BJJ 4 MMA

Starting a new class on Tuesday 19th February covering Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for MMA. The class will be no gi (obviously) and will mainly cover clinch, takedown and ground from a BJJ point of view but with striking options too.

"Cut Out The Middle Man"

X Guard seminar report on On The Mat

Thanks to Mr Fisher for getting us on On The Mat again.

http://www.onthemat.com/articles/Darren_Currie_02_07_2008.html

Keep up the good work, make me famous.

Monthly Combat Base seminars at Caged Steel Gym

February 12th sees the start of our regular monthly Combat Base seminars at Caged Steel Gym in Dewsbury.

The seminars will be no gi as the Caged Steel team want BJJ as applicable to MMA but also is equally relevant to no gi grappling.

The topic this time is Attacking From The Back following on from the last seminar of Taking The Back. It is a bold statement but I guarantee that after this 2 hour seminar your ability to finish people from the back will be much improved.
Starts at 7:30pm, everyone welcome.

“SPORT SPECIFIC” CONDITIONING SEMINAR

MIXED MARTIAL ARTS “SPORT SPECIFIC” CONDITIONING SEMINAR WITH ANDY FARRELL

SUNDAY FEBRUARY 10th1.30PM –3.00PM

CAGED STEEL TRAINING CENTRE
31 BRETTON STREET
DEWSBURY
WEST YORKSHIRE
WF12 9BJ

COST £8.00 PER PERSON

ANDY HAS FOUGHT MMA HIMSELF & BEEN IN AMERICA LEARNING CONDITIONING FITNESS WORK THIS TYPE IS A MUST.

FOR PRE-FIGHT OR PERSONAL EVERYONE WILL TAKE AWAY NEW DRILLS TO ADD THEIR OWN ROUTINESEVERYONE WELCOME PLEASE JUST TURN UP ON THE DAY.

MORE INFORMATION CONTACT NEIL HALL neil.hall@caged-steel.com www.csfc.tv

Darren Currie’s x-guard seminar at Combat Base Bolton, January 27th 2008

To kick start the year at Combat Base Bolton and to motivate the students after the Christmas lay off, Darren and Helen made the trip over to the land of the Red Rose to deliver a three hour seminar devoted to the x guard.

In all my years of training, the x guard had received scant attention, so I was more than looking forward to the seminar and becoming a white belt again for the afternoon; the seminar was well attended with Jamie Ward, Jamie Edmonds and members of Combat Base Bolton and Pontefract all supporting the event, as well as the support of pro MMA fighter Matt Thorpe, who came down to the event, so it was nice to see open minded guys from different arts all training together.

Darren started the class with a number of specific drills that can be easily incorporated into any warm up and then broke the entry into the x guard into smaller segments before getting to the x guard itself, which made it easier to understand and practice.

From the x guard itself Darren demonstrated a number of simple sweeps from the position and went on to show a number of ‘what if’ scenarios, arising from whatever position the opponent landed from the sweeps. With only three hours to train, Darren had barely scratched the surface on the x guard and the seminar came to an end and from there, students were paired off and rolled with each other and I am happy to say I managed to pull off a few sweeps from the x guard, surely a credit to my skill or Darren’s superior coaching skills? I’m sure Darren will have his own answer!

Darren will be back later in the year to deliver his speciality seminar, the half guard, which I’m sure will go down as well as the x guard session, judging from the positive feedback received after the seminar from the students involved.

Photos and more at http://lockflow.com/article_view.php?id=3609

By Carl Fisher
http://combatbasebolton.blogspot.com/

Eddie Bravo seminar at Combat Base North East

January 19th saw the return of Eddie Bravo to the UK being hosted by our friends in the North, as we had trained with Eddie previously, this seminar was a must attend.

The seminar was to be 2 hours half guard and 2 hours rubber guard with a healthy sprinkling of butterfly thrown in to link the 2 together. The seminar proved to be one of the largest I have ever been to, with around 60 people in attendance.

For people that can see beyond the pro-weed, wannabe rockstar there is an authentic bad ass BJJ black belt and excellent teacher. There is a genius in Eddie’s system, everything is well worked out, well drilled and above all else has a progression, a hierarchy of position. Forget the unusual, sometimes weird names given to the techniques, the system has structure and Eddie’s drill sergeant method of coaching is outstanding.

There is an argument that says that the more unusual or random the name anyway, the more likely you will remember it.

Rather than go through everything we did, suffice to say that Eddie said he had taught over half of his bottom game and, I for one, believe him because my brain was at saturation point there was so much detail.

For anyone who says that he did nothing new as they have seen it all before on the internet, in his books or on his DVDs then I disagree, I have trained days, months and years of half guard and rubber guard but I got so much detail out of the seminar as well as seeing a couple of things that were new to me too.

I was lucky enough to work with Eddie himself on the day so got to feel the pressure and the execution of his technique, none of which you can get from books or DVDs so the next time he is in the UK, you must train with Eddie Bravo.

Eddie also did a technique photo shoot for Fighters Only magazine and web site so keep your eyes open.

For brief interview and photos check:
http://www.onthemat.com/articles/Quick_interview_with_Eddie_Bravo_01_22_2008.html

Finally, massive thanks to Steve Paynter for putting the seminar together.