Basic Game Plan Experiment (Try it)

OK so been a couple of weeks since my last blog post, but how many of you took my advice and made a training log? Not many I bet but for those who did, well done and I hope you can see how it can benefit you!

Many of you will know that in 4 weeks time I am fighting BJJ Black Belt and all round Icelandic hard man Gunnar Nelson in what promises to be a war of a fight at Cage Contender in Manchester. Now this fight has really brought to the surface the importance of having a good game plan, drilling that game plan so it becomes second nature and then of course executing that game plan and then reviewing it after the fight.

So, today’s blog will be short and sweet (much like a sexual encounter with myself) and it is aimed at the beginner level student but anyone can try this and I am sure many of you will get something out of this.

Basically I am going to give you a real basic technique ‘system’ that you can use to finish someone. I will use a video I found as I don’t have time to film one right now. But this will become your mission for the next month. Yes one whole month.

Your mission (if you chose to accept it) is to get to side control by any means necessary and once you get there you will use the following ‘mouse trap’ system to submit your opponent. It is that simple. Just watch the following video and make sure you understand the finishes and try drilling them on someone to make sure you have it in your head……ok watch it now!  (ignore the blatant ad’s)

Right, so now you know the path to finish from the side control. All you gotta do for one month is try to get to side control and go into this series. If you find yourself underneath someone in mount or someone has your back, all you should have to focus on is escaping then getting to that side control. I don’t care what crazy moves you have seen or what you have been working just try this for one month or even one week.

By having a focus point like this you will be surprised how your game changes to accommodate it and by have a system to finish someone rather than flailing around like a mad banshee for anything you can grab hold of you will increase your submission success.

This is basically what I teach beginners to do in side control but even if you are an advanced grappler sometimes its cool to just go back to something like this and break down your game a little. I have seen some of my guys tap more experienced grappling with this exact system and it kinda reminds you how important it is to have a good understanding of the basics.

Try it for yourself then drop me a comment about how things went. Really try this out because over the next few months we will introduce more techniques and start to build a real game plan that you can use.

Remember you can only finish your opponent with this exact system, if you catch anything else just let it go until you can get to this system. Forget ego’s and let go!

Big Logs: Keeping a Training Diary

Something I have done everyday from the 12th of January 2008 is keep a training diary that logs every time I train, where I train, who I train with, what training was done and any new techniques that I learnt. Now why would I do such a geeky thing and how could this benefit what I am doing?

Well, keeping such a diary is a great way of reviewing your training and every couple of months I will read through all the training I have done and see how my training as changed. By doing this you can re-focus much easier as can actually see on paper what areas you have been training more than others. Sometimes looking at previous training will remind me what I need to be working on and also what I need to do less of.

In my training diary I also keep a record of every time I compete. Whether its MMA, BJJ, boxing, Thai boxing, it doesn’t matter I will write down when I fought and how I did, that way I can see how the training leading up to that particular fight/competition has affected my performance, again making it easier to identify any changes that need making in my training. This is all pretty general stuff, so I can see how many rounds I am doing, what fitness I am doing and even the standard of my sparring partners.

 But by also logging any techniques that you learn you can really help your game even more. Now, I have a pretty good memory and I can remember quite a few techniques without forgetting others, shit I can even remember who taught me each technique and what else we worked that day in a lot of cases but I’m just weird. Like, I did tae kwon do as a kid and no matter how hard I try I can still remember every damn pattern I learnt. Even after not doing them for over 10 years. But by writing techniques down and even drawing a few shitting diagrams that only you can understand then you can be instantly refreshed when looking back on such notes.

So this week’s homework (yes that’s right I am giving you homework) is to write down everything you can remember doing after each training session when you get home. Just put any techniques you did, any sparring rounds and fitness you did and even how you felt during sparring, fitness etc. You don’t need to keep reading it, just write it down for each session you do this week. Then stick it under your bed or some other foul place where you will not see it every day. Don’t look at you weeks diary for another month, just forget about it a crack on with your training.

Once a month or so has passed take out your diary and just read through each session you did and go over in you mind the techniques you were working. You may be reminded of a detail you forgot or you may have been working that stuff anyway in which case well done. But either way what you have done is re-enforced your training.

