So pleased to announce that Elementary Striking is now available on the Books page! It's taken a long time to put together and aside from the difficulty formatting a .mobi version I am very pleased with how it's come out!
For those of you who don't know, Elementary Striking is a lot more to do with my personal philosophy and teachings on striking than Advanced Striking - which was more case studies. The Advanced Striking will get a second volume but Elementary Striking is pretty much a one off guide to fundamental strategy.
Don't let the word fundamental fool you though - there's a lot in there that I haven't seen written down before and a lot of it isn't taught in most gyms!
It's been a while since I updated (as always it seems!) I've had a lot on with the new book and becoming a big attraction at BE (my articles are now being listed as "Jack Slack Breaks Down" rather than "Judo Chop", which is pretty awesome). I wanted to share a moment from an old PRIDE fight which I consider one of the most intense displays of emotion in MMA history.
This moment comes in round 7 of the incredible fight between Kazushi Sakuraba and Royce Gracie - which was scheduled to have no time limit other than being fought in 15 minute rounds. After fighting for an hour and a half both men were exhausted but Sakuraba began to best Royce with low kicks. At about 3:40 you can witness the start of the end for Royce Gracie as Sakuraba lands two such kicks on Royce's thigh to an eruption of the crowd.
At about 7 minutes into the clip Stephen Quadros, Bas Rutten and Maurice Smith begin to discuss how Helio Gracie must feel for his son. Helio had been in lengthy fights like this but never against a complete fighter such as Sakuraba. This is accompanied by a shot of Helio Gracie, looking intensely stoic as always.
At 9:25 Sakuraba drops Royce with another brutal low kick and stands over him in his guard. Both men are absolutely exhausted as they return to the centre of the ring and their mouths are open while their hands are low. No-one has ever fought for as long as Sakuraba and Gracie did in this bout and while it was understandably dull in places it remains an incredible spectacle.
By the 11 minute mark Royce Gracie is a shell of himself and simply hanging on through Sakuraba's hard kicks and punches. Every time Gracie drops to his guard he is finding it harder and harder to get to his feet. At 11:50 the camera cuts to Helio Gracie wringing his hands with concern for his son as the announcer declares that there are 3 minutes left in the round.
Helio Gracie is perhaps one of the toughest men in martial arts history - weighing only 140lbs he took on all comers in fights lasting up to an hour with his newly created variant on Judo newaza, Gracie Jiu Jitsu. He had not once considered throwing in the towel when the enormous Dan Severn was seemingly setting his son, Royce up for the kill, nor when heavyweight Kimo Leopaldo was bloodying Royce up in an unexpectedly tough fight in the UFC. In fact any time Helio appeared on screen in Royce's corner, even up until earlier in this round, he had been the epitome of tranquility in the face of his son's pain. This moment in the 7th round tells us more about Helio Gracie as a man and a father than any of the legends can. He may have been the authoritarian father figure, insisting his boys toughen up and come to blows for honour, but when he knew a fight was lost, he didn't want to see his son take any more punishment.
At 12:28 the camera cuts back to Helio and Rorion Gracie and the camera zooms in on Rorion's hand on the ring apron, holding the towel in a white knuckle fist. As this shot happens the crowd erupts and you realize that the image we are seeing on our screen has been broadcast to the entire arena. The crowd know that the Gracie's are going to give in, but Sakuraba and even Royce are clueless - never taking their eyes off of each other.
In the final minutes of the round Maurice Smith asks his co-commentators "How much can a fighter take? How much should a fighter take?" in reference to Royce Gracie, vainly throwing up kicks that visibly hurt his own legs. Gracie has abandoned attempting to stand from his guard and is instead attempting to chop at Sakuraba's legs from the floor. Sakuraba, 90 minutes in to the longest MMA match in history, against an undefeated opponent, summons all his energy to deliver what has perhaps become the defining image of his career.
After the end of this clip there is a minute in the corners before the Gracie family finally throw in the towel, but by that point it is ceremonial. In the course of this single round Royce went from in the fight to being savagely beaten, his family turned from intense, machismo and encouraging to the point where they wanted to end the fight, and the Japanese fans reached a fever point as a shaky camera shot confirmed that the legendary Gracie family were going to give up after years of refusing to submit, even through broken bones.
The fight between Sakuraba and Gracie is one of the most significant moments in both martial arts and combat sports history and I recommend that anyone who hasn't seen it put aside 90 minutes, sit down with a drink and a snack, and watch two master tacticians grind each other down. The lulls in action are more than made up for by the creativity of Sakuraba, the heart of Gracie and the significance of the bout.
Fabio Maldonado has been one of the most requested fighters for analysis in recent months - partly due to his upcoming bout with Brazilian stand out, Glover Teixiera and partly due to the continued assertion that because he has good body work he has good technical boxing. Now the light heavyweight division and MMA in general aren't stacked with guys who have excellent boxing technique and strategy - in fact most are just above passable - Maldonado's successful boxing career should put him head and shoulders above most in the division, and yet even against middling opposition he has looked nothing like a world beater in the striking department.
Maldonado has fantastic body punches and this has garnered him great attention because the body attack is firstly so underused in MMA as it is, and secondly it is such an effective means of visibly hurting and opponent. Kyle Kingsbury is an ultra tough guy in terms of durability - that much should be clear from his last two fights - but he was giving up the Thai plumm because of body shots that Maldonado was landing while stooped over and eating knees - that's pretty much unheard of. The only other individual in main stream MMA who throws body shots while defending the Thai plumm is Nick Diaz, and he's never visibly hurt anyone while doing it.
If Maldonado hits hard, works the body well and has a granite chin - how can I possibly say he doesn't have good boxing? The heart of boxing technique is attacking while attempting to stay safe oneself but Maldonado's defence is laughably bad when he stepsforward. I have often referred to what I call "Rashad Evans Syndrome" - where a fighter bobs his head back and forth as if he is a professional boxer, only to stand bolt upright as he steps in with punches. Where Rashad Evans, Frank Mir and others in MMA at least convince themselves to move their head when they're not punching - Maldonado NEVER moves his head. His approach to striking has been to walk forward and grind his opponents down as he would in a boxing match but he lacks the large gloves to hide behind when pressing forward.
In order to get inside to do his brilliant body work, Maldonado must close the distance. Where a good boxer would throw a dipping jab, eliminate his opponent's lead hand or move to an angle and move in while his opponent turned to face him - Maldonado simply jumps in with his head up and his shoulders down.
Notice here how Maldonado jumps in with a jab to the body and because his head remains completely vertical, with his chin up, his head is easily snapped back by Kyle Kingsbury's jab. Compare this to a good technical boxer - such as Anderson SIlva.
Notice that Silva jumps in with his head off line - so that he is hard to hit. When jabbing at an opponent the majority of the time their vision will be obscured even if you miss, so following your head is a tough task. If you keep your head in the same spot as in your normal stance every time you jab however the opponent can throw a punch with his eyes closed and still know where you're going to be. Notice that in frames 3 and 4 Anderson is standing almost on a line with his lead shoulder high and his right arm hiding his ribs and chest. In 3 and 4 Anderson wants Okami to come back so that Anderson can shoulder roll or duck and then counter - this is high level stuff. Maldonado simply wants to get inside and get to work - not set up a counter-counter, but if he moved his head when he lunged in it would certainly be a much less arduous task to close the distance.
Later in the same fight between Anderson Silva and Yushin Okami, Silva demonstrated how effective a jab with correct movement could be:
