The Gorilla Press, Issue 103

Did You See Last Months Podcast? : A Q&A With Matt  Thornton

One of the great things about the SBG video podcast is the unprecedented access it has given SBG members and the public to some of the biggest names at SBG, and in the BJJ world more generally. Over the past two years, SBG Head Coach Matt Thornton has sat down with the likes of Rickson Gracie and Chris Haueter to discuss their thoughts and feelings on the world of BJJ, coaching and life. But up until now, we haven’t had a chance to hear the thoughts of SBG’s enigmatic leader himself. Last month, that all changed, as Matt Thornton sat down in front of the camera with a list of questions sent in by listeners, and addressed each one in turn. Over the course of 40 minutes, Matt covers a broad spectrum of questions, such as “What BJJ position do you consider to be the most important?”, and “If you could go back to white belt and change the way you approached jiu jitsu,  what would you change?”, to “What would you be doing if you weren’t at SBG?” and “What gave you the confidence to go down your own path, away from JKD?”. You can enjoy the full interview above.

Episode 19 Is Live. Matt has a chat with the legenday Henry Akins

In this episode Matt sits down with the famous Rickson Gracie black belt, Henry Akins. Matt and Henry talk about fundamentals, different coaching and training styles, and much more.

Adam Scholl On BJJ

“One of the reasons i love Jiu jitsu is because you literally can not fake your way through it. You either have it or you don’t. In a world where there are so many systems that are essentially men behaving like boys and pretending that what they are doing has any real relevance to a real fight, jiu jitsu puts its in perspective every single time you step on the mats. If you are full of shit, everyone will watch you get strangled.

There’s no fake mystique, weirdo clothing, greetings or other nonsense. Shake hands, train and see who is better that day. Jiu Jitsu encompasses all levels of force from low level control of another person, to choking them to death if need be. It’s not perfect, but nothing is. It’s certainly something that anyone who considers themselves a martial artist or a fighter should experience. Or you can continue to dress up and play fight, just further perpetuating your own nonsense. Choice is yours. I know where I’ll be spending my time.”

SBGU Roadmap Series

SBG University has been delivering exclusive weekly content to users for a few months now, and the instructional videos have been a hit. As with all things at SBG though, we are always looking to improve. With that in mind, this month SBG University is beginning its SBGU Roadmap Series!

The SBGU Roadmap Series will include collections of exclusive videos organized into larger curriculums, so that they build on one another and allow for a greater understanding of the material as a whole.

Both BJJ and Striking starter curriculums will be released soon, allowing beginners to build on the fundamentals taught on the mats whenever and wherever they wish!

 

John Frankl On Connection

The major takeaway from Rickson Gracie’s visit to Portland last year was his concept of ‘connection’. ‘Connection’ is the key to making all positions in BJJ effective, and at times can be agonizingly tricky for coaches to describe. When something is hard to describe, it is perhaps best to demonstrate. John Frankl took the time to demonstrate the importance of connection while off the mats recently… that importance won’t be forgotten in a hurry for one student in particular!

Matt Thornton on BJJ & Mindfulness

SBG Head Coach Matt Thornton covered the topic of mindfulness as it relates to BJJ in his blog last month. The blog post gets down to what it is that makes BJJ so special, why BJJ improves your life, and what keeps students coming back time and again while friends and family fail to understand the appeal. The fact is that while engaging in a roll with a fellow student, worries, desires and stresses fade away as you focus on the very real challenge at hand. As Matt puts it:

“It’s too charitable to say Martial Arts training can enhance mindfulness. It’s more accurate to say combat sports like Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, due to their true and sincere nature, necessitate mindfulness while they’re being engaged in. “

 

Old School Jiu Jitsu On Matt Thornton

The impact of SBG and of Matt Thornton is felt far and wide in the BJJ community. The SBG Head Coach was featured on the Old School Jiu Jitsu Facebook page last month, with the author calling Matt “one of the most insightful martial artists he had ever met”.

“I’d like to share with the following quote from I book I found very insightful, Virus of the Mind: The New Science of the Meme, by Richard Brodie. 

Brodie created Microsoft Word.

“The beliefs (memes) you happen to hold at any given time program your mind to work in certain ways, much the way loading a program into a computer causes it to perform certain tasks. If you program yourself with the belief that life is meaningless and random, you are likely to live a meaningless and random life. If, on the other hand, there is a purpose to your life, you will tend to accomplish that purpose…We all live with certain amount of delusion and self-deceit; maybe it’s just a matter of consciously picking the right set of delusions to point us in the direction we want to go”

Success is a product of self-programming and selecting your environment. Cut out negative people from your life, refuse to let naysayers divert you from the task at hand, and set goals that others believe impossible.

Pic — Matt Thornton, SBG founder, and one of the most insightful martial artists I’ve ever met.”