For example, today I learnt how to do the Venezuelan Finger Choke (lets call it VFC for short). Then I went home and I wrote down everything I could remember about the VFC. A month later I looked at my notes and remembered all the details of the VFC.

So, not only have I learnt the technique, but I have almost immediately brought it to memory again by writing it down. Then I have reminded myself of this at a later date. So from one technique I have gone through three learning processes. Live practice, write from memory, read back into memory.

Now, I was a retard at school but I am pretty sure that if you use this method then you will remember more techniques and progress quicker with your training. Plus if every couple of months you review you entire set of notes then you are further re-enforcing all that old knowledge so you don’t need to worry about forgetting anything, its all there in black and white for you.

Man I feel like Neo off the Matrix right now, I’m going outside to make sure I’m still in the real world. But seriously, try the method and if it works, awesome, send me a pound on paypal or something, if not then you just wasted twenty minutes of your life reading some shit a crazy guy wrote.

Zen Masters

So you wanna be a f*ckin fighter? P5

Part 5 – The battle is over but the war goes on

The fight is over. Win, lose or draw what has been done has been done and now its time to reflect and move forward. You have to remember that the fight you have just had is the final product of many weeks of hard training and planning. Did you prepare properly? If you didn’t get the win, was there anything you could have done in training that would have changed the outcome of the fight? And if you did get the win is there anything you could have worked on to be more dominant in the fight? If yes then its time to re-group, re-arrange your training and get back to work. If the answer is no, then you are probably lying.

Now before we move on I just want to talk a little about losing. Nobody likes or wants to lose ever and if you do then you are some kind of sick freak who probably likes being run over for sexual gratification. It is ok to be pissed off, if fact it’s exactly what you should be.

Whether you compete in MMA on any kind of one on one combat sport there is always one winner and one loser (unless it’s a fucking draw of course). For every time someone has a 10-0 record there is someone else with a 0-10 record its just the way it has to be. I see guys come into my gym and train for a few months for an amateur fight, they have a tough fight, something happens and they lose the fight and that’s it, gloves are hung up, no more gym time, they go play football or another equally homosexual sport.

Is that the way a real fighter behaves? No it certainly is not. A real fighter picks himself back up and dusts himself off. You need to use that loss to fuel your training for the next 12 weeks until you get a chance to get back in that cage and fight you heart out once again. Remember, it is not an ‘L’ on your record for ‘Loss’ it is an ‘L’ for ‘LEARN’. Learn from your mistakes and improve. Even if you have a string of losses if you behave the right way and improve between fights then you will get the win you deserve and that victory will taste so much sweeter than those who have yet to taste defeat. The only real loser is the guy who quits.

Winning a fight is one of the best feelings you will ever feel. You have beaten someone in the most primitive form of competition and you have tapped into the caveman that’s trapped inside you. But there is an inherent problem with winning a fight that plagues the amateur ranks and we often see emerging into the pro ranks.

“Yeah I’m awesome I just beat somebody’s ass, I am the man I could take GSP right now”

That’s right, you have won your fight and now you think you are complete, you have the skills to beat any man, animal or machine that is placed in front of you and your training is perfect for any situation you will find yourself in. Sorry to burst your bubble but your wrong, because in this sport, if you aint’ learning your losing.

From fight to fight you need to improve in order to keep moving forward and the easiest way to do this is to look at what mistakes you made in the fight, or what you could work to fight more efficiently. After each fight I like to reflect on the training I have done up to that point and look at what happened in the fight then start to plan what I will be working for the next few weeks.

Time between fights for me is to work on weaknesses in my game, then as the next fight looms ever closer I begin to tailor my training to that particular opponent. I like to stay competitive between fights and often enter grappling tournaments and have the odd boxing match or Thai fight. Trying to stay injury free is a big thing to so make sure you train hard but you train smart too.

The main point of today blog is simply this…..don’t stop learning, don’t stop creating new challenges for yourself and don’t stop chasing your dreams.

“Running water never grows stale” Bruce Lee said that I’m fucking sure he did.

My first professional MMA loss against the unbeaten Eugene Fadiora (10-0)

So you wanna be a f*ckin fighter? P4

Part 4 – Stepping into the cage, the calm before the storm 

It takes a certain type person to step into the cage to fight. But even then some people step in with the wrong mindset and end up getting a huge shock when things don’t happen as they expected. Remember this is MMA, anything can and will happen when you step into the arena.

