A Theory on McGregors Cardio issue

[Nate Dogg]

In the first Nate fight he gassed hard and got finished. In the second Nate fight he gassed hard and resorted to literally running to avoid engaging.

the 2nd nate fight I would say Nates pressure broke him. like Conor was briskly jogging away from Nate at times and if you're dead tired you're not going to keep running.

Conor was legit scared out of his mind to risk being taken down. even when they were fresh and Conor knocked him down, he wanted no part of going to the ground. plus Nate kept coming forward despite Conor throwing his best shots. that pressure and discouragement just saps you.

same thing with Floyd, once Conor realized his power wouldn't KO him, he became highly economical with his shots. but by Floyd constantly being in his face and threatening, it forced Conor to waste more energy trying to keep him at bay.

so in sum, Conor has to really work on his infighting ability. ppl will walk forward hoping to emulate Nate and Floyd, so Conor needs to be willing yo sit in the pocket and crack back

 

[MuayThai101]

The Conor that fought Max was the best shape he has been in his career. You could see it in his fights. He moved more, much more dynamic, volume striking, looked fresh after 3 rounds.

Then he hurt his knee. Not once, but twice. He hurt it in toronto rolling with Rory before he fought Mendes. Add in the fact that he gained more muscle as well. He became less dynamic, less of a volume striker and more of a counter puncher, gets tired in the third round.

Bless him because he made it work. He became one of the best counter striker in the history of MMA. But who knows how much better he could have been had he not hurt his knee.

 

[Captain Herb]

Swimming >>>> Running

for cardio and your bones and joints

Swimming cardio is completely different from running cardio. As a kid/teen, I could literally swim for miles at a decent clip but when the football coach had us take a few laps around the track, I was dying.

 

[wonderbread]

Maybe he looks like a homosexual when he jogs and is embarrassed. Like Big Tasty on the GOLDBERG's.

 

[emefer]

I think it's because of his boner. He has one at weigh in and perhaps he has one during the fight. Maybe all of his oxygen rich blood is just supplying power to the angry inch. That may also explain him attempting to mount Floyd.

 

[KoreanZawmbie]

It's likely just genetics.

Take Pacquaio for example, 99.9999% of people in the world(including pro boxers) could train to try and throw 1000 punches all as hard and fast as each other in a fight like Pacquaio and still be fairly fresh at the end. But they couldn't, it's not just training sometimes it's genetics.

I disagree with the whole genetics one and done thing. There's a lot of research pointing to environment influencing your DNA and genetics, even just your thoughts can change how your cells operate.

If you know anything about pacman, he's been training like a beast since he was 11 years old. Think about it, hitting bags running 8 miles, 2000 sit ups a day for 27 years will make you a beast like he is

 

[emefer]

Swimming >>>> Running

for cardio and your bones and joints

Do you swim downhill?

 

[Teh_Lulz7]

The Conor that fought Max was the best shape he has been in his career. You could see it in his fights. He moved more, much more dynamic, volume striking, looked fresh after 3 rounds.

Then he hurt his knee. Not once, but twice. He hurt it in toronto rolling with Rory before he fought Mendes. Add in the fact that he gained more muscle as well. He became less dynamic, less of a volume striker and more of a counter puncher, gets tired in the third round.

Bless him because he made it work. He became one of the best counter striker in the history of MMA. But who knows how much better he could have been had he not hurt his knee.

This point of view doesn't get mentioned enough. The Conor that fought Max was in unbelievable shape. He didn't even look tired after dominating the entire fight. I would love to see Conor in that shape with the skills he has now. Fucking knees are the worst part of the body. They ruin so many good athletes

 

[kingkokong]

How you guys feel about skipping? i can run 10k in under an hr at a moderate pace. But fail to skip for 30mins with the Thai Rope

 

[Venom]

Good point and again, I've heard of this theory on YouTube. Conor McGregor explicitly has said he doesn't run on the road to protect his joints, possibly to avoid ruining his bad knee.

And the genetics angle is valid as well, I think. Conor McGregor appears to be physically very strong, possibly mostly fast twitch.

Just look at this:

 

[TAK47]

I hope so, can you imagine a fresh legs McGregor for 25 - 36 minutes - holy fuck thats terrifying

And just like that, Fresh-legs-McGregor is born.

 

[Lots]

I don't know. Cardio in sports is an interesting issue.

Charles Poliquin says, "conditioning is specific to the activity" This backs up a lot of "fit" people's experiences with trying cardiovascular sports that are forgein to them and being surprisingly tired.

There are athletes like James "fat ass" Toney who never gas out.

George St. Pierre talks about his Muay Thai coach smoking packs of cigarettes a day and having the best cardio he's ever seen. Able to out last every young athlete in his gym.

I think cardio = efficiency

More cardio = Making less into more and pacing yourself

I mean, take Floyd mayweather for example. He has historically great cardio. If we made him hit a heavy bag at 100% balls to the wall, trying to save his family's life effort, he would gas quickly. And if he can somehow go for a while, then he's not going 100%

If your able to do something for longer than your probably not doing it 100%

Are Olympic 100m sprinters not exhausted after sprinting?

Ramble ramble

 

[SHRHNS]

Iv been thinking about McGregors ongoing Cardio issues or should I say recent Cardio issue

It appears McGregor has about 10-12 minutes then fades. 4 good paced rounds (12 minutes) against Mayweather, 2 solid rounds (10 mins) against Diaz, before alternating the final 3 rounds with a very tough 3rd (10th - 15th minutes) with Diaz

So why does someone who trains so hard have a difficulty with such prolonged cardio into the deeper rounds?

Well iv watched all behind the scenes access, embedded shows, all access and MacLife for all recent fights and thought of something...

