Listen up Yo! Ya’ll need to shut your pie holes and drink from the well of wisdom. This ain’t no garden variety coolaid. This is the real deal. Too strong for your candy @$$es? Well that’s just too bad. The truth hurts like the taste of a 4 oz. MMA glove in your mouth.

MMA is just as much about your attitude as it is about your skillz. So take notes and learn yourself up yo.

Certainly any type of takedown can be used in the sport of MMA, but how to set them up and integrate them into a world where Neck Cranks, Chokes, Knees, Strikes and Submissions of all sorts can be employed as counter measures can sometimes be a daunting task. Cross Training Pioneer Erik Paulson has helped to continue the research and development of this field. Some would argue that he’s polished and even helped shape the landscape of MMA takedown protocols used in modern times. And you can put me into that group.

Here are some out takes we shot in 2009 and 2010 regarding some of those takedowns. As you might expect, these became part of the daily takedown regimen taught and studied at our school. And as the old saying goes, “Practice becomes habit, you don’t live up to your expectations, you live down to your drills and your training.” Such was the case in 2011 when a hand full of our students put these takedowns to the task at a local Submissions Only Tournament (no, time limits, no points).

Both the competitors seen in the videos (Jared Fahrner and Heinrich Mokofisi) used the running takedowns to eventually win their divisions.

One interesting idea to note was that one of our overall strategies going into the tournament was to employ the Catch Wrestling Concept of never offering your head to your opponent by means of “Shooting” for a takedown. Instead the competitors elected to use more upright, Grecco, Catch and Judo style takedowns when the opportunities presented themselves.

This not only allowed them to keep their heads and necks away from trouble but also gave them ample opportunities to utilize the Half Haltch, Grovit, Front Head Lock and Guillotine to control their opponents when they shot in and in some cases submit them outright.

Long story short, thank you again Sensei Paulson and Coach Robinson. This stuff works and works well.

And as a parting holiday present, we’ve included a final gift, an awesome impromptu lesson in leg locking for after you’ve taken your opponent to the mat. Courtesy again, of the legendary Sensei Paulson. So listen up and Lock On!

It’s been a while since I’ve had the time to just surf, dig, dig, and dig some more until I unearthed some burried gems. New artifacts (oxymoron alert!) for the Frontiers of Submission. If you read our earlier post on the subject you know that I enjoy seeing new ideas (perhaps not new to the world, but at least new to my eyes).

There was a dry spell there for a moment. Finding new, interesting and or useful material on the internet had become exceedingly difficult. Then things got busy and I simply didn’t have the time to sift through the muck to find a few viable possibilities. That is until now. As of late, I’ve found a few new ideas that are pretty interesting.

First up is this awesome Butterfly Guard Counter from www.DSTRYRSG.com A Guard Pass and Quick Kill all rolled up into one. What’s not to like? And anything that has anything to do with a Chicken Wing/Kimura/Double Wristlock is good fare for my tastes.

Next up are a couple of really nifty little wrist locks from www.vt1gym.com. I use that little Bicep Control Wrist Lock for quite some time now but that little hip shift detail has made it even more successful and efficient for me.

Below is some old school footage of Russian Wrestling. New? I think the video speaks for itself but I’ve never seen it, so it’s new to me, and I love it. If nothing other than for the pure eye candy of it. But there are plenty of great pointers you can pick up from checking this series out. I mean, it’s part 12 guys. There is a whole series, which could arguably keep us all busy for a friggin lifetime of study.

Barnett, Footlocks, NUFF SAID!

And I’ve saved desert for last. So much goodness to be said about this last clip. If it wasn’t awesome enough to have a Bravo clip sitting right next to a Barnett clip (If you aren’t privy to the keyboard war between the two concerning 10th planet JJ and Catch as Catch Can, you’re going to have to look it up on the MMA Underground yourself because I’m not going to go into here).

And as if that weren’t enough, we’ve got a leg lock set up from and Arm Triangle. Those of you who know how proficient Kiser is at using them and the hundreds of set ups he uses, know how useful this might be for him. Why do I post it here then when it will only make my life more miserable? Because I know he’ll never see it because he never reads my posts. I don’t even know if he’s literate to be honest. And I have to admit I get a kick out of hiding it here in plain sight.

