The Gorilla Press, Issue 105

Wimp2Warrior in Portland and Montana!

The life-changing event that is Wimp2Warrior has finally gotten underway for another year; this time in two locations simultaneously, as both SBG Portland and SBG Montana play host to a team of hopefuls looking to enter the cage in 6 months time for their first ever amateur fight. The Wimp2Warrior program takes individuals with zero fighting experience, and runs them through an intensive training camp were they will learn the fundamentals of fighting, both on the feet and on the ground, to prepare them for an MMA debut in front of a live audience! It is truly a fascinating event involving incredible transformation, and SBG is thrilled to be a part of it! Good luck to all the athletes taking part!

Matt Thornton on Aliveness

“It is an interesting thing, anytime Aliveness is removed from a Martial Art the Martial Artists ends up wasting a lot of time playing around in ranges that really don’t exist in an actual fight. In hand-to-hand combat, things go from kick and punch, to clinch, and then, often, to the ground. Rarely do you ever see two fighters stand toe to toe, in elbow and knee range, and exchange blows. Instead, one of them grabs the others. The mythical “trapping” range that the JKD community and so many other fantasy based arts like Silat and Wing Chun are so obsessed with, just doesn’t happen. So too with stick fighting. Within the JKD/ Kali (another term favored by Inosanto for Filipino Martial Arts) community, a large percentage of time was spent working at a distance where each person could hit the other in the head or body with the stick. The two players would click their sticks together, ‘check’ each other’s hands, and throw in foot sweeps and joint locks. And all of it, while often being very pretty and slick, was bullshit. Once either person began swing the stick the way someone really would, with bad intentions, all that stuff disappeared and people either clinched up, or backed up. In other words, they managed distance. The empirical nature of what we do, the universal laws of combat, once again proving themselves true.”

Training with SBG’s Martin Stapleton & Jaden Irving

SBG Coach Martin Stapleton took to social media to share the work he is putting in with MMA up-and-comer Jaden Irving. Stapleton is a former lightweight champion for the European MMA promotion BAMMA, and has been imparting his knowledge on Irving and other amateurs in Rochdale and Manchester. Check out their work in the video above.

Martin Stapleton is also leading by example when it comes to SBG’s #ChokeOutCancer campaign. 2018 is the second year running that SBG has spearheaded the pink belt campaign to raise money and awareness for breast cancer research during the month of October. Stapleton had this to share:

“Spare a second to read!! Throughout October you will see Coaches and Members from SBG gyms around the World rocking the Pink Belt!!
Here myself and @jed_turner_bjj just got finished Coaching our Kids Growing Gorillas class in our Pink Belts and yes… we were asked a thousand times ‘why are you wearing a Pink Belt?’ and thats a good thing because it meant we got to explain the cause a to a few more people and hopefully raise some more awareness!!
The Pink Belt is SBG’s ‘Chokeout Cancer’ appeal. All proceeds from purchasing the Pibk Belt go towards Cancer research so the more awareness that can be created the better!! We all know someone that is effected by cancer and im sure we’d all like to see an end to it so if you’d like to help the SBG Chokeout Cancer appeal follow the link here or in my bio to buy a Belt.
#thankyou for reading!!”

SBG Student Uncovers The Failures Of Academia; Appears On JRE

SBG Portland student Peter Boghossian has made quite the name for himself in academic circles for his outspoken views on academic dishonesty. The subject of protests at PSU, Boghossian and his colleagues have taken things a step further. In a project called “The Grievance Studies”, Boghossian and two other scholars sent fake papers to leading academic journals and got their bogus studies published at an alarming rate. The scandal made national news, and drew the attention of Joe Rogan, who had Peter on the show last week. Definitely give the podcast a full listen!

Kavanagh & McGregor Looking Forward

After a tough loss to Khabib Nurmagomedov last month, both Conor McGregor and his Coach John Kavanagh were in a thoughtful and positive mood. Both took to social media to pay their respects to the winner and state the intention of dusting themselves of and looking towards future challenges, including, hopefully, a rematch with Khabib himself!

