Mixed Martial Arts
Intro:
Mixed Martial Arts is both a style and not a style simultaneously. It is both
a new and old way of thinking about martial arts. It bases the decisions about
which techniques to use on their demonstrated effectiveness by different practitioners
in open, non-style-specific sparring and/or competition that is designed to have
as few rules as possible while still ensuring safety against death or severe permanent
injury.
There are two main styles of MMA:
- Sport MMA- Mixed Martial Arts designed for sporting competition, such as the
Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), Pride Fighting Championship, or Vale Tudo
style fighting matches. These matches usually have two unarmed persons duking
it out with the core rules being: No biting, No eye-gouging (with fingers or chin)
and No fish-hooking (inserting body parts such as the fingers into bodily crevices
such as the mouth or nose). Groin attacks (striking or squeezing the groin) are
also often illegal.
The promoters may add more rules, or simply use what are considered to be the
core rules. More restrictive promotions of MMA include Old Pancrase, Shootfighting,
or RINGS rules. These rulesets often ban striking on the ground, closed-fist striking,
or both.
In general, boxing (kickboxing/muay thai included), wrestling (Freestyle, Greco-Roman,
and to a lesser extent Judo), and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) are the three styles
that comprise the core of nearly all modern MMA training.
- Street MMA- The principles of Mixed Martial Arts as applied for non-sport
situations. There seem to be fewer mixed martial artists interested in this as
compared to sport MMA, though the number of practitioners is growing. In practice,
many, though not all, of the persons doing this come from a Jeet Kune Do background,
and sometimes call what they do Jeet Kune Do (ex. Matt Thornton, Erik Paulson)
Their work is somewhat different from the JKD mainstream in calling for large
amounts of few-rules sparring, and they encourage their students to do sport MMA
sparring/competition. One can argue endlessly whether what they do is or is not
MMA or JKD- suffice it to say there are similarities to both, and that JKD can
be MMA and MMA JKD.
Most Street MMAers believe that sport MMA merely needs some changes in strategy
(less emphasis on staying on the ground, more weapons awareness) and the addition
of some techniques to become highly effective for the street. By far the most
common addition to street-oriented MMA is Filipino martial art (FMA) training,
due to its emphasis on, and practical use of weaponry, primarily the stick and
knife.
Origin:
The sport developed worldwide in the current form circa 1997, with the main
centers of development being Brazil, the US, and Japan. During the time of its
development, there were many exchanges of knowledge between the nations that developed
MMA. Techniques were taken from the martial arts and sports of Brazil, Japan,
England, America, Thailand, Holland, France, and Russia, along with smaller amounts
from other nations. Early MMA was internationally popularized by the broadcast
of the Ultimate Fighting Championship I in November of 1993.
History:
The first documented Mixed Martial Arts style competitions, and certainly the
conceptual ancestor of todays MMA, were the Pankration events of Classical Greece.
Different styles of Greek wrestling and boxing were utilized. However, unlike
the early UFCs, there was little emphasis on proving which style(s) worked best.
Instead, there was much more concentration on representing the city the athletes
came from, and each city's native styles were considered to be equally good. Other
forms of MMA have existed throughout history, such as French Brancaille.
The first Ultimate Fighting Championship was the brainchild of Art Davie and
Rorian Gracie. Originally to be called War of the Worlds, it ended up featuring
a sumo wrestler, a boxer, a savateur, two kickboxers, a kenpo man, a shootfighter,
and a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu fighter named Royce Gracie. Gracie swept by the other
contestants to win the tournament, and swept two of the next three tournaments
(Gracie could not continue due to heat stroke in UFC III) By the time of UFC III,
the referee was allowed to stop fights. After UFC IV, Rorian Gracie pulled out
of the UFC, and after UFC 6, similar but smaller MMA events began popping up all
over the country.
In the first few UFC tournaments, when the rules were limited to the core three,
a large variety of stylists competed. However, few fared well. Boxers tended to
dominate the striking, wrestlers (Freestyle, Greco-Roman, and to a lesser extent
Judo) dominated the takedowns, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) dominated on the
ground. As a result, people began focusing on these three.
(Note- much of the information on the history of MMA came from the book
No Hold Barred: Evolution, by Clyde Gentry III, available at
http://www.groundfighter.com)
Description:
Most Sport MMA fighters fall into one of three general categories- the groundfighter,
the wrestler, or the striker.
The groundfighter is the closest to a "pure" grappler one finds in MMA nowadays.
The groundfighter's strength is the ability to force a fight to the ground, where
they then seek a fight-ending submission (joint locks or choke). While the ability
to perform takedowns is integral to groundfighting strategy, a clean, powerful
takedown is not as important to the groundfighter as it is to the wrestler.
The wrestler is a stand-up and striking on the ground oriented grappler, whose
strength is usually the takedown. A common strategy of the wrestler is known as
"ground and pound." This refers to the method of taking an opponent down, achieving
a dominant ground position, and finishing the fight with strikes.
The striker is also commonly known as the standup fighter, due to their preference
to stay on their feet and win with a knockout. The strategy of the striker is
called "sprawl and brawl". This refers to their focus on nullifying takedowns
(the sprawl is the highest percentage defense to one of the more common entries
to a takedown in wrestling, the shoot) in order to stay upright and exchange blows.
These categories should not be taken as exclusionary of other categories -
groundfighters learn at least the basics of wrestling to be able to take down
people and the basics of striking to keep from getting KOed. Strikers learn enough
wrestling to neutralize takedown and throw attempts and enough groundfighting
to get back to their feet if they are taken down. Wrestlers learn enough groundfighting
or striking to protect themselves in one of those areas and to be able to easily
finish opponents with another.
On rare occasions, you will see fighters highly skilled (by MMA standards)
in all three areas. These types of fighters are becoming increasingly common as
the sport becomes more professional.
Training:
Training resembles boxing, wrestling, and BJJ training, but with a much smaller
selection of technique (for instance, the BJJ spider guard is strongly de-emphasized
in MMA, as are wrestling pins). There is also a focus on 'putting it together,'
using boxing to set up a takedown, how to take someone down while maintaining
position for a submission, boxing on the ground, etc.
Street MMA may add weapon drills, awareness training, and changes in strategy.
Sub-Styles:
Examples of Street MMA are the Dog Brothers style of martial arts sparring
(full-contact stickfighting with limited to no protective gear and real sticks),
Roy Harris' school in San Diego, CA, and Frank Benn's school in Austin, TX. Reality
Fighting and adrenal stress/scenario training (such as that done by Model Mugging/IMPACT,
Tony Blauer, Peyton Quinn, etc. ) are also often large influences on many of these
programs.
(Contributors: Rob Meyer, Christopher Kallini)
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