It takes quite a bit of flexibility to be able to properly execute this submission. Unless you are naturally very flexible, you will need to do quite a bit of stretching be able to perform this maneuver. B sure when you do your stretching you concentrate on your hamstring muscles and your glutes. This will keep you from pulling your muscle in those areas when executing the GOGO Plata.

There are a variety of ways to accomplish this submission and in the following videos you can see exactly how each MMA specialist executes his version of the GoGo Plata.

Charles Bishop Showing how to execute a gogo plata from the guard

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The guys over at Submissions 101 showing us how they perform a gogo plata.

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Here is another good video from Submisions 101 showing a variation of the GOGO Plata From the Mount

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Many fighters think that when you are on the bottom that you just need to protect yourself. Well this isn’t true. When you are in the bottom guard position you also need to be on the offensive so that you can get out from the bottom position and the only way to accomplish this is to be on the offensive as well as be defensive at the same time. So learning how to cover your exposed elements to your opponent while maintaining a good offense is key.

In the following videos it will show you how you can maintain a good defense in the bottom guard while at the same time executing a good offense.

MMA Champion Tito Ortiz showing us some examples of really good bottom striking

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The guys over at Damage Control MMA showing us some really good defensive moves as well as the offensive moves from the bottom guard

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Another Awesome video from Damage Control MMA showing 3 varieties of arm trap striking from the bottom guard position.

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MMA Champion Chuck Liddell Showing how to use the elbows from the guard position to strike.

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Brian Yamasaki demonstrates a series of basic posture breaking methods which is a good defensive move from the guard to deal with a variety of different hand positions and hold downs

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Stay Tuned For More in this post. We strive each and everyday to provide you with the best MMA lessons.

Remember to bookmark us so you can stay up to date with the very latest MMA Fighting Lessons.

Use your fists and forearms to strike your opponent and if you see a weak or vulnerable point by all means go for that first. IE.. your opponent has a cut over his eye, then you must try to concentrate your strikes to that area because it will inflict as much damage as possible, and the chances that the ref. will stop the fight will greatly increase.

One thing to remember when you are being on the offensive from the top guard position is that your opponent will be working on ways to get you into a submission so be aware and take the proper action to try and avoid this.

To show you some ways to strike from the top position we have included some videos here for you to get a better idea.

Striking Practice on a Bag

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Red Schaeffer Showing some basic striking from the guard position

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Joe Lauzon Showing How To Strike From Inside The Guard

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David Hogan Showing His techniques For Striking

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Mario Sperry Showing His Striking Techniques

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The Guys Over at Imformed performance Showing Us their techniques

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Fedor Emelianenko Exhibiting His Tehniques

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We definitely will be posting ore videos in this one so be sure to bookmark this page.

Also we will be posting a lesson very soon on striking in the bottom guard position.

]]> http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/punching/striking-from-the-guard-01-2011.html/feed 0 http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/takedowns/the-standing-leg-sweep-01-2011.html http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/takedowns/the-standing-leg-sweep-01-2011.html#comments Wed, 19 Jan 2011 16:11:34 +0000 UofCombatBob http://www.uofcombat.com/?p=1798 In today’s lesson we are going to cover the standing leg sweep. The standing leg sweep is an effective tool to have in your arsenal of MMA maneuvers. The standing leg sweep is not a hard move to master ,however this is one lesson that you should surely learn and practice because the more you practice it the faster you will be at executing it and the more effective it will be in your MMA Fights.

To properly execute the standing leg sweep you grab one of your opponents shoulders with one hand and their other elbow with the other hand. You then place your one leg outside of their leg giving yourself some leverage. Then you push them away as you sweep your leg taking them off their base. Once you have them on the ground you can then execute a various number of holds to overpower your opponent.
Just to make things easier like we like to do here on U of Combat here are a few videos to give you a good idea on how to do a standing leg sweep the right way.

Submissions 101 showing us a Standing Leg Sweep lesson

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The Jui Jitsu trainers over at Expert Village Giving us a Lesson on doing a standing leg sweep.

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The guys at the Academy showing us a modified version of a standing leg sweep. They show us how to use it as a counter to a front or teep kick.