After the contest, John Kavanagh, not only Conor’s coach but the founder of SBG Ireland as a whole, was also featured on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast. Two SBG members featured on one of the most listened-to podcasts in the world, in one month! Alongside that, Kavanagh was also interviewed by Ariel Helwani. It is a rare treat to see Coach Kavanagh in such in depth conversations. Be sure to listen to both to gain some fascinating insights into one of the best coaches in the world today!

 

Matt Thornton, & Son Liam, Visit Niagara for Seminar

“A reminder on what matters.

To everyone who feels the need to moralize this morning, or message me about what two multi-millionaires did last night in Las Vegas. Three things:

1- If you’ve been teaching your children or anyone else to look to athletes, actors, or entertainers as moral role models, you’ve already made a mistake.

2- How many of us, after making more than 100 million dollars, would step back into a cage in front of the world, against such a dangerous fighter?

More to the point, how many of us have ever exerted even 20% of the time, energy, discipline, and sacrifice required to be as good at anything – as an athlete like Conor has in his craft? How many of you have that dedication; with anything?

3- If you want to lead morally, be a role model in terms of character, start with yourself.

Remember what Aurelius said, be ruthless with yourself and lenient with others. Everything else is just noise.

Now go do something that matters.”

 

SBG Podcast Episode 21 Is Live!

Matt breaks down some of the most common questions that he came accross while touring the world teaching his mount curriculum.

 

The Tribe Grows Down Under

Even though SBG has a gym on every continent, that doesn’t mean the worldwide tribe will stop growing. October saw another milestone for SBG as it added just its second gym in Australia. On October 7th, the unveiling of SBG Western Australia, in Albany, was announced. Congratulations SBG Western Australia, and welcome to the tribe!

The gym released the follow statement:

“We are proud to announce that we have teamed up with Straight Blast Gym (SBG), who are one of the world leaders in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and MMA. We will no longer be Viking Jiu Jitsu, we will be SBG Western Australia. We are very humbled and honoured to be accepted in by an organisation of such caliber and look forward to bringing world class instruction and methodologies to Albany. 
This will be a huge boost to the local community as we will have direct and consistent access to some of the best coaches and curricula in the world. SBG isn’t just a name you buy to stick on your building, they are an organisation truly committed to the tribe. They make sure every club and coach involved is performing at a high standard and they provide excellent training and information to ensure this is so.
We would like to thank everyone who has helped out, been a support and come along to classes. Without you, none of this is possible.
SBG WA
One tribe, one vibe.”

The Love Doctor on his Latest Victory

SBG’s Adam Proctor took his professional record to 10-1 in October with an impressive unanimous decision win over Angelo Rubino at Cage Warriors 98. It is his fifth win in a row and marks an impressive step up, as it is his first victory under the Cage Warriors banner.  Proctor had this to share after the fight:

“Saturday night I won my fight on Cage Warriors 98 via unanimous decision which now takes me to 10-1 as a professional.

I would like to thank Alex Enlund – SBG Coach and the whole team at SBG SOUTH SHIELDS for helping me to continuously grow and improve every day as a martial artist alongside Stephen Manuel Performance who has helped me become a better athlete.

Thank you to all of my sponsors who have all helped me greatly in various ways in the lead up to this fight. 
▪️Lean Eatin’
▪️CBDLife UK
▪️Powerhouse Gym South Shields, Home Of Champions

I’d also like to say a very big thank you to everyone who made the trip down to Birmingham to watch me or tuned in, your support is truly appreciated!

I’m happy to be fighting on Cage Warriors and appreciate the opportunity, I’m looking forward to my future with the promotion.”

