SubGrappler

You can compete as soon as you start, however I think most people would recommend that you at least train for 1-2 months before you enter a tournament (unless you've had prior grappling experience such as wrestling or judo). Tournaments are divided up by belts, weight divisions, and age, so if you were to go to a tournament, you'd fight against other white belts who were your weight and between 30-35 years of age.

You started off great here. But how do you start there and end up here? A 10 year old isnt going to do much better than a 6 or 7 year old. If you dont want to be a laughing stock, it should be at least 18 years old for a black belt- and none of that junior black belt stuff either- thats just as bad. Even an 18 year old is going to have a difficult time defeating a full grown adult, even though he would by definition also be an adult- theres a difference between a "man" and a "kid" - an 18 year old is still a kid and has a lot to overcome to beat a man in a fight. Of course thats not true, but your rank should be represenative of your fighting ability. You're practicing fighting moves- I should hope that if a black belt is signifying your extended knowledge of it he should be able to be a competent fighter.

Doing Muay Thai doesnt mean you're invincible, and doing TKD doesnt mean that you cant fight, buts its a simple fact of the matter that Muay Thai produces far more full contact champions than does TKD- it simply has to do with their training regimes. For example, in Muay Thai, you are trained over time to increase your power, often by heavy bag and pad work. You work combinations, learn how to hit, and learn how to get hit. In the process, you also harden your body and become more resilent to hits- If an average joe took a kick in the leg from a seasoned muay thai fighter, hed be hurting real bad. TKD has a lot of focus on forms, high kicks, and less hand techniques. In a full contact striking match, punches are far more important than kicks, almost to the point that kicks could not really be considered a necessity, but rather a great addition to your arsenal. Pulling your kicks, by lack of bag work, less effective kicking techniques, and kicking with the instep of your foot, lessens the power you hold behind your strikes. I've done both styles, and with my minimal experience in Muay Thai, the only thing I can say is that Im 100% impressed with those fighters, and I've managed to be around a few guys who were top notch in TKD and TSD. Its not a knock against TKD, its just that standup striking belongs to the world of Muay Thai- they literally have worked it into a perfect science.

Agreed- you described Muay Thai rather well- just bear in mind that the training itself does a good job of weeding out non hackers.

Its been my experience that people who claimed they can take on multiple attackers have never been in a real life altercation and speculate based on their sparring sessions. I train with people who instruct Aikido- in their words, its not something that you want to be fighting with.

I believe the rules have it that you cant punch to the face once on the ground. Its a nice little stepping stone between grappling arts such as Judo and BJJ to full contact MMA. I think its entertaining to watch, even though most of the fighters are white and blue belts. MMA with a gi is something I think could be very entertaining to watch. These types of competitions are very popular (so Im told) in Europe and Austrailia.

I dont believe a real Muay Thai fighter is going to kick with the instep of his foot, buckle under the pressure of a few weak jabs to the face, turn his back to his opponent, and fight with his hands at his waist. Trying to do fancy kicks like those shown in that video will get you seriously hurt against a thai/full contact fighter with minimal experience.

That fight was a fake- I dont even believe that the "thai" fighter was in fact a muay thai fighter period. Anyways, in reference to the first post: Back kicks are exceptionally difficult to perform in a full contact competition. Besides seeing the kick coming from a mile away, you open yourself up to so many attacks that its a technique that you should not be reliant on. His ego didnt make him lose- he was simply outclassed. Muay Thai fighters train for full contact striking matches where the idea is to beat your opponent to a pulp inside a few minutes- its fast, brutal, and hard on the body. You could see the difference in the conditioning between the fighters- the Thai fighter is conditioned to take hard shots to the legs and other parts of his body- the TKD fighter was not. TKD wasnt designed to do the same thing that Muay Thai was- now if you wanted to try to dismount someone on horseback, you'd have better luck with TKD than Muay Thai.