 

Matt Thornton On What Makes Martial Arts Effective

 
Matt was featured again on the Martial Arts Journey podcast last month, this time answering the question of what makes a martial art effective. For those who have had the fortune of training with Matt Thornton, or SBG more generally, they may well be familiar with the answer. Matt reminds the listener that the use of critical thinking and “Aliveness” are what lead to an effective martial art. “Aliveness”; training with timing, energy and motion, are what make functional martial arts effective, and building “Aliveness” not only into sparring, but into every drill undertaken in SBG classes, are what make SBG’s training methods so special.

Here is a great quote on the idea of “Aliveness” from the much missed founder of SBG UK, Karl Tanswell. “At SBG, we don’t train to fight the way we think it should be. Instead, we train for what it ‘is'”.

 

Big UFC Win For Eryk Anders!

SBG’s Eryk Anders returned to winning ways in emphatic style in August with a highlight reel KO victory over Tim Williams at UFC Fight Night 135. After a tough defeat to UFC veteran Lyoto Machida last time out, Anders left nothing up to the judges, felling his opponent with a brutal head kick as Tim Williams attempted to get up to a standing position. The win takes Anders to an impressive professional record of 11-1, earned him a Knockout of the Night bonus, and will only boost further the hype around SBG Alabama’s most exciting prospect.

Anders doesn’t currently have another opponent lined up yet, and few fighters can be relishing the idea as they watch highlights of his seventh career knockout, but whatever happens, the SBG tribe will be very excited to see what happens next.

Wrestling With Your Kids Is Good For Them

SBG has long been on the forefront of developing the MMA and BJJ athletes of tomorrow, as well as helping develop youngsters into upstanding citizens. SBG’s kids program, Growing Gorillas, has an amazing reputation and has helped moved combat sports away from the stereotype of aggressive meatheads and towards a pass-time that the whole family can enjoy. It will be of little surprise to tribe members that studies have increasingly shown that wrestling with daughters and sons. Summarized in an article on the jiu-jitsu times website, the benefits for kids of grappling with their family members include bonding, impulse control, ethics, and of course, fitness. If you have kids and you think BJJ or MMA might be great for them too, enroll them in an SBG youth program and see for yourself!

…And its never too late to start

The same website also shared the thoughts of a 43 year old white belt who has only been experiencing the art for the last 12 months. It the article, he points out that there is no such thing as starting BJJ too late, and that as BJJ is more popular than ever, now is the perfect time to get started.

SBG Fall Camp Six Weeks Away!

The SBG Fall Camp returns to the SBG headquarters this year! Portland, OR will play host to the global tribe for what will undoubtedly be the biggest SBG Camp ever. Each year, SBG camps grow both in size and in the quality of instruction, and as the SBG camp comes home, prepare for a truly special event.

Early registration savings are still available until September 15th, and SBG camps generally fill up fast, so sign up before its too late! In the words of the SBG President himself:

“6 weeks to go – to the biggest, best, SBG camp we’ve ever had. Coaches from the UK, Australia, and SBG’s around the globe will be meeting and teaching their best material. Do NOT miss this. 

If you’re a Portland student and don’t sign up for this, you’re missing out. Most students have to pay airfare, hotel, .etc – this camp is COMING to YOU! 

See Zach and sign up TODAY. 🦍“

 

Chris Conolley Live At M-1 Global

SBG Coach Chris Conolley took to Facebook live in August to give us exclusive, behind-the-scenes footage of SBG Alabama’s Kem “The Kraken” Oti, as he warmed up with teammate and UFC star Eryk Anders, ahead of his M1 Global bout. Kem eventually lost the bout by decision, but not before putting in a strong performance.

 

Frankl visits Idaho

John Frankl, SBG superstar and founder of BJJ in South Korea, visited Boise last month for a seminar. As always, when John Frankl visits an SBG gym, immense knowledge was shared and everybody’s game was improved.

“Many knowledge bombs were dropped this weekend courtesy of @john_frankl! Thank to Coach Frankl for the eye-opening insight and technical knowledge and post training hangs!!!”

 

Matt Thornton Seminar in Niagara this month

SBG President Matt Thornton is heading back up north next month to visit SBG Niagara for his latest seminar.

On September 22-23, Matt Thornton will be imparting the latest iteration of his learnings from an intensive year of seminar touring around the globe.

The seminars are always a phenomenal time, and everyone regardless of skill level comes out of Coach Thornton‘s seminars with a deeper understanding of this beautiful art of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu that we all love. Contact Rich Beaupit to sign up today!

“Rolling is a form of relationship, it’s a relationship between you and your opponent. It’s a physical conversation. The movements are the words, and the pressure and the weight is the tone.”

– Matt Thornton

SBG Illinois raises money for charity

On Saturday, August 11th, 2018, over fifty members of the law enforcement community came together for a first of its kind training opportunity. Attendees arrived from all over the country to visit Straight Blast Gym (SBG) in Elgin, IL for a five-hour seminar covering Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu techniques and philosophies specifically for law enforcement professionals.