SBG Fall Camp in SBG Portland

With the passing of another October, the SBG Fall Camp has again come and go. As usual, the SBG Fall Camp was an incredible experience and broke records for the number of attendees to have every fit into the Portland gym! The knowledge shared was on a par in size with the number of students who had traveled far and wide to listen. As with every camp he attends, Coach Cane Prevost took the time to break it down and share his thoughts on the camp as a whole. Not wanting to take away from any aspect of such an amazing camp, here is Coach Cane’s review in full:

“Friday night started off with friendly rolls. It struck me pretty quickly how cool this actually was. Over a hundred people on the mat sharing friendly rolls and smiles. Everyone was rolling at a friendly learning style pace. I got to roll with some old friends and people I met for the first time. It’s always a great way to start camp.

John Mertlich and I started things off with a session on open guard bottom. We presented a roadmap for open guard and tried our best to simplify the position into some easy to remember and learn fundamentals. It was an honor to present our research and I sincerely hope people found it helpful.

Saturday morning started early for the MMA athletes. There was a MMA training with Adam Singer that started at 8:00 AM. Adam requested doughnuts and coffee in advanced. When I showed up for the start of the regular camp at 9:30 Adam had his coffee and there were about 8 boxes of doughnuts including erotic pastry on the back counter. SBG.

Adam taught the first session of Saturday morning regular camp. He focused on standing wall work. His material is easily accessible to everyone in the room. He broke it down into small chunks and delivered it with humor and a fun attitude that had everyone smiling and comfortable. The material focused on fundamentals of postural control and he had everyone working controlling an opponent up against the wall. The material was perfect for self defense and just happened to come from a MMA curriculum. With all of Adam’s stuff I steal it right away and put it in my back pocket for my own classes.

Matt Thornton was next. Coach Matt did what he does. He contextualized everything for us. I have known Coach Matt for a lot of years. In all that time I have never seen him teach anything that wasn’t absolutely fundamental. His adherence to that is impressive. His idea for the day was that survival is important and a sometimes overlooked skill. It’s necessary and maybe primary. Learning escapes without knowing how to survive is inefficient and will many times make your Jiu Jitsu worse. When Matt shows fundamental stuff my response is often “oh duh! of course I should be doing that” His bottom cross sides stuff was exactly that. When you see it you know it’s what you should be doing because it’s so functional and efficient and fundamental. You will put it in your game.

Matt Inman was next up. It was my first time meeting Matt and he is SBG through and through. Great guy with a deep knowledge of Jiu Jitsu. He taught some great fundamentals of breaking grips and some very nice details of both the 2 on 1 grip and the kimura grip. The best thing I can say about Matt’s stuff is it reminded me of his coach Karl. It was brilliant and creative and innovative just like Karl always was. I’m sure Karl would be proud of the material Matt showed and I was grateful to see Karl’s legacy is well looked after.

Steve Whittier was up next. Steve is one of the best stand up coaches on the planet and the go to guy in SBG for much of that material. He certainly is the best Muay Thai guy in our organization. He taught an inside grip hand tie up position as a launching point for throwing elbows. I’ve been around for a while and this was the first time I have ever seen anyone really explain how elbows work and what the range actually looks like. It was way more than that though. The material was fundamental enough that even the lesson on how to control the inside position from this range was very versatile and would apply in a bunch of different places. He actually worked an entire room full of people with no thai boxing experience and had them throwing elbows in competitive drills with nobody getting hurt. It was very cool to see.

Salome finished out the day. I’m always amazed at the depth of knowledge that Salome brings to the table. Her knowledge about how the body works and why it works the way it does is inspiring. It lets me know how much more there is to know. She can take a room full of non yoga students and break down her craft to a level that we all can understand and accomplish. It’s always a perfect way to end a long day of training and I’m grateful for the lesson in how to take care of my body.

Saturday night we all went to the Kennedy School and had the outside courtyard to ourselves. The staff fired up outside heaters and we had several fire pits going with roaring fires. It was really nice to hang out with the extended tribe and get to know everyone off the mat.

