Do you do a Martial Art or MMA?

[Hooper]

I have a purple belt in BJJ. I also did Tae Kwon Do, I got my black belt when i was 12. (it only takes like 3 years). In my opinion, wrestling is THE best base for MMA. If you do take up BJJ, expect to progress very slowly. I can't test for my brown belt till I'm 18 or 19 (can't remember).

I remember having a few of my fights videotaped. I'll post 'em here if I find them.

Oh yeah, purple belt is good. I know BJJ takes AGES to progress, I'm assuming you wear a gi when you do it?

Do you think doing Taekwondo has done anything for self-defence wise and was it mainly just about doing fancy kicks with stuff all handwork?

Oh and yeah, you do NEED wrestling in MMA, even if its a bit boring.

 

[blazerix]

Yeah I wear a gi.

Self-defense wise, I'd go for BJJ, hands down. The only thing TKD really did was help me become a lot more flexible. When you're sparring in Taekwondo, its all about kicks. There is some handwork when you do poomsae.

I hope I made sense. (i'm on my ipod)

 

[King Pietersen]

I'm a huge MMA fan, and have done a little bit of jiu jitsu, but getting to the classes was a bit of a chore so I gave it up. Going to Uni in London in September though, so I think once I'm settled I'm going to start training down at Carlson Gracie's camp. It's only about 20 minutes from my Uni, so it's pretty much perfect. The only issue will be paying for it, but I'm sure it won't be too much of an issue. So if I did train there I'd end up training BJJ, Muay Thai and MMA. Sounds and looks like an awesome camp.

Are there many camps coming up in Aus? There are some good Aussie fighters coming through now, with George Sotiropoulous being the main one, but then he trains in the US, think Kyle Noke trains in the US as well. So that basically only leaves Sinosic, Haseman, Perosh and Te-Huna that train in Australia. How popular is MMA in Australia? Did the UFC card go down well? You heard about those Impact FC cards being held in Australia? One in Brisbane and one in Sydney already been booked. The Brisbane one features guys like Josh Barnett, Karo Parisyan, Carlos Newton, Sokoudjou and Jeff Monson; then the Sydney one features Paul Daley, Paulo Filho, Denis Kang, Ken Shamrock, Ninja Rua, Murilo Bustamante, Jesse Taylor and Bob Sapp. Looking like very good cards.

 

[Hooper]

I'm a huge MMA fan, and have done a little bit of jiu jitsu, but getting to the classes was a bit of a chore so I gave it up. Going to Uni in London in September though, so I think once I'm settled I'm going to start training down at Carlson Gracie's camp. It's only about 20 minutes from my Uni, so it's pretty much perfect. The only issue will be paying for it, but I'm sure it won't be too much of an issue. So if I did train there I'd end up training BJJ, Muay Thai and MMA. Sounds and looks like an awesome camp.

Are there many camps coming up in Aus? There are some good Aussie fighters coming through now, with George Sotiropoulous being the main one, but then he trains in the US, think Kyle Noke trains in the US as well. So that basically only leaves Sinosic, Haseman, Perosh and Te-Huna that train in Australia. How popular is MMA in Australia? Did the UFC card go down well? You heard about those Impact FC cards being held in Australia? One in Brisbane and one in Sydney already been booked. The Brisbane one features guys like Josh Barnett, Karo Parisyan, Carlos Newton, Sokoudjou and Jeff Monson; then the Sydney one features Paul Daley, Paulo Filho, Denis Kang, Ken Shamrock, Ninja Rua, Murilo Bustamante, Jesse Taylor and Bob Sapp. Looking like very good cards.

Yeah get back into it mate, sure they take into account your financial situation at most places (those which aren't McDojos that are only there to rape people of their money).

I've enquired around a fair few places round where I live, theres a lot of different choices, MMA is getting huge over here, I've got the choice of doing Taekwondo (not keen), Rhee Taekwondo (actualy Korean military style, sounds good), Judo, MMA, Brazillian Jujitsu, Boxing, Muay Thai, Kickboxing, Karate, akido. Everything basically. :laugh

I'm leaning towards this full MMA club that teaches BJJ, Muay Thai and takedown defence and ground and pound, hoping to one day compete in a few amatuear fights but I know even that is a long road.

The UFC card went well down here, pretty sure it sold out pretty quickly, got a bit of coverage in the news (UFC NEVER gets covered in the news here, still a bit of ":" over "cagefighting" here I must admit).

Wow, Paul Daley would be good to see, shouldn't of done that to Koscheck, I reckon he coulda become something in the UFC one day, ah well. Yeah, the Impact cards are pretty decent, quite a few ex-UFC and ex-Pride fighters so we can't complain I guess.

 

[King Pietersen]

Yeah, I'll definitely get back into it once I'm in London. Just a bit of an arse getting to the 'local' BJJ classes near me, and it's only once a week, so it's pretty pointless TBH. Once I'm in London it'll be a lot better though; Carlson Gracie's camp looks very good.

Sounds good mate. They're the disciplines you want to learn I think. Muay Thai is arguably the best striking discipline for MMA. Not only does it mix in more strikes with your elbows and knees, but they also teach you to throw your hip through your kicks more than in Kickboxing. The top MT practitioners in MMA are all awesome too, can't argue with a bit of Anderson Silva, Shogun Rua and Wanderlei Silva. The only straight kickboxer that comes close to those levels of awesomeness is Cro Cop. Wrestling's pretty important too I'd say, but if you learn BJJ at a good enough camp you can neutralise a good wrestler with a dangerous guard. The Maia-Sonnen fight was proof of that; as was the first Lesnar-Mir fight.

Good to hear. Wouldn't be too down about MMA not reaching Mainstream news shows in Aus yet, as it doesn't get a mention here yet either. MMA's definitely growing in popularity, but it's still nowhere near mainstream in the UK. The UFC shows sell out quickly, but it doesn't get much press other than on ESPN.

Aye, was a bitch move from Daley. Even though Koscheck's a complete douche, Daley shouldn't have done that, and was deservedly booted out of the UFC. Would still be interesting to see him fight though, as I'm sure he'll put on a good show, that's if he's refocused on training anyway. The cards do look very good yeah, much better than the UK shows we get over here. The BAMMA 3 card was one of the better UK cards I've seen since Cage Rage, and the only 'names' on that card were Tom Watson, War Machine, Seth Petruzelli and Matt Horwich; those Aussie cards are WAY better than that.