r/martialarts

A BJJ black belt and Aikido black belt collaborate! What do you think?

What do you think of Aikido and BJJ mix?

I’ve been a cop for 8 years and have multiple MMA, kickboxing and BJJ fights. I’m also a DT instructor

there’s always been a big disconnect between fighting on the streets and fighting in the ring. reality based guys think that ring fighting is worthless and MMA guys will fold the second eye pokes and groin kicks are brought into the mix

MMA guys think reality based guys never spar and have no ability because if the did they would complete.

what both parties fail to take into account is that if you’re a trained fighter the your opponent may not be the biggest danger. the environment is. a take down into a brick wall may cause just as much damage to you as your opponent. using your head to base out on pavement can crack your skull open. a tree branch may cause you to fall and split your head open. Hell an errant car can squish you to death real quick.

So if you are training for reality based self defense you really need to practice environmental awareness

Thought experiment.

Let's imagine a kid that could train with you until 16 years old, no hard sparring, only touch, point, light and other methods.

After those years, at 17-19 yo, how good he would become in 2 years of hard sparring? Could he shorten the gap to elite with good focused training?

How would you approach his training? (Forget about kids having fun, their willingness etc.)

I'm very interested in your opinions

ALSO: No, I don't have kids. No, I'm not planning to do this in the future.

Edit: Y’all are right about the gun, I’m already studying for my permit. Though right now I just have a stun gun, pepper spray, hydroflask and knitting needles. I’ve also been getting faster at running too so that’s a plus

Inspired by the girl asking bc she's tall. I'm short, so what about for me :) also, when j get skinny, is there one I should transition to instead? I'm sure both height and weight play into what's a good martial art match for a person

This guy's 7 and 4 record lighter than me but Shi genuinely felt like getting held down by a bear like when he got a single leg on me I genuinely felt like there's no way I could undo that grasp these guys operate on a different level man

Hi I'm a 17 year old kid from Glasgow and I have been a martial arts fan since I was 15 years old, that was also when I began training kickboxing and MMA in hopes that I might be a fighter one day.

However one problem that I always had was finding the motivation to turn up to training, I appear sometimes but most days I just can't be bothered and the feeling of training makes me want to shoot myself (not literally). And the thing is i really want to become a fighter and rise the ranks someday but this one problem is a hill I just can't a over

Anyone else have gone through the same and has gotten over it? If so please i would love some advice.

So a bit about my background. Basically, I started martial arts when I was 18 at the Lion's Den affiliate gym.

I don't know if it's still around, but it was connected to Ken Shamrock, and it was largely based on his philosophy. It was part of the MMA Mecca that Ken Shamrock was trying to create in Susanville, California.

Basically, hard sparring was the norm. Nobody knew anything about soft sparring. They thought the harder you go, the better you were.

A couple of people managed to get better, but my personal observation was that most people got worse.

You would walk out of the gym every day punch-drunk. You didn't learn how to beat people who are better than you; you just learned how to beat up people that were worse than you.

This was a huge, massive setback for me. I ended up with deep trauma from getting my ass kicked hundreds of times over, and my skill set actually got worse. My techniques got worse, and my instincts got worse.

It was also a huge gym with elite coaches, but unfortunately, it was like a hundred students per coach, and so there weren't even enough coaches to train you effectively unless you were already a fighter.

At the age of 19, I started training kickboxing, but once again, elite coach, too many students, too much hard sparring.

I knew I wasn't getting any better, and it wasn't until I was 24 that I met a man who was a black belt in judo who was trying to cross over to mixed martial arts.

He had three black belts, one in judo and two in Japanese jiu-jitsu, and he was also a champion high school wrestler.

For three years, we trained about 15 hours a week. He taught me escapes from grappling, but he did not teach me how to grapple because I wasn't interested at the time. We were mostly sparring partners.

What he did teach me was sensitivity and learning how to train.

He taught me how to spar playfully, and I got much, much better at the school I was training at. I became one of the better fighters, and it gave me a framework for training that I use to this day.

As many know, Cuban boxing gyms train the best fighters in the world, but they have some of the lightest sparring on the planet.

When you're having fun, it is now scientifically confirmed that your nervous system relaxes, and you end up having much better response times and neurological adaptation, which means that you adapt quicker to patterns so you can adjust and learn more styles.

(Firas Zahabi, Georges St-Pierre's longtime coach, specifically describes using a huge amount of very light live sparring to repeatedly go through sequences and develop seamless movement.)

https://fight.fudgie.org/search/show/jr/episode/20100728\_Wed\_xDsoWp743gM

(Another account of Zahabi's training at TriStar describes his advanced fighters doing very controlled, technical sparring followed by technique instruction and drilling.)

https://www.foxsports.com/stories/ufc/georges-st-pierres-training-secret-firas-zahabi-and-the-tristar-gym

If you've ever seen capoeira practitioners, you've probably seen them moving extraordinarily fast, throwing extraordinarily fast kicks at each other's faces, and yet very few injuries ever happen. How is this? It's because they're relaxed. They go into an alpha state that allows them to have enhanced reflexes.