Oh, and if that’s not enough to do it for you, did I mention Eddie’s partner is none other than Joanne of the MMA Girls… MEEEEEEEEEeeeee-OOOOOWWWW!!!

What fighter worth his salt would ever go into a fight without padding his proverbial hand as much as possible in his favor?

Having a rock solid wing man is one of the most overlooked and under rated pieces of prep work that a fighter can have in place for his/her up coming fight.

If you’ve ever taken the time to listen to the corners during a fight, you’d be surprised at the variance in ability and quality. It’s amazing how often the advice you hear being shouted from the corner is something along the lines of “F*** him up bro!” Really?

An important part of any successful competition is communication between Coach/Instructor and Student/Competitor.

This article will focus on a couple of methods we use to communicate to our students when they are in the middle of their matches. They can however, be applied to effectivly communicating during any traumatic or stressful event.

A good coach is like a second pair of eyes for their student. But what the coach sees is useless if he/she is unable to communicate that information to his/her student.

Below are a list of tips that we have found helpful in communicating to our students when they are in the middle of a match.

Less is more… Keep It simple

If there is a constant barrage of chatter comming from the sidelines, it tends to blend in with the myriad of other noises already being muted by the tunnel vision/hearing experienced by the student. Be patient, hold your tongue and only bark out an occasional observation. AND when you do give some instruction, keep it simple. Suggestions such as this, “slip the jab, then uppercut, overhand, left hook right kick and shoot.” Simply are too much for a student under duress to handle. Something like the following would be more helpful “SLip and counter”.

Use the student’s name.

During one of his fights, Trevor “Little Bang” Osborn related that when everyone was shouting, he didn’t know who was saying what to whom. He didn’t know if it was the opposing team or our team speaking to the other competitor or to him and pretty soon he simply tuned it all out… that is until he heard us shout his name. Then he was able to take focus and listen.

Proper use of use of this method would sound something like this:

“Trevor, be first.”
“Trevor, circle! Keep your back off the cage.”
“Trevor, Go Now!”

Make eye contact.

When your student is fatigued and or rocked they tend to do a little slot machine number with their eyes. Their head will roll lazily around and their eyes will roll up under their lids etc.

If this happens between rounds, control their head with your hands and force them to look into your eyes.

If they are in a contol position mid-round, tell them to look at you. This will again, help to re-focus them, not just on your instruction, but also onto the task at hand.

Trigger Words

Trigger Words are words or phrases whose meaning you and your students have agreed upon. They are words that have been used during training sessions leading up to the event so that the student is used to hearing them and reacting to them.

For instance, we use the Trigger Words “Go Now”. We all know that this means, it means that there is 30 seconds left in the round. We have trained the student to go all out upon hearing that phrase (Pavlov eat your heart out). “Establish Base” means, chill out. Don’t blow your wad just yet. Re-establish your position and calmly look for openings and opportunities.

These phrases should be reinforced and used repeatedly in the gym during training sessions.

Don’t use more than one or two Trigger Words in your gym. The more Trigger Words you have, the less impact and significance they carry.

Communicate Visually with Hand Signals and Expressions

There are many times that a student’s battle stress will completely debilitate their ability to hear your voice. There are also times that the venue is so loud that your voice simply cannot be heard above the rest of the noise. In these instances it is helpful to commuicate visually as well as verbally. For instance, we will point to our eyes, then look up and point to the ceiling if we want our students to arch their backs more, lift their head and put more body into straightening out the armlock, guillotine, etc.

We’ll point to the ceiling and loop our finger around in a circle if we want the student to relax and burn some time off the clock.

And remember… every communication should be prefixed with your student’s name.

I hope these tips are helpful to you and your crew and we wish you all the best of luck. Train hard… we’ll see you out on the mat!

It’s always a juggling act trying to deliver content to our followers and subscribers that I think they’ll enjoy, while at the same time trying to balance it with what I am passionate or excited about.