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]]> http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/takedowns/the-standing-leg-sweep-01-2011.html/feed 0 http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/preparation-is-the-key-to-success-01-2011.html http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/preparation-is-the-key-to-success-01-2011.html#comments Mon, 17 Jan 2011 15:30:39 +0000 UofCombatBob http://www.uofcombat.com/?p=1795 Today’s lesson we are going to cover some aspects of our MMA training that some of us overlook from time to time. Today we are going to cover some ways to condition yourself before a fight. Proper stretching and exercises before you do your training or fighting can protect you from many injuries that could keep you out of the octagon for weeks, months or more. So proper stretching and conditioning is essential.

Before you train take a few minutes to do some simple exercises to stretch out your leg muscles, back muscles, and your upper body muscles. Here are a few vids with some simple exercises to show you how do your stretching and conditioning fast and effective.

Eric Paulson Showing Us How To Do Some Stretching and Strength Training.

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Diamond Dave Showing Some Easy Stretching Exercises

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Eric Tisdale Showing Different Exercises he uses for strength training and conditioning

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Thai Kwon Do Master Kang Showing us Some Stretching Routines We can use. Although the videos language is chinese you can watch and see exactly how he gets his muscled stretched and ready to train.

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Ok now that we have gone through some stretching exercises  we can train safer and more effective. If you are wondering how the PROs train here are a few videos that show us some of their training routines

Sean Sherks Training video, This guy is a beast when it comes to working out.

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Rich Franklin Doing a 10×10 Circuit Workout Session

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Vitor Belfort Training before his fights.

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Rampage Jackson showingus a few things he does to get conditioned.

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We Will surely be posting more videos in this post so be sure to add it to our bookmarks .

The key thing to remember today is that proper stretching is vital !

The Guillotine Choke is used when your opponent goes for a take down and places their head to the outside of your body. Once they do this they ultimately put themselves into the right position for you to lock in a Guillotine Choke.

Now how do we apply the Guillotine Choke. Well we are about to cover that right now.

1st thing you need to do is From an standing position get a firm base with your legs about medium width apart, or from the guard. Pull your opponent’s head down by placing your hand on the back of his neck or by pulling down on his gi so that he faces the ground.

2nd Thing you need to do is you need to put your arm around his head into a position that resembles a headlock. Slide your forearm down, under his chin and across his neck, making sure that the bigger part of your forearm is firm against your opponents neck.

3rd Thing you need to do is Grab the wrist of your choking arm with your free hand. Keep the grip on his neck tight and try to keep his head wedged under your arm as deeply as possible. This applies more pressure and makes him tap even faster.

The Last step of executing the Guillotine Choke is to move one leg slightly forward, then you Stand up straight and twist your hips in the direction of your forward leg to execute the choke ad apply the pressure making him tap.

Here are a few videos for you to show you How to Execute a Guillotine Choke.

How To Do Bas Ruttens Guillotine Choke

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MMA Connected Showing Up Their Version of The Guillotine Choke This one is shown from the guard position also.

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Charles Bishop going more into detail on how to do a Guillotine Choke from the guard position.

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Just like any other move we do in mixed martial arts you must know and practice the proper stance and execution of the double leg takedown. To start off doing a double leg takedown the frst thing we must do is fake out our opponent and feign a head attack, all the while you maintain eye contact with your opponent that will keep him from thinking you are going to go for the ground. While you are faking the head attacks or maybe even with some jabs you slowly close the distance between you and your opponent.

The next step is to shoot for the legs. How this is accomplished is you crouch down into a semi squat position, the reason we do this is so that we can prevent just throwing our upper body against your opponents lower body. While in the crouch position you have your hands out in front of you.Then you step forward and go in for the leg shoot. Make sure when you go in for the leg shoot that lead with your arms and your chest and you must keep your head back. When you shoot your opponents legs be sure you grab him around his thighs. Once you have your arms wrapped around his thighs turn your head sideways as this will help with leverage and also prevent an unwanted neck injury.

To take your opponent down to the mat now that you have his legs locked up all you reallly need to do is push forward with your weight and pull on his legs and this will take them down. Just to make things a little easier for all of you so that you can understand it a little easier. here are a few videos for you to watch and learn from.

Video With MMA Champion Josh Koscheck showing us how to do a Double Leg Take Down.

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Georges St Pierre showing us a modified version of a double leg takedown.

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Jeff Keaton instructing us on how to set up for  a double leg takedown.

