Life vs Jiu Jitsu: June 2012

Jun 28, 2012

Around The "Machado" World This Week...

I have been away to Ohio for a few days. While I was down there, I took the opportunity to train at Jorge Gurgel's MMA. While Professor Jorge is a accomplished MMA fighter and Jiu Jitsu wizard (see season 2 of The Ultimate Fighter), the gym is probably best know as where Rich Franklin trains. I had a blast and will elaborate on my experiences there in a separate blog post. When I came back, I was surprised to find several new videos and news from around the "Machado World"

First and foremost I heard about the news of Joe Rogan's Black belt promotion in 10th planet Jiu Jitsu.

"I just gave @joerogan his 10th Planet black belt... Here's the pic of @joerogan getting his black belt :)" -Eddie Bravo

Eddie Bravo presented Joe with his new belt on Tuesday night (June 26th). It was an emotional moment for Joe, and my respect goes out to him. Congratulations.

Joe and Jean Jacques Machado

While not technically a Machado black belt, I know Joe received his brown belt from Professor Jean Jacques, and Eddie Bravo is a two stripe Black bel under Professor Machado. I am a dedicated listener of The Joe Rogan Experience and have really come to enjoy Joe's insight and candor into the world of MMA and jiu Jitsu.
Joe has the ability to sum up the reasons why I do Jiu Jitsu nicely with rants such as this:

"[There’s] something that my Tae Kwon Do teacher told me when I was a little kid that I never forgot was that Martial Arts are a vehicle for developing your human potential, and nothing in my life has ever put me in face with reality better than Jiu-Jitsu, ‘cause I think in life we can all distort our perceptions of things in order to make ourselves more comfortable, in order to except where we are, and there are a lot of people out there running around life full of s—t. You can’t be full of s—t when you do Jiu-Jitsu,” he said. When you do Jiu-Jitsu, it’s impossible to be full of s—t, because reality comes at you in the purest form possible. A life or death struggle using your determination, your focus, your techniques, your mind, and your training over and over again. And its reality, and if you f—k up, and you get caught in a triangle, you gotta tap and that is the end of the story. It’s as real as it can get, and that has made me a better person. It’s made me a better man, it’s made me understand myself, my weaknesses, my strengths, the s—t I need to work on. Jiu-Jitsu has been one of the most valuable tools that I have ever had in my life.”

You can check the video of his promotion here...

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My fellow blogger "Jake" over at The Ground Never Misses published an excellent interview with John Will, one of BJJ's "Dirty Dozen". John is a Rigan Machado Black Belt and has some great stories about traveling to Brazil for the first time with Professor Rigan.

Click here to get to read Jake's excellent post and interview, as well as see some cool vintage footage of tournaments.

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It also seems that Jean Jacques Machado has been traveling and has done another couple of techniques and interview for Jiu Jitsu Mania (a-la-Jits Magazine when Professor Machado came to our school)

It is always interesting to hear what Professor Machado is doing and what his opinion is on different topics.

The first technique video goes over a killer "Loop Choke" from Halfguard. My half guard is rarely an offensive position for me, I generally focus all of my energy to passing. I really like this technique and can see some real possibilities, though I feel like surprise is a considerably advantage when trying it out in rolling.

The second technique is a "crucifix" set-up from the butterfly guard. When I watch these techniques, Professor Machado moves so fluid. When I try these techniques, I feel clunky and robotic...something to work on for sure.

Awesome stuff,

Hope you enjoyed it

Mike.

Jun 14, 2012

Kettlebells For BJJ

My diet has been going well...I have shown myself real willpower to lose weight and it is working...

Time to ramp up the intensity with some exercise (supplemental to jiu jitsu training of course!)... which meant hitting the weights. I had bought a few kettlebells a year or two ago with the intention of using them, but just never really got them into my routine. They had turned into very heavy door stops.

The pink one is Jesslyn's....wise ass!

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First, a little KB history...

Kettlebell history is a controversial subject. Seems that nobody REALLY knows how and why they came into such prominence in Russia. They best explanation I have ever read is that during a time when cannon production was at it's peak in Russia, there was no standard size cannonball. Since each cannon fired a slightly different sized cannonball, it became impossible to have a constant supply of ammo in each size for each cannon. This posed an incredible problem for the Russian military, who quickly standardize the bore of each cannon (and therefore size of it's ammo).

Since the cannonball was produced in a standard size and was plentiful, it was not long before it was being used as the defacto standard for weights in trade. One cannonball or pood was 35-ish pounds, and could be used to measure out potatoes, or flour, or whatever else was for sale at the market.

Working day-in-day-out with a large round weight was cumbersome. I can only imagine that there were a few broken toes from a cannonball that slipped out of a vendors hand. Somewhere along the line there was an idea to graft a handle onto the weight to make handling easier, and the "modern" kettlebell was born.

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Kettlebells build muscle (and strength) in a different way than other weights. Because of the dynamic, off-centered, approach to controlling the weight, it promotes full body movement and exercise. A "functional" strength.

I like the idea of having functional strength. I have spent some time a few years ago hitting the machines in the gym. I wasn't very impressed with the how it built strength in very narrow plains of movement. I could bench press a decent with my arms at 90 degrees, but change that angle and I was as weak as a kitten. My body was starting to look great, but had little real strength.

for the past 3 weeks (on my Jiu Jitsu "off" days), I go through a 25 minute workout with my 'bells. It has been paying off tremendously physically and mentally. I feel "tighter" and with improved strength, my "upa" is more explosive, and my cardio has increased.

I have been surfing YouTube for a few cool videos of training with kettlebells for BJJ. Turns out there are hundreds of different videos (though most go over the same techniques or slight variations)

Here are some of my favorites:

I personally love the shrimp move with the KB @ the 0:50 second mark

This video is great for the explanation of what each KB exercise is and how it translates to Jiu Jitsu

Great instruction for my most feared KB exercise... the Turkish "Get Up"

Based on the results I am seeing in this short time I have been using them...I can see these kettlebells being in my life for while...

Mike

Jun 8, 2012

Jean Jacques Machado Interview and Technique

Professor Machado recently came by our school for a seminar (my 4th JJ Machado Seminar...where does the time go?) While he was there he spent some time with Matt and David from Jits magazine giving them an interview about his philosophy on Jiu Jitsu, progression of the students in Canada, and an interesting sweep-to-crucifix when someone is passing your guard...

But first... the seminar photos (faces blurred out of respect for peoples privacy)

The Seminar Begins

Congrats Shihan for a stripe on your Black Belt

I get to be the "Uke"

"The Three Musketeers"

King of the Mountain

Professor Machado goes over our technique questions one by one.

All-in-all a great seminar thanks to Shihan at ACMA for bringing him in, and thanks to Jesslyn for taking these awesome pics (check out her photo blog)

RCJ Machado Photo History

I hope you find these pics of the Machado brothers as interesting as I do... They are by no means an exhaustive record, but this humble blog post will hopefully document some of it.

The Machado Story