Don’t get me wrong. I enjoy those types of techniques as much as the next guy,

but at the same time, I find myself more and more enamored by the obscure and or understated positional escapes, grip fighting basics or in this case, Coach Billy Robinson’s take on the Long Sit Out.

I’d learned it, or rather, began to learn it decades ago while wrestling in Jr. High School. But, with wrestling being a season long sport, with only so much time for practices and only a few coaches to manage 3 different grade levels, various weight classes and different levels of potential and skill, there was only so much that I could learn about that specific move way back then.

A season filled with countless losses and 1 victory over the only kid skinnier and weaker than myself coupled with the humiliation a scrawny kid feels after being pointed at and laughed at while wearing his wintergreen tights and doing bridges on the mat in the pre-match warm ups, pretty much sealed the fate of my wrestling career (if I can call it that), and the lesson on the Long Sit Out would have to wait another 20 some odd years before I’d understand it for what it was.

It’s been months since that lesson with Coach Robinson, and I still haven’t quite made the incorporation of the Long Sit Out into my game seamless, but reviewing the technique as I edited the footage, helped me remember some of the details and again, understand when and where to use such a technique during a roll. It’s a late escape from a Quarter Position scramble, or a pre emptive escape from the Back Mount.

Either way, I’ll continue to work on it as an important niche maneuver of my escape and defensive repertoire.

Coincidentally, Jake Shannon and Coach Robinson have just recently released a new book “Say Uncle!: Catch-As-Catch Can Wrestling and the Roots of Ultimate Fighting, Pro Wrestling & Modern Grappling“. It’s a chronicle of the history and men responsible for the brutal art of Catch As Catch Can Wrestling. I must say, it’s a very interesting read which includes great interviews with men such as Coach Robinson, Gene Lebelle, Dick Cardinal, Josh Barnett, Billy Wicks, Fujiwara, Erik Paulson and many others as well as some fundamental play by play techniques. And heh, whaddaya know, even Coach Kiser and I make a cameo.

Without grizzled men like these, the art could easily have died out just prior to my generation. Their dedication to excellence and their tireless work ethic is really the only thing that’s kept the art alive.

He just never stops, every second is spent developing fundamentals, and instilling the desire to achieve the perfect technique.

Coach Robinson IS the King of Catch. Long Live the King!

Next week a few more escapes from side cross with one of my Jiu-jitsu coaches, Pedro Sauer BJJ Black Belt, Mike Diaz.

It’s been a while since I’ve updated the Damage Control Blog, so I’ll dispense with all the worthless excuses. I mean, the Southpaw series with it’s 16 videos wasn’t that time consuming to produce. Tax season has been a cinch this year as we’ve got double the paperwork do to a recent gym move, company restructuring and building purchase. Erik Paulson didn’t roll through town, oh wait a second, he did, and I had a wonderful time training, hanging out and messing around that whole weekend.

Jeff Monson is on the docket for next weekend, but really that was supposed to happen this past weekend. Plans were made, schedules were cleared, but we had to reschedule due to a marathon 5 rounder he went through the Friday night prior to the preposed Seminar date.

Meanwhile I’ve been trying to organize a relief effort called M.M.Aid Fund for people of the world who may find themselves in hard times. Saying this about the situation in Japan is perhaps the understatement of the year, nevertheless, you’d never know how difficult it is to set up a charitable effort until you’ve tried. There’s more red tape in relief efforts than in trying to open up a fast food road kill restaurant at the cafeteria in USDA’s headquarters.

So what did I scrounge up for this Blog Post? Well, it’s a couple of videos we filmed about two years ago that never made it onto our T.V. show, never got published on Youtube, and have been sitting on the cutting room floor until now. I’ve been saving them because I really like the material but we never released them because there was a problem with the audio that could not be resolved. But I liked them so much I kept them around, perhaps for a rainy day like today.

First up is a series of Ankle Pick Takedowns by one of my all time favorite instructors, Coach (Collegiate Wrestler and Pedro Sauer BJJ Black Belt) Chris Wells.

