There were no topics on this, so i just made it and mods please delete immediatly if theres another topic. Well i have had previous kickboxing experience, but that was when i was 9 to 11. Anyways today i was completely embarrassed by my other opponent and a Muay Thai instructor. When i first sparred my opponent i was feeling weak from the msg filled pho and i didn`t give it my best and for the Muay Thai instructor sparring him was a train wreck. My MMA training on me is an excessive amount practicing grappling and not that much kickboxing which is why i`m sorta "annoyed". Does anyone have any tips to kickboxing training by yourself and a partner? Any tips will help.

You seem to start many martial arts threads... maybe these should just be posted under the martial arts thread so they aren't all spread out.
Just a kind suggestion

Heavy bag is your best friend. If u don't have one, get one. Preferably a thai bag. Kicking it will condition your shins and kicks will become WAY more effective. Remember to lead with the hip. Also if you have a partner, sparring with shin guards and gloves is great too. As well as combo drills with thai pads and clinch work.

I'm confused though, if you have a muay thai instructor, you prolly know all this?

Thanks for the suggestion, i`ll probably do that in the future. I understand the kicking, punching, kneeing and elbowing it`s just that I need some good sparring tips like tips for countering and such. I`m currently doing shin conditioning at home and too answer your question my instructor teaches MMA, but our training is so grappling dominant. I hardly ever get to practice some stand up now that`s the reason it`s agitating me right now. Reason i feel this way is that when i sparred that i got pretty embarrassed because I barley retaliated much and all i did was just take the hits. It` probably my laziness right now. SO now i`m freaking motivated to increase my stand up game.

I think you're taking training the wrong way. Thats nothing to be embarrassed about. Your gym should be a place where you learn from mistakes and get feedback from your instructor and teammates. I'm sure they are not trying to embarrass you in anyway. If they are, you are training at the wrong place.

Anyway, be patient and just continue to train hard. You'll get better. Don't be embarrassed by friendly competition. Just have fun.

www.lockflow.com
www.sherdog.net

Have you been? If not, theres some good stuff.

Oh and youtube. I like to watch awesome stand up fighters and try to mimic their styles... dissect their technique and try it out during sparring and if it works, it gets adopted.

stand up styles i like:
Iron Mike Tyson (for obvious reasons, duh... intense, stalking prey, freight train)
Yodsanklai Fairtex (pure muay thai)
Ike Quartey (my god the quickness...)
Takanori Gomi (hes around my weight lol)

Anyway, good luck with training and don't take it too serious... even monkeys fall out of trees. Look what happened to Crocop.

Thanks ill be sure to hit up these websites when i go home. Man too much grappling is getting to my head, i`m tired of just constant grappling lol.

video tape your sparring matches every so often and watch them.

I actually have a video of that it`s more like friendly kickboxing til the end though. Sloppy Stuff

Part 1 isn`t up cause it has no action in it
Kenny vs Me pt.2
My favorite part of that vid is 54-57 secs
Kenny vs Me pt.3
Kenny vs Me pt.4 Teh Finisher!

haha i like the part where one dudes chasing the other.

so whats the deal, why does one guy get 4 oz mma gloves and the other dude 16 oz? boxing gloves? no fair no fair! lol but i guess it was just a friendly session huh.

lol, well i would`ve wore boxing gloves, but my friend was boxing someone and he hit the other guy so hard that his gloves exploded @_@. So i brought my MMA gloves, since he said he was alrigtht and we didn`t wrestle at all.

Yikes...you should really set boundaries so you can't just run 30 feet in any one direction. The bigger guy (I'm guessing Kenny) was able to run around you because you had no boundaries to be able to cut him off meaning most of the action happened only when he felt like letting it happen. Also, you throw your kicks wayyyy too often, and none of your roundhouses/thai kicks (I'm not sure which you were going for) were turned over properly - meaning there was very little hip recruitment which in turn means very little power. I'd just nix all your straight kicks altogether. The one effective spinning back kick you threw would only be effective in a street fight and illegal in a sanctioned fight since it looked like a low blow. Granted, you're going at it barefoot on grass in the pouring rain, so I guess it's somewhat harder to execute perfect form, but still, those kicks were ugly.

BTW, I'm not hating or anything - I'm just letting you know what I saw since this seems to be a thread about learning how to improve.

To fix up your hands, from what I can tell, you really not to stop worrying so much about getting hit. Because your head's always turned to try and avoid damage you miss countless counter opportunities and get hit more than you should. Your boxing stance looks decent when you first start out, but when hands start flying on either side, your hands drop down near your waist and your stance gets all crooked-eyed. Keep your hands up and block those punches, or learn to slip them so you can counter. Initiate more - if you're constantly attacking at different angles with different kinds of punches, it'll throw your opponent off and give you more openings, especially when he tries to counter. When you're always on the defensive, AND you're worried about getting hit, you'll be tense and likely to get hit. Plus, if you get hit when you're tense AND when your head is turned, you're going to get knocked out.

Finally, because you're not utilizing combos and because your opponent is always so far from you, your moves are telegraphed for the most part. If I'm 10 feet away - even from a fighter like Anderson Silva, I'll be able to see his strikes coming at me. So make sure you step in with your punches and make sure your kicks are in range. Make sure you know when to throw what too. When you're out of range, don't just throw kicks for the heck of it, and if you do, throw them at his legs. You throw high kicks mainly when someone's circling you. For instance, you throw three jabs with some power behind them while trying to make someone circle to your right. Boom, RHK as he moves. You throw leg kicks when you want someone to focus down low so you can go up top with punches, or to throw a HK. You throw punches always, unless you're Buakaw. Punches are really your most effective stand-up weapon. Use your jab either to gauge distance in order to throw your cross, or as a set-up punch for combinations, or even to keep someone away from you so you can switch angles or distract someone so you can close in on them. Throw hooks in close, or looping hooks when someone's circling towards your lead hook. Throw uppercuts when you're really in close or when the guy's guard up top is rock solid - confuse your opponent and consistently try to throw him off guard.

