MMA (and most other combat sports in general) are totally unique sports in that, IMO, the widest realm of physical attributes are needed.
In most other sports, you can narrow the physical attributes needed to one or two main things. However, in MMA, you need virtually all attributes: maximal strength/power, strength/power-endurance, cardiovascular endurance, muscular endurance, work capacity, etc.
That said, MMA is also one of the most diverse sports (save for maybe some of your multi-event track competitions a la decathalon or the like) in that you have to know so much. It’s really like trying to prepare for 3-5 sports all at the same time between wrestling, submissions, boxing, kickboxing/MT, etc. You may not have to master all of these, but you have to know not only your game (be you a striker, grappler, etc.), but know a good amount of (at least) defense all-around.
That said, the amount of time needed for skills training is probably as high or higher (percentage wise) of any other sport.
In other words, if you can spend 75% of your time skills training in any other sport, 25% of your time S&C training (these aren’t meant to be any sort of accurate percentages, just pulling numbers for discussion’s sake), then with MMA, you’d probably be closer to a 85-90% skills to 10-15% S&C ratio.
So what does this mean? This means that you have to get the most “bang for your buck” when you’re doing your S&C work. Really, this is one of the things that drew me to S&C work for MMA years ago, as at the time, MMA was still a small sport, and many of its participants were still working full-time jobs just to make ends meet. This reduced training time even FURTHER, but that is another subject.
If a fighter has to get the most “bang for the buck” with his S&C training, this means not just putting together abbreviated routines. This means putting together routines that will put the fighter in the best possible position to win.
Now, this can vary from fighter to fighter. If a fighter is very weak, then ME work is more needed. If a fighter needs better cardio, then this is where the training should be focused. Same goes for strength/power-endurance (which, as Xen said, is damn near KING when it comes to MMA), muscular endurance, and the like.
And for most fighters out there, they are going to be better served with endurance-based training for a variety of reasons.
First of all, strength can take a good amount of time to develop - or at least longer than commensurate increases in a given form of endurance. One of the things that separates out MMA, boxing, etc. from all other sports (even wrestling) is that there are no defined “seasons”. A fighter can literally fight at any given point during the year.
It is really only the upper echelon of fighter (MMA or boxing) that makes enough to train full-time. Those that train full-time can plan out their training camps (and in turn S&C training) far ahead enough that if some ME work is needed, it can be done with enough time to make sure the requisite levels of strength/power are reached. (I’d say that much of the ME work that’s done during camp is more for making sure that strength is kept rather than built, but that’s another topic as well.)
Otherwise, it’s not uncommon for a fighter to take a fight on just days/weeks notice. In order to do this, a fighter has to always keep in good shape. True ME work will take enough out of a fighter, that he won’t be able to keep endurance levels (of all varieties) where they need to be.
Chad, you mentioned (and Xen commented on this) that increasing maximal strength will carry over and result in a raise in work capacity, strength-endurance, etc. And this is true.
However, the opposite is also true. Focus on intense work capacity, strength/power-endurance, or the like and see what happens. Take 85% of your 1RM is various lifts, and build to 30-40 reps inside of 5 mins on a given exercise (you could even use your famed 10x3) and see what happens to your ME numbers.
This is much better suited to fighters.
Now, I’m not saying that ME work doesn’t have a place in a program, b/c it does. It just shouldn’t be the focus by any means.
One other thing, Chad, that you said once in relation to ME work…
You said once in an article (IIRC - please correct me if I’m wrong) that a fighter should have a bench of 1.5xBW, SQ of 2xBW, and DL 2.5xBW.
With all due respect, but these numbers are way out of line and totally off-base.
For every fighter that could make these numbers, I’ll show you two (or more) that couldn’t. Does this mean that they should build up their ME strength? Not necessarily. I’d venture to bet that most of your LHW (205) fighters aren’t going to DL 500+.
Will getting their DL up that high make them better fighters? In most instances, no. And really, that is what we should be looking at - not how much weight or how many reps a fighter can put up in the gym, but what’s making them better in the cage/ring.
Along those lines - I see all these questions about “sport specific” training, and I think it’s bullshit. I can see a fighter training to be able to exert himself at very intense levels for 5 mins rounds and such, or trying to find exercises that might be more useful while still working targeted muscles (e.g. - a one-handed leverage bar pushpress instead of a standard bench press), but everybody has gone overboard on this whole “sport specific” bandwagon.
S&C work is, by its nature, GPP - meaning General. Want to make it specific? Then spend time training your sport (in this case, grappling, sparring, etc.)
Joe DeFranco once answered a question on this, and the basic gist of it was to get stronger in the weight room, and use that strength to get faster and become a better player while on the field. Don’t try to turn the gym into the mat or the mat into the gym.
One last thing - I think we make these fucking things too damn complicated. Want to become a better fighter? Then get better at striking, submissions, takedowns, sprawls, etc.
When it comes to S&C work, I think many - if not most - of us would do better to err on the side of more basic than more advanced. As much as I think we’d like to bullshit ourselves, very few (or less) of us are elite athletes. We’re not going to the Olympics any time soon, and we’re not some sort of adonis-like gods. We’d do just as well to create a very basic, yet well-thought out program, and work at that, then over-scruitinizing every last detail of our training.
In fact, I think most fighters could take CT’s Metabolic Pairings article from last week, and use similar routines to some great fucking success if they put in the work a couple times/week there, and focused the rest of their time and abilities on becoming as technically proficient as possible.