Posts Tagged ‘Thailand training journal’

Capoeira

Posted on: October 29th, 2009 by admin 16 Comments

Capoeira is a striking art with origins as an Afro-Brazilian art form which combines elements of martial arts, music and dance. In the martial arts aspect of Capoeira, it focuses on striking particularly kicks accompanied by acrobatic movement. Similar to Muay-Thai and Indonesian Silat, Capoeira is accompanied by its traditional Afro-Brazilian music and is demonstrated in coordinance with the tempo of the music. Although almost non-existent in MMA, Capoeira has made its way in becoming a fully fledged sport.

There have been many theories about the styles that make up Capoeira, however one theory has been considered by many Capoeiristas that Capoeira may have been influenced by a ritual fight-dance called N’golo (the zebra dance) from Southern Angola, which was performed by people of southern Angola. Since the 1960s, the N’golo theory has become popular amongst some practitioners of Capoeira Angola, although it is not universally accepted.

Created by slaves brought to Brazil from Africa, during the colonial period, Capoeira is a martial art that grew from survival. People were brought from Angola, Congo and Mozambique, and with them, they brought their cultural traditions. They hid their martial art and traditions into a form of dance. The African people developed Capoeira not only to resist oppression, but also for the survival of their culture and the lifting of their spirits. After slavery, they continued to play Capoeira.

Capoeira was against the law for 20 years until 1918. The first Capoeira School ever to exist was that of Mestre Bimba. He was given permission to do so in 1937, after he demonstrated the art in front of President Getúlio Varga. Capoeira was finally recognized as a national sport.

The Jogo (game/match) in Capoeira is played in a Roda (the circle of people around the Capoeiristas), its circular shape is maintained to keep focus on the players and musicians and retain the energy created by the Capoeira game.

Capoeira does not focus on injuring the opponent. Rather, it emphasizes skill. Capoeiristas often prefer to show the movement without completing it, enforcing their superiority in the roda. If an opponent cannot dodge a slow attack, there is no reason to use a faster one. Each attack that comes in gives players a chance to practice an evasive technique.

There are two main styles of Capoeira that are clearly distinct. One is called Angola, which is characterized by slow, low play with particular attention to the rituals and tradition of Capoeira. The other style is Regional, known for its fluid acrobatic play, where technique and strategy are the key points. Both styles are marked by the use of feints and subterfuge, and use groundwork extensively, as well as sweeps, kicks, and head butts

The actual object of the game is different according to what style of Capoeira you are playing.

In Capoeira Regional the object is to try and floor your opponent. But still you do not actually floor him or her. You just show how you might be able to the moment you find an opening.

For Capoeira Angola the object is to try and hit your opponent in the face. That is why in general the arms are held up higher in Capoeira Angola to protect the face. Again, the object is not to actually hit your opponent but to show where you might be able to. Angola is played mostly close to the ground.

Yet having very little to do with MMA, Capoeiristas have managed to involve Capoeira in MMA competitions yet some have succeeded and some have not but still it proved that Capoeira is not useless in MMA and one can benefit from it with the right combination of styles.

Notable Capoeira practitioners in MMA:

* Elvis Sinosic
* Marcus Aurélio
* Jose “Pele” Landi-Jons
* André Machado Gusmão

Boxing

Posted on: October 28th, 2009 by admin 1 Comment

Boxing is a striking art. Boxing, along with wrestling is the oldest form of combat sport in history. There are Egyptian paintings depicting boxing scenes and boxing was introduced into the Greek Olympics in 688 B.C.

Boxing is typically used to describe a combat sport where two participants fight each other with their fists. Strikes below the waist are not allowed. A fight can be ended by knocking the opponent unconscious (KO), injuring an opponent to the point where he cannot continue anymore as deemed by his corner, referee or himself (TKO) and via judges decision based on points accumulated.

Professional boxers, like other combat sport athletes are known for their tough training regimen. Road work, or long distance running along with shadow boxing and bag work are what a boxer spends most of his time on. Pad work with a trainer and full contact sparring are also hallmarks of boxing. Other conditioning exercises used by boxers are known at floor work and consist of sit ups, medicine ball exercises and push ups. A strong core is heavily stressed by boxing trainers to absorb blows to the body and because the rotational power required in punches is generated from the core.

The first part of this video shows how boxing ranks next to other more traditional Martial Arts.

Boxing is often referred to as the “sweet science” due to the importance of technique in throwing punches and moving defensively. Boxes are recorded to have the strongest strike of any martial art or combat sport. This is due to the fact that boxers are taught to punch using their body and not their arms, the physics behind a boxers punch is to summon the maximum amount of ones bodyweight into each strike. In regards to defensive techniques boxing footwork and head movement requires years of practice to master. Bruce Lee incorporated many aspects of boxing into his Jeet Kune Do system.