Modern sports psychologists have identified that when your brain goes into an alpha state, you have enhanced reflexes because time neurologically slows down.

The ways to get here are flow sparring and light sparring.

These teach you neurological adaptation that will help you learn patterns, so when you get into a real fight, if you see a pattern, you adapt quicker.

So a lot of people then will ask, "How do you get better?"

Here's the thing: if you look at Matt Thornton from SBG MMA, he explains it. You have to use aliveness.

What is aliveness? Some people think that means hard. It doesn't. It means adaptability.

Here's the thing: a fight is basically a circle. You're moving through stages of adaptation. The first person who fails to adapt loses. If the striker fails to deal with the clinch, they lose. If the grappler fails to deal with the strikes, they lose.

If a kick comes at you at a weird angle you've never seen before, you're probably going to get your ass kicked. What does this mean? Well, Bruce Lee identified it quite well: it means you have to have adaptability.

That's why Bruce Lee trained in as many fighting arts as he could, with as many people as he could.

Here's the thing: even if you think a fighting art is silly, somebody might throw that technique at you, and if you've never seen it before, it's probably going to work on you. Usually, the things we haven't seen are the things that get us.

That's why even Conor McGregor trained in capoeira. He knew he was fighting some people from Brazil, and he knew they probably were going to throw a capoeira kick. If he hadn't had the neurological stimulus of that kick before, it was probably going to get him.

By having the adaptation already built into him, when he saw it in his next fight, his adaptability would be higher.

The way this generally works is the first time somebody does something on you that you've never seen, it works 100%. The next time, it works 80%, then it works 50%, then 30%, and so on, because in the periods between that technique working on you, you are subconsciously adapting. You're subconsciously figuring out the angles of evasion and so forth.

This is why soft sparring is so important. It teaches you adaptation without the risk of injury.

You don't get brownie points for getting injured, but you do get points for adaptation.

Aliveness training, which is the secret to getting better, merely means adapting to more and more neurological stimuli. That requires you to go out there and see as many styles as you can.

Believe it or not, the best fighters are generally the ones who have been around the most and seen the most things, because it's the hardest to get something on them.

It's not the toughest guy. It's not the most buff guy. It's the person who has been able to adapt the most with the least amount of injuries.

So this is a good reason to get some experience in Wing Chun, Shaolin, capoeira, or whatever else. You don't do these because you necessarily want those whole styles. You do them so if you ever go against somebody who does any of those techniques on you, the chances that they will work are less and less.

And vice versa. Anybody who does those styles should be doing the same.

We all come in with a base, but the process of scientific refinement is what makes you a true martial artist, because you have to adapt again and again.

This is the secret of getting better.

Train in not just one school of boxing, but as many as you can. But always train safe. This is your body. Protect it. This is your brain. Protect it.

People will often be critical and say, "Well, if you get hit in real life and you've never been hit, it will all crumble."

They are somewhat correct.

But you don't want neurological damage, so the way you do this is how some of the best gyms in the world do, which is somebody throws a hard punch, but they tell you exactly what technique they're going to do and exactly where they're going to land it. And what you basically do is you learn to roll, you learn to slip, and you learn to block or counter that technique.

In the case of kicks, you learn how to either reinforce your structure, check it, evade, or catch.

The attacker needs to be well trained so if they see that the person made a mistake, they don't follow through the punch, and they pull it at the last moment so as not to cause neurological damage. Believe it or not, there are no brownie points for getting neurological damage. You just end up retarded and slurring your speech.

(This concept of controlled, technical sparring is also used by boxing coaches who progressively introduce athletes to light, controlled sparring before moving toward harder contact.)

https://www.coachalfranco.com/mens-boxing-skills

There are no brownie points, and in fact, the more neurological injuries you have, the slower your reflexes get, which is why every coach will tell you that getting hurt sparring right before a fight usually means you're going in with an injury, and you're likely to be hit by the exact same punch.

Another reason is if you've been knocked out by a particular angle, when you see that angle again, because you have not readjusted your neurology with soft sparring, what ends up happening is your brain freezes out of trauma, and so guess what? You get knocked out by the exact same punch.

Soft sparring readjusts your neurology. It relaxes you, that way you can have neuroplasticity and start recovering and start adapting to the attacks that defeated you in the past.

This is the best framework for training fighters. We have to always adapt. We have to always get better.

Remember, the person who wins the fight is not the toughest; it's just the most adaptable person.

Have fun. Live life. Remember, we fight to live; we don't live to fight!