Next is a Swing Kick I filmed with my good friend Khuen Khru Johnny Miller. Johnny has been a training partner and friend of mine for years. I watched him come up through the ranks at my Instructor’s Gym and eventually earn his Apprentice Instructorship under Ajarn Chai. He’s recently relocated to Hawaii and I posted this to reminisce a little about the good old days.

Finally, is a perfectly good clip we filmed at the 2011 CACC Certification with Coach Billy Robinson and Jake Shannon. I didn’t want to put up a post with only damaged goods, so I included this sneak peak at a video that eventually make it onto our Youtube profile. Assistant Coach Sam Kressin, one of the highest ranking students of the Scientific Wrestling (Billy Robinson’s) Program, was kind enough to share these gems and Coach Robinson sneaks in for a cameo.

Stay tuned, we’re still alive and kicking. We’ll be clearing off our plates in the next few weeks and be back to regular blog updates in no time.

Until then, keep your hands up, your chin down, your mouth closed and your eyes and ears open.

Recently Coach Kiser and I had an old friend stop by for some mitt work and conditioning for an upcoming fight he had here in Utah.

That friend was none other than TUF Contestant and Pit Bull Attack Survivor, Kyacey Uscola.

Between training sessions, Kyacey shared with us some of his favorite tricks he’s picked up during his time out in Sacramento while training with Urijah Faber and Team Alpha Male.

I always enjoy the opportunity to see what’s going on in other parts of the MMA world, especially when they come from teams whos style has as much contrast to our own as Team Alpha Male’s does.

It’s always good to come in contact with new ideas.

Whether you choose to adopt them in their original form as we have (for the most part) with the “Sixes” circuit that we picked up fom former Team Quest Member and Extreme Couture coach Dennis Davis (Kiser replaced the Olympic Bar with Kettle Bells), or to modify them to suit your needs is up to you.

You may even decide to completely avoid the exercises, techniques and tactics you see being used in other camps. But even then, you do so with the benefit of knowing what’s going on beyond your own horizons, and what others are doing to prepare for a battle they may some day wage with you.

At any rate, I urge you to look beyond your own MMA horizons and explore other ideas and possibilities.

Until next time… Happy Hunting!

I don’t really know why I’ve saved this one for so long before making it available to the public. I do that sometimes with techniques that have sentimental value to me. And this one does. I guess the technique itself isn’t all that unique. But whenever I watch it, and I watch it quite a bit, it reminds me of when I learned it from Coach Wells and to me

what was unique was how he taught the technique, which, for the sake of time, was basically, in a way that even a self proclaimed idiot like me could understand it.

On top of that, it wasn’t just the technique, it was the concept that he taught to me. That

the Double Leg is the Jab of Wrestling. A probing, long range technique used to measure the opponent’s responses and create openings for second and third beat techniques.

Sure it works as a stand alone technique, but when used in conjunction with a bigger, broader takedown scheme, it becomes something altogether different, better, more potent.

And thus began my quest to develop such a game. And under Coach Wells, it has been exceedingly easy. At least for me to understand… execution is an entirely different story, but as the old addage goes, only a poor craftsman blames his tools, and in the case of Coach Well’s takedown game, I know it’s not the tools that fail.

The quest continues to this day, as do my other pursuits. And

during a conversation with Coach Wells while we watched a couple of mutual friends fight at a recent MMA event, he imparted yet another idea that has hence forth brought about a second revelation in how I look at the takedown game in general.

I have for some time now attempted to develop “games” from every conceiveable position known to me. A “game” would constitute a series of at least 3 technique options for any given position/situation whereby at least one techniques covers any given opposing energy. This would be for escaping a postion, passing a guard, or in this case finishing a takedown.

As I spoke with Coach Wells I told him that I had felt that for the hips in, I was comfortable with his Takedown Trifecta “game” (Spiral Takedown, Knee Tap Takedown, Body Lock Takedown).

However, once hips were way, I didn’t feel like I had the same 3 or more options.

He explained to me that he had tried to offer me (and his other students) this in the form of an over hook series he had us working on and then I began to put the pieces together.

