Victory!

I'm so happy for my bro Ken Haddix, who won his first MMA fight last night! I wasn't able to be there to see it, and I don't think there is a video, but I heard that he won by armbar at 1:37 into the first round! He's been talking about wanting to fight in MMA for a few years, and he made it happen! Woohoo!

Ken is one of my oldest dojobros, and by that I don't mean he is old (he's actually about four years younger than I am), I mean that he has been my bro the longest. He's stood next to me since I began Karate, and then he started training Jiu-Jitsu shortly before I did. He's also a brown belt in Judo, which means that he is a true mixed martial artist!

I would like to think that Ken's victory had a little something to do with all of the sweat I've shared with him for the past eight years (some days in Karate class we were the only students there!) but he did this all on his own. He trains really hard, and even though he's a little older than most people when they make their MMA debut, his dedication paid off. David Danger cornered him for the fight, unfortunately I don't think many other people we know were there to see him win (because he didn't give us enough notice beforehand!), but we are all very proud of him. Way to go, Ken!

Since I don't have a video of his MMA fight, here's one of Ken winning a Judo tournament by armbar a few years ago.

Founding Father

I've never met Ido Pariente, but he is essentially the founding father of our Jiu-Jitsu class.  Before I started training at the dojo, Ido came to Lincoln from Israel to learn from Shihan.  He trained Karate and Judo while he was here, and he asked Shihan to focus on some groundwork with him.  Ido already had some BJJ training when he came here, and he combined all of that knowledge when he started teaching the very first Jiu-Jitsu class at our school, which has progressed into the one I now attend.

Ido was in Lincoln during the early days of the MMA scene, and a local bar used to hold amateur fights in which there were no weight classes and very few rules.  I've heard stories about how Ido would always win his fights, and how that would sometimes anger his larger opponents!  He's gone on to have a successful MMA career, and he was even a participant on The Ultimate Fighter Season 8, but he lost his first match: against the person who went on to win the whole thing.

Ido recently posted a picture on Facebook with a simple statement that I found to be uplifting.  I wanted to share those words from one of my Jiu-Jitsu founding fathers.

"Jiu Jitsu is a life style. Doesn't matter if you train twice a day or twice a week.  If you want to be a champion or just train for fun.  You decide what path to take in this life style.  And no matter what path you take, make sure it makes you happy. Train and smile. :-)"

Super Saiyan

Around five years ago, I was in a karate sparring class at the dojo, and there was a guy there who I had never seen before.  We struck up a conversation (which is unusual for me), and he told me that he'd been in his first amateur MMA fight just the night before.  I said "Well, you don't look too beat up, so I guess you did alright".  He smiled and sheepishly said "Yeah, I won."

He was mainly at the dojo to train Jiu-Jitsu, but he kept coming to sparring class occasionally, and he kept competing in amateur MMA matches.  A couple of months or so later, the two of us finally sparred.  During that bout he threw a kick that I caught, and I swept him to the floor (which totally surprised him).  Then I retreated, because I hadn't started training Jiu-Jitsu yet, and I knew I didn't want to end up on the ground with him!

After we sparred I told him I liked his gloves, because they were silver, and he immediately took them off and gave them to me.  He got new gloves every time he fought, and he had signed that pair to give away to his adoring fans (which he already had by then!).  I've worn those gloves ever since, and his signature has all but faded away.

James Harrington has now been a professional MMA fighter for a couple of years, and watching him grow from an amateur to a finely tuned fighting machine has been awesome to see.  He's won some, he's lost some, but he never loses heart.  All of the time and energy he puts into training is a full time job, with very little pay.  When I told him that sometimes when I go out in public with a black eye people look at me with pity, he said "Try being the guy riding a city bus with one, everyone is terrified of me!".  Which is too bad, because James is one of the nicest, most good-hearted people I know.

I try to make it to as many of his matches as I can, but I don't really like watching him fight. I guess it's too personal for me.  A couple of years ago, he left in an ambulance after one of his fights, and it was heart-wrenching.  Luckily he was just a little dehydrated, but his crappy-paying full time job is also somewhat dangerous, and I don't want anyone hurting Sweet Baby James! 

He will be fighting in Omaha tonight, and no matter how the fight turns out, or where his MMA career ends up, I will always be proud of him.  I just need to get him to sign those gloves again, before he gets so famous that he starts charging for his signature. Psshhh, he knows I will just sweep him if he tries to charge me, and I'm not afraid to go to the ground with him anymore! ;)

Nebraska

I saw my first live UFC fights in Omaha last night, and the headliner was Nebraska's very own Jake Ellenberger! You know how in football they sometimes call the crowd "the twelfth man" because they can affect the game with their noise? Well, last night the crowd was trying to be Jake's right hand man! The intensity of the crowd cheering for him was off the charts. I was not fond of them booing his opponent, Diego Sanchez, but I'm sure if Diego had not been fighting against our hometown boy, they probably would have cheered for him.

Neither fighter disappointed, it was a fantastic match! They were on their feet for most of it, and Jake took the first two rounds. Towards the end of the last round they went to the ground, and Diego started raining down punches. It looked like Jake's hopes for a win might be ending right there, with only about forty seconds left in the fight. The crowd went insane, yelling at Jake to get out of there before the ref called it. At that moment, I think the sound level might have even rivaled Memorial Stadium on a Husker game day (although our crowd was much smaller).  Now, I don't really know if the crowd noise had anything to do with it, but Jake mustered up the energy to escape just before the bell rung. And the winner by unanimous decision is  Jake "Juggernaut" Ellenberger!

Jake's win last night, coupled with the fact that last Sunday's "Walking Dead" was titled "Nebraska", leads me to conclude that Nebraska's time has finally come. All other states shall now fear and praise us!

Fun fact: "Nebraska" is a Native American word that means "nothing of value here". 

Ha, I just totally made that up! It really means "flat water".

Dream On

Since I seem to be on the subject of MMA, I thought this would be a good time to admit that if I was ten years younger (maybe even five years), I have no doubt that I would be a cage fighter. It might be hard for some people to understand, but I feel like that's where I belong. There is a big part of me that would like to try it at least once, just to see how it feels, and to find out if I could really do it.

Of course, I can barely compete at a tournament when there's a small audience without having a panic attack, so I don't know how I could possibly walk out in front of a big crowd without passing out. I also know that to even get to that point, I would have to work harder than I have ever worked in my entire life.

I am 42 years old, and prior to age 36 I had no martial or athletic training at all. Most people in MMA have retired by the time they are my age. Although there are a million reasons why I know this should just remain a dream, once in a while I find it hard to let go. I actually think I could still make it happen if I really wanted it bad enough. I have no illusions that I could go anywhere with it, but I think I could get a fight. I would most likely lose that fight, but I really don't even care.

I'm not getting any younger, and this dream isn't getting any closer, so someday it will probably just fade away. I finally figured out what I really wanted to be when I grew up, but it's about twenty years too late.

In my dreams, this is my MMA walk-out song. It just totally makes me feel like beating someone up, which I believe is the point.   

"Stand back if you frightened!  Yeah, get back cause we fighting!"

Grrarrring

I know that some people call submission rolling "sparring", but for simplicity I usually just call it grappling, and I call stand-up striking sparring. Then I got to thinking about what I would call it when we practice rolling with striking (you know, MMA style). Strolling? Um, no. Sparpling? Strappling? Grarring? Oh, I kind of like that one, but it needs more rrrrr's...grrarrring. "I'm going to the dojo to grrarrr!"

Whatever you want to call it, I don't train it enough. Grappling is a lot different when striking is involved, and I think focusing too much on submission rolling can give a false sense of security when it comes to self-defense. I might be alright on offense with only Jiu-Jitsu, but if I could not defend against strikes, I could be at a big disadvantage. I've seen some great Jiu-Jitsu fighters lose MMA matches because they couldn't seem to figure out how to stop getting hit.

Luckily, my Karate training has taught me how to defend against striking, but I rarely practice that skill on the ground. When I have done it, I was really surprised by how much it changed everything. Although I am very comfortable with either rolling or sparring, when they are put together it's whole new game, even when the striking is just light contact. It would be even more of a challenge in a real-world situation.

I've seen people training MMA at the dojo, and other fighters in local matches, where as soon as the fight goes to the ground they appear to forget that they can strike. This seems to particularly affect those whose main style is submission grappling. It's not really Mixed Martial Arts, or complete self-defense, if you just practice the arts separately.  You have to put them all together to get the full advantage.

Man, I Feel Like a Woman

I was watching a news show, and they were talking about women in MMA.  The gist of it was that there isn't a lot of support for it because the general public doesn't want to see it.  This is common to women's sports, but the report said it's even harder for people to accept women fighting.  It's not something we are supposed to do, it's not natural.

That is something I personally have a hard time accepting.  I am a woman, I love being a woman, I love womanly things...but I also love to fight.  I don't move, think, or feel like a man when I am sparring or grappling, and fighting does not feel "unnatural" to me.  What is unnatural is society convincing women that to be feminine they have to be weak and submissive.

I think the world needs to stop calling boys who are into the arts "sissies", and girls who are into sports "tomboys".  There is nothing unnatural about any of it.  I'm a woman, I beat people up, and I get beat up in return...get over it.

The Ginga Ninja

I'm really looking forward to the Friday Fright Night Fights!  We managed to score table seats, so we get to be up close and personal for some great live MMA action.  Julian Fernandez was supposed to be fighting, but they can't seem to find anyone who wants to step into the cage with him (not that I can blame them!).  That's disappointing, because he always puts on a great show, but I'm sure there there will be plenty of other wicked awesome fights.

One match that I'm very excited to see is Rob Bieber's (son of Harvey my Hero, and thankfully no relation to Justin ;)  He is known as The Ginga Ninja, and he is the most bad-ass Ginger I've ever met (besides myself, of course).  He has freakishly long arms and legs, and he can triangle choke a six foot man who is standing, while he is laying on his back!  I swear I saw him do it once.

His MMA record stands at 7-0, with most of his wins being by submission.  For one of his fights, the results say "Rob Bieber Wins by Submission (Rear Naked Choke) 0:00 in the 0th round"  Um...I'm not exactly sure how you RNC someone in 0:00 seconds, but if anyone could, it's Rob!  I can't wait to see him in action on Friday.

The Real Deal

After the tournament on Saturday; Kristy, Joe and I had the pleasure of watching Julian Fernandez compete for the TCF Welterweight Championship. After TKOing his opponent in about two minutes, his record now stands at 7-0. The kicks he was throwing were so hard that I could feel them from the front row...and they hurt...a lot.

During intermission Amy came up to us and said that she thought Julian had the potential to go all the way. I could not agree more. He has mad skills, a wonderful personality, a strong drive and work ethic, and he looks pretty tasty in a pair of vale tudo shorts! All of his victories have come from either referee stoppage from strikes or submission by rear naked choke. What's not to like? To top it all off, despite being a beast in the cage, he is a super nice guy.

This is the only one of his fights I could find on YouTube. It's from the Cornhusker Fight Club Fighting Irish event on March 25, 2011. I have a feeling that it won't be long before his videos become a lot easier to find, and are seen by a much larger audience. I'm glad I got the chance to meet him during his rise to the top!

Tuff Fighter

I woke up this morning to discover that I have yet another black eye. I'm not sure how it happened, I don't remember anything that could have caused it yesterday in womens jiu-jitsu class. It was probably given to me by the newest member of our class, after all, she is a cage fighter! Just kidding, I probably gave it to myself, I'm good at doing things like that. Even if she did have a part in it, she can give me black eyes every week for all I care, because I'm so excited to have her in our class.

Her name is Kristy Gynan, and she is just beginning her amateur MMA career. She has had one fight so far at the Tuff Love event with the Cornhusker Fight Club, which she won by split decision. A couple of weeks ago, she sought us out to help her improve her ground game, and we were more than happy to oblige. She fits right into our class, and it's really cool that we don't have to play all nice with her, because she's a tough dame. She has voiced the intention to stick around, and I am really looking forward to seeing her skills improve, and supporting her in her MMA endeavors. After all, she is living my dream! I also think having her in class is really going to help Skyler and I improve. Besides, we were getting tired of just beating each other up in womens class all the time.

So, welcome Kristy to the Roseberry's family! We are very happy and proud to have her on our team.

The Heart of the Matter

One of the MMA fighters at our dojo, James Harrington, has a tattoo over his heart that says "100%". He's said that sometimes in a fight when he was out-sized or out-skilled, all he had was heart to see him through. It takes heart to step into the cage in the first place, but giving it 100% is what makes champions.

I believe having heart means you give all of yourself to the fight. You are completely engaged in the battle, not the outcome. It means you don't give up when the odds are stacked against you, and you don't stop fighting until the bell rings. You fight through the pain, and the doubt, and the fear. I believe having heart means you fight because you love it, not because other people love that you do.

Having heart is what helps keep me going through the down times in my training. When things start to seem futile, and I ask myself why I am doing this, the only answer I can come up with is that I just really love martial arts. I am completely engaged in this battle, and I give it my all. Sometimes I get side-tracked by pointless measures of success, but at the end of the day, win or lose, I still love what I do.

It was actually a hard thing for me to deal with when I realized that I really like to fight. I worried about the concept of being a violent person. Outside of a fight I think most people would describe me as compassionate, so the idea of hurting someone bothered me at first. Now I understand that it isn't any different than any other contact sport, I simply enjoy the process of physical battle.

Heart is what keeps me walking into the dojo day after day, covered with bruises and minor injuries that will probably never really heal. Heart is what helps me push aside my fears of inadequacy and failure. Heart is what makes me keep asking people to roll, even though I know they are probably just going to submit me yet again. Heart is all I have sometimes...but it's all I really need.