I personally think your problem is that you're adding more to your regime when you should be subtracting. As men get older, their strength actually does increase with age (up until your 50's actually) but other things, such as speed, endurance, and recovery time, diminish a bit. That being said, its quite possible for you at 44 to still be able to hang in there with people half your age when your sparring them. The only thing you need to remember is that you're going to need more recovery time than they will in between workouts. That is the unfortunate drawback of age that catches up to everyone. Rather than working out more frequently, try giving yourself some rest in between workouts- you may find that you'll feel much better afterwards.

Well, the worst is when you get a big guy who knows how to hold and gets to your cross side. Theres 3 things I can attribute to training with guys like this: 1: I get put in uncomfortable positions often, so over time I get used to being comfortable in bad positions (i.e. I dont panic in cross side for example). 2: I'm used to fighting tired- important if you ever want to be a good fighter, regardless of the venue you choose- anyone can fight when they're fresh, but being able to fight when you're tired gives you a leg up on the competition. 3. It improves the technicality of my game- you're not going to force your way out of positions with power, which leaves you with technique. If you can escape from a 250lb mans cross side pin a 150lb guy will be easy.

Attack his collar- it doesnt require a great deal of movement on your behalf, and it may bug him enough to start defending (otherwise you just may catch him).

Why would you call him arrogant? I cant speak for UseoForce however, from what I saw of Ultimate fighter 2, he seemed to have quite the ego. I respect him alot, however I thought his arrogance was quite apparent from what I see of him. But thats probably what helps him stay confident in his strategy. He didnt have a poor attitude- he was pushing his fighters to make them as best as they can be. Hes a 4 time collegiate champion beyond the fact thats hes probably the most dominant champion in the history of MMA- Matt Hughes knows what it takes to be a champion and know how to push people. Hughes kinda reminded me of my own coach- there are times that you need to light a fire under someone, and hes not going to pat anyone on the back. One of my friends in Ohio, who's quite good in BJJ, trained with him and said that hes exceptionally respectfull and one of the nicest guys you want to meet. Theres a difference when someone's trying to be your friend and when someone's trying to be your coach.

People larger than you often hold a "sizeable" advantage over you- thats the world of real fighting. That being said though, one of the advantages of a smaller fighter over a larger one is that a smaller fighter has much more potential to have greater endurance than the larger fighter. It is in this respect that endurance is can be the most important attribute in a fight, and it is often this way (wearing your opponent down) that smaller fighters have often defeated larger ones.

Why would you call him arrogant?

Imagine that..... You mean to tell me that you could use these techniques against some random joe on the street? I'm calling you out on that one- theres no way that techniques that work on the best fighters in the world could possibly work against some untrained brawler

Excellent post, I agree 100%. Personally, I think the whole reason people try to debunk the idea that you have to fight in the ring to be a good martial artist is because they themselves are afraid to step up to the plate and try it themselves. You do NOT have to compete or fight MMA to be a good martial artist, but the best ones happen to be those who do compete. So many others want to be on the same skill level as those fighters, but do not want to put in the time and effort, nor do they want to take the risks of stepping into the ring and putting it on the line, so they try to bring those fighters down to their level by lessening their achievements and using things like rules as excuses as to why they cant fight.

This is the same kind of fight Im thinking of too. Of course, it is entirely possible that Hughes may decide to play the smart game and keep the fight on his feet, kinda like Rulon Gardner vs Hidehiko Yoshida. Thats a vague statement- one of the best at subs compared to who? To MMA fighters in general? If thats the case, then I would agree, but in comparison with other BJJ MMA fighters, Royce is far from having the submissions that these other guys have. Im going to be cheering for Royce as much as possible during the fight, but someone like Renato Verissimo, who I believe is 10 x better than Royce, could not make Hughes tap in their fight.