Sunday morning started with Yoga from Kisa Davison. Again I’m amazed at how well Kisa can describe posture. The way she can get an entire room full of balled up and tight Jiu Jitsu people into beautiful Yoga postures is great. She is able to expertly articulate how the posture looks, feels, and works. As a Jiu Jitsu coach I really admire how she can do that with such detail that we all understood and were able to reasonably accomplish the postures. She had 5 postures that were specifically tailored to Jiu Jitsu players. One of the postures that targeted the shoulders and neck felt like magic to me and after my neck and shoulders felt amazing. All the stress and tension was gone. Great stuff.

Travis Davison was next up. He worked half guard bottom. I told Travis that it was the best half guard bottom class I ever had and I meant it. He did something that hardly anybody does that made all the difference. He started with strategy and what the purpose of the half guard was. He then taught a bunch of stuff (tactics) that all served that strategy. It was brilliant coaching. What I learned quickly was that I have been playing half guard strategically incorrect. Fixing the strategy was way more important and effective than just learning some new tools. It’s game transforming stuff. I can’t wait to try out the material and the new strategic focus.

John Frankl was next. I’m a huge John Frankl fan. Everyone is. He taught a position called iron pillow. Before I die I want to think up a cool name for a Jiu Jitsu move like that. John had learned bits and pieces of this position from a few people over the years and has been organizing the material into a teachable curriculum. I had been playing around with it for a few weeks and he really patched up some holes in how I was doing it. The material fit perfectly in with the material Matt showed because it was bottom survival at it’s most efficient. The material was really well crafted and you could see all the time and thought that John has put into crafting it. Even more than the material though John really talked about how to be a good Jiu Jitsu student. His quote that “You should love learning Jiu Jitsu more than you love winning” was great. That phrase really speaks to John’s whole approach to Jiu Jitsu and what many people admire about him. I really appreciated the message and took it to heart.

Ben Power was next. It was my first time meeting Ben. I had heard great things about his Jiu Jitsu game and was looking forward to his session. Like all SBG coaches he brought a fundamental idea to his session. He structured everything around a few simple ideas:
Use what’s free
Change your shape
Improve your posture
These ideas sound simple enough but they are an incredible tool for taking the game you already have and making it work way better. Ben showed us several different examples of this idea in action. In themselves the techniques he showed were great and worth adding to the arsenal. Even more than that though they were great examples of a way of looking at the Jiu Jitsu game. Instead of focusing on what the opponent has trapped or locked down we can instead look at what parts of our body are free to move, what angles and directions they can move, and use that to change our body shape to neutralize our opponent’s advantage. It was a very cool concept and the examples he gave us really showed how it works. It will immediately go into my game.

Paul Sharp was the last coach to teach. There is a reason Paul is last. It’s because nobody wants to follow him. Paul is a veteran police officer and his knowledge of self defense and everything you need to know around that topic is vast. The material he taught has been refined from many hours of teaching and many years out there in the trenches seeing first hand how violent interactions happen. He had the whole room rocking in no time and not only did we get some great self defense lessons but we all were laughing so hard and having such a good time. Paul is a great guy and sincerely teaches in a way that he wants us to all present our best selves to the world and his material really transcended self defense in that. He gave us some really great life advice that I took to heart. I’m leaving that session not only with some great self defense material to take to my students but also a renewed desire and plan for how I can be a better person. How cool is that? I don’t want to sound too corny but Paul walks the talk and he inspired everyone in the room to put their best selves forward. I hope I can live up to that and bring some of that vibe to my students.

Great weekend! Big thank you to everyone who came. I really appreciate you visiting our gym. It was an honor to spend time this weekend with you all. Until next time.”