I have fought on many different shows and in many types of combat sports, seeing fighters from novice level (some who shouldn’t even be stepping near a hamster cage never mind and MMA cage) all the way up to elite top level athletes just before they step into arena and show the world (or local piss heads) what they have to offer.

Something I have noticed is that everyone prepares differently just before the fight, some have a specialised warm up, some have no warm up at all like Robbie Lawler, some go through a personal ritual that sets them in the right mood, and some panic and start trying to learn a shit load of submissions to save them before they get thrown to the slaughter.

Personally I am very calm before a fight and for those who know me well and have seen me just before a fight, you will know I like to joke around and don’t take all the build up too seriously. I never feel that nervous before a fight just an anxious feeling that I want to get in there and start moving around. For me the worst part is just before I walk out to the cage, it is not a bad feeling just like when you are sat at the dentist waiting to go in. But as soon as I step foot in that cage I feel totally relaxed and as calm as a Hindu cow. The only difference is at that point I am mentally switched on and focused on the task ahead.

Now not all people are like me, some people fight better with a bit of anger inside them and that’s fine but you have to be in control of your emotions because if you cant control them then how the fuck are you going to control you body?

For a beginner who has never been in competition it’s hard, but trust me it gets easier. Remember if you have done all the work in the gym then you can be confident, as you know that there’s nothing more you can do to prepare yourself. It’s a good idea to have a good warm up and then just run through your game plan with a co-operative partner so you can refresh your memory on the movements you need to be making.

My main piece of advice is to not let the whole thing get on top of you. This is what you have trained for, this is what you came to do, this is your time. I always say this to my guys when they walk out to fight. Its ok to be nervous and sometimes this can help you fight, but if you are sat in a corner shitting yourself thinking ‘why God did I agree to this’ then maybe its time you bought a snooker cue or a dart board.

Find your comfort zone before a fight, this will improve each time and fighting will become almost second nature to you as it has with me. Finally make sure you surround yourself with the right people before a fight. No negative thoughts and no idiots telling you what they think you should do. This is a good time to find out whether you have the right coach or not too. If your coach is going crazier than you then maybe a switch of gyms is in order.

If its your first time to step into the cage then the months before the fight you can work some mental imagery and just find a quiet place to relax on your own, close your eyes and image warming up, them calling your name to fight, walking to the arena, hear the crowd shouting, walk out to the cage with your entrance tune on and step into the cage. If you run this through your head enough then actually stepping in for real becomes a lot easier.

I hope this helps some of you to deal with those pre fight worries and I’ll see you in the cage. Till next time. Peace.

Cool as a cucumber

So you wanna be a f*ckin fighter? P3

Part 3 – Getting your game on

You may be training in a gym or gyms and now you have decided that it time to start training for the big day….fight day. Now its time to step up your training and get your body ready for the battle that it’s about to go through. This is the time where the fight is won or lost so put down your KFC and pick up your gym bag.

So we need to start looking at how to get the most out of your training and start building some kind of game plan. Something I have learnt about fighting, or something that fighting has taught me, is ALWAYS HAVE A PLAN.

Now some people will say you don’t need a plan just train hard get in there and you will be ok. That’s all well and good, but by not having an aim or even an idea of where you want to take the fight then you are putting yourself at a huge disadvantage.

This all starts with your training. You need to plan your training so that it gives you the best possible preparation for the fight. If you are fresh meat in the sport then you have to start from scratch. It’s always good to have some kind of base in a certain area but this is not essential if you plan your training and work on the correct things.

A good way to think about training is to think about the stages of a fight. All MMA fights start with both fighters standing so moving into striking range is always the first (and sometimes last) thing that will happen. So in your training you need to deal with this area by working on boxing and kickboxing. I find the biggest thing with striking on your feet is confidence. So make sure you get plenty of sparring in and get confident on your feet because even if you not knocking everyone out, sometimes your going to be forced into stand up wars so be ready. Focus should be on keeping the chin down, hands protecting the jaw, straight shots and setting up low kicks off the jab.

