Thread: suggestions for working graveyards...

hey everyone, im in a bit of a squeeze. i want to return to mma fighting and make it my full time job, trouble is im working a great job with hours that are horrible for training. ive decided being the insomniac i am anyways i should work graveyard shifts. any suggestions would be most helpfull. i have work experience in sales/forestry/and furniture delivery.

Are you looking for advice on how to maintain yourself on graves or jobs?

I've worked graves for several years and there are some tricks but very few people ever get used to it.

Let us know.

i meant graveyard shift hours. working in a graveyard at night would be cool with me though too hah

I worked midnight to 8am as a security guard for a while in Calgary till I woke up in a standing position. That might be a really good fit for you.

Hostels and hotels also need night desk people and are often anxious to find them. You'd have to learn how to do night reports, but you don't strike me as a moron and you really need to be a moron to fail at that.

thanks x, ya the only thing im totally not willing to even consider is working at say timmy-ho's or dennys. no fast food oriented job. other than that im wide open to suggestion.

I would suggest that you get away from nights if you are serious about training. Night shift is terrible on the body....Humans aren't made to go without sunlight and work against our body clocks. It will catch up to you and you will notice a difference in your counterparts that train during normal hours..find osmething where you can train but not get to tired before your afternoon session...

Nothing I can tell you is going to make it any easier, especially if your body and brain are used to the "dawn 'til dusk" type routine that the majority take part in. If you've never programmed yourself to get used to this type of thing, expect atleast a week or two of biological confusion.

One thing I can offer, though, is to focus on nutrition and adjust accordingly to your training schedule. I don't care if YOUR day "begins" at 11pm in the evening; make your first eating is a "breakfast" style meal. This trains your body as well as your mind to adjust to a new lifestyle. Since you're training MMA, I'm assuming that your body, training and nutrition are important to you, so these are variables that must be taken into consideration if you plan on adjusting to a new daily routine.

In short: NOTHING should change; only your waking hours. The eating and training schedule should remain the same -- only the time and hours which you do it should be any different.

Also, I disagree with the sentiment that your body and training will be compromised due to such an extreme difference in a normal training/eating routine. As a former competitive powerlifter, adjusting to a new schedule wasn't that difficult after a couple rough weeks of getting used to it. My training, conditioning and diet didn't suffer at all. If anything, I was more focused with training thanks to there being fewer people in the gym in the wee hours of the morning and/or late at night.

A doughnut shop or bakery might be ideal. If you don't know how to bake or make doughnuts most shops will train you.

A friend of mine drove a bread truck delivering to groceries and delis in No Jersey for 30 years. He loaded up around 3AM and got done around 10AM. He never got used to it. I went with him on his route once. I was shot for days. The trouble is that you work the graveyard 5 days a week and on the 2 you're off you try to go back to a 'normal' schedule. Anyway, hotels frequently hire desk clerks on the midnight to 8 shift.

Originally Posted by Wintchase

I would suggest that you get away from nights if you are serious about training. Night shift is terrible on the body....Humans aren't made to go without sunlight and work against our body clocks. It will catch up to you and you will notice a difference in your counterparts that train during normal hours..find osmething where you can train but not get to tired before your afternoon session...

+1

I worked graveyards for about a year and a half, and I felt the effects. While a young person who does it in a disciplined way can cope with it, there's no way you're at your physical best. I wouldn't recommend it as a strategy to facilitate athletic training, and I doubt any doctors (or trainers, for that matter) would, either.