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Chuck Liddell Showcasing how he does a double leg take down.

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Now there isn’t one magical move to protect you from every punch thrown, so we will cover many of the defensive moves in this thread. So be sure you keep checking back frequently for the very latest defense moves, as we will be constantly adding to this post.

There are many different ways to counter your opponents punches and below you will find some great videos from experts on protecting yourself and performing some counter moves to aid in “taking down” your opponent.

Here is a video with Ed Wedding MMA Instructor showing us how to block a right cross and a left jab

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Tres Tew a Black Belt In North Carolina show us in this video some punch defenses and also some good counter moves.

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Jason Jeanette & Daniel Klapheke Showing us various defenses against punches such as the the hook punch, The Hay sucker punch or otherwise known as the “Haymaker”

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]]> http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/punching/defending-yourself-against-your-opponents-punches-01-2011.html/feed 0 http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/kicking/properly-executing-the-spinning-back-kick-01-2011.html http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/kicking/properly-executing-the-spinning-back-kick-01-2011.html#comments Thu, 06 Jan 2011 02:41:56 +0000 UofCombatBob http://www.uofcombat.com/?p=1780 Today we are going to cover what is known as the spinning back kick. The spinning back kick is definitely one move we all want to learn as we train for mixed martial arts. It is a very effective weapon against your opponent if it is executed properly.

The spinning back kick is performed by standing in a fighting stance with your legs medium width apart so that you do not lose your balance. Then you lift your stronger leg . Then as you spin on your other foot you extend the leg and strike your opponent in their torso or if you extend your leg high enough you can hit them in the head.
Be very attentive when performing a spinning back kick because it really leaves you vulnerable while you are spinning and after the kick. A good mixed martial artists knows when you are setting up for a spinning back kick so he will have a few milliseconds to prepare a counter move. It is best to do a spinning back kick at the end of a series of moves or when you are up close to your opponent.

One of the biggest keys to performing a spinning back kick is to master the art of doing it all in one fluid motion. The better you are at mastering this  the quicker you can execute it and that will greatly decrease the amount of time your opponent has to set up his counter move.

Here are some videos to show you exactly how to execute a spinning back kick effectively.

Here is a great video from the “Iceman” himself showing us how to properly do a spinning back kick.

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Here is a video that further explains and shows us with great computer animation how to do a spinning back kick

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Mixed Martial Arts Trainer Gary Hellman instructing us on doing a spinning back kick.

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David ‘The Crow’ Loiseau has a devestating spinning back kick and he show’s ‘Showdown’ Joe Ferraro how exactly he generates so much power from it. although its rather quick its still a decent video.

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Mixed Martial Artist Fernando Loio demopnstrating a few variations of  a spinning back kick

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Stay tuned there will be a lot more to come…

]]> http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/kicking/properly-executing-the-spinning-back-kick-01-2011.html/feed 0 http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/punching/how-to-execute-the-superman-punch-01-2011.html http://www.uofcombat.com/instructional-video-reviews/punching/how-to-execute-the-superman-punch-01-2011.html#comments Wed, 05 Jan 2011 02:09:06 +0000 UofCombatBob http://www.uofcombat.com/?p=1775 We have had a few requests for lessons on the superman punch. So I wanted to post  one for all of you. The superman punch is more of an advanced move not geared too much towards the beginner, however it is a good lesson for the beginner to workup to and also master.

The superman punch is also know sometimes as the cobra punch, or the diving punch is a technique that involves feigning a forward front leg kick then quickly snapping the leg back while throwing a right cross. This is how it got it’s name as you look like superman as you throw the punch. The lunging adds extra power to the punch therefore making it extremely effective.

The superman punch is used a lot in kickboxing but has become more popular with the emergence in popularity of MMA.

Here is a Really good video of Muay Thai Master Andrew Bridden from the Arizona Center for Mixed Martial arts showing us how to do a superman punch.

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Here is a video from GAry Helman From Tiger Schulman Karate Training . He shows us first how to do the right cross, then a knee kick, and ultimately shows us how to incorporate them both with a superman punch.

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In this next video We have Russian Kickboxing master Konstantin Selivanov demonstrating how to throw a superman punch and make it as effective as possible.

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Here is one of the masters of MMA Georges St. Pierre showing us how he executes his devastating superman punch.

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