Some Eastern Bloc videos

[Ivaylo Ivanov]

Also, of note about the videos themselves. Obviously I really like the drills, the way they move, especially their posture and how control of distance and positioning seem to be emphasized. So I'll leave this here, and Onq, I'm sure you'll be able to see some of the slight adjustments that we Caribbeans made, this is Arni and I on mitt-work:

I like the pivoting. And the style you teach looks fluid.
He looks a bit too open and static for my taste- I make people bob and wave even in their rounds on the bags or constantly slapping them with the mitts.
Also, I noticed in the beginning of the video, he always lifts his rear leg in the air when he jabs.
Nice video!

 

[Sinister]

Thanks. On the bobbing and weaving thing, the reason Dadi doesn't have him do that so much is because he's an MMA fighter, not a boxer. He knows how to roll, I'm not sure if you saw his sparring video against the other MMA Fighter (who is out of the Ukraine I think, but was mostly a grappler, unfortunately for him learning all of his Boxing here), but he does move more when sparring hands only. And yeah, the back foot thing, that's been a persistent problem of his, though it's gotten a lot better. In his fight with Siver, before beginning to learn this system, he was completely front foot heavy and almost stood totally leaned forward.

This video is more indicative of what's going on in Iceland as a whole, under primarily Dadi's influence, it's gotten better (there will be a subtitled version soon, when it comes I'll replace this one):



That's Bjorn, who was also here during the summer, and a student of Dadi's. Of course not all of them are competitors, their Boxing is mainly kept alive by the fitness aspects of it, as well as recreation for kids. But the guy in the red shirt whom Bjorn has on the mitts just fought in Sweden with Bjorn himself, and Kolli (the tall one from the big "Training of a Viking" thread). Bjorn has a very particular style of his own, though, he's still doing quite a bit of posture work though it has gotten significantly better. Here's a fun match where I'm Coaching him from the summer, against another kid I work with along with Merqui Sosa:



Man, if only I got stipends to do this stuff.

 

[KounterPunch]

^ I like the guy in white though I (IMO) he has two glaring faults (strategically speaking).
He seems content to just stick his hands out there without actually trying to land clean.
Two , he freezes up when inside. Like he just hates it.

As or Arnie , I thought u taught hands lower but out. It looked like his lead hand was by his pocket.
The other Scandinavian has it better though.
Thoughts ?

Ps - all these Scandinavian / nordic boxers look dense.....physically , that is.

 

[Sinister]

^ I like the guy in white though I (IMO) he has two glaring faults (strategically speaking).
He seems content to just stick his hands out there without actually trying to land clean.
Two , he freezes up when inside. Like he just hates it.

As or Arnie , I thought u taught hands lower but out. It looked like his lead hand was by his pocket.
The other Scandinavian has it better though.
Thoughts ?

Ps - all these Scandinavian / nordic boxers look dense.....physically , that is.

They're huge people. Even one of the girls that came was like WAY bigger than me. Not that there aren't small ones.

Joey doesn't hate in-fighting at all. In fact he loves it. But what he does in the inside is bide his time usually. He's never been taught proper inside fighting. All he'd do is wait for a guy to stop punching, then punch back. But when I first met him that was ALL he did. He's Mexican, Filipino, and Italian. But to see him box back then you'd just think he was Mexican. Walk forward, get hit in the face, hit back.

Also, at the time of that video he'd only been with Sosa and myself for like a month. So even at this point he's less than 8 months in. We only let him spar with Bjorn because he already had fights, and we know he's tough and fit. The first time they met they both bloodied each other quickly. This time I had Bjorn box more, and enter more strategically, it threw Joey off.

As for Arni, I wasn't worrying about telling him where to put his hands because remember, I wasn't teaching him from the get-go. Just small refinements. He puts his lead hand way down like that when he's very comfortable. In his most recent fight, though, he didn't do it nearly as much because his opponent kept him needing to establish control of distance via a threat, and it took him a whole round to get it.

