I remember one Sunday evening while I was a new bouncer at the bar. Eight guys powered past me before I could card them and ordered some beers. The obviously had already consumed a fair amount of beers. I was a bit nervous as there was the old bartender, a few dancers and everyone was depending on me to keep the peace.  

I calmly walked up to them and asked them to meet me outside. The six big guys followed me outside and I told them they were out for the night since they had not followed the rules. They were having none of that and they attacked me! More on this later but what could I do against six big guys?  I mean I was 155 pounds to their 200 and over?!!!

In this post I will address somewhat of a lost art – the much maligned sidekick! What? Yes once a staple of karate is not considered somewhat of a risk to use in a fight for some reason. Back in my day the sidekick was a great equalizer. I mean most people were inept at kicking and did not really understand how a little guy me could quickly gain the upper hand without a punch!

Here is a quick video showing some of the mechanics of the sidekick.

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This short video shows a good example of a basic front leg sidekick. Back in the 70′s this was staple of point and full contact sparring because of the speed and power of this kick. One could safely stay out of punching range and deliver a kick somewhat like a jab into your opponent’s side! What’s more the shuffle side kick could be more powerful than your best punch!

I have seen the sidekick break the defender’s arm in tournments even though it did not hit a ”vital’ area (no point was awarded). Ideally if targeting the ribs - you can break the ribs or arms if the kick lands squarley. I have also seen plenty of guys kncked down with the front leg shuffel sidekick!

There are a bunch of ways to throw sidekicks. Offensively and defensively (moving forward, in place or moving back, jumping and/or spinning), with the front or back leg, with our without initial movement and using the side edge of the foot or just the heel.

Just doing a quick count I come up with   24 combinations and their are probably more if one includes snapping or thrusting. The point is there are a lot of ways to skin this cat (throw this kick).

What I tend to do is used initial movement along with critical distance and timing to set up this kick. I was sparring recently and found many of the newer guys that do not use this kick much anymore – do not know how to defend against it well. I was able to keep them honest (out of striking range) because they did not want their arm or ribs bruised anymore! I was taking it easy on them.

How do I use the sidekick? I generally throw my front leg defensively with a hop back (if they are coming in fast) or with initial movement offensively. I don’t do much with spinning kick or back leg. I like to move around a bit and take advantage of any positional mistakes (switching footing within my range) or if I am fighting a blocker, mistakes cuased my a shoulder, hip or body fake. Whatever mistakes I can provoke on my opponent I like to take advantage of them with a good slip-sidekick.

The target depends on if it is for keeps or not. I mean if I am just sparring with someone – I’ll push the kicks up to the ribs (or arms) and keep the power down a bit (so I can spar for a while). But if the guy has good initial movement (can blow by my distance) – I increase the power to the ribs and if I have to – aim down to the hips to knock him back. I understand the hips are not really a legal move but I can generally get away with it and it changes they way my opponent attacks once he understands the price.

Sparring in the school I generally tend to use the side-edge of the foot too because this is the softer of the kicks. If you kick a guy with the side edge of your foot – the force is spread over four or five square inches. On the street or a tournament or for keeps – no such niceness from me. I use the heel! One square inch of directed force increases whatever power I am able to generate with my slip-sidekick. It is often enough to stop an attack from all but a seasoned fighter. The opponent will often start shying away after feeling a couple of these kicks if he has not already retreated.

So there you have it – a basic kick that generates more than enough speed, power and damage to end many fights. Why then is this kick not used much today?

I think it is because fighting has changed a bit since UFC 1 and Jiu-Jitsu. Since UFC 1 and the Gracies showed the world the grappling was a force to be reckoned with fighters have had to consider how to counter the ground game. At first not many fighters knew how to do this and Muay Thai kick boxing started to be dominant in MMA – quick karate style kicks lost of favor. MMA fighters tended to not throw snap, side and rear kicks that Jiu-Jitsu practitioners could easily use against them.

I think there is still a lot of that mentality today even though the ground game is easily countered if the fighters understand grappling. The telegraphed Muay Thai power kicks are easily subverted if one understands distance, timing and initial movement too but again I think many fighters today favor power and grappling and sidekicks has become somewhat of a lost art.

