Caroline Portugal has exactly four more months to make her dream of becoming a professional mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter a reality as she is getting ready for her professional debut at the Real Fighting Championships (RFC) event in February 2010.
Needless to say, her almost daily training is no walk in the park. Aside from learning new submission techniques she also works on becoming a more well-rounded fighter by perfecting her stand-up game.
Staying injury-free and healthy in spite of the high impact during long and sweaty work outs at the gym are, however, crucial for any professional athlete. Maybe even more so for MMA fighters who deal with a variety of components in their daily training, like ground work (jiu jitsu, wrestling), stand up game (jiu jitsu, boxing, kick boxing, judo), and last but certainly not least conditioning for maximum endurance during a 15-minute fight.
Being a life-long martial artist and fitness competitor has helped Portugal develop her own methods to counter-act the stress from her high-impact training. Here is what she revealed during some Q and A.
This article appears in Oct 29 – Nov 4, 2009.