Here's a tool every martial artist who cares about fighting ability should be using — yet not many have even heard of this despite its thousands of years of history.
Before modern gyms, warriors of history trained with one goal in mind: survival and performance in the real world.
They didn’t have machines to isolate muscles nor did they care about such vain metrics.
Instead, they chose tools that were practical and functional to match the difficult environment they were living. Every exercise translated directly to combat and life.
Among the most powerful of these tools were clubs and maces.
In places like ancient Persia and ancient India, wrestlers and warriors trained extensively with these training tools.
Persian Zurkhaneh athletes swung heavy wooden clubs for endurance and strength, while Indian pehlwans used the gada (mace) to build powerful grip, shoulder power and core stability.
These weren’t random exercises or just tools for play. Over millennia, they became refined systems that were developed through generations.
And here’s the key difference:
These warriors understood functional strength in a way that many modern mind cannot even grasp. We simply don't live in the same reality anymore.
Ancient Strength vs. Modern Detachment
Coffer's illusion - what do you see?
People who grew up in modern industrialized countries often see rectangles meanwhile indigenous people of many regions see circles.
In nature, there are no straight lines. Yet, how we build and think about things is entirely linear and rigid in the modern times due to how our minds work today.
How does this connect to the ancient training styles? If you train with the clubs, the movements are circular and flowing. Yet, most people train in the gym with exercises that go in straight rigid lines from point A to B.
Nature is not like this.
Moreover, much of fitness knowledge today comes from controlled studies and laboratory environments. While science has its place, it often examines movement in isolation with limited thinking detached from the chaos and unpredictability of real life.
Ancient warriors didn’t have that luxury.
Their training had to work in the unpredictability and steep demands of life and combat.
This created a system of training that was holistic, integrated and fundamentally practical with the reality itself.
Clubs and maces have survived that test for millennia.
Unlike modern equipment, these tools were designed in a way that naturally developed usable strength.
They challenge the body through uneven weight distribution, levers and thick grips. This combination forces your muscles not just to produce force but to control, stabilize, and adapt.
And that’s exactly what the real world requires. Not perfectly convenient and easy tools that go only in straight rigid lines, but tools that challenge you in multi-faceted ways.
The Grip: Your True Point of Control
In grappling, control often comes down to one thing: your ability to hold onto your opponent.
Whether grabbing a wrist, controlling the neck or securing an opponent’s limb, your grip determines your advantage.
This is where clubs and maces truly shine.
Unlike barbells or a pull up bar, which train your grip in a fixed direction, these tools:
— Pull in constantly changing angles changing the requirements of your grip
— Challenge your wrist stability constantly
And because the handles are thick, they mimic what you actually grab in real life... not a thin steel bar, but an actual human limb.
Moreover, when you swing a mace, your body doesn’t get comfortable.
The force shifts:
— Forward
— Sideways
— Rotationally
Your grip has to respond instantly. This is why ancient tools train something deeper: adaptive strength.
Full Forearm Development: Not Just Strength, But Control
Another major advantage is how these tools develop the entire forearm.
Instead of just squeezing (like with most gym exercises), you also train:
The result is not just stronger forearms but more capable ones. Moreover, in the real world you don't just need raw strength, you need to sustain it (strength endurance).
Swinging clubs and maces creates this continuous tension. There’s no real “rest” phase. Your grip, wrists, and arms are constantly working to control the movement.
This builds long-lasting grip endurance and resistance to fatigue. Whether it's self-defence, striking (clinch), grappling (wrestling or BJJ), strength endurance and your ability to hold onto the opponents body and limbs firmly for long periods of time is essential.
Rediscovering What Was Never Lost
Clubs and maces aren’t new. They come from a time when training wasn’t about aesthetics or isolated strength. It was about function, control and real-world performance.
And that understanding still surpasses approaches that are disconnected from the environments they’re meant to prepare you for. Especially nothing is more chaotic than fighting and clubs prepare you for that chaos.
You can reclaim this same strength from thousands of years ago. The only thing you need to do is pick up the clubs.
If you’re looking to build strength that actually translates beyond the gym, it might be time to revisit these ancient tools and experience firsthand why they’ve endured for centuries.
For a complete training method that covers 5 ancient and old school training methods, see IronKingMethod.com
Stay strong.
