Diary / Training Notes

MMA Clinch (diary entry)

November 18, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
body clinch

17.11.2021 Wednesday night my client continued his work from the clinch. This time we explored it through MMA and worked our way through 12 themed rounds: Collar and elbow-tie drilling and sparring in MMA gloves Layered in under-hooks and over-hooks Layered in foot sweeps and Muay Thai sweeps Layered in leg grips and ankle picks Layered in full takedowns and throws Layered in knee strikes Layered in body punches Layered in leg kicks Layered in body kicks Layered in punches […]

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Fighting from the Ground (diary entry)

November 18, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
ground and pound 2

17.11.2021 Wednesday saw my two Kingham Hill lessons deal with the very difficult subject of ground fighting in self-defence. This can be a difficult topic to handle for non-martial arts students, unfamiliar with grappling and in their teenage years. However, we made it through with varying degrees of enthusiasm. Those who felt uncomfortable in dealing the symmetrical situations drilled this as a solo exercise. We revised transitioning through postures, followed by asymmetrical ground-fighting, followed by symmetrical ground fight both from […]

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Teacher Development Programme: Ground Pins (diary entry)

November 17, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
mikael zoom teaching

16.11.2021 Tuesday night my client’s teacher development programme booked by Denmark’s Holstebro Taekwondo Klub via Zoom reached its 11th hour. Originally this course was booked for 10 hours, but early on an extra hour was added now yet another hour has been added for next week. This is little surprising given the amount of content present in ground fighting. Although my client is a highly experienced martial arts teacher with an experienced and very able co-teacher as his training partner, […]

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Bring on the Elbows! (diary entry)

November 16, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
Cover Elbow (loose)

15.11.2021 The eighth hour of my client couple’s course on the clinch brought in elbow strikes. For the benefit of at least one of the two clients we isolated elbow strikes than looked at their place in the clinch or even in combinations. After our standard warm-up of sport-specific dynamic stretching, callishenics and shadow boxing, we went through the following techniques: Major Elbow Strikes Horizontal Elbow – Popularly delivered off both lead and read arms from mid and close range. […]

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Building a Foundation (diary entry)

November 15, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
coaching juniors 1

11.11.2021 After last lesson’s taster of Mixed Martial Arts, my new junior client has opted to train in Muay Thai/Kickboxing for the remaining nine hours of his course. We focused on setting up the classic modern Muay Thai stance, which is square on, and coninued work on the teep, jab and cross. I also introduced spear knee strikes both in the warm-up and in the final intensive section of the lesson as well the lead hook punch. We worked on […]

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Regaining the Initiative (diary entry)

November 12, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
5twfa8

10.11.2021 My two afternoon lessons on Wednesday were a continuation of my self-protection course for teenagers at Kingham Hill School. We shifted our focus onto the regaining the initiative stage. This is the first stage of reactive fighting from a hard skills perspective. Here we are beyond preemption and we have been preempted. I always make a point of stating how much this stage needs to be avoided. Whatever happens here on in, is reliant on a degree of luck. […]

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Teacher Development Programme: Clinch & Ground (diary entry)

November 10, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
zoom mikael lesson clinch sparring

09.11.2021 Tuesday night’s first lesson was my client’s teacher development programme booked by Denmark’s Holstebro Taekwondo Klub via Zoom. Tonight we finished off our clinch section with three types of single leg takedown, a series of sparring exercises and finished with top position ground-fighting. This was all preceded with relevant dynamic stretching and callisthenic exercises used to warm-up/activate the right muscle groups and movements. Single Legs: We covered the basic single-leg involving trapping the leg between the knees and shooting […]

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The Machine Gun (diary entry)

November 10, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
Freddie-Mills-with-Brighton-Chipperfield-Bear

09.11.2021 Joey “Machine Gun” Maxim was the light-heavyweight champion in 1952 when Archie Moore was finally given his shot at the title.  Tonight, we had a look at Maxim and two interesting bouts he fought prior to finally giving Archie Moore his shot. Born Giuseppe Antonio Berardinelli on 28th March 1922 in Collinwood, Cleveland, Ohio, USA, he earned the ring-name Joey Maxim after the Maxim gun, the world’s first self-acting machine gun. This came from his rapid use of the […]