Days later,

as I shoveled the walks in front of my home, I contemplated this further and began to hypothosize that maybe what Chris had been teaching me would also answer another question that had been rattling around in the dusty, cavernous, emptiness of my brain. Why use and Underhook as opposed to an Overhook?

Why an Overhook as opposed to an Underhook? Was it a matter of personal preference? Was it a matter of body type or natural attributes?

Certainly, my hypothosis would include possibilities for the above, but what seemed to make just as much, if not more sense, especially after looking at the techniques that Coach Wells had presented (both for close range, hips in clinching as well as for medium/long range, hips out clinching) was that there was something consistent going on.

It would seem that the closer the hips, the more, the techniques favored the Underhook, which made sense mechanically, physiologically, and kinesiologically.

And conversely, it would seem that the farther the hips are away relative to each other, the more the techniques favorered the Overhook. Which too, made sense, as the farther the hips are back, the more your opponent is tempted to break the head, knee, toe rule in the frontal plane. In being situated in such a way, it would make sense that you would want to be able to exert presured downward to help him break this plane and the Overhook is a better tool for doing so than the Underhook in this situation.

I’ve been playing around with the idea of including a Flow Charting Program with the members area of DamageControlMMA.com and in light of this idea, I’ve thrown together a quick, dirty, diagram of how this hypothosis looks on paper.

Keep in mind, there are plenty of other techniques that could be filled in, different branches that could be added, exceptions, etc. etc., but my goal was to show the general idea of hips in and hips away and the correlating Underhooking/Overhooking Scheme and subsequent takedown options.

A Rapid Prototype Flowchart Drawn On A Whim To Demonstrate The Possible Connection Between Hip Distance and The Most Advantageous Arm Control (Overhook vs Underhook)

I’ve also added the other 3 techniques shared with us by Coach Wells, so that you can see the whole picture; i.e. the Double Leg Takedown as an entry into the Wellian Trifecta, The Spiral Takedown, Knee Tap and Body Lock (hips in, close range clinch *) game from Over, Under 50 – 50 Clinch Position.

The quest continues, as I am sure it will until my final days.

Remember, what I’ve presented here in terms of general principal (hips in = underhook vs hips away = overhook) is a hypothosis, which means, it is untested and unverified by those more qualified than I to make such generalizations. But at any rate, I hope it has at least given you some food for thought.

Best wishes and happy hunting!

This is a great technique that I picked up at the 2009 Pacific Northwest Muay Thai Camp. There is so much information there and the instructors are simply the best. I got a bunch of incredible techniques even outside of the wealth of information given to us druing the regular sessions… and this was one of them.

I’ve been working on this dump for some time now, but I’ve never seen the the Partner Preservation aspect I picked up which was really cool! A special thanks to Khuen Khru Ian Alexander out of Virginia Beach Virginia for sharing this with us. If you’re ever in that neck of the woods, you’d be doing yourself a favor to checking out their world class facility.

Now, happy dumping!

When was the last time you worked cage tactics?  When was the last time you incorporated the cage wall into your takedown to nullify your opponent’s ability to sprawl and protect his hips?  When was the last time you defended having your head crushed in the cheese grater of chained links?

Ignoring the importance of this aspect of MMA competition can be detrimental to your MMA game.  If this is the first time you’ve given these situations any consideration, or if you drill these positions as frequently as you clean your bathrooms, than this article might have some use for you.

Below are two more basic options for when  your opponent takes you down and attempts to drive you into the fence, a tactic that can severely cramp your ability to use your guard to it’s full extent.  These clips are Damage Control MMA exclusives for our friends here at www.DamageControlMMA.com

Basic Turn Off The Cage

Cage Walk Arm Bar

Here is an older clip we released with UFC Veteran Todd Medina. It contains more information pertaining to the use of the cage in an MMA fight.

And one more little bonus for you loyal followers of Damage Control MMA. A scrap from an old shoot we did that never made it to production because of a problem we had with the mic. The audio is unsalvageable but maybe you might find something of use in this one. A different way to look at knees while your opponent is against the cage.