Coach Brian Fernie

YOUR TECHNIQUE DOESN’T HAVE TO LOOK PERFECT

🥊 TECHNICAL TUESDAY

Coach’s Breakdown

YOUR TECHNIQUE DOESN’T HAVE TO LOOK PERFECT

Something I say to fighters quite often is:

Pads aren’t the fight.

You can look brilliant on the pads.

Perfect combinations.

Perfect timing.

Everything exactly where it should be.

Then you get into sparring…

And suddenly it looks very different. 😂

The opponent moves.

They hit back.

The distance changes.

You’re tired.

You’re under pressure.

And that perfect combination you’ve been practising suddenly disappears.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing.

That’s where the learning starts.

Good technical training should eventually move from:

Practice → Pressure → Adaptation

You need to learn how to use your technique when things aren’t perfect.

Because in a fight, they rarely are.

As a coach, I’m not looking for a fighter who can perform a combination beautifully when everything is controlled.

I’m looking for someone who can make good decisions when things get messy.

That’s the real skill.

🎯 Coach’s Point

Don’t just practise the technique.

Practise adapting the technique.

Because your opponent isn’t going to cooperate with your game plan.

💬 What’s harder for you?

🥊 Getting the technique right
🧠 Making decisions under pressure
👣 Managing distance
⚡ Keeping technique when tired

👇 Let me know.







Coach Brian Fernie

Strength • Conditioning • Performance

Train With Discipline.
Fight With Intent.
Perform With Purpose.

🥊 FIGHTER PERFORMANCE FRIDAY

HARDER ISN’T ALWAYS BETTER

I see this quite a lot in combat sports.

A fighter finishes a session absolutely exhausted and thinks:

“That was a great session.”

Maybe it was.

But being destroyed at the end of training doesn’t automatically mean you trained well.

I’ve had plenty of sessions over the years where the best work wasn’t the session that left everyone lying on the floor.

Sometimes it’s the session where you:

🥊 Got your technique right.

👣 Moved better.

🧠 Made better decisions.

⚡ Worked at the right intensity.

🎯 Focused on something you needed to improve.

And walked out feeling like you could have done more.

That’s not a wasted session.

That’s intelligent training.

As fighters, we sometimes get addicted to feeling tired because it gives us a simple way of judging whether we’ve worked hard.

But fighting isn’t about who can suffer the most in training.

It’s about who can perform when it matters.

So before you judge your next session by how exhausted you are, ask yourself:

“Did that training actually make me better?”

That’s a much harder question.

But it’s the one that matters.

🎯 COACH’S POINT

Don’t chase fatigue.

Chase improvement.

Train hard when you need to.

Train smart when you need to.

And understand the difference.

💬 Be honest — what makes you feel you’ve had a good session?

🥵 Being exhausted
🎯 Learning something
💪 Getting stronger
🥊 Performing better

👇 I’d love to hear your answer.







Coach Brian Fernie

Strength • Conditioning • Performance

Train With Discipline.
Fight With Intent.
Perform With Purpose.