Friday, July 11, 2014

Joe Silvia - "Every throw has specific fundamentals."

Yesterday, I posted something my good friend Joe Silvia (aka "Ausgepicht" on some MMA forums) wrote up for me when I asked him a question on the name of a technique:



Today's entry is a followup by Joe expanding on General Fundamentals vs Specific Technique using Throwing as an example.


My deepest gratitude to Joe for sharing of his time, experience, knowledge and teachings with me! Hope you will benefit from Joe's wisdom!



Fundamentally speaking, every throw - and sweep, which is actually a horizontal throw....or is a throw a vertical sweep? - has specific fundamentals. To put it simply:

  1. Locking arm & power transfer
  2. Cant & tilt (Disrupt base camp - his posture, alignment, breathing, etc.)
  3. Intention towards the triangle point
  4. Reading, adjust, finish.

This means there is really just "one" throw and everything is a variant of it. If a person focuses on these fundamentals they "know" every throw on earth and will improv and create new throws in the moment.

There is everything practical and nothing mystical about this. Every successful throw has these in common. EVERY class should be about experiencing these and NOT 10,000 dry runs. Practice the root and not the 10,000 variants - of which you'd a few lifetimes to learn.

For example, in Ronda's Koshi Guruma - which SG corrected me on - we have:




  1. Locking arm: seat belt with left arm around Alexis's upper back sealing her to Ronda's body. Power transfer: pulling with tricep control on Alexis' left arm.

  2. Cant & Tilt: bend Alexis over at the waist so she is in poor posture and will have a harder time defending.

  3. Triangle point: Ronda's right leg and Alexis' left leg form the base of the triangle and Ronda drew her towards the apex of the triangle in front of them both.

  4. Read: Alexis was basing out trying to make herself heavy. Adjust: Ronda bumped her hip into Alexis's hip disrupting her balance. Finish: continue through the triangle point to the ground.


Of course, Ronda could have improved any of these variables INSTANTLY. Instead of the seat belt, she could have had an underhook, overhook, collar tie, etc. Instead of tricep control she could have pulled with a collar tie or wrist control. Of course, closer to the hips means more control, so there is an hierarchy.

Instead of the hip bump, she could have reaped one of Alexis's legs or both of her legs. If Alexis pulled back instead of falling forward, she could have back heel tripped Alexis.

Yada, yada, yada.

Practical point of all this:

You can spend 20 minutes getting 1,000 reps of a throw - no context, and in a completely sterile environment. Or....

You can teach a man how to fish, by working on the fundamentals.

Spend a 5 minute round pummeling with various control ties, try different combos of locking arm & power transfer.

Next 5 minute round, use your control ties to disrupt posture, alignment and balance. Nothing more.

Next 5 minute round, practice pushing and pulling into each other's triangle points.

Etc.

Happy training!

-Joe



For selected posts by my good friend Joe Siliva aka "Ausgepicht" that you may have missed, please check out:



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