Im just currently learning some Muay Thai, so I'll fill you in on that once I get a little more experienced. As far as transitioning, grappling and striking have completely different philosophies- now I know why you'll never teach a pure grappler to be as good as someone who started out with striking, and a pure striker will never achieve the level of someone who started out grappling. As far as grappling is concerned, one of the "easy" things I think is the high learning curve in the beginning- you start off learning the moment you start getting submitted and start to build up a submission defense very fast. The difficult part in grappling is the better you get, the harder it is to get better- for example, your skill level may improve 10 fold in your first year, but the longer you train, the more time required to get to the next level, and that leads to a bunch of impatient purple belt grapplers that want to go ahead and fight MMA (in my opinion).

I think it would be more accurate to say holding back no control of power.

If you can give us a rough idea of who is in your town and what schools you have an opportunity to train at, it would be helpfull. For example, people will say that BJJ has better groundwork than Judo, but thats comparing best case scenario (i.e. black belt instructor vs black belt instructor). Natrually, opinions will change according to situations- a better instructor may dictate a more suitable choice for a style.

I'd like to know which fighters these are. I've never seen a striker win against a grappler with pure striking. Sometimes there are bouts in which the standup fight is mutual, in that both fighters prefer that phase of combat (i.e. Jens Pulver vs Takanori Gomi, Nick Diaz vs Robbie Lawler) but in the event that one of those standup fighters fought someone they knew had no ground experience, the intelligent ones would take them to the ground immediately. In other words, some fighters elect to keep the fight standing because they respect their opponents ground work, and the opposite is also true. They used striking in conjunction with grappling training as well. Want to know why people like Liddel and Cro Cop are so vicious with their strikes? Because they know they have great takedown defense. Both know that they swing for the fences, so to speak, because if their opponent manages to evade and clinch (or shoot in) they've got exceptional skills from that position. In swinging for the KO, they open themselves up to a takedown much more so than if they fought conservatively. This is how an Olympic wrestler in Dan Henderson could be taken down by a BJJ fighter with average takedowns in Murillo Bustamante. To further illustrate my point, look at K-1 fighters such as Peter Aerts, Stefan Leko, and Jerome LeBanner who have not shared the success that Cro Cop has in MMA. In my opinion, these kickboxers are better than Cro Cop (in K-1), but Cro Cop has adapted to the MMA game much better because of how well he picked up the sprawl and clinch work. MMA fighters dont advocate ground fighting as being the ultimate form of fighting- MMA fighters cross train in all venues of fighting from striking, to clinch work, to ground grappling. The only reason why you see grappling brought up so often in these arguments is because ground fighting is easily the most neglected part of fighting in todays martial arts systems. There are many fighters that utilize the flying knee. Watch Alistair Overeem or Pele if you enjoy those. To be better at what you "do" is only going to help you if you can keep the fight in that phase. A perfect example goes all the way back to the original UFC's. Every fighter that Royce fought was better at what they "did" than Royce was at takedowns. Pat Smith, Gerard Gordeua, and Jason Delucia were much much better at striking than Royce was at takedowns- Royce's takedowns were absolutely atrocious then- he basically made every mistake you possibly could when attempting a double leg, but this worked for him, not because he was good at it, but because his opponents had never even practiced it before.