What made this seminar truly unique was that all of the attendees, and the black belt instructors, work in the law enforcement field. Agencies represented included police officers, sheriff deputies, corrections officers, probation agents, troopers, and federal agents. Instructors and attendees came to Chicago from as far away as Alaska, California, New York, Washington DC, and Virginia. More locally represented were Illinois, Wisconsin, Iowa and Indiana. Everyone on the mats understood the daily stress and danger faced by those who keep the rest of society safe – because they live with it too.

“I have never heard of a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu seminar of this size where everyone involved works in law enforcement” said Lt. William McCormick of the Appleton (WI) Police Department and Blue Line BJJ member. “Usually the instructors are civilian. At this event, everyone from the instructors down to the students understands the daily stresses and physical demands of the job because we all experience it regardless of what part of the country we work.”

To add to the uniqueness of the seminar, 100% of the money raised will go to the non-profit group C.O.P.S. (Concerns of Police Survivors). The C.O.P.S. organization helps support families of officers that have died in the line of duty. One way the organization does this is with a summer camp that provides family interaction, camp activities, and grief counseling for kids ages 6 to 14 years old.

The Blue Line BJJ seminar event raised $2,630.00 that will go directly to the C.O.P.S. organization and help support the kids camp. The donation amount surpassed the initial goal of $2,500.00 through the use of entry fees and a silent auction. Items and talents from companies like The Jiu-Jitsu Soap Company, Soflete, Vortex, MMA Warehouse, Hill Country Combatives, Defense Soap, and Combat Corner helped provide the extra financial push to help Blue Line BJJ reach its fundraising goal.

“Plans are already underway to hold similar events during the 2019 Police Week in Washington DC and again in the upper Midwest next year,” said Lt. William Krieg of the Appleton (WI) Police Department and Blue Line BJJ member. “We would also be interested in expanding to other parts of the country if there are groups of law enforcement officers interested in an event closer to home.”

Blue Line BJJ is a law enforcement training group based in Appleton, WI. The mission of the group is three part. First, to provide efficient, realistic solutions to ground based problems commonly seen in law enforcement. Second, to provide ‘team within a team’ support all members of law enforcement regardless of their individual jiu-jitsu team affiliation. Third, to provide a platform to share techniques and grow the sport aspect of jiu-jitsu. In addition, the physical nature of jiu-jitsu helps provide law enforcement professionals with a positive coping mechanism to deal with the stress of their jobs.

Matt Thornton on “Self Defense” vs MMA

“Whoever put this together is doing a public service.

What Mastro does in his “self-defense” demo’s is what Bruce Lee rightly called ‘dissecting a corpse’. Sadly, much of the JKD world fell into the same trap of make believe bullshit, after Lee’s death.

There are plenty of dead patterns from Silat, Kali, Systema, Gung Fu (insert fantasy based martial art here), promoted within the JKD world, and it’s all the same nonsense – it’s what you see Mastro do to his compliant students.

Put ‘experts’ like Mastro (and he’s a particularly egregious dick in how he treats his fully cooperating demo partners), against even a low-level amateur MMA player, and he will look like a guy trying to box, wrestle, and do Jiu-Jitsu, who has no idea how to box, wrestle, or do Jiu-Jitsu. In short, it ceases becoming a sport and it instead becomes a beating.

Don’t fall for the delusion – stick with reality, stick with combat sports. 🦍“

 

Wimp2Warrior Starting Again Soon

After the enormous success last year, the Wimp2Warrior is returning to SBG Portland. Wimp2Warrior is a 22 week program that takes individuals with little to no fighting experience, and provides intensive training to prepare them to take their first MMA fight in the cage at the end of the period. It is very much the ultimate human experiment, and friend of SBG Rokas Leonavičius, who has been interviewing Matt Thornton on functional martial arts, will be shutting his dojo to take part in the program.

The program not only develops a person as an MMA fighter, but allows for personal growth through facing challenges and fears in a supportive and safe way. If interested,  contact Zach Thornton at SBG Portland about taking part.

Big Wins For SBG East Coast

SBG East Coast athletes appeared on the card of Cage Titans 40, and came away with two impressive wins. First up, Arthur Mpofu stepped into the cage for the very first time, and won his amateur debut by unanimous decision. On the other end of the card, Jeff Perez made up part of the co-main event. Perez stole the show with an emphatic first round win via submission. The rear naked choke came a mere 1 minute and 35 seconds into the fight,  is his third RNC victory in three fights, and takes Jeff Perez up to a 4-0 professional record.

Congratulations to Arthur and Jeff on their incredible performances!

Henry Akins Visits SBG, and the importance of fundamentals

August saw Rickson Gracie black belt, Henry Akins, visit SBG both in Portland and SBG East Coast, and drop some serious knowledge via two seminars. As a Rickson black belt, Akins has a focus in all his seminars on the true fundamentals of BJJ; what is most important. He steers clear of new fads and fancy techniques that are so often taught by new BJJ instructors. It says a lot about the quality of someone’s instruction when SBG President Matt Thorton recommends their online material, and he does so with Akins: