BAMMA 3 – MMA show at the NEC

Last weekend I attended BAMMA 3 at the NEC with some friends. I’ve only been to a few MMA live events and have generally enjoyed them and this was no exception. At BAMMA 3 though there was a certain amount of controversy concerning the main event and a bit of a media circus too.

Tom ‘Kong’ Watson was supposed to fight Alex Reid for the Middleweight belt but Reid pulled out with a knee injury. The controversy concerned Reid’s preparation for the fight, which centred on a TV program where he went to different countries trying out a variety of Martial Arts. I’ve only seen the clip of Reid rolling with Roger Gracie, and he didn’t look too good, overawed and out of his depth is probably the correct description.

Watson, on the other hand took the fight more seriously training with the GSP camp. Incidentally, GSP was present to show support for Watson in his fight with Matt Horwich.

Reid turned up to watch the event with his wife Jordan/Katie Price. It’s fair to say they took some stick! It was quite entertaining at times, particularly the two blokes dressed as Price and Reid who posed for camera’s and got the crowd going.

It needed something as the undercard was not always the best. The first fight we saw involved pink shorts and really only got going in the final round with the Norweigan Thoresen getting the decision over John Maguire. Then there was a break for 15 minutes.

It took that time for the projectionist to get one of the big screens properly operational again, after it had slipped. Not exactly UFC! The first fight after the break was for the Featherweight belt with the wrestler Mark Adams beating self-taught Alan Omer by decision. This was a much better fight. Omer looked lively but couldn’t cope with the wrestling.

Then followed three fights decided in the first round. Americans War Machine and Seth Petruzelli (Kimbo killer) both submitted opponents after barely a minute. Petruzelli seemed to be a step too far for Ryan White who did trouble him with a counter to a head kick and flurry of punches from guard, but forgot about defending his arms, an arm bar being the result.

For the Lightweight belt Rob Sinclair took out German Daniel Weichel by ground and pound TKO. He was well on top but the fight did seem to be stopped early. I was expecting more from Wiechel, although I have read that he suffered an unseen low blow which he didn’t recover from, all academic now.

The main event needed to go longer than the first round and it went the distance, although Watson only just managed to make it to the second. In the lead up to the fight, a la UFC, they show recorded interviews. The interview with Horwich was bizarre; he mentioned quantum physics and spirituality while being only just coherent. He came out bashing a bible against his chest and bumbled around the cage waiting for Watson. He did not look good, in fact he looked unprepared. I was concerned for his safety, he just didn’t look right! I needn’t have been as he gave a very good account of himself.

The fight was an old school MMA clash of styles, the boxer/kickboxer verses the wrestler. Watson dominating the stand-up until Horwich took him down, which he managed easily. Watson nearly lost to Rear Naked Choke in the first and almost again in the second or third. As the fight went on Watson was better able to resist the takedown attempts and was always much better standing. I think he deservedly sneaked it with the judges.

It was only the third BAMMA event and I did enjoy it, although it was a good job the Americans came over to fight, they significantly raised the standard of the fights. The stick that Reid and Jordan received, really helped the entertainment level but was a bit distracting from the fights. GSP turning up to support Watson was a nice touch. The interviewer was awful though, lame attempt. It would be good to have someone who knew a little about MMA doing the interviews, Reid maybe? The announcer was excellent though, Michael Buffer stylee!

We got the tickets for a last minute concessionary tenner which helped, I might not have enjoyed it as much for £25 but I will probably go again if it comes back to Brum. If this report has made you desperate to watch the rerun is on Bravo tomorrow night.

BJ Penn belt taken, Mister Miyagi and Chopsticks

This post is NOT a Jackie Chan UFC crossover! I’ve missed a lot of UFC lately and and so have lost touch with whats being happening. Today I managed to catch some fights from UFC 112. BJ Penn lost his belt to Frankie Edgar and was taken down, for the first time in six years at lightweight! Amazing!

Penn v Sanchez

Watching the fight it became apparent that Penn was trying to counter strike Edgar, similar to the tactic employed, to great effect, against Sanchez. Trouble is that Edgar moves completely differently to Sanchez. Sanchez came in at Penn with a regular timing/beat and Penn was able to easily read this and pick him off at will.