The next range you will meet after striking is the clinch and takedowns range. For me this range is the key to winning a fight. If you can master this range then you can decide when you want the fight to happen. If you’re a master striking you can use the clinch defensively to keep the fight on the feet, and if your subs are slick as a mother fucker then you can use this to take the fight down to the ground to your domain. Practice, shooting for the legs, sprawling on shots, striking in the clinch, takedowns from the clinch and how to escape the clinch. Try to focus on maybe 3 good takedowns to work into your game. You may not want the fight down, but at some point you may have to take it there, plus takedowns are a excellent way to score points in a fight, especially at the end of a round to leave an impression in the eyes of the judges.

The final range you will find yourself in is the ground. The main thing here as a beginner, is to work on escaping submissions and positions. You only really need a couple of attacks to be successful. People worry too much about having loads of crazy attacks but when someone’s mounted on you dropping elbows into you ugly face then I am afraid that rolling calf crank into the twister doesn’t really mean shit. Try putting yourself in bad positions and even submission in training and try work your way out, once you start getting confident with your defence on the ground, then work on a couple of solid attacks and you will start to have a decent ground game.

Remember, you can move back and forward through the ranges very quickly so its important to put it all together with full MMA sparring as well as breaking it down into each area separately or even working specifics such as defending the takedown when your backs to the cage or setting up takedowns with boxing.

All this technical training and sparring has to be back up with some good strength and conditioning. I don’t really want to go deep into this topic as I have talked on this subject before. But a good sprinting session a week and a good strength session concentrating on power movements such as dead lifts, pull ups, cleans etc will do the trick.

As the fight looms closer, its time to start getting specific and looking at playing your strengths against your opponent’s weaknesses. This is time to start making some kind of game plan. You need to look at your training and see what area/s you are doing well in. If you can find anything about your opponent then that helps with this process but at lower levels this is hard.

Now you can start with a general plan such as, you want them on the ground because your fancy yourself as a submission artist. But you need to look at how your going to get there and the options your opponent has too. Here is a quick example of a mini game plan, hopefully you will understand and start using the same idea.

Plan – Need them on the ground so I can work submissions from the top (lets say Kimura from the side is your money move)

How – Use boxing to set up double leg takedown, or clinch against the fence and take down, then get to side control and use set ups till I hit the deadly Kimura or take what he gives me.

What If

#1 – I shoot but he sprawls – work back up to my feet if not pull guard and try to sweep them onto their back, if that fails feet on hips push away and scramble back to feet

#2 – I take him down but he pulls guard – use strikes to open the guard and back away, pass the open guard to side control

#3 – I get to side control but his defence is too good – use strike to try open up his defence, if not step over to the mount and try to stop him with strikes

That’s a pretty simple plan and there is a lot of variation what can happen but by having a plan you will have more confidence in what you do and wont panic as much when the shit hits the fan.

I hope you understand what I am trying to get across, its only a basic overview of what you should be looking at for training but for those who are practising kata’s and breaking boards over their heads ready for an MMA fight then you fucking need this!

The more you bleed in the gym, the less you bleed in the ring aye Joe?

So you wanna be a f*cking fighter?

Part 2 – So you got the minerals, now what?

I talked previously how dedication and heart were the major factors in becoming a fighter. But if you have the qualities that it takes to become an elite level fighter, that’s only half the battle.

Now you need someone to guide you and to show you how to train, the correct techniques to use at the correct time and basically how to win fights. This is not always as easy as looking in the Yellow pages for your local martial arts club.

The most important thing when looking for a good club to train is just to go and try a session. Most gyms will give you a free session and in this you can usually assess how good (or shit) a gym is. And by gym I am not talking about the amazing facilities, I am talking about the quality of coaching and the standard of training.

When you step into a fight gym for the first time it can be a strange experience for some, there is a lot to take in and you will probably get your head filled with lots of information. Don’t be afraid to ask questions about the training, remember the only stupid question is the one you didn’t ask.

Now choosing a coach is hard for a beginner because they have nothing to compare it too. But by trying out at a few gyms you will get a feel for what is better. You all want to say ‘yeah I train at Extreme Cage Fighters R Us and we fucking smash each other to bits every night’ but this may not be the best place for you to train. Remember training has to be smart, so you need a coach who has a technical approach but at the same time can motivate you to work hard and give you a ‘kick up the ass’ when you need it and also bring you down to Earth when you thinking that you could take Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris out with one kick.

Coaching fighters is a tough job and requires more patience than anything. But going back to what I spoke about in part 1, by showing that dedication you will make a coaches job a hell of a lot easier. So, find a gym that you are happy with, begin your training, show your desire and put the time and effort in.