Here is what I think. Side, front snap and rear kicks are all more powerful than hand strikes but take some skill and knowledge of fighting strategy to pull them off. If a fighter is willing to take his or her fight game to the next level – he or she can learn some old fashion fighting skills to use in their bag of tricks. I know for me in late middle age – the power moves are out. I depend on relaxed speed, torque, distance, timing and initial movement to have the same effect as brawlers who favor the power moves. I like to say I can stand toe to toe with anyone to 3 minutes. This is ok for me as most fights on the street with one opponent should not last more than 15 seconds.

The recent rash of UFC snap kicks and Cung Le using spinning rear and side kicks should demonstraite that yes – even the sidekick can still be relevent in today’s martial arts.

To finish my mass attack experience, I have to half flip and twist out of the attack and lost my shirt (literally). I then challenged them to fight like a man, one at a time. I knocked three of them out in a row with a defensive reverse punch and then it was a running battle. I attacked whenever I had one of them in my sights. I used lunge punches, side kicks, wheel kicks an at the end I let the last three of them surround me – I was side kicking them whenever then encroached on my distance. You see they were scared of me by that point but where half heatedly making an attempt to find my weakness.

The cops rolled up and it was kind of funny to see 6 guys saying I attacked them. They wanted to know what I knew. I did not say a thing but later when the cops asked. I told them I was a brown belt in kenpo karate. Those cops signed up at the studio.

So remember the lowly sidekick is a force to be reckoned with  – even if it falls out of style with some that do not know how to use it effectively!

MMA has a way or turning the martial arts world on its ear. I remember back when the UFC started and this skinny guy trained in jiu-jitsu took the contest! I thought, wow – what a fluke! Everyone knew that wrestling around on the ground would not win any fights! Now almost 18 years later, UFC 1 changed fighting!

The more traditional martial artists like myself have had a love-hate relationship with MMA. You see it has proven to be a way to test various techniques within the framework of the rules – to see if  they have any merit. You see martial artists take techniques taught to them at face value – meaning if our sensei says it will work – we believe it.

MMA has changed all of that to a point. It is not quite self defense because there are a lot of rules compared to self defense but it is the closest and most exciting fighting constest probably since the Roman arenas! Today’s martial arts students see and hear a lot about various fighting methods. Students know what is fairly realistic in a fight and what skills are just a piece of the puzzle.

In this post I will first speak of my frame of reference  so you can evaluate my thoughts about MMA, Steven Seagal. Then I will focus on the trend I have been seeing in MMA where more traditional arts are coming back into these modern gladiators fighting skill sets.

First for your persual here is a video of Steven Seagal being interview after Machida’s recent win.

Master Steven Seagal is kind of an anomaly as he has trained in Japan in various martial arts but is mostly known for Aikido. To be truthful here I did not know he was a master of Kendo or that he also has black belts in Karate and Judo. You see I did not hear about Seagal until his movies started coming out in the late 1980′s.

While I like his fighting style in the movies I did not think he really fought like that because there were a lot of strikes. Then in the early 1990′s while developing his bad boy image the challenge happened. After reading about that I just assumed that anyone that talked smack about karate – made a challenge and then would not back it up (he said he could beat anybody in the world and then something to the effect that if he fought – he would have to kill them) – could not back it up.

You see at that point I thought Steven Seagal was a movie stunt man with some Aikido background. Unfortunately I formed an opinion without very much information and recently when some bloggers have been ranting about the Lord of Pasta… I’ve not thought much about it. You see formed my opinion in the early 90′s and I assumed Seagal was just another tough talking stunt man and dismissed it.

I loved Steven Seagal movies because the fighting seemed more realistic. I’ve always hated to see fights last a long time because in real life, if one of the fighters is a trained fighter – fights last seconds. One minute in a one-on-one fight is an eternity. Here is one of the more recent movie parts where he got a chance to show off some of his kendo skills.

So if you will now (like me) accept that Steven Seagal is not merrily pigeonholed in one martial arts discipline but truly knowledgeable in many martial arts – you have to once again accept that another martial artist is helping MMA evolve fighting again!

This has been a pet peeve of mine because since the early days of UFC, karate style fighters tried to mimic the tougher looking Boxing and Muay Thai front stances and lost much of the defensive nature of their arts. Soon most of karate schools started to teach Jiu-Jitsu to stay relevent to today’s students.

Here is my complaint… the skills most sport karate fighters learn early on – how to keep the distance  with kicks and then bridge the gap for the strikes whenever one has an advantage has been lost. The current batch of reality show bred MMA fighters give the fans exactly what they want! Exciting fights where two guys (or even gals now) meet in the middle of the ring and vie for knockout of the night without applying much fighting tactics.

Now before you MMA types flame me here – keep in mind when I say “much fighting tactics,” I’m not speaking of tactics within the box but rather trying new stuff like karate, judo, aikido, or whatever martial arts that have been generally dismissed by MMA today.

I’ve really enjoyed watching Anderson Silva and Lyoto Machida fights because both of them have used distance to their advantage. Why when I was watching some Silva fights where the crowd was booing him – I thought he fought a great fight.

A match of any kind exists within the framework of the rules in the event. While I agree it is boring to the fans to see a fighter ahead on points – just going through the motions to get the win -I understand it. Think of it this way – when Silvia beat Maia, he had to win a few rounds decisively before he could afford to fight more defensively and cruz to a victory! I mean why would he risk winning at that point?

I’ve watched Machida win bouts while he fought from outside the normal distance. That is typically a sport karate (not kick boxing) strategy that is more along traditional karate lines of thought. I mean why risk your bacon until you have an advantage? When Machida won his title – karate practitioners the world over were rooting for him.

So I for one do not think there is any “best” martial art or a most effective way to fight MMA. I will grant you there are more generally accepted ways of fighting MMA but as soon as one dismisses a formal style and forgets how to defend against it – it will probably come back and bite you in the butt!

Master Seagal was not well known when I owned my karate school. So now that I know more about him – I do not begrudge him for saying he is the best in the world. Others have made that claim including me (privately) because to be a good fighter – one has to believe he is the best in the world or what are you doing as a fighter? I mean if you do not believe that one a good day – you can take anyone – anywhere – give up. You have no business fighting as you will defeat yourself way before the other guy does.

Now that I understand that Steven Seagal is the real deal and not just a stunt man with some marital arts skills – it is only natural and wonderful to see him bringing his own view of martial arts to MMA! There is a saying in investing that probably holds true for fighting too… find out what everyone else is doing (read investing) and don’t do it. Fighters could stand to take some advice from financial types here.

A good MMA does not have to know jiu-jitsu, Muay Thai and boxing to make it. There is certainly not anything wrong with these martial arts but if everyone else is doing it – that is a good reason to branch out and find a different path.

Aikido as most understand is a martial art that take years to become proficient at. A master not only has to understand distance, holds, locks, throws but has to master him/her inner spirit – known as ki. Fighting while mostly defensive in traditional Aikido (to my understanding) become second nature. In my Masters thesis for my 5th dan ranking I stated this about Aikido:

Aikido was born out of a need for a gentle martial art for a former Jiu Jitsu instructor weakened by scarlet fever (Lewis 70). Aikido does not use the violent throws of Judo, the chokes of Jiu Jitsu and the kicks and punches of karate, but uses an opponent’s own force against him. Aikido has similarities to religions because of the mind control needed to be successful at this art. The concept is to help an attacker to achieve his goal, for an example, pulling a punch, then moving slightly to let the punch crash into a wall. The Aikido stylist did not stop the punch or hit the attacker, bu merely helped the punch flow through faster, thereby missing the intended target. Aikido is a martial art that combines unique defensive techniques with a guiding philosophy that molds a practitioner’s character and inner harmony. Aikido has the effect of unifying the mind and body to create “KI” (pronounced kee), a force that focuses the spirit and enables the serious practitioner to accomplish seemingly supernatural feats (Lewis 70+).

So Master Steven Seagal is probably the perfect instructor to give Anderson “the spider” Silva and Lyoto “the dragon” Machida an fresh perspective to help their MMA. I found a video of Seagal teaching. I hope you have enjoyed my view of MMA’s latest hot new trend – getting back to basics!

I was watching the title match between Brock Lesnar and Cain Velasquez the other night and was surprised at how well Velasquez did! Not that anyone is unbeatable but Lesnar seemed to be the nearest thing to it because he would smother guys on the ground and pound the side of their head until they tapped.

Lesnar took out Carwin and Mir in the last couple of bouts demonstraiting (I thought) his transition from wrestling to MMA. Watching the Shane Carwin bout, it was apparent that Lesnar had a hard time with a striker but he was always able to wether the storm and own the opponent in the ground game.

I have some interesting old ideas about this  but first take a look at Lesnar’s first UFC match.

See how Lesnar kept his advantage on the ground seemingly so easily? One thing to remember before we forget, fighting takes strategy and skill. All things being equal – the fighter with the best plan will win the day. What does that take? It means a fighter has to see the other fighters weaknesses and then exploit them!

Velasquez did not allow Lesnar to smother him by rapidly putting space between them and getting up. He obviously trained for that so he could land some leather on Lesnar. Brock Lesnar while certainly a big, strong, quick guy, had not yet picked up striking skills. That along with his endurance (not sure about this but it seemed like he would not do well in later rounds) gave the advantage in this bout to Velasquez.

Unfortunately a win against Lesnar will not ensure a win against Mir as each fighter matches up differently. Mir could not hang with Lesnar’s ground game as he probably thought his jiu-jitsu was superior to Lesnar’s wrestling. Not sure how Velasquez would match up to Mir but I hope to see it soon! 

Hopefully Lesnar will work on his striking and endurance (against guys that can hang with him) and come out better for future showings. By the way I’d like to say how pleased I was at the sportsmanship Brok Lesnar displayed in this match.

WEC 49 had some interesting bouts  (June 20th) as did Strikeforce Fedor vs. Werdum (June 26th). I’ll just highlight a couple of the fights and link to some results for each. But let me just say they were worth watching!

The main WEC fight was a battle between Jamie Varner and Kamal Shalorus that was marred by Shalorus kicking Varners family jewels three times. Kamal lost one point. If you get a chance to watch this fight you’ll see Varner getting the best of Shalorus in most clashes but Shalorus has a good chin. Even without the penalty point taken away from Shalorus I had Varner ahead on points easily. The fight went the distance and much to my surprise two judges were split with the third calling for a draw! Results here.

Here is a video of Fedor vs Werdum (don’t know how long it will be up).

I was not really that surprised by this result as while Fedor is a great fighter – he has pulled out some surprising wins at times. But wow – Werdum really pulled off the win while Fedor was trying to pummel him on the ground! Results here.

The fight I really enjoyed on this ticket was Scott Smith vs Cung Le rematch. Le fought this bout better than I’ve seen him so far by choosing his shots and fighting a bit more defensively. Le easily out classed Smith this time and found a home for his decisive spinning rear kick that Smith had so much trouble with in the last fight. Here is a video of this match up.

This has been a good month for MMA fights. There were some other really interesting match ups but I wanted to highlight the Smith vs Le as my favorite. What was your favorite this month?

I am excited to announce that on June 26th Showtime is airing “Strikeforce and M1 Global: Fedor Emelianenko vs. Fabricio Werdum” that will include Chris “Cyborg” Santos vs. Jan Finney. Who has not heard of Fedor as one of the best heavyweights today. Unfortunately he has not fought in the UFC but he will be facing a top heavy weight in Fabricio Werdum.

In this post I’ll introduce the fighters in some video and give an overview of each. I don’t know much about Jan Finney but most of you have heard of Chris “Cyborg” Santos after her decisive win over Gina Carano and her title defense over Marloes Coenen. Here is an overview of Werdum.

It was interesting to see Randy “The Natural” Couture saying (at 3:22) that Fedor was going to have to fight top level guys again. Some of that has to be guys loyal to their organizations and some contract limits. From what I can see of Fedor – he seems to be a very well versed MMA fighter that has the Judo background like Fabricio. Here are a couple of highlight videos.

Both of these fighters have what it take to walk away with the win. I like that Fabricio has jiu jitsu, muay thai, boxing, and judo skills to the table. Both of these fighters have won some big bouts. I’ll have to say this one is too close to call for me although I would bet most everyone expects Fedor to win.

Chris “Cyborg” Santos is seemingly unbeatable in MMA right now. Her wins against Carano and Coenen were decisive. Here is a Cyborg vs Baszler video for your perusal.

I found a couple of old fights with Finney but most recently here is a Women’s MMA Roundup video that includes some Finney information.

While Jan “Cuddles” Finney looks to be a good fighter, I don’t see her lasting beyond the first round with Chris “Cyborg” Santos. Cyborg threw Coenen around the cage during the title defense won that match easily. So if Finney does have something to bring to the table – I will be pleasantly surprised.

I hope you have enjoyed this overview of a couple of the matches in the upcoming Strikeforce & M1 Global: Fedor vs. Werdum event and please let me know if you have any insight about these fighters.

Tonight CBS is airing Strikeforce Nashville (April 17, 2010)! UFC 112 featuring among other great fights was Silva vs Maia (although many will disagree with me) and on April 24 Aldo vs Faber will fight in Sacramento as well as another fighter I like to track, Michelle “The Karate Hottie” Waterson will fight  Masako Yoshida at the Spring Brawl in Fargo, North Dakota!

In this post I’ll mostly talk about both Silva vs Griffen and Silva vs Maia as I was the most excited I have been in a long time to see a truly great fighter get in the ring (octagon) and own a couple of other fighters. As I said most people like to see the guys meet in the middle of the ring and duke it out like WCL matches!

Not me! I’ve always said fighting is fighting is fighting. The only thing that matters is if you win or not… making the other guy/gal look like a novice or knocking him or her out is gravy… I’ll save my view for later but first here is a trailer for tonight’s fights.

I like Henderson and Sheilds just fine so this should be a fun night. I also like the other guys on the card. Now getting back to Silva, when he fought Griffen at UFC 101 he seemed to be toying with Griffen. I would say that he used his timing and distance to make Griffen look foolish. Not many fighters could do that with Griffen as I’ve seen him win some tough fights.

Why did a fighter like Griffen seemingly fall so easy? I think Silva understands what it means to use distance an timing to his advantage. He (Silva) seemed to have great boxing skills beyond what one would expect of a Muay Thai fighter (more akin to a Muhammad Ali in my view) and he also really understands what timing and distance is in a fight! Watch this video (hopefully it stays up):

Now in UFC 112 Silva used the same timing and distance to keep Maia off for 5 rounds but he did not seem to go for the kill! Many would see that as a failing as they paid all that money to see the fight. But remember what a fight is – to win the bout within the frame work of the rules. If one is ahead in points – why risk it? I remember when Cung Le fought Scott Smith – Le was ahead easily and then risked everything by continuing to engage Smith. While I as a fan applaud his spirit – I question the strategy as the only thing that matters is if you walk away with the win! Here is that fight if you want to see it.

Ahh seeing the beginning of that fight is good to see Le kicks. As a former point fighter – I really love to see basic karate type skills working in MMA. But the point with this I am trying to make is why would one attack when he is clearly ahead? I would coast to a point and try not to muck up things too much.

One story comes to mind where I employed this strategy. We had a visiting Navy fighter from a Japanese school that was doing well against all comers in my school. That was a feat in it self but this guy was not modest. He was a light weight and had some mean foot sweeps that made him a worthy opponent.

I was matched up with him after I saw what he did to my peers. I opted to hang back and use distance and timing even though I had a 20 pound weight advantage on him (that did not help the heavy weights). We played around for a while and I hit him and he was not able to hit me. You see I was fighting defensively and using my reach to my advantage. He got mad and challenged me to a sudden death match!

For those of you do don’t know that just means the first point wins. We enlisted three judges and went to it. I danced around for a few minutes until I saw him getting frustrated (I had all of the time in the world). I waited until he overextended himself and threw a loose-fast inverted counter punch in and out and scored! He got mad again and wanted a rematch! I took off my gloves and walked away.

You see it is only important that one wins within the framework of the rules presented – whether it be MMA, kick boxing, boxing, wrestling, jiu jutsu, street fighting, or self-defense! Winning is everything although being a good sport is an honorable thing to do.