To understand both punching power and perfect defensive movement watch this video of Mike Tyson training.

Most MMA fighters nowadays focus on boxing as their striking skill set. Although kicks can pay dividends in an MMA fight, the act of kicking leaves one vulnerable to getting taken down and so most strikes seen in MMA are fist strikes. Also, because of the small gloves used in MMA knockouts are far easier to achieve than in boxing fights where there is far more padding on gloves, so it is in the MMA fighters interest to utilize punches.

Some MMA fighters known for their pure boxing skills are Andre Arlovski and Marcus Davis. Andre Arlovski trains with hall of fame boxing instructor Freddie Roach and Marcus Davis was a pro boxer before competing in MMA.

Although boxing is considered a sport it must be remembered that it is a martial sport and should be viewed in the same category as other arts and sports such as Judo, Sambo and Muay Thai to name a few.

Pakistan has a growing boxing scene and is currently going up in the ranks in world competitions. A famous boxer of Pakistani origin is Amir Khan who won the silver medal in the olympics. He is also coached by Freddie Roach and is currently a world champion.

Kaewsamrit

Posted on: June 19th, 2009 by admin No Comments


Unfortunately as I was editing this post the first few paragraphs got deleted. A reminder to never use a public computer for this blog again. Heres a summary of what I wrote.

I arrived at Kaewsamrit at 12 am and got shown to my room. I was staying in a basic room with fridge, dresser and fan three houses down from the gym. Kaewsamrit is located in a quiet neighborhood slightly outside of Bangkok but for really it is still part of Bangkok even if it officially isn’t.

The gym is 4 houses. One is the gym with the pro shop and rooms for fighters and trainers. The second one it seems is for the owner and his wife, another house for fighters and trainers to stay in and another houses that seems to act as a storage/kitchen and probably has people in there too. The whole area is a beehive of activity with people constantly going in and out.

At the moment of this post there are only 4 guys training there and thats not that much, I was there 2 years ago and this place was packed. I was very surprised because this is known as a very strong gym that currently still has Anuwat fighting, whom by the way will be fighting in Jamaica next month for what I have heard to be half a million baht ($20,000 ) purse which is a whole lot of money in Thailand. It is also home to Hiroya, a 17 year old Japanese fighter who recently fought Masato in K-1 for the first of Masatos trilogy fights. He is the seen by alot of Japanese as the next great Japanese fighter.

The gym is made up of two rings. One in the front on in the back.From what it seemed the foreigners stayed in the front with the trainers and the Thai fighters would be in the back and there would be casual cross over all the time but generally this was the case.

My first day there I tried running but having been accustomed to the beautiful scenery and crisp mountain air of Pai I couldn’t do it and turned around after maybe a kilometer. The air even in the suburb was pretty bad, at least to me, everyone else was doing 10k’s. Around 7 o’clock the trainers had us shadow boxing and I start sweating much faster than normal due to the humidity. Warming up and staying warm was real quick. We next did 4 x 5 minute rounds and I felt good but felt way more exhausted than usual because of how hot and humid it got. I could feel the heat trapped on the outside of my body with no where to go. I felt like I had a fever.It gets very hot in there. Very, very hot.The pad work with my first guy was really basic, but that’s normal for not knowing someone. After that we were made to hit the bags under supervision of a trainer who would be correcting us and pushing us to go harder on the pads. After that was a little bit more shadow boxing and then 200 sit ups. There was a trainer with you the whole time and they didn’t let you get lazy, during training time it is all business. In the afternoon we sparred and I sparred once with Anuwat and I don’t know what to say about that because we didn’t go very hard. But yes, the guy is very, very good.

I’ll continue with some of my thoughts about my time in Kaewsamrit in the next post along with how training is at Paddy’s Gym in Phnom Penh.

For some Good Info if your planning on heading over to Thailand to train Click Here!

Fight Day

Posted on: May 18th, 2009 by admin No Comments

I left Pai yesterday at noon and got on the public bus crammed full of people in every possible space. I could have taken the mini van which is more comfortable in terms of seating but is much worse when it comes to motion sickness. The ride from Pai to Chiang Mai is not one that can be done regularly.

The ride down I gave much thought to this fight which I have a hunch is going to be against my toughest opponent yet. I took my focus off of winning which just makes me nervous and concentrated my thoughts onto doing the best I can and to putting my skills to the test and getting a chance to see where I have reached in my knowledge of Muay Thai.

Arriving in Chiang Mai, I started to get the nervousness that is natural before a competition. It was odd for me having to make a 4 hour trek from my small valley town of Pai into the big city of Chiang Mai. This fight experience is definitely going to a unique from my previous fights which were all within 15 minutes of where I trained.