Im basing this on seeing how he fought in his prime (10 years ago) and his latest fights, including 2 bouts against Yoshida, Akebono, and Tokoro. Royce has been working to try to make himself more well rounded. He showed improved striking ability against Yoshida, and even showed half decent takedowns against Tokoro. Unfortunately, while he is improving in these two aspects of the game, those skills still fall grossly behind the average MMAist. Royce is never going to stun someone with his standup, let alone knock someone out, and people arent very concerned with his takedowns either. Royce is almost 40, Hughes is a dominant champion in his prime. Hughes is also much more well rounded than Royce is. Royce's jiu jitsu could be listed as the least of his generation (Renzo, Rickson, and Royler all have better jiu jitsu) and he plays a very different guard game. Allow me to elaborate. BJJ guardwork for MMA and self defense are two different things. The BJJ you see Royce doing is exactly what you want to do in a self defense situation- he stays close, he stays tight, and plays the waiting game- this is exactly what Helio Gracies means when he says that people do jiu jitsu to themselves, and this is why the Gracies (namely Royce) enjoyed fighting under no time limit so often. The advantage of this style of play is that you protect yourself extremely well and never open up to any attacks. The disadvantage is that in being so defensive, its difficult to finish your opponent until he makes a mistake, which could be a time consuming process. Now, guardwork for MMA has to be entirely different, namely for BJJ fighters who often make their game there. Today's MMA has time limits, frequent standups, and rounds. These are not favorable for a ground game, so what this means is that if you find yourself working from the guard in MMA, you must actively work in order to submit your opponent, sweep him, or escape. Holding your opponent will only result in a penalty (in Pride) or a standup (in UFC). As a result of the rules forcing the guard players to set up their submissions, rather than wait for their opponent, they open themselves up for attack more often. In attacking arms and necks with submissions and attempting sweeps, fighters have to open up space, which leads them to get hit more often. The advantage of this style is that you can end the fight much much quicker, and by constantly attacking your opponent, it becomes like a shotgun effect- fire alot of attempts, and something's going to land. The disadvantage is that you leave yourself vulnerable to being knocked out moreso than the other style of guardwork. Royce plays his street defense style of guard. If he does not attempt to open up and attack Hughes from the guard, he will have a very difficult time defeating Hughes. There lies the other problem with Royce's style for modern day MMA- With no time limit, you have to soundly defeat your opponent. Since the fight goes to the judges after 3 rounds, Hughes doesnt need to knock Royce out as much as he simply needs to control the fight, which he can do without overexposing himself to a submission. Right now, I believe the saving grace for Royce is that Hughes has shown a weakness against good guardwork. I'll be cheering for Royce, but I think the odds are stacked against him.

How could you possibly think Hughes gives MMA a bad name? Hes a world class fighter and world class guy. About the fight, Im going to be cheering for Royce, but even under the very slim chance that he wins, hes going to be hurt bad. I dont think Royce is good enough to catch Hughes, but Hughes has shown in the past that hes vulnerable to triangles, which may turn out to be Royce's saving grace.

Kettlebells do a great job of recruiting muscles when you do a workout. Many freeweight and body building type exercises only work specific muscle groups- great if you want to have a nice physique, but it "teaches" your muscles to work in isolation, whereas the kettlebells work together with stabilizing muscles. For instance, in any sport you do, you never use just one muscle at a time, as you do in body building exercises, but rather numerous muscle groups, as you would with kettlebell workouts. My results with them have been rather good- better than I had when doing a more traditional body building workout. Atkins doesnt put you at a loss for energy, but rather while your body is attempting to adapt to the diet, you will feel rather tired. This often lasts for about a week. Most people's bodies burn carbohydrates as a primary source of energy. In Atkins, you're trying to shift the main source of energy from carbs to fat. The actual chemical process for breaking down fat into energy takes much longer than carbs. When you start limiting your carbs, you limit your bodies primary source of energy, which makes you tired. Once your body adapts and starts using the fat for energy, you'll be fine. Its almost like slowing down the gears so you can throw them in reverse. As far as needing energy to burn, there is 4 calories contained in a gram of protein or carbohydrate. There are 9 calories per gram of fat- you'll could very well double your daily calorie intake.

I commend you for your service, but who do you think is teaching these soldiers their hand to hand techniques? I had the pleasure of training with a kid who was going to SEAL camp and he was quite the physical specimen. Incredibly strong, amazing endurance, and as humble as could be, but he still fell victim to submissions like everyone else. The best sport fighter wouldnt last 5 or 6 seconds IF that soldier was armed. If its a hand to hand fight, then he did something wrong.