 

[KounterPunch]

All he'd do is wait for a guy to stop punching, then punch back..

I almost meant to put this.......but didn't.

What do u think of a drill where he can only punch WHILE the other guy's punching ?
It'll look ugly but might help the mind frame.

^ obviously not balls out.
Just working a few rounds PRIOR to actual sparring.

 

[Sinister]

Oh yeah, I do A LOT of partner drills in my work. A lot of old and newer Cuban stuff (like I said in the Kostya Tszyu thread, I'm fortunate to be able to consult with more than one generation of Caribbean fighters). Though his posture is mainly what I've been focusing on since then. If you notice he turns his lead foot too much to his right and gives up the outside angle readily when he's not jabbing. That's taken a while to change, as well as the leaning problem he used to have, and standing up straight problem. Now that all of those are sorted out, we're moving into more advanced stuff.

FWIW, he's going to the Nevada Golden Glove tournament. Eventually he'll become a notable Pro himself.

 

[Discipulus]

I experienced that same phenomenon as Arni in the Murrie fight recently, only I didn't have the instinct to stick that knife out there to maintain my space. I like the low lead hand so that I can throw sneaky up-jabs, but when the opponent encroaches on my space I don't instantly think that I need to establish a threat envelope, as SAAMAG calls it.

Sinister, maybe you can help. I think part of the problem is that one of the most common partner drills at my gym is what we call a Dutch drill, in which you and the partner take turns going back and forth, throwing combos, usually ones that end in kicks. You throw, your partner defends, and vice versa. You get the idea. I can see the influence of this type of training in a lot of the sparring that goes on at the gym; that is to say, there's a lot of "back and forth" fighting. One guy attacks, the other one defends his attacks until he finishes with a kick, then he responds with his own combo, which also usually ends in a kick. Not a lot of countering. In fact, the only time I usually see counters land in the other guys' sparring is when a slugfest breaks out, not as a result of timing and strategy.

I believe all these things to be the result of this training method that's so common at my gym, and I believe that I'm affected as well. I'm not conditioned to counter or interrupt an incoming opponent with my jab or anything, because this drill is all about passive defense. My question to you is, how can I approach this drill to improve what I get from it? How can I make it apply better to actual, continuous fighting.

 

[Sinister]

Very simple, after that last kick of the combination, jab. It sounds almost stupidly simple, but it instills the principal of "reset." From there, your mind may lead you to realize "hey, I can do this whenever I want" with the jab lengthened or shortened respectively. That's a good way to get started, and you can see me add that to Arni in the video. I'll let him get a combination on the mitts, and when he gets the motion down, I'll make him reset with a jab.

 

[Discipulus]

Great. I'll implement that right away. Thanks for the advice. Simple, and I think it'll work!

 

[KarateStylist]

Also, of note about the videos themselves. Obviously I really like the drills, the way they move, especially their posture and how control of distance and positioning seem to be emphasized. So I'll leave this here, and Onq, I'm sure you'll be able to see some of the slight adjustments that we Caribbeans made, this is Arni and I on mitt-work:

[** vidchop **]

^^^ Very professional argument for the expert use of focus mitt training.... ****

^^^ Counter argument, mine, the wrong fork in the road to 'unbeatable' striking capability....

KarateStylist

**** you pined for a stipend,,,, shouldn't some sponsor be picking you up, on focus mitt training expertise alone??? Guess those commercial / investor guys in MMA are a little slow @ recognizing where MMA striking needs to improve....

 

[KounterPunch]

Very simple, after that last kick of the combination, jab. It sounds almost stupidly simple, but it instills the principal of "reset." From there, your mind may lead you to realize "hey, I can do this whenever I want" with the jab lengthened or shortened respectively. That's a good way to get started, and you can see me add that to Arni in the video. I'll let him get a combination on the mitts, and when he gets the motion down, I'll make him reset with a jab.

^ Hearns 101.