Even before Penn cut Sanchez’s head in half, Sanchez’s face was swollen and beaten, while Penn was pretty much unmarked. Not so against Edgar, if anything Penn, certainly by the end, had more marks than Edgar. Furthermore, as mentioned, Edgar was able to take Penn down, not just once but twice!

The difference between the two fights was that Penn was unable to counter anything like as successfully as usual because Edgar was too awkward. Not only was he moving his head as well as his feet a lot, but his rhythm was not regular, he was moving with broken timing.

Edgar defeats Penn

Between round one and two Edgar’s corner told him to keep changing his head movement so that he didn’t just move forward and back but also laterally. From then on Penn was struggling to get Edgar. Sure he caught him occasionally but not often. Edgar moves well and is quick on his feet, really quick. He manages to throw shots from unusual angles because of his movement and because of his irregular timing it seems to be a bit like tracking a fly. Or trying to catch a fly with chopsticks!

A well deserved victory for Edgar and certainly not what I was expecting to see. I really like the counter attack style Penn uses, particularly when it comes off so well as it did against Sanchez.

Miyagi tries for the fly

Coupled with his movement Sanchez just couldn’t get a shot on target or get out of the way. But against Edgar it failed. Edgar was in constant motion and very difficult to counter on because his timing kept changing and he was able to hit as he was moving in/out and left/right.

Edgar’s broken rhythm, his quick feet, great head movement and ability to throw punches wherever he was meant that Penn ended up like Mr Myagi from the Karate Kid; tracking and trying to catch a fly with chopsticks!

GSP v Hardy

UFC 111 - GSP v Hardy

After the rather unexciting fight card of UFC 110 this weekend’s event features a Welterweight title fight between Canadian  George St.Pierre and Dan Hardy from Nottingham. On the surface it seems as though Hardy will simply be just another victim for GSP, as he is relatively untested in the UFC. But Hardy is dangerous, he’s an athletic busy fighter, very strong standing up with plenty KO power. He has spent time training with Freddie Roach to improve his ‘hands’, and by the looks of it his timing too. He has also shown he is patient and calm under pressure, winning a number of fights by decision.

Hardy seems to think GSP will go ‘hard at it’ until he gets hit with something too big to handle. Hardy likes to trash talk and says he likes to let his opponent know he’s up for the fight and the night won’t be easy. This has worked before, he certainly had Marcus Davies rattled pre-fight, but interestingly Hardy reckons that GSP has got in his own head. I think GSP is far too cool to be affected by any trash talk, and with experience on his side is pretty unlikely to under any more pressure than before.

St.Pierre says he’ll be taking the fight to Hardy, dictating the pace and won’t be taking punches to land his own. That will be difficult standing up as Hardy is very good and can trouble GSP, if he decides to keep it standing. If Hardy has in him trouble he’ll switch to wrestling.

Hardy’s groundwork is a bit of a mystery, although he has spent time training with Eddie Bravo he is unlikely to be able to cope with GSP on the floor. St.Pierre, despite losing to them first time round, was able to easily take down both Matt Hughes (excellent wrestler) and Matt Serra (BJJ black belt), dominating them both. Hardy won’t be in the same league as these two on the ground and so shouldn’t be too much trouble for GSP in that respect.

While Hardy has been consulting Serra for tips, his chance lies in his stand up skill and KO power, which is better than Serra’s. Obviously he has to avoid being taken down and get up if he does. GSP learned the lesson of underestimating an opponent (first fight with Serra) and says he isn’t doing so with Hardy but in the same article he talks of winning in a ‘beautiful fashion’. If he gets caught up in attempting to win with beautiful technique he’s playing with fire. He won’t be able to toy with Hardy in the stand up, if he starts going for the lovely roundhouse KO, Hardy will be in with a very good chance. But he’d better take that chance sharpish as GSP will switch to a ground strategy which will most likely be too much for Hardy.

Short Range Power – the Phantom Punch

On May 25th, 1965, in Lewiston, Maine,  Muhammad Ali  beat Sonny Liston for the second time. Again there was controversy, this time it was related to the ‘phantom punch’. Ali finished the fight, in the first round, with a short chopping straight right, which knocked Liston down for somewhere between 12 and 17 seconds, while the referee flapped around losing control as Ali stood over Liston shaking his fist. The ref was informed of time Liston had spent on the mat and stopped the fight, declaring Ali winner by knockout.

The straight right that tagged Liston was known as the ‘phantom punch’ as many missed it completely, others said it didn’t land at all. Many believed the fight was fixed, for a variety of reasons, one of which was that many believed the punch was not hard enough to knock Liston out. In slow-motion, it’s clear the short right hit Liston plum on the jaw as he is regaining balance from a lunging jab, he had trouble landing punches in both fights. The clip clearly shows a jarring, shaking of Liston’s head which appears to be sufficient to knock him out.

Steve Morris explains that a knockout occurs when the reticular activating system, responsible for controlling consciousness is disrupted.

The disruption of the reticular activating system occurs through the violent rotation of the brain on the brainstem. In most cases, this rotation is very obvious, whether it occurs through twisting, moving side to side or through the head being violently snapped back

The slow-motion clip indicates a rotation of Liston’s head, the ambiguity concerning the efficacy of the phantom punch is to do with the assumption that a bigger punch is required to cause a knockout. Big punchers tend to throw the kitchen sink at their opponents, Tyson, Marciano and others of that ilk certainly did. But if the opponent is off balance when hit, less force is required to rotate the head, and so cause a knockout.

In 1965 there were still those that believed Ali was unable to punch hard, he was retreating when he threw it and given the short range of the phantom punch it’s easy to understand how people didn’t believe their own eyes. Ali himself claimed the punch, which he called the anchor punch, was too quick for the eye to see.

A short punch on the retreat does not have the obvious power of a Tyson blockbuster, but the phantom punch was not the only time Ali was able to knockdown or knockout an opponent while going backwards. The highlight clip shows a few examples, while Anderson Silva did something very similar to Forest Griffin recently. I suppose people find it difficult to believe that it’s possible to generate power while going backwards, let alone short range power.

On your marks 3

A comment on the last post, made by John of Massachusetts, indicated that the clip of the elite level Shotokan fighters did show fast Shotokan techniques delivered from traditional stances, that’s the gist anyway. I chose the clip precisely because of the high standard of the fighters. While these fighters are able to deliver fast punches and kicks, the stance they adopt, fudo dachi I think,  fails to support fast positional movement. In order to successfully make ground quickly they need to adjust the starting position before they move.  If you observe the video carefully you will notice this adjustment.

This adjustment, particularly from the bounce, rapidly shifts the fighter through the equivalent of the get set and go phases of the sprint start. Bouncing up and down in the starting posture does not provide the correct lower leg angle to propel the fighter forward with plyometric action at the ankle curtailed.Does that make sense?

If we return to the sprint start analogy, the get set phase positions the sprinter to explode out of the blocks, the bouncing stance does not position the karateka to explode, an adjustment is required. The sanbon kumite of the original grisly clip provides even less opportunity for explosive movement as the plyometric action is completely absent. To illustrate what I mean follow this link to an article analyzing the blocks start of Usain Bolt, notice how the angle at the ankle of the right foot changes as he begins the movement, it goes back before moving forward. This is the plyometric action or the stretch shortening cycle, which greatly increases power. The starting position in the blocks completely supports this; forward posture and lower leg angle.

The Karate fighters in the clip tend to move from a position that is not set up to support explosive movement, of course the blocks position is impossible to attain but nevertheless the fighting stances they adopt have limited forward posture and usually have a less than ideal lower leg angle. This results in them having to make an adjustment before they can explode out of the blocks, as it were. It’s the equivalent of not being in the blocks properly when the gun goes.

Despite this drawback the bouncing is clearly more dynamic than the stiff movement of sanbon kumite although the starting stance is not too different to that used in sanbon. Note the centralised weight, supporting stability rather than mobility.

To achieve the equivalent of the starting blocks position the fighting posture needs to support rapid positional movement, with the weight forward and a lower leg angle supportive of a plyometric action similar to that in the Usain Bolt link. Clearly, that would be better than adopting a posture that requires a big adjustment before rapid movement can be achieved.

While the fighters in the clip above start in a sub-optimal position they still move quickly, this is achieved through a lot of feinting and minute positional adjustment to draw the opponent into making a half movement against which they can time their strike. While the rules of the tournament are far removed from street fighting there is still plenty of skill on show. The timing and distancing is very good and this is what Machida has successfully taken to MMA, but thats another post.

The Knockout

In any kind of unarmed martial arts setting, sporting or self-defence the knockout is the most spectacular and effective way to end a contest/confrontation, against an armed assailant it becomes an even greater asset.

There are endless examples on you tube of boxers, MMA fighters and regular citizens knocking out the bad bloke. On the Fighting Arts Alliance Forum Steve Morris has gone into great detail on how a knockout can be effected from both close and longer range in terms of power generation and effect on the target, i.e. the head.

Using biomechanics with reference to great knockout fighters and the use of tools by skilled exponents, knowledge gleaned from these sources provides an insight to

being better able to deliver enough force to knock a guy out or stun him with a shot to the head, or drop him with a body shot, or even break bones with a blow

The article is in several parts over the course of a thread and contains numerous links for supporting evidence and illustrative purposes. The outcome is a wealth of information and tips and how to use this effectively to improve your chances of executing a KO on the bad guy. There really is a ton of information that can be applied to your training to bring BIG improvements. It’s a very well produced piece of work.

Some of what he covers includes

1. different ‘shots’ to effect a knockout
2. how the knockout occurs
3. rotational knockout
4. increasing mass, increasing velocity
5. levers & supportive structures
6. hammers & nail guns
7. the role of the body
8. training tips

Personally, I find the combination of science with real life examples invaluable, it really gives you something to chew on! Why not join up and have a look?

KISS – Keep It Simple Stupid

I’ve recently been given a link to the youtube section for clips from Fedor’s training team (thanks Tommo). It’s a pretty good insight into some of the practices they get up to. One very obvious thing is the simplicity of their training methods. In the clip below, Fedor’s group are doing some circuits out in the forest at a kiddies playground. Yep a kiddies playground. The greatest MMA pound for pound fighter trains in a kiddies playground making do with whatever there is around, they’re doing crunches on a park bench!

Hammer swinging and some basic exercises put into a circuit. Great. The ‘make-do’ element is continued in this clip, where they are using rocks and even a kettlebell for medicine ball slams. In an article on the benefits of hill running Ross Enamait says

……..people seem to discredit simplicity. They falsely assume that complexity trumps simplicity, when often the opposite is true……. In the words of E.F. Schumacher:

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius—and a lot of courage—to move in the opposite direction.”

I’m a big advocate of using science to ‘get an edge’ but sometimes this approach can overcomplicate matters detracting from the real goal, improved fighting performance in Fedors case. All training should be applicable to that goal.

By taking science into account but without losing sight of simple methodologies a progressive form of trainnig can be achieved. Drawing from many sources can be inspiring but also potentially confusing. With youtube and other internet resources a massive array of training information is available but simplicity should not be ignored. Ask Fedor!

On the Fighting Arts Alliance forum, there’s a huge amount of information available on numerous topics related to martial arts training but simplicity is not ignored. People are using hammers, tyres, bulgarian bags and all sorts of similar simple, often homemade equipment to compliment punching things.

This in many ways is similar to what the Okinawans were doing with their hojo undo in the late 1800′s; using simple training equipment. This practise seems to be less prevalent in the west and with the information available on the internet could probably do with being updated and augmented. That would allow some progression in traditional karate and the like, rather than being restricted to a historical approach. My experience of the hojo undo exercises was along the lines of performing the exercises in a prescribed manner only. There was little if any innovation and as such no progression.

In the hojo undo clip the bloke is performing exercises that clearly provide decent conditioning potential, however by incorporating kettlebell exercises the ishi sashi could become a more versatile piece of equipment, for example. The trouble with being historically accurate, as karate often purports to be, is progressive training methods are negated. All down to personal preference I suppose, my preference is for progression…….

Baddest man on the planet

Both Tyson and Fedor have been dubbed ‘baddest man on the planet’ but while both were or are top of their respective games they are very different men. Last night I watched documentaries on each of the ‘Worlds baddest’ and while one rose and faded the other continues to rise and looks unlikely to fade in anything like the same way. Nevertheless there are interesting parallels.

By the time Tyson became the youngest ever World Champion he had a fantastic team around him. Cus D’Amato had taken him out of reform school and away from his troubled neighbourhood in New York and with Kevin Rooney and Teddy Atlas was guiding his boxing potential. After D’Amato died Rooney took responsibility for Tysons training, resulting in his distinctive style that brought him success and fame.

Tyson’s Peek-a-Boo style allowed him to slip and weave his way in close, avoiding his opponents punches, allowing his devastating speed, power, and aggression to wreck the other fighter. In the documentary “The Tyson Story” Kevin Rooney  time and again mentions how Tyson, right from the start threw punches with ‘Bad Intention’. That’s the phrase he uses; ‘Bad Intention’. You only have to watch him training to see that while the knockouts are dripping with bad intention.

For me this ‘Bad Intention’ is the overriding similarity between Tyson and Fedor. If you watch Fedor training the same ‘Bad Intention’ is evident and again he’s dripping with ‘Bad Intention’ in the ring. In the documentary ‘Baddest man on the planet’ Fedor says he trains “relentlessly, like an engine”. He has a strong team around him practicing with his trainer Aleksander Michkov for many years, he is comfortable with his surroundings and just gets on with it. His aggressive style re-wrote ground and pound in MMA.

Outside the arena there are similarities, both literally fought their way out of poverty, both liked to fight as kids but I can’t see Fedor fading the way Tyson faded, he just doesn’t have the distractions. Tyson faded because of those distractions and sacking Rooney was clearly a mistake, he changed his fighting style and became a beatable fighter, and then there were the frustrations boiling over with inexcusable results in and out of the ring.

Despite the inexcusable side to Tyson the ‘Bad Intention’ in the punches, training and the fights is key; besides Fedor has shown that these inexcusable outcomes are NOT inevitable. Regardless, this ‘Bad Inntention’ is the type of thing you get from Steve Morris’s assertion to ‘Watch the Fight’ take it, absorb it and use it in training. This ‘Bad Intention’ attitude can then be taken from training into the fight if you have one, in either a sporting or in self-defence setting. In essence you’re preparing properly and you will improve.

Thiago Alves

Alves v Koscheck

I like Thiago Alves, he is an aggressive fighter with excellent strikes and kicks. As such he is exciting to watch. Early in his career he was submitted a couple of times but has hugely improved his takedown defence as he showed against former champion Matt Hughes and earlier against Karo Parisyan. Fighting out of American Top Team Alves trains regularly with exceptional BJJ fighters and has clearly developed in this regard. Alves likes to uses his striking skills as part of his takedown defence, anyone shooting in on him can expect knee strikes!

Alves has excellent leg kicks which he uses to reduce the mobility of opponents, apparent against Koschek who received plenty on the way to a unanimous decision. On the ground Alves likes to get back up again, a simple tactic but ideal as he really is a great stand up fighter. Against Hughes and others, when in the opponent’s guard Alves strikes, viciously negating the other fighters BJJ game, at least to an extent.

Alves prevents a takedown against Hughes

This approach has got him to number one contender in the welterweight division, he has won his last seven fights. In UFC 100 Alves fights GSP for the title in a great match up. While not as all-rounded as GSP, Alves will pose a significant problem for him, clearly he will want a stand up battle, while GSP can fight standing he likes to bash ‘em up a bit on the floor, his takedowns are exceptional these days.

On the face of it Alves will try to spoil takedown attempts and any ground strategy GSP may have with intense striking and keep it stand up. His vicious kicks, with both knee and shin will definitely give St. Pierre problems if he lands them, while his strikes are equally as dangerous.

GSP will try to use his slick transitions between the fighting phases to wear Alves down and dominate him, probably through ground and pound and variations of it, he likes to use knee strikes to the body on the ground. He sets up his takedowns beautifully and has great success against fantastic wrestlers and BJJ fighters, it maybe more difficult against Alves as he only really wants to defend takedowns, this may be a factor.

Will the Alves’ tactic of spoil and strike be enough to stop GSP’s fluid all-round fighting style? GSP tends to come into the octagon with a strictly designed game plan for each fight; he may use something different to what I suggest, we will see at UFC 100, July 11th

Physiological Arousal and Mushin

mushin

Often in UFC fights the commentators mention the class of fighters post fight. When the match is over they tend show each other respect. For a sport that is so brutal at times, this is always good to see, in terms of sportsmanship. This post-fight show of respect also highlights another concept, namely control of physiological arousal, as often a fighter can switch from a highly aroused state to a much calmer state, just like that. From a Sport Psychology perspective physiological arousal can, hypothetically, be thought of as on a continuum ranging from comatose to raging, or something along those lines anyway. Meditation or chess would be firmly placed toward the comatose end, while sprinting would be toward the raging end. It’s interesting to speculate what the optimal arousal for fighting or MMA would be.

In Japanese arts they talk about mushin, that state of no mindedness in combat when the mind is unconcerned with thoughts or emotions and so open to everything. In Wikipedia mushin is described thus

“There is an absence of discursive thought and judgment, so the person is totally free to act and react towards an opponent without hesitation. At this point, a person relies not on what they think should be the next move, but what is felt intuitively. It is not a state of relaxed, near-sleepfulness, however. The mind could be said to be working at a very high speed, but with no intentions, plans or direction.”

Clearly, this would be desirable to a fighter, mind absent of thoughts of failure, fear etc and free to tactically respond to the opponent while being sufficiently aroused to strike effectively. Often in Japanese arts they also strive for mushin during kata performance, again from Wiki

“Many martial artists, particularly those practising Japanese martial arts such as aikido or aikijutsu, train to achieve this state of mind during Kata so that a flawless execution of moves is accomplished — that they may be achieved during combat or at any other time”

All very good in theory, but there is potential for trouble when the mushin is achieved in kata but not applied to fighting. The mindset required for kata performance is fundamentally different to that required in a fight or MMA match. During kata performance an open mind while the striving for perfection allows the practitioner to concentrate on the execution of technique, or, preferably, the underlying principles (see Kinaesthesis and Proprioception 2). During a fight or MMA match a person’s physiological arousal has to be further toward the raging end than if he were practising kata. That’s pretty obvious, but the point is that the state of mushin derived from kata practice is not synonymous with a state of mind required for fighting. It may very well be better than a fearful, anxiety ridden state but it is not optimal. Although, while a highly aroused state is desirable, it is possible to be overly aroused. The following clip shows examples of highly aroused MMA fighters, many of whom show none of the class I refer to at the start of this post but definitely plenty of arousal.

A couple of things spring to mind, firstly a kata mushin would be of limited value if faced with any of the fighters in the clip, most of whom seem to be close to the raging extreme of the arousal continuum. Secondly, these fighters seem over-aroused, they are so close to raging that they are unable to stop once the fight is clearly over. This may very well seem like an appropriate mindset for fighting or MMA, although successful in the examples in the clip, there is a danger of a fighter gassing if the opponent survives the storm. Alternatively, the raging fighter might end up losing quickly as in the following clip.

To me it’s obvious that Thompson was overly aroused, while Fedor’s brother Alex had a more appropriate mindset. The Emelianenko brothers and Cro Cop amongst others have a calm exterior which belies vicious explosive action when required. These highlights of Fedor and Cro Cop clearly illustrate this. Sure they are highly aroused, you can’t strike like those fighters without being so, but, importantly, they are not overly aroused. This state of highly aroused yet calm seems to me to be very close to that described in the first Wiki quote, which while being toward the raging end of the continuum its not too close.

To reiterate, the ideal state would be highly aroused but not too close to raging, free from thought and emotion allowing intuitive action; feeling not thinking. Mushin, if you like, but fight mushin NOT kata mushin! I’m not suggesting that a mushin man would always beat a raging bull in a China shop (to quote the commentator in the last clip), that would be absurd. Rather, I’m suggesting that raging is not optimal, a calmer yet highly aroused state, possibly synonymous with mushin, would be more appropriate both during the fight, so strikes can be delivered with optimal power, but also afterwards, so an opponent can be shown respect, unlike some of the fighters in the first clip.