What he is still updating this?

I don't update this very often anymore there are two main reasons. The first is that becuase of a military course and an injury sustained on that course I have trained in a couple of months. The second is that prior to going on course I was more in a refining stage rather than a learning stage. I primarily post new things up here as a journal and maybe for people who stumble on my blog to learn a couple of things. Well today I learned something new. Even though I am still out of training for (hopefully only) a few more days, I converse with a few very intelligent people by the names of Cecil Burch and Jerry Wetzel on a regular basis. Cecil and Jerry are trainers for Crazy Monkey Defense (CMD or CM) a striking style devised by Rodney King or south africa. On the surface it looks very much like a mix of boxing and MT and the question was put forward recently, what is the difference between CM and western Boxing. Rather than try an explain it myself, I am going to post a few of the better quotes to help people understand the difference.

Cecil Burch:
Most systems pay lip service to defense and emphasize the offensive part. So when a newbie gets to spar for the first time, it is going to be hard enough to maintain his protective wall. Add the fact that he is most likely going to be thrown into the deep end under extreme pressure, the situation is worsened. In CM you are exposed to pressure right away, but it is just enough to push you without overwhelming the person and collapsing the structure you are attempting to internalize.

The analogy I use to give people an idea of what pressure to use on their partner is that we are pushing the envelope as much as possible without tearing the paper. So as the person gets grooved in, the pressure can progressively (and continuously) increase.

Jerry Weztel:

The fundamental goal in CM is to provide a solid defensive structure that is behaviorally congruent to what we do under pressure while at the same time keeping things simple and efficient. Traditional slip, parry, catch, and bob and weave take a very long time to develop if they do develop and in the mean time people are going to take a lot of punches. Most will end up quitting long before they develop this skill. Furthermore, even if these skills are developed, the addition of kicks, clinch striking, and takedowns make these not the safest options to say the least. There is still slipping and ducking, but it is modified to fit with the rest of the game plan. The cover is different to what is taught in boxing due to the square stance and is taught differently.

This is not to say that CM is just about defense. Having a bulletproof defense allows for strong offense. Rather than having to sit back and wait for a break in the opponents offense, the defensive structure allows one to come forward aggressively without worry about counters. There are a few strikes that would be considered unorthodox to someone from a western boxing background as well.

If you are looking for a striking game that is not attribute based and is based on tight defense, CM is a great option. You can check it out here:
http://www.crazymonkeydefense.com/site/

Daily Technique

Normally in my technique posts I post a video but in this case I will post a link to the Sherdog.com striking forum. I have a thread there that is consolidating all the info I can find on fighting southpaw, or left handed. I fight southy ever though I am a right hander for a couple of reasons. One being that I wrestle and grapple right foot forward and the other being various injuries make it harder for me to fight orthodox, or right handed.

Fighting Southpaw

Take a look and I would love to here of any other resources.

Daily Submission

I just came back from getting my ass beat and I feel great. I only kickboxed today because both the BJJ and kickboxing classes were at the same time and I am still babying my shoulder a bit. After warm up we worked a series that I had a lot of trouble with for two reason which I will go over in a minute. The series went cross, hook, cross, parry a jab while throwing a jab, cross, hook, cross, slip a cross, hook cross. I had two problems, the first is that it is a little awkward for a southpaw so it took some getting used to. The second is that I suck at slipping punches. I am more of a rocky then a sweatpea. So although I had a hard time with it, it was a very valuable drill for me.

We spar later and I went against this dude Dustin. Dustin is a true heavyweight and I am at best a super middle weight. He had like 8-10 inches on me and a good 50 pounds. It was like matching mickey ward fight Wlad Klitscho. I got hit a lot. It was a good exercise for me to work my CMD guard and practice slipping his punches. Once I got his timing down, I was more successful and landed a few good punches including a solid right hook to the jaw. But I definately got my ass beat.

I think it is important to get beat down once in a while in training. It keeps you humble, it prepares you for things get bad and it is better then getting beat down for real.

"It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything"
Tyler Durden

It has been so long!!!

God it has been so long since I posted anything because frankly, I wasn't training. I re-injured my shoulder and the rehab has been brutal. I had blown my rotator cuff about two years ago and it was not diagnosed so when I re-injured it they had to fix all that damage as well.

So I got back to training at Zuma last night. I got say, I love that gym. Between my injury and my military training I had been there once in 10 months. But I walked in and it was like coming home. A great enviroment to go along with Adam's top notch instruction. The fighters at the gym have been doing awesome, Sarah Kaufmann has had two fights for strikeforce and won both. There is talk of a 135 women's title in the works for her. She also got her Purple belt from Marcus Soares. Alot of the other guys have been doing well in MMA, Diego Wilson is currently 4-0, Gavin niel is still doing well as are a bunch of others.

So I doubled up on my first day back. I did some Muay thai prior to BJJ. The main focus was on a lead hook, cross combo. From an othrodox stance, you stepped to you right, dug a lead shovel hook hard in to the belly and followed with the right cross. The step put you at an angle that let you hit hard from a position where he couldn't hit you. For me because I fight southy it didn't work as well, I ended up stepping into a right handers power. I think i will work it stepping to the right (my lead leg) and digging the shovel hook into the kidney's and then follow up with the straight left.

I also had a chance to spar which I haven't done in a long time. It went well. I have been working on fighting from a Crazy monkey Defense structure. I found I had good succes with it when I stayed focused on keeping the hands high and moving, staying in the hunch back posture and keeping my elbows on my ribs. More time under pressure will help but it was a positive first experience.

The BJJ clas was pretty relaxed, we worked on a couple of half guard sweeps that I have talked about before in this blog, then just shot the shit for awhile before rolling.

Rolling went well, I was obviously out of practice and you could see it in my movement. I was slow moving my hips and I had trouble with some sweeps. My opponent was bigger than me and had good posture. I found him leaning way back a few times so I used one of my old standbys and used my feet on his hips to push him back then scramble to a double leg and take side control. I haven't used that in a while so it was good to see it was still there. Got mount fairly easily as usual but still have trouble finishing. I find with the bigger guys, when I try to hard to finish I get rolled.

More work for me.