tallgeese

I do kind of like that idea. I've kept that sort of thing for years. Never had to present it for a test, but I think it's a good idea.

Congrats for you as well!

Congrats. Nice work.

today- 3.5 mile run back/bis

In a sd sense, about the only thing I do in regard to "sizing up" has already been stated. Size, athleticisim, posture, how he's holding his hands, the potental for hidden weapons, the availiabilty of him to access his buddies for back up, ect. Once it's go time, it's time to initiate what movments that instictively present themselves to you and try to effect them as best as possbile. If these are blocked, then you move on and continue to assert control over the individual in question. That's about the long and short of it. For sparrng, I tend to just put my best game out there. Or, if we're working specific drills, I just do them as best as I can to, again, assert control. I don't spend as much time sorting out what he's good at, ect before hand. I just continue to adapt my work to whatever he gives me that seems vuneralbe. Now, for competition, you should probibly do your best to scout first. Video of your opponat is good, against a wide variety of fighters. This will help prepare the way for you to capatalize on training your tools to face him. Remember, that this is a bit different from the suprise element often faced in sd settings, or the use of sparring to train for that. This is a predetermined contest that will allow for specific preperation. You should use it. If it's a tourny setting, then watch as many of the competititors in other matches as possible. This will give a feel of the things that they will try often, and maybe holes they give up frequently. Not as good as video study, but maybe all you've got under the circumstances. So, it varys, I think from what perspective you're looking at it from. For sd training, it's good to get inghe habit of reading pre-fight indicators, but not such a good idea to give any sort of quarter during a "feeling out" period. Take the fight to them and over come. Adapt as needed. That's how I think in terms of the question for sd.

today- 3, 3 min 40 % roll for position for warm up. 20 min drill on escaping mount, side work, move to north/south 3, 3 min rounds from knees, all start from negitive position 7, 3 min rounds from standing, free roll 15 min kinfe work, drilled my new patterns vs. full speed attack with an armored wepon hand for the attacker. Results went well.

True, you can view it as an attack, but you have to initiate a respone that isinline with the threat it presents. If it's an isolated push, you probibly can't justify whacking him. Could you redirect nd control and arm? Sure. But hitting hiim might escalte too far for alot of courts. Now, if you can articulate that he pushed you and then pulled back to hit you, now yo've got something. NOw you can swing away to preempt his attack. It's proportional, I think this is where you're comment of "lead-in" come into play. Good point.

today- 3, 2 min rounds on the body guard and mitt gloves of: head/upper body movement evasion, counter with strikes to the body, add strikeing high as well. Finish with tie up and knees. Then have the holder grab the last knee for high single. Striker defends by posting our and getting leg back Repped leg kicks for a bit with one of the guys who dosn't kick much. Back leg as well as front to the inner quad. 20 min instructinal block on working from guard, part of sweep series and a couple of submissions 4, 2 min rounds of grappling from guard exclusively. Bottom man works sweeps and submissions, top guy works for escape. If either is acheived you restart, same position. 5, 3 min rounds free roll from standing.

You can hit, in most cases, proportional to the threat until the threat is neutralized. No further. So, if a good hook puts him down, you'd best not kick him a few times to teach him a lesson. Unless he's pulling a weapon, then the threat is still real and you can deal with it. Now, you can't hit him at all for simply pushing you. That's the proportional part of my answer. So how much and how often and where are really a qustion that works on a sliding scale based on the perceived threat at the time.

Takes time. Don't stress it too much. eat less, workout more. Keep at it.

I agree, if you're low on nutirents it cuold very easily cause the problem. I havent' competed much at all in the past 8 years or so. Espically in shoot or mma. I have done the odd grappling tourney here and there. I was looking forward to this naga, I've been really focusing on the ground the last couple years. Oh well, the young guys I have should keep me working for the next one. Good you got to train with your old partner. It's a bummer when you loose a guy like that.