Basically it's like this. If someone's constantly attacking you, it's only a matter of time before you get hit. If you're attacking them, it's only a matter of time before THEY get hit. Just make sure you keep a tight guard in the process and your offense will improve 200%.

So now, after this long essay, I hope you continue to practice and start wrecking people. MMA is a lot of fun, and you look like you enjoy it a lot, as do I. Take care and best wishes.

Thanks for that essay lol, i`m not offended actually. You gave me a lot of good ideas, the way i was fighting was to utilize all the moves i got and at that point no so much. Right now im back to basics im trying to correct my stance ( i fight southpaw), using my hips more for kick power, working on better form for punches, kicks and etc. I`m MOST DEFINATLEY going to post up another video soon of me sparring my friend. This time i`ll be sure to add the boundries, i`ll be sure to send you the video link once i get a chance to spar. I want to be on top of the game and my previous performance last Thursday was horrible and that made me realize that i need to focus on my kickboxing game, rather then my wrestling game.

You're a good guy Wain, I'm glad you don't have an ego and you're really looking to improve. How old are you? Well it doesn't really matter because I'm 150% sure you're younger than me (I'm 24), so I know you'll only keep improving with experience and coupled with that positive attitude of yours, you have all the tools you need to succeed. Good luck!

I got a long time to get good and im 15 btw, so yeah i have loads of time on free time and afterschool with friends to train.

Yeah I figured you were pretty young as well Wain, which is why I didn't go in detail on what could be fixed.

But since Johnny did... I'm just gonna have to agree with what he said. He did a good job explaining the most obvious things that are wrong. I'm quite sure your mma instructor will tell you these things as well.

You're WAY young... so keep training and you will have proper form ingrained into muscle memory and everything won't look as sloppy, have more power, and be more accurate. I started training when I was 19. I'm 22 now, so you're way ahead of me if you stick with it. Anyway, good luck!

something you could do on your own, would be to work on footwork. footwork is mighty important, faster footwork leads to more opportunities for you.

My MMA focuses alot of our training on ground fighting and i don`t want to diss him, but some of the moves he teaches us is somewhat redundant if i may say that. I mean it`s good that we learn a variety of moves, but some of the moves seem nearly impossible to get to or be able to use in that situation. He`s a good instructor, but some moves don`t seem practical.



Yeah footwork is very important, i`m working on it every night. Every night before i sleep i spend 30 to 40 minutes working on my form like; utilizing my hips more for punches and kicks, sprawling, i also work on my jabs, straights, hooks, uppercuts, elbows, knees, kicks and such. Then I finish of the little session with 80 push ups and 50 sit ups.

^ Good dedication. Do you work those on a heavy bag? If not, you should - drill those punches and kicks over and over with good form and you'll be an absolute terror to all your sparring partners.

What kind of moves is your instructor teaching you that don't seem practical?

I got no access to a heavy bag, because my gym is pretty small and i have access to a kicking bag, speed bag and another bag that i don`t know what it`s called. So yea im basically just going to be doing drills now and for a long long time. Well some moves are pretty impractical that i can`t describe them to you in words, a lot of them are heel toe locks or calf crushers, BUT he did show us this pretty cool move that seems to be practical, it was a fireman throw to armbar counter! Think about how that works and it looks like the sexiest counter if exectued correctly.

What is a kicking bag? Is that the same thing as a standing bag? You really should get a hold of a heavy bag.

Oh and I assumed you meant impractical in terms of striking.

Yeah I agree, toe holds and Achilles locks are pretty much useless against even a beginning grappler... but its good to have it in your arsenal than not, right?

Seems like you need to get a separate striking coach altogether? A gym without at least 1 heavy bag doesn't seem like a good place to learn how to strike.

This is a kicking bag. I have to disagree with you Achilles locks do work if you can execute them well i can make some people my own belt tap out from this, heel toe's are much harder to get someone to submit from. I don`t have money to spend on another coach.

What's that a counter to? I can imagine a fireman throw to an armbar - the arm would be right there for the taking. Maybe a counter to a front headlock or sloppy sprawl? It's good to know all sorts of moves, just so you're never surprised by anything, so keep at it. I don't know if you've watched much of Pride, but remember Shogun v. Randleman at Pride...32 maybe? It was a U.S. show if I remember right. lol poor Randleman - Shogun had him tied up in a toe hold/heel hook back and forth for a good minute or so with Randleman screaming in pain the whole time. So I guess there's some merit to learning them.

Oh ok so it is the same thing as a standing bag...

And you can condition yourself to Achilles locks... toe holds are prolly more effective...


edit:
LOL at randleman... poor guy. awesome wrestler... but never was stellar in mma... haha

Never really watched a lot of MMA on tv besides IFL, i watch a lot on Youtube. Uhhh i believe one fight i saw was Silva or Silvia fighting a small japanese dude, but he ends up losing to a flying scissor hook to heel toe hook and the japanese dude did it all in mid air o_O, that move an awesome move. Heel toes are a learning curve for me. The counter is from the fireman throught. My favorite move is the calf crushers from guard and i wanna try to do some more knee bars.

Yeah thats true once you get up to blue belt in BJJ you can withstand most of them. And yes toe holds are more effective, but toe holds aren`t effective when i use them i should start doing them.