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Clinching from Kick-Catches (diary entry)

November 8, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
kick catch 4

08.11.2021 Hour seven of my couple client’s course on the Muay Thai clinch brought kick-catching together with the clinch. We looked at countering after having a kick caught. We began with the simple drag down and then we covered clinching to break and knee strike. All of this was preceded with a revision of upright Muay Thai grappling and knee strikes. We finished 3 x 2 minute rounds of clinch-specific sparring. Services

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Junior MMA Trial Lesson (diary entry)

November 7, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
sprawl

04.11.21 Thursday night’s class saw a new client begin his course. He is a junior who has opted for my Mixed Martial Arts programme. I have advised that the best way to tackle MMA is by training in its component arts first. Usually this takes the form of boxing, then muay Thai before wrestling and submission grappling. However, some choose to start with any of the other arts depending on their experience or general preferences. Upon conducting an informal and […]

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Rise of the Mongoose (diary entry)

November 5, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
Moore vs Bivins

04.11.2021 Tonight’s lesson focused on my all-time favourite boxer, “Ancient” Archie “The Ole Mongoose”, Moore. Ring Magazine list him as the third greatest pound-for-pound fighter of all time and fourth greatest puncher of all time. It is contested that Moore might have the biggest string of knockouts in the history of the sport. Welterweight boxer, Billy Bird, whose career ended in 1948 and sadly we have no available footage of fighting, gets the official recognition with 138. Moore’s official record […]

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Circular Strikes (diary entry)

November 3, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
Hook palm 2

03.11.2021 My two self-protection lessons for Kingham Hill School looked at the hook (power slap) and the offline (rear elbow/hammer fist) strike. These are both circular strikes delivered pre-emptively but under different conditions than the straight strikes. The hook might serve as a preferred variant on the straight strike some people, but these days I tend to teach it from a more sophisticated set-up such as the invisible fence or with a deception. We also trained it from a restrictive […]

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Teacher Development Programme: Grappler’s Clinch Cont. (diary entry)

November 3, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
Double leg takedown Zoom

02.11.2021 Tonight we moved onto the ninth hour of my client’s teacher development programme booked by Denmark’s Holstebro Taekwondo Klub via Zoom. We picked up grappling clinch training again, looking at counters to the rear waist-lock/bear hug as well as training three variations on the double-leg takedown. Waist-lock defence used the cut-off footwork and counter with a waist-lock. The rear bear hug used a rear single leg takedown defence The first double-leg take-down was the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu version, which […]

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Kick Catching & Notes on Different Footwork (diary entry)

November 2, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
kick catch

01.11.21 The sixth hour of my client couple’s course on Muay Thai clinch took a detour into kick catching. We covered methods for catching kicks, how to follow up a kick catch and finally sweeps from the kick catch that brought us into line with last lesson’s sweeps in the clinch. We began with a warm-up where I decided to provide a litte comparison between Muay Thai and Western Boxing footwork. It’s something that I have become increasingly aware of […]

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Junior Grappling/Senior Muay Thai (diary entry)

October 28, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
pawing long guard thai

27.10.21 Tonight my junior client began looking at the clinch into ground submission work. My senior class continued looking at set-ups for overhand rights and rear round kicks. Areas he needs to work on with my junior client include wrestling attack and defence as well leg-locks. Due to his age, I am always concerned about any form of joint manipulation work. He is to execute full submissions on adult coaches and training partners but only to receive strong positional techniques […]

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Teacher Development Programme: Self-Protection (diary entry)

October 27, 2021 | Diary / Training Notes [ssba]
DSC00358

26.10.21 Tuesday night also saw the continuation of the teacher consultancy programme booked by Denmark’s Holstebro Taekwondo Klub via Zoom. Tonight we took a break from active sparring drilling and training to focus on their self-protection programme. Areas I covered included: Recommendation that attitude should be trained before awareness training Confirming their inclusion of situational awareness training Discussing either the inclusion of the 3 Rs version of the OODA Loop or, at least, bringing in the “double tap” Establishment of […]

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