Literally the credo of the Highlander.

soo pencak silat is already niche. it’s a south east asian/indonesian martial art but pencak silat is specifically the sport martial art that includes striking, kicks, takedowns, a lil grappling as per 2026 rules.

So anyways maybe u don’t do silat but some other similar martial art. how do u cope?

Im pretty sure i have hypermobility or something and ive gotten a few injuries in a short period unfortunately and im young.

so i started trying to jog 2 yrs ago and then like very soon after i developed pfps but it doesnt hurt during exercise usually, its mostly pain and stiffness after sitting for a bit. it goes away with movement after a few seconds.

Second is shin splints which isnt exactly related to hypermobility per se but may provide a deeper picture.

Now 1 year ago I began Silat. My first injury was quite quick. My right big toe. I suppose i kicked with it and it got sprained i guess. a yr later and it just doesn’t feel as stiff as my left toe that is healthy. now it’s a concern whenever i kick even on something stationary like a bag.

next injury: well actually my left pinky knuckle has always been split in half like when i straighten it i can feel the saggital band as one thing, but when i curl it, the bone and band indent. i have no clue why but i suspect its congenital or early trauma. so despite the funky look it never ever hurt. but then i punched and boom my pinky got sprained or something. ever since, whenever it gets pushed inwards slightly just like my big toe or maybe moved left or right is hurts and stops hurting then gets easily hurt again whenever those options happen. ugh so i started wearing cringy grappling gloves. mind u silat only wears a chest guard. now im wearing a left glove, and both feet protection.

next; i tried doing a scissors attack but i guess i smashed my knee into the 1.5 inch mat instead of my hamstring being on the floor and i couldn’t walk for 3 days and i was in a lot of pain. the scar tissue is still thick and a bit numb months later.

next: my left wrist start hurting. not sure the reason but i suspect it’s possible that i was holding a big vinegar bottle by the flimsy plastic and cuz it’s heavy like i was tryna do a single arm overhead press with it but it prob put some weird angled pressure on my wrist by doing that. the pain at first it was when i angled it to the left. now it hurts in a couple other directions. i thought it would go away but it’s been like 3 weeks since initial pain.

next: my left thumb got kicked and i suppose it bent upwards with that kicking force so i have to immobilize it for a bit but now its fine it just clicks.

next: i fell into a group of people and i didnt see but i felt my ankle kinda go inwards and when i walked back it feels like when u twist ur ankle. it hurt at first but now it doesn’t hurt it just feels unstable and when its incidentally goes inwards i have that twisted feeling however no sharp pain

-not an injury but related to hypermobility. i can sit on my ankle while it’s inverted like i can go from standing to sitting while its in that position and i can put my weight on it and get up while its inverted and i don’t feel some pressure or pain.
another thing is sometimes ill punch and my wrist like it goes downward towards my forearm and so i suppose my punching force goes from well it’s supposed to go up my radius to god know where when my wrist is pushed down against a chest guard but anyways that didn’t hurt or my wrist didn’t get sore either.

lastly: my wrist was hurting like i said so i wasn’t gonna punch more. mind u i punch a lot because im scared for my feet and also getting whiplash when i get caught and thrown. anyways so im mostly using my right arm 2 nights ago, my thumb is proper it’s not like inside my fist or something. I WAKE UP AND 2 DAYS AGO IT HURTS WHEN BENDING MY THUMB UPWARDS like i guess the tendon right on top of my thumb. it also clicks when i flex and put it upwards. it’s not too bad as the tender to the touch on top of my thumb has subsided however it’s the fact that both of my hands r not right lmao and i’m young bruh.

at this point, my left leg is so slow and weak that i don’t bother kicking. my right is limited by my fear to sprain my big toe again, like even when i tippy toe i feel how my toe isn’t fully stable. anyways and i don’t wanna get thrown but i suppose ill have to face that fear eventually. i just don’t want my brain cells to die. my future depends on a good brain. my left wrist means i can only do elbows which i’m not too familiar with. my right thumb means no punching or slaps or anything that can straighten it or it’ll irritate the sheath again or something. so i’ve just stopped going for now, hopefully my wrist heals with isometrics.

Tbh it’s not about these individual injuries . yes my wrist can heal probably. it’s the fact that something keeps coming up. i stay in the sport cuz i wanna travel to south east asia and have a community through this sport and honestly i think about it so much i don’t want to leave. but i also have no clue how im gonna do this for 3 more years. i dont know which injury is next. everyone spars hard. my instructor keeps saying he wants to see me spar better he needs me to fight better to move up and learn but i cant fight better if im actively or about to fall apart with one wrong move

tdlr: lots of injuries since starting martial arts a year ago. some examples of hypermobility. want to know others experiences and what i should do or how to continue on. i’ve heard like building the muscle around the tendons and ligaments since they’re too stretchy so muscles would keep it stable. any hyper mobile combat sport athlete shall respond. thanks.