I took a tuk-tuk from the Bus Station to Tha Phae Gate where Bee and Charlie (who is also fighting tonight) were staying. There was some sort of street festival going on with people selling random foods and sweets in street cards on the side and parents bringing their little kids dressed in traditional Thai clothes to dance for the tourists in the ancient style for money. I navigated my way through this with my back pack with my fight clothes, and bare essentials and my shaving kit stamped with U.S ARMY that I have had for 7 years swinging in my hand.

Since then I have been pretty much holed up in my hotel room enjoying my first hot shower in a month. I had gotten very accustomed to using the buckets of water in the gym toilet and so now this very plain hotel room is quite the luxury. I have about 7 more hours until I have to begin getting geared up for the fight. In the meantime I can only relax and eat and get ready for the encounter tonight.

In Chiang Mai plus Student profile

Posted on: April 20th, 2009 by admin No Comments

Got to Chiang Mai this morning. I spent 12 hours on a bus getting here from Khon Kaen. I had to sit next to one of the fattest Thais in Thailand. Some seriously obese 60 year old who was taking up half my seat and kept jiggling into me on every bump. There were a lot of bumps and my head kept hitting the window next to me. I left at 8 pm and arrived 8 am, travelling at a top speed of 40 mph with the air conditioner on full blast. Needless to say, i did not get much sleep. However, I got a nice hotel room for cheap with free wireless and I downloaded the latest UFC, Silva vs. Leites. Had a good time unwinding from that bus ride. Tonight I am heading to Thae Pae stadium to watch a fighter from True Bee compete. I don’t know anything about the guy or what to expect so I’ll fill you in on a later post. Chiang Mai is a nice city in the mountains of North Western Thailand. It’s the second biggest city in the country but is not as fast paced as Bangkok. It has a lot of history here, many temples scattered throughout the urban sprawl. It has a very distinctive feel and vibe to it like many other great historical cities like London, Casa Blanca or Moscow. A lot of nice views even in the city itself, just like this one from the balcony of my hotel. I was going to go train but changed my mind after I did not get the nap I wanted to, due to watching the UFC. I have a thing about training on a lack of sleep. It doesn’t seem like you would get too much benefit out of it. Anyway, I save some money by not having to pay for training and taking a ride out to Lanna or Chai Yai, I’m gonna need it to pay for the entrance fee to the stadium. Should be a good night of watching Muay Thai and seeing old friends. At least the fights should be about 3 hours long instead of 8 and a half like last time at the village festival.

Like, I said earlier I was gonna add another profile of a student of mine. The students name is Mashood Ahmad and he actually just started training on my last visit but has shown himself to be a dedicated student committed to learning all the technical aspects of MMA. Like a lot of Martial Arts players here, he has really taken to the ground game due to the novelty of it. Also the fact that I toy with everyone I roll with despite only being a blue belt shows them that this stuff works. You can do that with MMA and especially the ground game, showing someone a fancy trick and a kata and assuring them that it will work takes faith, not rationale. Before I left I asked some of the guys to give me some info about themselves and Mashood actually wrote it out for me so i am going to include what he wrote as is, with no corrections.

“I am a great fan of Martial Arts. I have gone to many clubs to watch fighting skills.I found ninjas to be the best. Once I watched MMA match on TV I saw it combined Muay Thai with Jiu Jitsu. I wished if it were in Pakistan. I was pleased to know that its been started in Pakistan. Now I am training MMA and hope it would spread in Pakistan very soon.”

We know that MMA isn’t only Muay Thai and Jiu Jitsu, but I think the point is, is that he noticed it combined a striking game with a ground game.

Anyway, Mashood is 21 years old and is very new to the MMA game but I think he has a bright future if he keeps it up. He is one of the few students that really pays attention to other students and myself rolling and then asks questions about how I did a certain technique or what a counter to a certain move would be. Very analytical fighter this guy. Wish him the best of luck and thank him for his support and for serving as a good role model to other guys who train with me.

Anyway I going to post this later but I just got back so I will do it really quick now. I just got back from the fights at Thae Pae Stadium. Pretty good time. The crowd was all farang which was a novelty for me. I am used to seeing at least one large section of loud Thais going Owaii! The two guys from true Bee Gym fought well. I have never trained with them so I have no perspective to which to judge how they performed in their fight. One guy lost due to knees to his hip, he had had issues with it before as well. One of those nagging injuries, before that he was doing really well and walking his opponent down. The second fight was won by the guy from True Bee due to a punch to the solar plexus in the second round. The fight was entertaining before that. I would say the guy (his name is Matt) had the upper hand most of the time but it was still a pretty close fight.

Anyway off to Pai tomorrow in the morning to begin some serious training in the mountains of Mae Hong Son.