It's Thursday. You show up to your local MMA gym after a whole week of martial arts training coupled with S&C work.

It would only make sense the body is feeling stiff and sore. No biggie — you'll just get warmed up. This hasn't stopped you before and you can just push through.

So you get through the warm-up and the pad work, bag work, drilling. Still feeling a little sluggish, but you can manage.

Now it's time for sparring.

Fast forward to round 3. You're getting tagged. Your legs feel like they have bricks tied to them, and no matter how hard you try, you're too slow and your opponent is always two steps ahead.

If you fall into either of these two categories — you've just started martial arts, or you've noticed a regression in your training — this is for you.

It is very easy to get overloaded and shut down the nervous system in sparring. Especially if you're going with a training partner who doesn't have control, or who's a level above you, or if you're carrying outside mental weight into the training room.

Three things here, and we'll address them one at a time.

First — find an even sparring partner. Someone you can work with and have an intellectual back-and-forth with. A challenge that will propel you forward in martial arts progress by making the game playable.

Second — pick the partner with control, then talk to them. Once you've got a lay of the room and figured out where you're at technically, pick the partner who has the best control — then talk to them and get on the same page. Think of the playfulness of the Thais in sparring. You need to find someone you can naturally do that with, or get your training partner there. Something like "let's keep it playful this round. Still serious, but no need for full power." That same type of convo leads into a better dance.

And third — cut the extra noise as best you can. The only way to learn and progress at anything is to get your nervous system — your mind — into a state where you can learn and absorb during training. Stressed out, hungover, staying up all night, doom scrolling, dealing with personal problems — these all create havoc on your nervous system. Understand that these compound and accumulate over time.

And yes, I do understand. Everyone is human. And yes, there are things out of our control. Just do your best.

For me, at the firehouse, I would occasionally have to get up at night for 911 calls. Something I didn't have control over, and it disrupted my sleep. To really double down, I was doom scrolling and pumping caffeine and nicotine into my system until it was fried.

Then I'd go home to my mom's house, where I still lived at the time. I just couldn't seem to truly reset mentally with my mom and grandparents all in the house. I couldn't get my own space, and my nervous system was starting to boil over.

On top of it all, I'd show up to training every off day and do S&C around my training sessions.

And this is where I started noticing the decline. I was getting pieced up in sparring, feeling slow, like my legs were cemented down. Reaction times were terrible.

The key — calm the nervous system down by cutting out the extra noise.

My body, and my legs specifically.

And for me, in my short time training (3 years), I felt slower than ever. Like I was going backwards. So I did some reflecting, and here is what I found.

First, about my background:

So I had transitioned away from running, jumping, sprinting and plyometrics to focus on heavy weights in high school. Then I stopped that while I was preparing to join the fire department and starting Muay Thai. Eventually the lifting stopped entirely, and from there my body slowly declined.

So here's my answer. I eliminated all the movements that made me elastic, explosive, and able to be nimble on my feet. Heavy compound lifts, plyos, sprints.

My body only compensated for so long.

Just think about it. We stand in the same stance and throw the same strikes in the same plane thousands of times a week. What else is there to expect?

It's like a car that drove thousands of miles with no oil change, no new tires, no maintenance. Then when it breaks down you wouldn't be surprised, right?

So why would it be any different for your body?

That is where a great S&C program comes into play. Targeting the opposing muscles to the overused striking patterns, as well as targeting sport-specific attributes like speed, strength and agility.

Now if you could pick all this out perfectly — cut the nervous system noise, and add back in the movements with a strength and conditioning program that gets you to your prime athletic state for the training ground — then you'd be primed and ready for anything.

The training partner who beats you to the check and returns a kick before you can get one off? That training partner has logged more reps. He's seen that same kick, and his brain is more aware of the subtle cues of how your body — or anyone's — moves when getting ready to throw.

That's something you can't change. But you can improve your speed and learning rate with more efficient training.

Some of your opponents and sparring partners have more time in the game, and that isn't anything to get upset about. It's just reality. It means they have been doing this longer than you have.

To combat that and get to a point where you can compete will take time. Now, this time can be shortened. And that really just means —

More focus × better strategy × consistency — for as long as you can.

That's the formula.

You stick to that and all of a sudden you feel untouchable. And in some sense, you will be.

If you want to restore proper movement, train with maximum efficiency, and start dominating your fights — this week's free program targets elasticity, speed, and agility. Hopefully it gets you moving like an athlete and performing better in the training room.

I'll see you next week. Have fun, be safe, don't die. — Dylan