Good question. I like the left front for a couple of reasons. First off, my left hand is better for finess movements such (or at least I've trained it to be so) as intercepting attacks and such. This brings up the second point of keeping my power handback to capatalize on hip torque and impact with it. Since the right has better power potental, it's better off for me to grab with the left and hit with the right, optimally of course. Most attacks with lead appendages will be weaker in delevery due to the limited hip rotatin used. So I won't usually let my good hand's power suffer due to positioning. Same with kicks, I"ll harass with he lead foot,but will use the right ot bring power with. This works out well since I'm kind of coordianted that way. Lastly, if I have to losean appendage early in fight due to injury,best that it's my weak hand, thus preserving the weapon that's likely to be most helpful for me over a wider range of things. These are the things that are pertinate to me. Not a hard fasat rule for efficiency. I think everyone should train to what ever side they are most capable of using well and gravitate there. I don think this should be by experimentation and not just becasue x style does it that way. I also think that once you've gotten the idea, it's best to spend a majority of time working from there just to maximize training time. But that's just me.

Fat and muscle are two entirly different tissues. One does not turn into the other. If you train muscles, they grow. If you don't, they shrink. If you eat more calories than you burn, you're body will store it as fat. If you burn more than you eat, it will take it away; and if you eat and burn in the saem amount you'll be in homostasis and noting will happen. So, if you're doing a ton of crunch work (and I agree with white owl, I'd do crunches) you'll hypertrophy (or grow) the ab muscles. But like bushid man said, you won't notice them if you have fat over them. That's where the burning calories comes into play. And he' right on the spot reduction as well. I have yet to see a study that suggested it was possible.

Very nice find. Thanks for posting. They look far better than the elbow and knee protectors I'm using now. Ordered a pair of both. I'll let you know what I think. Again, thanks for posting good finds like this.

4th Dan Bujin Bugei Jutsu 2nd Dan Gokei Ryu Kempo Jutsu I too often simply say that I'm "ranked in" or a "dan grade" during conversation.

I personally haven't seen too many McDojo type places that cater to the mma crowd. Most of the training is just too heavy on the cardio and elicits too much work for them to be supported by the country club ma crowd. But that's just my experiance, mileage may vary. And if someplace wants to cater to adults rather than kids, so be it. It probibly means that the art or system or combat sport or whatever will retain it's core prinicples longer. Personally, the only kids I teach are my own. I don't want to turn this into a mma/non-mma debate, just give my view on the issues brought to light above in light of me using it as an example. I'm still interested in hearing more feedback in regard to the intial issue on both sides. Good question.

As to the comment above about what mma is like- not traditional, sometimes not graceful, course, and kinda gritty....sounds more like a real fight than what lot's of arts will portray. No, they shouldn't be held as poster children for anyone, but how many of us should. At the end of the day, if martial arts are about fighting, these guys are pretty good examples of that. So the current form of mma might be a good example of the question at hand (although I agree with bushido man- this has been around in one form or another for quite awhile). You have a set of movements, many taken from various arts, deliniated over the past decade or so into a fairly recognizable pattern that works very well for what it's designed for. It's tools that have been around, codified into a set of operational parameters (their rules) that are new. I'd say that it seems to work well given the fact that you can see what's effective by it's continued use in match after match year after year with success. That seems to make it legitmate to me. It has it's own value system in competitive record instead of belt rank. Now, if this has happened for a combat sport, how much different is it to apply it to combat itself? I'd say not much. You're essintally doing the same thing, just using slightly diffent tools at times and altering the mindset to deal with the street and not a ring. We've seen ligitimate bad men grow out of the process, why not more? As bushido man points out, JKD is a great example of just the sort of thing we're talking about. If Lee hadn't made movies his art would have have been every bit as effective, we just wouldn't all have heard of him. The mere fact that his fame is based on ma films seem to give him legitimacy even though the films have little to do with JKD as a whole. For purposes of him ma legacy, it's his development of JKD that sets him apart. How many others, without the fanfare of films, could have done similar? Oh, and Chuck Norris dosn't do push ups, he pushes the earth down.

Bummer. Lot's of ice and lots of anti-inflammitory. If it's not substantially better in a couple of days, get it checked by an ortho. Normally, I'd give it longer, but if you've got a comp pending, best to find out sooner. Assuming that nothing is broken and your ligiments are still substantially intact, then tape....lot's of tape. Good luck.

today- 20 min warm up with 30-40% effort rolls for position. 25 min of work on escaping the mount, bumps, shrimping, in series 6, 30 sec. drills- escaping mount 3, 3 min rolls from knees 5, 3 min roll from standing starting to ramp up to the naga at the end of april. we've got several guys going. Unfortunately, my sister in law was inconsiderate enough to schedule her wedding that weekend , so I'm not going to be able do it.