This brings me onto the main part of my blog post today which is the Four C’s of fight training, in fact any sport that you apply them to:

COACHABILITY – you have to be open minded and listen to your coach, but also absorb that information and actually use it in your game or you will not improve.

CONDITIONING – fights are won or lost on conditioning. If you haven’t got the gas to fight then you have no business getting in the ring. Make sure you stay fit.

CONCENTRATION – you need to block out everything and concentrate on what need to be done. Always focus on what you are doing and what your goal is.

CHAMPION – if you are coachable, have good conditioning and always concentrate then you have what it takes to become a champion.

Thanks for reading today…in part 3 I will talk about training for a fight a building you ‘game’ till then, i’ll see you in the gym!

So you wanna be a f*ckin fighter?

Part 1 – What does it actually take?
If I had a penny for everytime a newb came into my gym and said, ‘Danny, I think ive got what it take to make it to the UFC’, I would have about £16.35. Running my own gym I meet these people day in day out and God forbid if I go to the pub I encounter a more drunken and confident version of this phenomena.

OK, so you have watched some UFC videos and you think you got what it takes to step up into the cage, then you go find a local mma gym/kung fu school/boxercise class and begin training, tell your friends your a cage fighter and buy every tee shirt that tapout have ever made. This is all well and good but becoming a professional or even amateur fighter takes a certain amount of heart and desire that most people do not posess. I know this because I see it nearly every day.

I have plenty of beginners starting at my gym every week and its never long till they ask the golden question ‘How long before I can fight?’ to which my answer is always the same. ‘Train your ass off and when your ready you will get a fight’. Usualy they reply by telling me how they will train everyday, run 5 miles at 6am every morning and they want 15 private lessons. Then I wont see them for 3 weeks until they turn up with some new mma shorts on or something and the process begins again.

For those of you who dont want to fight, thats cool, just train get better, hell maybe even one day you’ll feel so great about it you might even jump in and have a fight just for the crack. If so thats awesome. But if you do want to fight then you have to put aside the image you have in your head that its cool to say ‘hey im a cage fighter’ and start to think about the gruelling hours your gonna have to put in at the gym and the countless bumps, bruises and breaks that are so common within our sport. Because i’ll tell you something, your opponent is going to be training his ass off and if you step in that cage just a little under prepared your risking damaging not only yourself physically, but mentally too, and ultimately you can make yourself look stupid after spending months in the pub telling all the chicks how awesome you are.

The number one thing in my eyes that you need to become a fighter in this sport is DEDICATION. If you train hard, train often and do everything in your power to become the best you can be then you will do well. Even if you lose your first 10 fights if you stay in the game and keep that dedication, eventually you will succeed and its as simple as that.

Ive got guys in my gym that I thought, ‘nah, these guys will never make it past 6 weeks’ but they did and they improved, and won fights, and still win fights, all because of that magic word DEDICATION.

Theres plenty of guys with natural ability, they dont always last long at the gym because they dont always have the work ethic that you need to move forward. You have to look at yourself and say, ‘Is this something I really want to do?’. Because im sorry to say folks, some people just are not cut out to fight. They say you either have it or you dont. I dont think its as clear cut as that, but alot of people just weren’t made to fight. Some people were born to fight, just like some were born to cook, some were born to dance the list goes on.

I can always tell someone who is a natural fighter because when I push, they push back and when others quit, they keep going. Quitting is like a disease. You see other people quit and think its ok to do it yourself. But a real fighter keeps going and doesn’t stop until they get the job done or they cant physically do any more.  Its all about having HEART. And this is something that no gym can give you no matter what you pay them.

Some people think that by learning shit loads of crazy submissions and deadly strikes you can win any fight but this is not so. Yes technique is very important, and after you read this go drill your triangle from the guard 100 times, but you can win a fight just by having more DESIRE and more HEART than your opponent. Because when it comes down to it, a fight is just about who is going to quit first. Now ask yourself, how far would you go before you quit?

So, next time you stroll into the gym and think ‘hmmmm I wouldn’t mind a fight’ , think about the shit that your gonna go through to get there, if you are cool with that the show your DEDICATION by training hard and often, and let us see you HEART by demonstrating the DESIRE to win and to no quit when things get tough.

If you do all those things, then the rest is up to your coach.

Judo for No Gi Grappling and MMA

In the world of no gi grappling and mma, wrestling is seen as the key to controlling a fight. If you are a good striker you use wrestling defensively to keep the fight up on its feet so you can bang it out. If your a super slick submission expert then wrestling is what will get you to the ground and let you work your game. And if you just like to ground and pound people into a bloody mess then wrestling will get you into that top control position that you need to finish the fight.

Now something that sucks major ass in the UK is that we dont have much in the way of wrestling. Yeah we have a couple of good clubs dotted around the country and a British team but compared to the Americans who spend most of their high school days shooting double legs we aint got much!

Something we do have, and have to a high level in this country, is the traditional Gi based sport of Judo. Judo or ‘the gentle way’ is very similar to jiu jitsu as most of you will know. Judo came from the traditional Japanese style of jiu jitsu and focuses on the throwing aspect of a fight, the main aim being to land a perfect throw on your opponent and score ‘ippon’ to win the match.

Alot of people seem to write off Judo as innefective for no gi grappling and MMA as it uses the gi and doesnt seem to work as well as the double and single leg shots of wrestling. This my friends is not the case.

Learning to shoot a double and single is definitely on your A list of things to do, but with the right modifications, Judo can become a very dangerous weapon in no gi grappling as The Asylum team member Dane Mitchell has been proving for the last couple of months. He has won gold in the last 3 no gi comps (these are the first no gi comps he has ever done) winning a total of 14 matches and taking the Grapplefit.com Absolute division belt beating 2 guys well over 100kg, not bad for someone who walks around at 77kg eh?

Now Dane is a 19 year old Judo black belt who has spent most of his time throwing people in the gi. But recently Dane began to work his Judo for no gi and also work on his ground skills and submissions. With some minor grip changes, many of the throws of Judo work perfectly for no gi and even set up submissions instantly in some cases.

With the help of our resisdent Judo coach Ian Johns and with Dane assisting him we are slowly introducing Judo into our fight team, and we are starting to see positive results already. Like I said before, wrestling is important, you need to be able to make those shots and hit those sprawls, but remember theres never a Judo club too far away……..

Check out some videos of Ian Johns and Dane Mitchell below

Lift the Veights – Strength and MMA

I have been involved in martial arts for roughly 14 years now and been competing in full contact matches of varying types for about 12 of those years.

For years I experimented with different bodyweight exercises, squats, push ups and sit ups were the mainstay of my program, and for years I barely touched a dumbbell or even graced the weights gym with my presence.

Competing on a regular basis I found that my superior technique was enough to win fights and I would often beat guys who were more than twice as strong as me just through having a better knowledge than them and by using the classic martial arts theory of ‘using their strength against them’ like something out of a dodgy Seagal film. This pretty much threw me into the mindset that, ‘I do not need to do weights, they will make me slow and take away from my technical approach to fights’. And that was how it stayed for a long time.

As the competition got better and better coaches became available in the UK, fights got harder and opponents got more intelligent. Then shit started to get tough. A new breed of fighters started to appear, fighters that were highly technical, yet highly athletic, strong, fast and agile.

For my first 4 pro fights in MMA I would say that I did ZERO strength work, but plenty of conditioning and I was fit to go 4-5 rounds as I proved in the Total Combat 4 man tournament in Feb of 2009.

But I began to realise if I wanted to compete at the elite level, I had to train like an elite athlete. I needed everything. Strength, speed, power, stamina AND my technique and skills.

So, I began to research strength training specifically for MMA and through a few chance meetings I ended up having a session with strength and conditioning coach Brendan Chaplain. This opened my eyes to a whole new world of training. Not like the useless isolation body building exercises I had once thought was strength work. But dynamic movements and plyometrics giving you strength and power that is functional for MMA.

I started working with Brendan just before my fight with Les Ojugbana and my God did I need it. Les is a very strong guy and most of his fights he uses the clinch to tire his opponents out, takes them down and bullys them on the ground with his strength. I needed every bit of strength I could muster to fight him so going from weights room virgin to dynamic strength movements twice or three times a week.

By the time it got to the fight, my progress had been steady but I had improved on my weakest area and felt that I could hold my own at least when push came to shove (literally and metaphorically speaking).

