Ken Shamrock's "Beyond the Lion's Den"...worth the investment?

I'm trying to sharpen my catch-as-catch-can knowledge and ability to the max...and as far as a book I can find on the shelves of Barnes and Nobles...its basically the only relevant text out there. Decisions, decisions, decisions...

I have a notebook where I sketch down moves, take notes of principles passed on to me, etc...plus, I have lockflow.com and other online sources for moves....that, in addition to some old wrestling handbooks....as well as a video instructional, "Instant Submissions" by Frank Shamrock and of course, an enormous MMA library...

30 bucks...is behind the Lion's Den worth it...?

ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH......

 

I do think I read that you already have Cechines catch wrestling tapes. But do you have Mark Hatmakers?

Edit: Sorry havent read beyond lionsden..

 

I guess my worry about Tony Cecchine is looking at him while you have Gene Lebelle, Frank & Ken Shamrock, Kazushi Sakuraba, Erik Paulson and the like all with their own instructional tapes. In Tony, you have a guy whose expertise you are largely taking at his word whereas in others you have catch-as-catch-can experts who have proven the efficacy of their style in the ring.

I did have one of Tony's tapes, the coolest part of which was--to me--watching footage of Lou Thesz pull kimuras, keylocks, toe-holds etc. on his opponents.

Interestingly though, much of what I saw or recall seeing in Tony Cecchine I actually see from Severn and the people that train under him when I go to Severn's place to train, as far as neck-cranks ect. Its little known, but Severn considers himself a catch-as-catch-can man.

Anyway, I don't have Hatmaker or Cecchine(at the moment, I've had tapes of his uploaded and gotten rid of them)...please give me your two-cents about how they stack up.

 

Well I know that there are a lot of controversy surounding Tony Cecchine, but I must say I have taken a lot of god shit from them. Some things do seem awfully low percentage (even though I have thrown some of that shit in sparring and surprised people with it), but other things are pure gold, for instance I now do the straight ankle lock basicly exactly like Cecchine shows and it has turned into one of those insta kill subs for me, you know when you start to get the position that you will get the sub.
Of course im not at the highest level of grapling or anything, but yeah I like his shit.. (Fcuk im longwinded today..)

Matt Hatmaker is interesting because he does also come from a catch background, and many things are similar to how Cecchine does it, but there are also a lot of subtle differences. But I really like Hatmakers stuff.
I think you will like them..

 

I'll have to check Hatmaker out. Do you know anything about him and his background...?

 

I thought it looked like a pretty good book by just glancing thru it at the book store.

 

I have no idea about Hatmakers exact lineage, but I think he is fairly respected and its obviously catch in one form or another.

 

The book had a lot of standard jiu jitsu moves plus some really interesting shootwrestling techniques. I was going to pick it up but I got Bravo's book instead.

They also had Hatmaker's book. I have not heard him being labelled as a snake oil salesman....

 

Bravo's book is awesome. Actually the Twister is an old CACC move that is sometimes called The Guillotine (different than the BJJ guillotine) or the standing abdominal stretch.

Hatmaker has some good ideas, Cecchine's leglock tapes are the only one's I'd bother with, Furey's neck crank tape is the only decent one he's put out, but be sure to look for Saku's instructional, Hidetaka Aso's material, and of course Fujiwara's comprehensive Sub-Mission Master.

If you are looking for legit CACC books, I have compiled quite a few into The Authoritative Encyclopedia of Scientific Wrestling. They are expensive but all 3 volumes are approximately 500 pages each!

Hope this helps,

~Jake Shannon
Managing Director
Scientific Wrestling

 

Yeah Bravo said that when he started out he would use a few wrestling moves as submissions.

What Sakuraba instructional are you talking about?

 

its a good read but the moves are the basics if you have been training for some time yiu probley know them but its a good refresher

 

And the Ken Shamrock book is good, but I think you did a good thing buying Bravo's book first.

There are a couple Saku instructionals (in japanese):

Amazing Techniques VHS by Kazushi Sakuraba

Kazushi Sakuraba Instructional: Gimmick VHS

Hope this helps!

 

I took a few notes off Shamrock's book, and it did help to improve my rolling kneebar...I was going into the roll without keeping an arm and just rolling directly for the leg...I noticed Shamrock overhooked from the clinch and then when he rolled for the knee bar, kept the arm. That changed everything....the move became much tighter and also less risky because the position I landed in wasn't one where I would get plastered if I didn't immediately get the kneebar.

 

I took a few notes off Shamrock's book, and it did help to improve my rolling kneebar...I was going into the roll without keeping an arm and just rolling directly for the leg...I noticed Shamrock overhooked from the clinch and then when he rolled for the knee bar, kept the arm. That changed everything....the move became much tighter and also less risky because the position I landed in wasn't one where I would get plastered if I didn't immediately get the kneebar.

 

The Sakuraba instructional is pretty good. He shows some simple high percentage moves. The best material on it IMO is his section on arm bars from side mount.

