For those of you that haven't seen it, the post-fight rant of James Thompson is making its way across the internetz. He had just been on the losing side of a dubious decision to "the world's strongest man", Mariusz Pudzianowski. At any rate, here's the hilarious and NSFW video (language):
The real score should have been a majority draw, meaning there would be a 3rd round. The 3rd round didn't happen due to the scores being incorrectly counted, and as such, the fight is now a "no-contest".
Walked in Monday morning to work and booted up my laptop to kill some time at work/watch several of the MMA fights I missed this weekend. This weekend I was pretty busy playing Gears of War (which I bought pre-owned for XBOX on Black Friday. Go 'Merica!!!).
It was a busy weekend splitting time between doing nothing and killing the Locust Horde while intermittently cursing my TV and lack of skill with the XBOX controller.
At any rate, the video below is 90 seconds worth of grappling with a bevy of triangle/armbar submission attempts from the bottom by Mamed Khalidov versus Jesse Taylor (most known for getting wasted at a casino, breaking glass, and insulting a woman while drunk on The Ultimate Fighter show. Keep it classy!)
At any rate, Taylor wastes no time getting a double leg, putting his head on Khalidov's chest and seemingly settling for a ground and pound decision.
Unfortunately for Mr. Taylor, the lack of sweat, his lack of posture, and Khalidov's dearth of BJJ fundamentals leads to some near missed armbar/triangles and finally caps with a pretty textbook turtle roll/scramble to kneebar following an armbar attempt.
All inside the first round, and all inside of 90 seconds.
It's the kind of transition you see on a DVD/instructional and think, "man, I dunno. The guy should f'ing know if i turtle then I may go for the leg...and he will hammerfist my head into the canvas while I latch onto his leg, then he'll pass or worse yet take my back."
Well....someone didn't send the memo to Mr. Taylor.
Enjoy.
Jump to 7:52 for the start of the brief and sweet fight.
Having tried this transition probably 50 times and hit it perhaps 4 times in Gi and NoGi, it's pretty badass to see this guy hit it inside of 90 seconds on a professional fighter. You can tell by the 2nd or 3rd armbar attempt that's pretty deep as Taylor tries to pull out of the triangle, that Mr. Taylor's submission survival clock is ticking down to "0:00".
--
That being said, Saturday at open mat, I was rolling with a white belt.
I'd hurt my knee pretty severely earlier in the week so I was just happy to roll around on the mat. At any rate, I finally hit guard, got one hand deep in the collar and collar choked him with the first collar choke I learned in Judo. At any rate, he asked about how to defend the collar choke with his hands, what to do once the choke was set, and I told him the best way as taught to me by one of my coaches is "don't be there in the first place." My coach wasn't being facetious, he just meant that good posture will avoid many submissions before they start. Good posture avoids danger(s) and good posture leads to passing. Passing leads to control/position. Position leads to submission(s).
At any rate, it's interesting to see basics and semi-basics lead to a quick and relatively punishment-avoiding submission in MMA. Taylor is no world beater, but he's not a guy making his pro debut either.
Found this over at Submission Control. At that point, I then realized I'd seen a clip of this guy with his omoplata sweep posted over at sherdog. A sweep I had played with and gotten to work with the Gi a couple days later.
At any rate, I'm posting this b/c it's a Great interview in terms of commitment to the craft of grappling and life in general.
"The ego is a trickster and I believe our own ego’s control us heavily. This is why the typical American person is fulfilling a ridiculous quest to acquire trinkets. These trinkets, cars, houses, things, give them a shallow happiness and as they feed the ego it grows steadily. An additive cycle is formed and people become married to things like houses and cars. I saw this happening in my life and I became disgusted. I saw myself growing old while acquiring trinkets, only to die once I’ve acquired everything our society deems important."
"If you are reading this and work a job you hate, and you have a dream, then do the following: Quit your job immediately, isolate yourself and pursue your goal relentlessly. The more people who tell you you’re crazy the better. If your family does not support you then that is a sign you’re making the right decision! Lose your trinkets, and find the best environment in the world for you to achieve your goals and move there."
"Reach ten thousand hours of deliberate practice, and you’ll separate yourself from the mediocre and reach an elite group of individuals. Once you’re the elite, success comes from determination, will-power, teamwork and passion."
"My humble advice is don’t lie to yourself. Don’t say you want to be a Black Belt World Champion when you drink alcohol on the weekends and train once a day. Don’t claim you want to be the best when you don’t compete in every tournament, you don’t drill for hours a day and you don’t train through pain and injury. If you’re injured you train, if your mom dies you train, if you’re sick you train. I’m not perfect, but try to be. I train twice a day no matter what, I’m always early to class, I stay at home on weekends and I use that time to work on improving myself. I drill constantly; I train sick and never complain about injuries. Finally, as soon as I find myself in an environment that is not congruent with my goals I change my environment."
"Never show weakness, never look tired, never complain, never give up. Drill more than everyone."
Before the UFC, before MMA exploded into the scene, before Yoshida fought in Pride, before Ronda Rousey began her armbar demolition of women fighters......there have been other great mat work specialists.
For those uninformed, Newaza, or Ne (ground) Waza (technique) is the term for the ground aspect of Judo.
Behold, it exists!
Guys like Kashiwazaki, Neil Adams, and other have taken down, pinned, and submitted fellow Judoka on the mats since Judo began.
A common misconception about Judoka is a relative lack of skill on the ground.
The rules in Judo, specifically due to short(er) time on the ground allowed, differing rules on legal submissions, and the ability to win by pinning akin to wrestling dramatically changes the mat work.
Kosen, or what has become high school Judo rules in Japan still allows for much longer mat work. Additionally, in training Judo 5-6 days a week, the body simply cannot routinely do full speed throwing/randori without injury. As such, often mat work is done in the morning and/or on off nights while standing, throwing, randori occurs on the other nights of the week's training.
At any rate, this post was going to be about Flavio Canto, but I think I'll hold off on that for the time being, and instead, rewind to one of the earlist Judokas in the UFC and semi-modern MMA. (interesting that we now view early UFC's at old or the pioneer days of MMA and it only dates back to 1993). Being present for the birth of a cumulative combat sport is awesome.
At any rate, Remco Pardoel fought waaaay back in UFC 2. He finished his first 2 opponents before succumbing to Royce Gracie.
Remco would go on to continue fighting after the UFC in other MMA organizations to a final record of 9-6-1.
Here's Remco taking down and submitting at Karate practitioner at UFC 7.
Grappling is awesome. In virtually all of its forms. Since I saw the final the other day with the rolling/leg-grip Kimura/omoplata, I've been going through and watching all the Sambo World Championships I can find. Here's an awesome armbar finish.
Last year, I was up at the Abu Dhabi Pro Trials. Some of the coaches milling about were guys like Renzo Graice, Lloyd Irvin, Marcelo Garcia, Cyborg (also competed).
At any rate, Marcelo's guys were quick to attack the neck as it's a favorite of their instructor.
If you've read previous posts on here, I like the submissions and takedowns for which I routinely find entries and opportunities to attack in a multitude of places: the arm and the neck seem to present themselves quite a bit. As such I like chokes and armbars.
I also like things that don't come naturally to me. The Guillotine fits all of the above criteria. I've found and gotten together the candidate for Guillotine Master in Marcelo Garcia and below is a HL of his, then him teaching the guillotine from a variety of positions. Now, go attack that neck.
See highlight for examples:
See Marcelo's Guillotine from Sidemount:
See Marcelo's Guillotine from Butterfly Guard:
Aaaaaand, see Marcelo's Guillotine from Mount :) :
The "Judo Jumper": Coming to a Fall Fashion Line near you!
I like techniques with many entries, many set-ups, many options in which it can be used.
Owing to the fact that I've hit uchimata in MMA, Judo, and BJJ, today we will revisit one of the initially easiest Judo throws there is. That and the fact that recently I hit a sweet uchimata to head/arm choke in a tournament.
Again, like the cross-collar choke, or the armbar, do not confuse basic with inferior. What makes it basic is how applicable it is from a variety of situations.
I was never much of an uchimata guy from the beginning of Judo. In fact, I tended to use it as a counter to weak/poorly set up single leg attempts than as an outright throw on my part.
See here:
Don't let anyone tell you this "basic" technique will not work.
I've used it in gi, nogi, bjj, judo, wrestling, mma sparring with 16 oz. gloves.
This works.
Moving on....
Once I found that the uchimata worked as a counter, and I began competing more frequently in BJJ, I started looking for lower risk throws that did not open my back, involve complete commitment. Particularly as players compete at a higher level, they adopt defensive posture and look to hop on your back as you enter for a big throw. Again, in Judo, the defensive, avoidant, throw-averse-resistant player will be penalized into changing his posture. In BJJ, he can remain here as long as he would like. Granted, he poses little if any threat to you other than perhaps an ankle pick or a single leg, provided you are wary and control with a strong lapel/sleeve grip.....but he can be more difficult to throw, particularly early in your Judo trainingz.
See defensive posture here:
Again, we've all competed with and trained with the player in the white gi on the above left. He may seem strong and impervious to deep entries, but this is not so!
He is dead set on maintaining his Vulcan death grip and keeping his hips as far back as possible to avoid the big entry/forward throw. To quote my coach, his hips are far away from you which does make him perhaps harder to throw, but he also has virtually decided he will not be doing any big throwing as well.
The above stance is the perfect entry for uchimata. Specifically, a variation of uchimata known as "ken-ken".
The Japanese call it Ken-Ken uchimata, simply meaning "again, again" b/c of the again and again hopping action it often takes to tip the little resistant tea pot right over onto his back.
Notice the brief, but extremely bent over posture of the non-Japanese player:
His weight has broken the center of gravity line, with a tug/kuzushi, his weight will be even more unbalanced, and driving his head down and around will facilitate this throw into the mat.
Happy Trainingz!
As a bonus, here is probably the greatest documented Uchimata player demo'ing one of his many variations of this classic and ergonomic throw:
Despite respecting the martial arts, Budo, a sense of fair play et cetera...I still like a good mean mugging, staredown, or pre-fight staredown that gets out of hand.
I don't know if they don't like one another, if one guy is from a different part of the post Soviet bloc, whatever. It's entertaining. Here's to you, Tomasz Narkun and Saparbek Safarov, for putting the spectacle in the sport for today!
While I can't promise to teach you the mystery of Chess Boxing.....Marcelo can learn you right good about some grapplin'
School's in session. Grab a pen. Or some coffee. Grab your Teddy Ruxpin. A pack of smokes if need be. Whatever.
Marcelo is about to break down his own performance and some of what he remembers thinking during the last ADCC. You can't really put a price on this kind of knowledge, b/c well, you just can't.
Quick question grappler, is Ezekiel the name of:
a) 6th century BC priest/prophet whose 7 visions comprise a biblical book of the same name
b) Ezekiel Paraguassu, member of the Brazilian National Judo Team who choked a number of Gracie Barra black belts from inside the guard with the sleeve choke now given his namesake
c) both of the above
d) none of the above
---------------------
The correct answer is "C".
That being said, this was one of the first chokes I learned in Judo about 7 years ago. I'd gotten away from it in the past few years, but like most "basic chokes", you find over time, it's not the choke that doesn't work or is easily prevented, but rather you lack discipline in your set up.
Often, earlier in my Judo trainingz, I'd remark a particular throw was difficult, or not suited to my size. There is some truth to this, but as my old school Judo coach always would say half jokingly and half deadly f***ing seriously:
1) you lack discipline.
2) if done right, no can defend.
The idea being that, through diligent study, the throw will become eas/y(ier).
The basics work well in a multitude of scenarios, and if done correctly, they are very difficult to stop.
Above tangent aside, the following are 2 Judo greats demonstrating the fine(r) points of the Ezekiel choke. It is a rare choke done inside the guard, a great choke to set up other attacks/make your opponent react/defend, and works from a variety of positions. Like the guillotine, if your opponent does not respect the choke, and does not defend with vigor, he will get choked the f*** out.
Here's Koji Komuro, the "Komlock" showing his version(s):
And, the truly inimitable Katsuhiko Kashiwazaki showing his wares:
Sweated out my hangover at a nice afternoon open mat session. Definitely not on my "A" game, but I feel better and tonight I will sleep deep, pleasant, catatonic sleep.
Thank you to Judo and Jiu-Jitsu for:
keeping me humble
teaching me the meaning of a team
the friends I've made
the coaches I've learned from
teaching me the value of "kaizen", or continual improvement
helping me minimize many of the bad habits/vices which have plagued my personal life
teaching me patience, determination, work ethic, and finesse
reminding me that I know far less than I like to think I do