The fight went well and I pretty much dominated the clinch and managed to score the takedowns I needed, the conditioning work we had done carried me through to the 3rd round where I managed to secure a choke that ended the fight.

This fight was really the turning point in my thinking and since then I have worked closely with Brendan on my Strength and Conditioning, slowly but surely working towards becoming an all round athlete.

Now I know alot of you fighters or guys who train probably lift weights anyway and the guys that do will be pretty strong. But to get the most out of your strength training I have learnt that you need to work on the large muscle groups that you will be using in a fight and not isolation exercises that will add unecessary bulk and give you strength in all the wrong areas.

Some of you may already do some of these exercises, if so thats great, keep it up. But the people reading this who want to compete and dont, then I suggest you try some of these and see how you functional strength develops, I will assure you that if you stick to these exercises you will make some positive gains and hell you might even start to look abit better a chicks my even take a fancy to you and your athletes body even though you have cauli ears and a flat nose.

Heres my top 5 exercises that we work at out gym that I find the most beneficial.

Deadlifting – one of the best strength exercises there is, if your not dead lifting then you need to start, just make sure you get someone to show you the correct form as doing this incorrectly will have a damaging effect on your body.

Squats and Split Squats - the power to drive with your legs if obviously very important for all sports, again good technique is important, explosive driving on the upward motion is key.

Weighted Pull Ups – a strong pulling motion is essential to any strength workout and pull ups are one of the best. Strap a plate to a weigh lifting belt and try mixing up your grips too.

Dumbbell Press - just like pulling, we need a good pushing motion. The press should be explosive and use the full range of movement. Try an alternating press (one arm at a time) for a harder workout and greater core stabilisation.

Barbell Rollouts and Barbell Rotations – as well as having a strong upper and lower body you need to have a strong core to link them together. Rollouts from the knees as well as from standing with a barbell and standing rotations with a barbell wedged in the corner of a room, help to increase this core strength and also improve mobility.

So thats my take on strength work for MMA, obviously there is alot more to it than that, plyometrics, dynamic mobility, stretching etc, but I hope that some of you who are maybe not doing strength training as part of your MMA training learn from my experience and maybe start to work some of this stuff in.

If you want to know more on the subject then please check out Brendan Chaplains site by clicking here The guy knows his shit and unlike alot of coaches he actually has alot of experience in combat sports.

Well thats my rant for the day, if you want to see any of the stuff in action check out Brendan’s youtube channel by clicking here

Peace Homies. Stay Strong.

BANG!!!! (I appear like a Ninja in a cloud of smoke)

Well thought i’d start my blog off with a bang, so there it was.

Welcome friends, aquaintances and enemies to my new blog. I hope that this provides you with some source of entertainment on those lonely nights when facebook no longer satisfies your needs and even if you do nothing more that crack half a smile at one of my pathetic jokes then it was worth it.

I will try my best to teach you something as I write my blog, whether its about fighting or my philosophy life in general (yes I have an A-level in philosophy), but most of all this blog is simply here to reflect my intelligent side that many fighters do lack in or even fail to posess.

Over the comin weeks, months and even years, I will delve into the depths of my knowledge and educate you in the art of Dan-Jitsu. Hopefully when I die these words will forever be immortalised and make someone a shit load of money. All I ask is that when that happens you build a huge bronze statue of me and place it in Doncaster town centre for pidgeons to crap on.

Ok, so the title of this first post has got me thinking. Theres some pretty crazy stuff that happens in MMA. Double knock outs, flying submissions, but what is it that raises someone to Ninja status?

Lets take a look at some of the most Ninja moves in MMA. Maybe then you will begin to understand the true meaning of Dan-jitsu…….or maybe not.

We will begin with a classic, Ryo Chonan is getting picked apart by the man that is Anderson Silva. Out of nowhere he jumps for a scissor heel hook and the Spider is done. Awesome comeback.

Next up we have Shuichiro Katsumura and his amazing choke that would have Eddie Bravo doing cartwheels. This move is so Ninja, thats its named after one.

And finally the most Ninja move that I have seen is probably Toby Imada’s crazy inverted triangle he did in Bellator.

And as if that wasnt enough for you then here he is teaching that very same move…

Well ladies and gents thats it for todays blog. I will do my best to keep updating and bring you some interesting stuff to talk about next time you step onto the mats or into the pub. Till next time….ta ta