MMA guy came to our Tai Chi tonight.

[Liokault]

Just got back from a very interesting training session.

A young Latvian MMA guy came tonight and we did a lot of stuff together ending up by sparring.

Its hard to say how much training he has had as he has only been speaking English for 3 months so communication was very hard but his stand up wrestling was very good indeed. The only thing we can get out of him is that he trains for "cage fights".

Ok on to the sparring.

Now this guy is a MMA guy who looked good in our wrestling session (he also out wrestled the only guy in the class who beats me in the previouse session that i missed) he is also taller than me heavier (a lean 85kg to my 80kg with about 4 kilos excess weight) and younger do I was a bit worried.

We kick off .....Bit of a stand off as no one wants to make the first move.

I throw in a few kicks to his thigh that land heavily.

He moves forwards and throws a combo that misses.

I throw some punches ...some land but he shrugs them off and we clinch.....he cant get a throw on nor can I


Ok it goes on like this for about 5 mins.......he is trying to take me to the floor but its not going to happen for some reason.

ok its starting to get a bit stagnent now so i try somthing differant.

what followed was the cleanest nicest feeling throw I have ever done...ever. we would call it step up raise hands and its basicaly shooting in underneath the guy, pulling his weight over your center of gravity and coming up right throw him up and behind your self.......It goes on perfictaly to my spurise as it starts off more or less like a double leg take down........My throw ends up droping the guy upside down with his body almost dead straight from about 6 foot in the air!!!!


Ok he wants a rest now



Ok hes ready again and after the first try I am expecting him to try to get level and be a bit more agressive but it goes on as above till my teacher says.....ok lets change it a bit.....carry on on the floor if you go down and go for submissions.
Next clinch I try a hip throw that dosent work and we go to the ground with my arms around his neck is an atempt at a lock.....ok we on the floor now and im worried again....then he just stops saying he has a cramp!!


Not sure what to think as i have no way of knowing how good he is (appart from his stand up werstling whice was very very good) and i could not get out of him or his friend how long he had been training but i was expecting to get my ass handed to me....at least on the ground:confused:

[TaoBoy]

Ah well. It was a good experience for you if nothing else. :)

[jon]

ROFL
I had almost the exact opposite experience last night.
I went to a MMA class :D

The guys teach a combination of kickboxing, 'streetfighting' and traditional stuff.

I went though an intire class with them all and came out with a new found respect for our sporting associates.
MY GOD those guys train HARD!!!
I dont think ive ever sweated so much in my life, we must have spent about an hour solid on timed drills on the bags :(

Finaly we got to the sparring.
I got parred up with a beguineer who i had some fun with just bobbing and slipping and testing his defences.
Next i got parred up with the instructor. I had met this guy before and he is a top bloke. Also HUGE... Im talking like a treetrunk size.
He offered to remove the gloves so we could proparly spar without the limitations. Either of us had much protective stuff on so we kept it easy.

Here is where it got interesting. For those of you who dont know most of my fighting these days is done using the internals.
Hence i used Bagua.
I simply couldnt lay a hand on him, dispite being an enormous guy and having watched him box earlier he was not fighting me the way i expected at all.
He was butter soft and and would slip forward and backwards in and out of range with short flurrys of powerfull internal mechaniced punches.
The good part was that after about 3-4 mins of flat chat sparring neither of us had managed to land a solid hit.
He had basicaly kept trying to run me over and i had kept moving around him in an attempt to get inside.

We both finaly clinched and began to laugh as we where both totaly out of energy.
I smiled at him and he smiled back and we both thanked each other deeply.
He then went on to explain to his students.
'Guys when i teach you its just basics, hard and fast, you will notice when i spar Jon im using softer stuff'
'What are you using?' says one of his students.
Li Ha Ba Fa he replied :)

LOL i got tricked :)
Seriously though this was a big education on a stupidly obvious point.
Dont judge a book by the cover, i had spent the class with this bloke watching him throw hooks and uppercuts and when we sparred that was what i was expecting. Then i get hit with what is very obviously a much more refined system.


To any who are wondering.
The guy has studied cma under several sifus for comming on 20 years. He does a LOT of full contact and does a lot of bouncing work for a living (his size helps). He has only done the Li Ha Ba Fa for two years - already its his system of choice.


Honestly if there are any MMA guys looking for a good stand up game i would highly recommend any of the internals.

[TaoBoy]

Nice post Jon.

Who is this guy? Where is his gym?

[jon]

TaoBoy

lol hmmm not dead sure if i should be leaving the guys details online or not.
On the other side of it he really is a great instructor and i would highly recommend anyone to train with him. He is also still a student of his master himself.
I guess it cant hurt to give the man a plug.
His first name is Andy i honestly cant remmeber his last.
His gym is in Parramatta at the police boys club its called 'eye of the eagle'. The gym is fully equiped with a boxing ring, protective equipment and a wealth of hanging bags, speedballs and what not.
Im not dead sure on the rest of there contact details as i know some of the guys there personaly so i just get in touch with them.
They train several nights a week but the ones i know of firmly are Tuesdays (last night when i went) and Saturdays.
There all great people who imho have an excerlent outlook on both training and combat.

