Training
How fit do I need to be before I go?
Updated 2026-09-01
The short answer
You do not need to be fit to start, and camps take people straight off the sofa every week. What general fitness buys you is a slightly easier first week. It does not protect your shins, your hips or the skin on your feet, which is what actually limits people early.
Running and lifting at home will not prepare you for two hours of kicking pads, because nothing prepares you for that except kicking pads. Strong runners still finish their first session flat.
If you want to do something useful in the weeks before you fly, work on hip mobility, ankle and calf conditioning, and skipping. Skipping in particular, because you will do a lot of it and being bad at it is a miserable way to start every session.
The other genuinely useful preparation is heat. If you are coming from winter, expect the first few days to cost you more than you planned for.
Still deciding where to go?
Six questions, and we will tell you which camps fit and which facts about them we have not confirmed.
Find your camp