You can get the answer to that question in the last of this post. However, you can stay assured that the answer will please you.
If you are looking at one of the oldest forms of combat, then karate is one of them. It is quite unique in its style and is a very popular form of fighting and fighting training. Yes, you can learn defensive skills with it that can help you solve tricky situations or problems. This factor, through all these years, has defined what karate is. However, the question is if it can make you a stronger person.
In order to look at that, we need to find out what the word ‘strong’ means to us. Is it lifting 50 kilos of weight without panting? Or is it working out for hours and not getting tired at all? Well, we can get the answer if we look at how karate takes over our bodies and trains us. This investigation will lead t the answer at the conclusion of this post. So, read on.
Find out if Karate/ Martial Arts Makes You Stronger
Looking at karate from a scientific viewpoint, we will find that it is a form of combat involving many muscles and muscle groups in the body. This leads to intense workouts in terms of getting physically stronger. Although there is a particular workout for targeted muscle groups, Karate can train almost all the muscle groups at once brilliantly if you are practising it in accurate ways.
Karate burns about 720 calories. This energy burn is quite a good milestone if you want to lose weight and reduce fat. Hence, karate is going to take care of issues related to obesity. However, that remains in the realm of weight loss. To find if we get strong enough by practising karate and learning it, we can consider the following points:
1. Building Muscle Means Strength: Does Karate Help with that?
If you want to build strength, you need to build some muscle. Here is where karate can definitely help you. So, with this idea, we can already conclude the fact that karate does build muscle. You just need to amplify your training.
Before you start looking for karate institutes online and buying equipment with a 15 minute loan from a direct lender (in case your savings are frowning at you), we need to discuss the muscle-building process.
Fitness trainers would like to call it muscle hypertrophy. A process builds muscle. When you lift weights, do heavy workouts; exercise intensely, or simply do something with the increased force that engages the muscles and pushes them beyond their limits; your muscles bear the pressure and the muscle tear at the micro level. Due to this micro tear, you suffer that traditional ache in your body in places. Due to this breakdown, the body naturally moves towards repairing these muscles taking enough nutrients from your body (that is why you need to have a good diet) and repairing the muscle. As a result of such recovery, you see muscle growth and, with it, increased strength and endurance.
But what does karate have to do with this?
Karate builds muscle at a definitive point. But it is more of a comprehensive development than a targeted one. Notice that weight lifting or bodybuilding is more accurate in focusing on muscle groups. If you are a bodybuilder, you can choose to work on a particular muscle or muscle group and increase it in size and strength.
You may not achieve this particular ‘class’ of muscle building with karate because it trains all the muscle groups in your body at once. In summary, karate can increase your overall strength and build muscle in a more generalised form. But the increase in strength is always effective with karate. In conclusion, we can state that karate develops your muscles and makes you stronger from an ‘overall’ perspective.
2. Karate Builds Internal Strength and Endurance too
Not offending the gyms, the workouts encourage strength building along with aesthetic purposes. You go to the gym not only to get stronger but to look better. Bodybuilding is the art of building strength and endurance. But it also cannot deny the need for aesthetics.
Karate, however, comes from a different philosophy. It is a form of combat that not only teaches you defence but also trains you to fight efficiently. In that light, karate involves comprehensive and extensive physical training at intense levels to build your strength from the body’s core. Endurance or stamina is what karate is concerned about, along with physical strength. Practising it will not only make you stronger; but you will develop resistance, which translates to increased stamina; tolerance and force.
Being a karate professional or an enthusiast will lead you to develop immense power of will. Your mind will develop a deeper connection with your body, and part of your mental strength will aid in maximising the strength in your body.
3. Karate Makes You Stronger by Pushing You Beyond Your Comfort Zone
In this regard, karate goes hand-in-hand with the gym. Muscle hypertrophy will not happen with the same force or resistance repeatedly. For example, you have trained with a pair of 2kg dumbbells to increase your strength. At first, you will feel it is a little challenging to train with it. But, with time, your muscles will get stronger, and you will no longer feel it tough to lift 2 kg dumbbells. You have to move to more weight, such as 3 kg or 4 kg, to keep on tiring your muscles so that muscle hypertrophy takes place and you experience muscle gain.
This translates to karate in almost the same manner. By practising it, you may try new moves and fight techniques, which will push you to work harder. This factor works in the exact way to build your strength and increase it. You can notice that the process is similar to the one you just learned in the previous paragraph. In gyms, people also increase weight resistance by using this biological procedure in the muscle to ‘push’ it to be stronger.
To Conclude: Be Safe While Training
In both weight training and karate, you need to take care of your own responsibility. Speak to a professional trainer about this. With that, decide whether or not you want to get started with karate in the institutes or at your home.
If you want to learn karate in an institute, then search online and stick to a nearby centre so that you can stay for a long time there practising. However, your budget is also a deciding factor. So, balance the distance of the institute with the fees you can provide and come to a decision.
The other popular options happen without the need to commute. Of course, we are speaking about home training. Speak to trainers online and book courses. You can also choose different online platforms to find yourself a karate trainer. You have to make sure the trainer you have gotten in touch with is a certified professional.
Karate is a skill that each and every individual needs these days. In order to be safe and to build strength, karate has fewer alternatives to it. If you become one more person in the karate community, then you will feel how amazing it will ‘upgrade’ you.
