gzk

Royce choked out Remco Pardoel in UFC 2, giving up about 80 pounds. Remco I believe won a few national Judo titles before concentrating on Jiu-Jitsu and MMA. I don't really know who's who in Judo, so maybe he wasn't what you'd call world class.

Sometimes I feel like I'd be wearing a dunce cap on the mat if it couldn't potentially put an eye out... In grappling I find it very difficult to get to a decent position, let alone think about submitting my partner. I posture up in the guard, but the second I try to do anything I just get swept into mount and any escape I know rarely works and is often countered. Ditto for guys passing my guard. I know a couple of side control escapes but I can't make them work on anyone unless they take pity on me, tell me what I'm doing wrong and lower the resistance. I have trouble thinking of anything quickly enough and spend most of my time trying (and failing) to avoid losing position or getting submitted. In standup I find it agonising to try and keep my hands up for as long as is required and I have to disengage to drop my hands for a second to try and recover. It's the same for repetitive fitness stuff; I hate slacking off but sometimes I simply can't make my body comply. I know I need to drop 30kg (about 65 lbs) and develop better sleeping habits, but I don't intend to stop training until then. Now, I know I should be leaving my ego at the door, not expecting to progress on anyone else's scale. I got utterly slaughtered by a guy who only just graded up into our BJJ class but I know that's because he's been going to open mat sessions that I can't make it to and is a freak athlete. I don't care about that. What I don't want to do is become a burden to my instructors and training partners. The guy who you avoid partnering with because you won't learn anything, or who keeps getting drills wrong. Have you ever been in a similar situation? How were you able to deal with it? Am I making too big a deal of this?

Depends where and how hard you hit them, but the one with weaker abs - usually the one with the fat belly but not always - will probably feel more pain. It also depends on how conditioned each fighter is to feeling that type of pain.

I would definitely take BJJ and either TKD or MT; I wouldn't do both TKD and MT at the same time. There are a lot of similar-but-different techniques in those two styles that it would be too easy to get confused, especially if you're already taking one other style. You wouldn't want to get thrown out of the dojang for clinch knees or something If your priority is practical self defence I would probably recommend MT over TKD, but watch a class of each first (and if they don't let you do this, this is a huge red flag - don't sign up there!) and see what you think. As for how long to be able to defend yourself, it depends how long you train, what your co-ordination, balance, etc is like naturally, how good your training and instruction is, your attitude, what self-defence scenarios you're likely to find yourself in in your area, etc. Most likely it will be a gradual, continual process. I think if you have the time and money, cross training is a great idea. However, you'll want to cross train in styles that compliment each other. TKD and MT cover the same aspect of fighting, pretty much (standup striking and some limited standup grappling), which is why I recommended you definitely take BJJ as it will cover takedowns and ground grappling. If someone manages to take you down in the street, and worse still, mount you, TKD or MT aren't going to do a lot for you. If you need to hit and run, BJJ isn't going to be your best choice.

Check http://www.ufc.com/index.cfm?fa=LearnUFC.Rules. Says nothing about standing joint locks being illegal.

As for my favourite techniques, I would have to say: knees from double-collar tie ("Muay Thai clinch"), offensive armdrag to give you the opponent's back (a standup grappling technique we use in shootfighting), and the far-side armbar from kneeride (BJJ).

I'm sure that's a large part of it, and I don't disagree with you, but my point is more that the Semaphore UFC was much better and more significant than a lot of people give it credit for. Although, if Severn had no idea how to escape from submissions, I doubt it would have taken Gracie 15 minutes to submit him.

That's what Zuffa would like to see him as. Whenever I see any promo material, news story, or anything else that involves a summary of the UFC's history, it portrays the UFC from 1993 to 2001 as some wild, anarchic circus. Then Dana White came in and cleaned up, and now it's highly respectable. Art Davie and Rorion Gracie barely, if ever, rate a mention. I mean, they only created the UFC - something I've seen Dana White credited for, actually. And while I agree that the organization is better now, and quality of fighters is better, some of my favourite fights and fighters were in the pre-Zuffa UFC. We will never see anything like Gracie vs Severn again, where the little guy gave up huge weight and reach disadvantages, yet won from the bottom with a submission. Nor Rhodes vs Ettish, where we saw the utter destruction of a guy unprepared for (almost) no holds barred fighting and thus learned to question the value of belt ranks. But oh no, they'd have you believe that was all disorganized "spectacle". Anyone else noticed this lack of respect for the Semaphore-era UFC?

No, that was Cage Fury. A "minor leage" competition. What is boxing, if not a martial art? What was Bas Rutten training Kimbo in, if not martial arts? With good training, yes, it would be possible. Yet, it doesn't seem to be happening - who in the UFC now (or in the last 7 years or so) would you consider a "street fighter"? As for Tank Abbot, yes he did well when UFC was new, though he never won the tournament or any weight division belts. His record now is 9-13. And to achieve that, he trained in boxing for over 10 years and wrestled at high school and college. Well style is a matter of taste of course, personally, I like watching guys who can transition smoothly from one phase of a fight to the other - standup striking to clinch to ground and back again - and that's what good MMA is all about. As for tradition, well, how about Pankration, from ancient Greece? Brazilian Vale Tudo is from the 1920s. I would think that would make MMA fairly traditional. Now, having said all that, while I do consider MMA to be martial arts, I don't consider it a martial art. Someone may specify their own MMA system, such as Pat Miletich's MFS, that, I would consider a martial art.