 

[Wow Exuberant**]

Not exactly. Dadi and I work as a unit as much as we can. So via exchanging of footage, I assist. Always remember Arni is Dadi's student. Whenever I take over as Boxing Coach (which would be when he goes to the UFC), I'll forever credit Dadi with his basics. He just spent two months here over the summer and asked to work with me directly. Wanted some Caribbean flava.

Yeah I watched his last fight just there, his KO was impressive.

I loled at the post fight interview:

"When I find my Groove, my viking fist is gonna crush"


"I feel no pain, I have no soul"


The dude's intense to say the least

 

[Sinister]

Jajaja! That's all bullshit. Well, it's his character..."The Ice Viking." Arni, in reality, is a big goofball. Of course not when he steps in the ring or cage, but he just has the ability to pull those dead-pan responses in his Viking cyborg accent. On his personal page I posted:

"So wait a minute, if partying is no good for your soul, but you have NO soul, are you saying you party all the time?"

My favorite thing he said, though was when the guy asked him how it felt to have that belt and he went: "It's good, I'm gonna look cool at the Gym."

 

[KounterPunch]

My favorite thing he said, though was when the guy asked him how it felt to have that belt and he went: "It's good, I'm gonna look cool at the Gym."

lol

 

[Wow Exuberant**]

Oh it's a character? That's fucking hilarious then

 

[Sinister]

Yes, Bjorn is the for real cyborg.

 

[Sinister]

^^^ Very professional argument for the expert use of focus mitt training.... ****

^^^ Counter argument, mine, the wrong fork in the road to 'unbeatable' striking capability....

KarateStylist

**** you pined for a stipend,,,, shouldn't some sponsor be picking you up, on focus mitt training expertise alone??? Guess those commercial / investor guys in MMA are a little slow @ recognizing where MMA striking needs to improve....

Sorry, didn't see this until today.

Anywho, I could go on and on about why things are the way they are, but the bottom-line comes down to how Americans view boxing...or rather don't view boxing. Americans no longer view boxing as a viable Sport, generally speaking. You no longer see scholastic boxing programs (my Middle School had one), you don't see Boxers with local business sponsors the way you see baseball/basketball/football teams. Hell you probably couldn't even convince a Sporting Goods store to get behind a Boxing team. You can hardly find Sporting Goods Stores that carry decent equipment. Even though Gyms provide kids whose families can't afford Sports that DO require a lot of equipment a way to keep off the streets, we're pretty much on our own when it comes to making enough money to stay in business.

Though one thing our Gym managed to do this past year was garner non-profit status, so that helps out some, but you have to jump through hoops to get any benefit from it. It's a sad state of affairs, capitalism doesn't always pay off for the things that should be worth paying for.

 

[Sinister]

Another promo video of Bjorn's Gym in Iceland:

 

[devante]

Sorry, didn't see this until today.

Anywho, I could go on and on about why things are the way they are, but the bottom-line comes down to how Americans view boxing...or rather don't view boxing. Americans no longer view boxing as a viable Sport, generally speaking. You no longer see scholastic boxing programs (my Middle School had one), you don't see Boxers with local business sponsors the way you see baseball/basketball/football teams. Hell you probably couldn't even convince a Sporting Goods store to get behind a Boxing team. You can hardly find Sporting Goods Stores that carry decent equipment. Even though Gyms provide kids whose families can't afford Sports that DO require a lot of equipment a way to keep off the streets, we're pretty much on our own when it comes to making enough money to stay in business.

Though one thing our Gym managed to do this past year was garner non-profit status, so that helps out some, but you have to jump through hoops to get any benefit from it. It's a sad state of affairs, capitalism doesn't always pay off for the things that should be worth paying for.

yeah alot of guys i know grew up w/college or juco boxing teams, even some schools had it; an the older guys i know def came up w/boxing as part of the curriculum, so the art has lost some popularity and some of the tech/strategical development because of it's lack of popularity or perceived lack of viability.