All of McGregors cardio training is off his feet. I mean literally he does no road work or at least none evident, not even a treadmill for running.

We see him rowing, aerodyne, out cycling, pad and bag work but no running, no miles not ever - why?
In fact the only time we ever saw him 'running' was at the UFC performance institute in a specialised underwater treadmill to avoid impact and very slow paced which leads me to my point.

As someone who has cycled internationally and ran for my county I can tell you now the cardio for one movement doesnt transfer to the next. You will get a base level of fitness that will give you something to build upon when changing disciplines but I can tell you from experience just because I could comfortably do a 60 - 80 miles cycle didnt transfer to fitness for running a 10k for example and vice versa even though they both use 'legs'

Why? Impact! The impact of being on your feet and bounding and dealing with the gravity of carrying your own weight around is a very different type of fitness than non weight bearing cardio (the examples of which he prefers as outlined above)

Conor does not run and there must be a reason for this as to why he stays in his comfort zone as his 'legs going' as the boxing pundits would describe it or jelly legs if you've ever felt it is what McGregor concedes to when fights go into that 15 minute + time frame.

Keep in mind boxers or stand up fighters are notorious (no pun intended) for their road work, the early morning runs, the 5 miles a day (35 - 40 minutes = to fight duration of 12 round fight) the getting up at 5am or in Mayweathers case the 2am night time runs in the cooler Vegas weather - but they all put the miles in except McGregor?

So what is the reason?

Well his first and last 3 rounder was against Holloway this was a very fast paced fight and while McGregor hurt his knee he did not drop the pace or did not appear affected by Cardio in this fight at all

Therefore there are 2 reasons why McGregor doesnt do the road work required to have the 'on feet' impact level fitness required to compete 15 - 30 minutes

1) He is lazy, soft and doesnt want to work out of his comfort zone as he doesnt enjoy running

2) He has joint issues (knee, hip, ankle) or potentially his reconstructed knee following Holloway fight simply will not allow him to run and put in the miles expected in order to get himself through a training camp and has thus sourced other cardio methods as previously mentioned, in fact making reference to the underwater treadmill when I googled it, it is designed exactly for NFL athletes recovering from injury to avoid heavy weight bearing on the joints - this is the ONLY time we say McGregor run in any of the build ups in previous fights


I dont believe it is Number 1, he is tough, he does have heart fighting through a knee injury to get decision over current FW champ holloway, he doesnt look to stay in comfort zone challenging himself immediately wanting a rematch at 170 against the 185 - 190 Diaz who had 'strangled him on live TV' months earlier. He moved up in weight class, fought every opponent in front of him and challenged the P4P no 1 and TBE in Mayweather. This isnt dick riding, thats just a list of facts so its not number 1

So in my opinion (I said opinion not fact) it must be Number 2 which is a fucking shame that he must have had to find a work around for cardio post knee injury as cardio was never an issue previously, he played football as a youth but since that injury... no running, every other form of cardio but weight bearing running.

And this is why I believe McGregor will always struggle to have the fight level fitness required to compete in later rounds as his legs simply cannot cope with the demands of the type of grinding road work necessary to get himself into that condition to be on his feet for 30 minutes during a fight

Just my opinion folks and an angle I havent seen proposed


*TLDR

McGregor needs to do more running for the appropriate cardio required to fight

The issue is psychological and not physical.

 

[streetscience]

Ahh, what about swimming? How effective is swimming compared to running. Swimming ain't easy. I was swimming my ass off years ago at a Bally's and some grandma in the other lane was smoking me...and also smirking at me and shit....like I sucked ass. I mean, yeah I sucked ass compared to her, but that's pretty weird to be a dick to someone who's a noob, like that. That was so strange.

Swimming does seem to give me a lot of crossover benefit. Good overall strength increase, cardio and increased range of motion. I think too much would be bad, it feels like they make your ankles weaker, which make sense because they are not really getting much resistance in the pool. I guess it is all about balance.

 

[defcon5]

If Conor didn't use cocaine he would have better cardio

 

[PapaBherd]

A good compromise would be jumping rope. Less impact as you are only a couple of inches of the ground most of the time, and you're forced land softly on your toes which lessens the impact on your knees and other joints.

 

[98bird]

I think too much would be bad, it feels like they make your ankles weaker, which make sense because they are not really getting much resistance in the pool. I guess it is all about balance.

Interesting thing about the ankles....the last time I swam was probably 5-6 years ago when Bally's Gym was still open. I asked one of the lifeguards about how I should paddle my feet while swimming Freestyle. He said to resemble a duck. I can't remember what he meant...to keep the ankles stiff (paddling my entire leg/foot as 1) or loose and paddle with my feet and legs as 2 sets of paddles.

 

[Lawrence]

Wall of text

Did read

TS has a strong hypothesis

Sadly, millions of dollars suggest that Conor will never fight again.

 

[ReadWrite]

Bad knees or lazy fighter, either way, it's really weird having a UFC champion with only a two-round gas tank. None of the other current champions have bad tanks, and I can't remember the last champion before Conor known for a bad tank.

 

[bigma]

No. Just no. There's a reason cyclists and rowers have the biggest VO2 Max levels on the planet. If you're saying he needs to spend more time on his feet, it has nothing to do with roadwork. Cycling, when done correctly, taxes the cardiovascular system just as well as running. And given the amount of training he should be doing in the other modalities of mma, it's probably better that he's not pounding away at his joints as running, which involves approximately 180 brute force impacts beginning with your foot and radiating up your entire posterior chain, is one of the most injury-producing activities one can do. Conor gasses because he's either not doing enough cardio, blowing his load prematurely, or taking too much of a beating.