Here is a link to Silva vs Maia at UFC 112 for your perusal if you did not see it: Silva vs Maia. I think the first rounds Silva was clearly ahead and then seemed to get a bit tired in the later rounds. That did not keep Silva from using timing, movement and distance to his advantage. Even though Maia did well in the later rounds – he still got owned by Silva and lost. The fans did not like this fight but I thought it was masterful (as a former fighter)!

There you have my thoughts and there where many more great fights that I did not mention. I did like Penn vs Edgar and Hughes vs Gracie. I’ll close with a preview of the PPV Aldo vs Faber next week!

I am a MMA fan that likes to watch the fights that are easily available without watching PPV! That means I just have an overview of the sports from some of the various leagues such as UFC, WEC, Strikeforce, M1, and K1 (probably a lot more too). What I am trying to say is while I opine on the fights I watch; if you were to use me as your sole source of information about men’s and women’s MMA – you would probably be missing a lot.

I’ve been following Strikeforce as I am able (I don’t get Showtime anymore) and just found out that Sarah Kaufman beat Takayo Hashi to win the Strikeforce Women’s Welterweight title!

In this post I will give an overview of the Kaufman vs. Hashi fight and give the latest on Michelle Waterson’s latest fight. I will also speak of some of the (many) exciting MMA fights coming soon in the WEC, UFC, and Strikeforce. Here is a promo video done before the Kaufman vs Hashi fight. I’ll post the four links of the actual fight (not sure how long they will be good) if you want to go to youtube and watch it.

Here are the links:

• Kaufman vs. Hashi 1 of 4
• Kaufman vs. Hashi 2 of 4
• Kaufman vs. Hashi 3 of 4
• Kaufman vs. Hashi 4 of 4

Watching this fight I noted that Kaufman was able to fight her game plan – staying on her feet and out boxing Hashi. Hashi got knocked down several times during the rounds but Kaufman did not follow her down to the mat. Kaufman was able to avoid the ground game altogether with her sprawl and strength.

The fight went poorly for Hashi, losing every round with the final score of 50 – 45. I’m not sure but I would say Hashi would have had a better chance had she been able to get Kaufman to the ground. Kaufman to her credit kept to her game plan and did not give Hashi any openings. This was a very disciplined fight on Kaufman’s part.

Shop these mat shoes for MMA.

The WEC has a couple of fights coming up soon. The first on 3/6/10, Brian Bowles vs. Dominick Cruz is highlighted below. I have seen Bowles fight before and this one should be good (and free on versus TV). Torres and Pulver will be fighting on different bouts too.

The WEC has the much anticipated Jose Aldo vs Urijah Faber for the title on 4/24/10 on Pay Per View (PPV). I guess I am going to miss this one unless I find it on the internet. You see my budget and the cable company had a disagreement. I cannot afford to pay $100 dollars a month on TV with some pay channels. I’ve striped down to the bare minimum of channels for $15 bucks a month and spend another $15 on Netflix! I now watch more movies than I ever could from the cable company for about 1/4 of the price. Here is Urijah speaking about that fight.

UFC 114 on 5/29/10, looks to have some good fights… Rashid Evans vs. Rampage Jackson. Also among the many match ups, Machida vs. Rua  is happening. Here is some video of the highlights of Evans and Jackson.

Strikeforce is making an announcement Monday. I believe it might be about the headliner fight on their 4/17/10 event. My guess is it will be a Shields vs. Henderson proclamation.

The Karate Hottie, Michelle Waterson has apparently won a match at the Extreme Beatdown 6 event against Rosary “Ro” Califano in the first 15 seconds of the first round. I was not able to find any video of this. Why, you might by wondering, do they call Michelle Watterson the Karate Hottie? Here is one of her latest videos modeling at bikini.com. Don’t be fooled by her looks folks, this lady can fight!

Do you remember the post I did about Michelle appearing in the Megadeth, Head Crusher, music video? Well here is a training video for that spot.

In case you don’t remember that music video, here it is (don’t know how long the link will work). If the link breaks – you can find this on youtube.

I hope you have enjoyed my comments on some current and future MMA events.