I also think that it can be a great equalizer agaist greater skill. In your example for instance, a heavy guy with minimal skill was able to just utilize weight to off set the skill difference. Converstly, us smaller guys need to use skill and movement to off set bulk. Each is an advantage. Now, two fighter of equal skill, the winner will in all lilkely be the larger, more conditioned athlete.

today- modified crossfit: 21- (63/45/27 descending each time thru for the dips)-9 of shoulder press dips push ups chest/tris

Size is always a factor, and if properly managed, it's an assest like any other. It's always good to have more functional mass to bring to bear on an opponant. Smaller fighters might give one a problem, espically if the rule set you are training under is designed in such a way that you can't use your superior weight to an advantage. For example, if your system won't allow you to grab or throw someone to the ground or minimized the amount of power you're allowd to bring, this will put you at a bit of a disadvantage. You can overcome it, but stylistically your not being allowed to make the most of your gifts.

Crashing the kick is great. I should throw in too, though, that in certain forms of sparring it can be more difficult to utilize. This tactic really come into it's own when you can power hard in the inside with combos to shift their body posture, or strike and tie up. In rule sets that mandate a break after contact it would be less than ideal due to the close nature of the tactic and the lack of the ability to follow up with more stirkes. Minimal contact will also hinder the movement because you won't be able to really move the individual and overwhelm him. It will still work here, vastly better than with any sort of stoppage, but now as well as it will with forceful (not necissarily full) contact. Still, it's a great tactic but one you have to commit to fully. It's my favorite choice, but even I don't get it done everytime. It's very aggressive and presses the fight hard to the opponant. It's best used in situations where that mindset will sevre the plan well.

MMA to a certain extent has a connotavitve meaning of using tools that have a long reputaion of working in caged free fighting events. Mainly, you're looking at some form of stand up, jj, and wrestling. That's ingnoring a vast amount of skills that could be useful in other venues and situations where a graded response might be called for. Therefore, I'm not sure you can lump new codifications into the "mma" catagory. Espically when they might include some form of weapons training that stems from the basic unarmed principles and striking that would be disallowed in competion....the list can go on. I'm also not saying that everyone who does some for of cross training should should slap a new name on an existing style. See my list of questions above. I'm merely saying that with everyone's divergent gifts and intrests, even those people withing a given art won't look identical and will deviate in their own way. Certainly tidbits picked up here and there will also serve to seperate practitioners further. I don't think it's good if ma-ers out of the same system are carbon copies. We should all look a bit differnt as fighters. For optimization to occur, we must persue skills that we can utilize to their fullest. Some times this will be differnt than the guy next to us. I'd argue that most systems lauched since the beginning of the 20th century, probilby before, haven't come up with much that's new. Creation of something entirly diffent is diffucult after a few thousand years of learning to hurt and kill one another. Unless radical changes occur in physiology, the basic ways to hurt each other will remain the same. Weak points in the human body will be the same, physics for generating power won't change, ect. If radically new, never before seen movements, are needed for the definition of a "new" art then we probibly haven't seen many since Thag put his neanderthalic fist into Grog's face over who owned the water hole out back. Most of what delinates arts is the concepts behind the application of tools and the stratgey of how best to defeat an opponant. How to best utilize your tools to overcome aggression. Those we still see advances in as well as the occassional change in direction ddue to a specific sector that the movements will be used in. That refinment is probibly where most "creation" occurs. Now, I'm not saying I've done this myself. I just see the possibilites in it. I do come out of a style where this amalgamation of tools out of multiple, well understood arts, was placed under an umbrulla set of combative principles, then unified and deliniated by teaching progression. It's served me well as well as given me a framework into which I can incorporate and grow what I do and still keep the form of the goal in mind. As someone above mentioned, there are pleanty of guys out there who just slap somehting together. They probilby aren't all that good. So be it, the proof is always on the floor. It's a shame they feel they need to do it for no reason and without sufficient cause or understanding. But it's not hurting us at all. There can be a place for it. Like I said- maybe

At least she didn't whack you