Although he didn't show my personal favorite arm bar of his. It was an AWESOME set up by him. I forget who he did it to. But he was sitting in side mount, with his arms draped over his opponent, relaxed. The bottom guy didn't know what to expect. All of a sudden, Saku EXPLODED with punches to the guy's face, out of nowhere, just rapid fire; BAM BAM BAM! Instinctively, the bottom man put his hands up to his face. Biiiig mistake. Saku grabbed the near arm and armbarred it. I want to try this, but it's a move that seems like it'd be more effective in a match than in the gym, because it relies on that rapid fire, hard punching; something you wouldn't want to do if you like your training partner.

Hatmaker has some good stuff. Whenever you buy his material, you can be rest assured a lot (if not all) of it is going to be old school western empiricism. His stand up is based on old school bareknuckle boxing, and his submission game is based on catch wrestling.

I've taken a look at Shamrock's book. He's actually got some pretty cool stuff in that book. The coolest move I saw was what he calls a "Figure 4 Takedown." Basically, you establish a deep overhook on his (in this case) right arm while standing. You take your right hand (the one that's not overhooking), and put your palm against his sternum. Then, you grab your right wrist with your overhooking hand, so in effect, you've Figure-4'ed over his right arm while posting on his chest. Step in deep, and do the same movement you'd do for a "*** Whizzer;" kind of an arch and turn movement. Puts him over your head, on his back. I love takedowns like that.

If you don't mind not understanding what people are saying (unless you speak an advanced level of Japanese), I really recommend the 100 Submission Arts DVD by Hidetaka Aso.

Hidetaka Aso is the founder of SAW (Submission Arts Wrestling), also known as Combat Wrestling. If you've seen the Takanori Gomi grappling video that's circulating around the SD forums, this is the event he's competing in. Aso shows some really cool moves, and shows lots of high pain maneuvers. It really looks like and has the feel of one of those old-school catch wrestling sessions, where you can make the bottom guy just scream.

http://www.budovideos.com/shop/customer/product.php?productid=16705
Here's the link to the video.

Also, you can't go wrong with Erik Paulson from what I've heard. The guy's a total expert at shoot wrestling, and Stephan Kesting, who I have complete trust in, recommends him.

I don't know if you'd consider it catch wrestling, but if you're including just any Japanese submission fighting, you could always go with Bas Rutten's material. He learned most of his submissions out of Pancrase dojos, so if you're considering Shamrock catch wrestling, Rutten falls in the same category.

Bas' Big DVDs of Combat are probably the best investment you can make if you're looking for instructionals. Over 12 hours of material, and no repeated moves. He's not lying when he calls them Big. I've had these DVDs for 8 months and I still don't have every move memorized from them.

https://www.basrutten.tv/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=shop.flypage&product_id=25&category_id=2&option=com_phpshop&Itemid=65

^^ Link 1, from his website

http://www.budovideos.com/shop/customer/product.php?productid=20132&cat=311&page=1

^^Link 2, from budovideos.com. Bas is a great guy, so it's not his fault, but the people he's hired to manage his merchandise aren't always the best at it. They're all good people I'm sure, but I was one of the people to pre-order these DVDs the first week of January, and have to continually deal with delays until I finally got them in the middle of April. So I would buy them from BudoVideos.com. Bas still gets the money.

The DVDs are 115 bucks, but worth every penny. If anything, they're worth way more. "Example: The leg lock DVD itself, has over 60 leg locks on it plus right away after every leg lock, he shows you how to stay out of it and if you are caught with it, how to get out. Same counts for all the other DVD's." (taken from Bas' website)

 

Wow. I can't stop making these posts where I go off on a tangent.

I'll try to make it shorter. No promises on how short.

-Shamrock's book looks good, but I wouldn't buy it. There are only a couple moves he shows that I haven't seen. Your book store will probably let you sit down and read it. Just memorize the "new" techniques. The book's really only worth it if you're just starting MMA and/or want to read about Shamrock's life.

-For DVDs, I'd recommend 100 Submission Arts by Hidetaka Aso, or Bas Rutten's Big DVDs of Combat. Lots and lots of cool moves on both of these. Links to the DVDs are in the long post.

-For books, Mark Hatmaker has good material. His first book "No Holds Barred Fighting: The Ultimate Guide to Submission Wrestling," you are probably not going to need. It covers basic positioning and submissions that everyone has seen before. His two books on catch and old school wrestling that you'll want to get are

More No Holds Barred Fighting: Killer Submissions (link)

and

No Holds Barred Fighting: Takedowns (link)

Hope I helped, and sorry for talking so damn much.

 

the fujiwara tapes are good if you are looking for pure catch.

 

I want to buy it just to read his biography. I have read the first few pages of the biography part and it is pretty nuts-o.

 

Iceman5592...Ken Shamrock and Frank Shamrock both have submission bases in catch-as-catch-can...Shamrock's first tutelage in submissions came as a pro-wrestler and later in Japan he trained under Masa Funaki, who was trained by Fujiwara.

The reason I asked about Ken Shamrock's book is because its right there on the shelf at Barnes and Noble...of course its not my first choice and I'm not ignorant of the other great instructionals out there...but Shamrock's book is in stock and Barnes and Noble whereas the others are obviously more of a hassle to get a hold of. I'll say this for Shamrock again...his rolling kneebar from the clinch is very effective...for that I'm thankful to him.

I already keep a notebook for submissions and wrestling...and I wonder if I should stick to that rather than buying more instructionals...perhaps there's something more rewarding in it.

 

BTW--thanks for the feedback, y'all.