Apparently Pencak Silat does.

It's not all like that. To use a baseball analogy, the IFL is a AAA-standard competition at best. The majors are the UFC and PRIDE, with the occasional match in K-1's MMA events being of similar standards. There are plenty of mostly-standup fights in the UFC these days and PRIDE as well, though I mostly watch UFC. You are correct that there is no "MMA system". A school may teach (or claim to teach) an "MMA" curriculum, but it would be their MMA system, not the MMA system. My MMA system might be Muay Thai and BJJ, someone else's might be Karate and Judo, someone else's might be Boxing and Greco-Roman Wrestling with Pentcak Silat for good measure.

BJJ * escape from side control headlock ** bridge and turn onto side facing opponent, slip elbow between your body and ground, and grab far arm of opponent ** walk toward opponent's back ** hook opponent's nearest leg with your nearest leg ** pin wrist of opponent's headlocking arm with your arm that isn't grabbing their arm already ** pull head out of headlock ** pull opponent's wrist around their back into hammerlock The other stuff was revision of stuff I know..

I'm pretty sure I saw Van Damme doing that in the movie Kickboxer

I have either 2 or 4 hours of formal training each week depending on whether I can make it on the Wednesday or not (usually I can't during baseball season). After each class I have half an hour to review what I learned and make notes. I'm starting a routine of doing about 45 minutes as soon as I wake up in the morning before I get in the shower, then an hour in the evening. During these personal sessions I work on both fitness and technique.

Opposite shoulder! No wonder I was always falling over! Yup, that'll do it! Good luck. I just managed to do three consecutive back rolls I think I was doing it right; most of my problem was being afraid to roll over and lacking momentum. I think I got the head/shoulder co-ordination right, since I ended up in the right position. I'm going to try and get to class earlier and do some more there in my gi on the mat. Bring on that front sweep! Thanks heaps ps1. Are you teaching any grappling classes at the moment?

I've noticed that people seem to be horrified at injuries incurred during MA competition or training, but injuries incurred during "normal" sports are acceptable, regardless of actual severity. I've been bruised up from being hit by a cricket ball at training (sorta like baseball, for those of you who don't know) and gotten no real grief over it, torn my hamstring playing baseball so bad my leg looked like a pool table leg painted purple and nearly required surgery, torn my rotator cuff playing baseball and missed close to a year of sports, yet the slightest bruising from MA training (that didn't even hurt) and I'm a maniac?!? Anyone had that before?

Good work Matt

I train with a right hand/orthodox stance. I would guess that training in both is uncommon because while it can mess up your opponent, it can also mess you up; it makes keeping your balance harder, it can make your responses a little slower, make ranging more difficult, etc. For all the opponent-confusing value it has, you still have to land good shots and avoid those of your opponent. Having said all that, I do think training in your non-preferred stance to some degree is a good idea, just in case you ever find the need to use it.

They tend to get freaked out a little when I show them a choke or three

In fighting stance, we have fists up in the armpit/shoulder/jaw area, as in boxing. We also practice striking from the "fence" stance (a passive pre-fight stance for self-defence situations) in which the hands are out in front of you, strong hand back a little, at about rib height.

I don't know how things work at your dojo but is it possible he started off easy then escalated when he saw you were dealing with him without too many problems? If that is the case I don't know that I would call that losing control, more lifting intensity appropriate to your skill.

Hey gzk, do you guys do any weapons defense? If so does the shell tie in with that at all? Not so far, but I would imagine that if I had to defend against at weapon aimed at the head I would probably go to the shell pretty automatically. Another structure we use is the "visor", which is something like how your arms should end up after throwing a horizontal elbow, with what would be the striking arm locked on to the other arm.

In regards to you throwing your arms in front of your face "like a spastic", are you talking about guarding your face with relatively stationary arms, or are you talking about throwing them around wildly trying to parry? Guarding your face with your forearms is a perfectly valid form of defence against an unexpected strike or flurry, boxers and others do it, and call it "covering up". We call it "the shell" and anchor our hands on our heads, toward the forehead region, leaving enough space to look through the arms at the opponent/attacker and practise holding our ground while taking (gloved) punches on the shell. The reason you're not reacting as if you're in a fight is because until you see the punch you don't even know you're in one yet, which is a totally different situation to what you've probably been training. As far as getting exhausted to the point where you can't train, are you talking about gassing out or muscle stiffness? Unless you're doing something very unusual, the solution is probably to just keep training more and you'll get used ot it.

Gracie Maintains Innocence

The Sweet Science Wrestlemag It may just be my prejudices (in fact it almost certainly is!) but I'm with YoungMan on this. If it was going to happen anywhere it was going to be MMA. Only because it is dominated by such a pro sport "win at all costs" ethos. we've seen it in boxing (I don't know about kickboxing, K1 etc?) and I think MMA was always going to be next. Next? It had already happened - Vitor Belfort and Kevin Randleman, among others, and I agree with you that the cause is the pro sport "win at all costs" ethos, but that is because we are talking about top-level pro athletes, not MMA in particular. In fact, if you compare the level of incidence for MMA over, let's say, the 15 years it's had worldwide exposure against other pro sports, I think you'll find it not too high. Like any sport, there are top-level pro MMA competitions, minor and semi-pro MMA competitions, and entry level amateur MMA competitions. This is a pro sport problem, not an MMA problem.