts like hell.
The other thing that makes HIITs so appealing, is the fact that the actual training is only about 8-12min long. Add a warm up and a cool down and you have a 30-45min training session and you're actually done. You don't have to do anything else for the day, because HIITs due to their intensity work up a high response in your body's hormonal system and they rev up your metabolism. This effect can last up to 24hrs after the training itself. So, if you got the possibility: try it.

Tomorrow the stitches are being removed and I'm almost back to normal again. I should probably be careful for a few more days so the scars don't open, but then we're back in the game!