[SevenStar]

sounds like both of you had good experiences. Liokault, since you don't know the skill level of that guy, perhaps you could go to his gym sometime?

[TaoBoy]

Thanks for the info Jon.
I'll look them up when I get to Sydney next.

Cheerrs,
Adam

[dezhen2001]

hey jon sounds like u had fun :D
take it easy mate!

dawood

[omegapoint]

Wow! You guys must be awesome. There is no way I could even get a solid blow in with my standup teacher. He just waxes me. I don't know if it's internal or external, but his external shots do penetrate internally!

As for being able to seriously give Ryron or Renner Gracie a run for their money, again uh-uh. Again, a formal waxing is usually in order.

I've heard the Internal arts represent the pinnacle of fighting effectiveness and efficiency. Good luck, and continued good training!

[jon]

omegapoint
lol trust me dude, if this guy had *wanted* to he could have ran me over like a steam roller - he is litteraly twise my size.
What 'was' very unusual for me was not being able to lay a solid hand on him. I have pleanty of larger sparring partners and none have given me so much trouble. It was like fighting against a massive wave.
I did still manage to keep him from getting a solid hit as well but i could feel that if he used full force i would be having real problems. We where after all basicaly just playing.

As for Ryron or Renner Gracie, if your learning of them - your a lucky man. Im sure if it was me trying to spar them i would curl up into a ball and simply cry.

Still i wanted to clairfy a little...
Sparring is sparring, fighting is quite different.
Whilst i could hold this guy at bay in a sparring situation in a real one im fairly confident he would fix me a new face.

I guess the main point of my post was that going to a MMA gym the last thing you expect to be hit with is an internal MA. Was a *very* pleasent surprise. It was also testement to the open mindedness of the school. If it works they use it and they teach in a progressive mannor. No point learning to issue fa-ging if you cant even throw 'regular' jab.



Does anyone know any good links on Li Ha Ba Fa?
Ive read a bit on it before but sparring this guy has rekindled my interest and i think it may be time for some more research. Its also commenly refered to 'Water boxing'.
Anyone on the board practice the art? If so do they spar with it? I was quite surprised to find a practioner in such a situation.

[friday]

hey jon sound like u had fun

:)
can u take me there?

friday

[Royal Dragon]

http://www.liuhopafa.com/

This is a Link to Wai Lun Choi's site. He's the Lineage holder to the style. It's a small system, with few branches. You might want to contact him to find out where the good stuff is. It seems few have it.

[Liokault]

Sevenstar


sounds like both of you had good experiences. Liokault, since you don't know the skill level of that guy, perhaps you could go to his gym sometime?


Like I said he trained (and comes from ) Latvia so going to his gym is out of the question.

i will try to get more out of him if he comes back to class.

Also on the sunday class he came to but which i missed my teacher said he was very good on the ground so im going to try to see if he will show me/us some stuff and possiably teach us some ground fighting.

[jon]

TaoBoy

Anytime :)
Still if you do make it up this way then please make sure you look me up as well. Im always up for meeting another practioner, we can have a play - or just yum cha :D

dezhen2001
Certainly was good fun.
Hope your well, say hi to our mutual friend for me ;)

friday
Definately...
Im actualy planning on going down there myself once a week for sparring practice. If your interested just give me a buzz and we can try and arrange a time.

Royal Dragon
Thank you kindly for the link, great site with some good information. Not to mention some brilliant old photographs.

[friday]

hey jon
did u see my thread on yum cha? let me know if that date is ok with u

friday
will do i'll let u know when i'm finished this semester :)

[Hau Tien]

I study LHBF as well as 7* PM. My teacher teaches those who want to know how to fight with the art. (Which luckily happens to include our entire class right now) We've been getting into the free fighting applications of the style lately, and it is a lot of fun. I really find that it has been affecting my sparring in the 7* class as well. I find myself using LHBF techniques on one of my 7* sihings who doesn't train the internal, but is a Canadian Muay Thai champ. Bugs the hell out of him when I stop his kicks before he can even get em out :)

When I read this post a day or two ago, I was quite excited to see someone mention LHBF, and that it was used successfully (and from the sounds of it, rather impressively) in a sparring situation.

I know of at least one other member on the board who practices LHBF. He practices under Master Choi (whose lineage is featured on the link RoyalDragon gave you). I wouldn't be surprised if there were more of us out there :)

[Liokault]

LOL


The MMA guy didnt come training last night as he couldnt walk properly after our sparring!!

I spent a bit of time talking to his friend and got out of him that hes been training for 3 years and has done at least 1 fight....couldnt make him understand that i wanted to know weather he won or lost.