 Proud Parent At SBG Athens

SBG is proud of the vibe it has created throughout all it’s gyms. SBG the world over has an inclusive spirit that welcomes people from all walks of life to train, learn and improve their lives together. As such, the tribe is lucky to have experienced some great moments that see kids, parents and grandparents training side by side. One parent from SBG Athens took to Facebook to share a proud moment as her son received his newest belt promotion. Here’s what she had to say:

“I actually teared up watching this and hate that i missed it. Thanks to the coaches for working with Robert day in and out. I know it’s not easy and some days you want to hang him upside down by his toes, but you are all making the biggest difference in his life and giving him a confidence he couldn’t get elsewhere. 
This new belt meant the world to him and he was so excited to tell me about it. His Aspergers scares him and makes him feel different a lot of the time. But here he feels safe. 
This is Robert. And HE will be ok. And a huge part of that is SBG 💕”

New Black Belts & Stripes Awarded

October saw three new black belts awarded at SBG Ireland. Not only does the tribe continue to grow in numbers as new gyms open up across the globe, but the depth of quality BJJ continues to increase, with members reaching new heights every day.

Congratulations to Joey, Kieran, and Cain, on receiving their black belts from John Kavanagh. None other than SBG President Matt Thornton was the one to present to new belts.

Matt also took the time to hand out stripes to some of his oldest black belts. Congratulations to SBG VP Travis Davison, who received his fourth stripe, and Said Zeiai, Head Coach of SBG Sweden, for his first stripe!

“I was honored to award some stripes today to two well deserved black belts. Said Zeiai, head of SBG Sweden, who taught a great class this afternoon, received his overdue first stripe. 

And the Veep, Travis Davison – who becomes my 4th 3rd stripe black belt – and who spends his days helping everyone in SBG accomplish more. I’m proud to know these leaders.” – Matt Thornton

SBGU Expands to Include Yoga!

SBG University is a ground-breaking new way to access the incredible teaching and coaching of SBG from anywhere in the world. Over the course of recent months, Matt Thornton, alongside a host of other top SBG coaches, has been sharing content in the form of interviews and instructional videos to improve the practice of SBG students everywhere. Just when it seemed the offerings from SBG University couldn’t get more comprehensive, starting in November subscribers will have access to a full restorative yoga program designed and instructed by Primate Yoga founder, Salome Thornton! The Primate Yoga section of SBG U will include weekly videos, bonus clips and live Q & A sessions, while topics will include: breathing, composure, injury rehab, recovery, and yoga training designed specifically for the Combat Athlete.

If you haven’t checked out and signed up for SBG University, do so now!

SBG Montana Wins Team Competition

When SBG Montana enters a competition, they come to win. Not only do they train incredibly hard, but the Montana gyms will travel en masse across the northwest to completely take over regional BJJ competitions! In October, the Grappling Industries tournament in Helena was no exception. SBG sent over thirty competitors to the tournament and blew away the competition, winning best overall team by a comfortable distance.

SBG Montana Coach, Leah Taylor, was one of the high level athletes that was in attendance:

“It felt good to get out on the competition mat this past weekend! 🦍 We brought over 30 competitors! It is the tribe that makes these experiences amazing. Jiu jitsu is very much a team sport if you are doing it right. 💓The whole Montana tribe came together to support each other. Thank you to everyone who competed and coached!!💪”

SBG Ireland Win Big At Northern Ireland BJJ Championships

Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, SBG Ireland won their own team competition, securing overall best team at the Northern Ireland BJJ Championships. Meanwhile, SBG Belfast excelled themselves, picking up second in the individual team competition.

“Another Best Team for SBG today at the NI Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Championships today. Congrats to all the teams on a great combined effort. Special mention to SBG Belfast winning 2nd overall in individual team placement.” – John Kavanagh

 

Travis Davison On What He Is Grateful For

“I am happy to be home but thankful for all of the great experiences from this past week at SBG Euro Camp.

1. I received my third degree from my Coach Matt Thornton along with Said Zeiai who received his second. Well done brother👊🏻

2. I witnessed the promotion of three new SBG black belts under John Kavanagh. Congratulations Cian Conlan, Kieran Davern, and Joey Breslin🤘🏼

3. I had the opportunity to meet with and encourage some of SBG’s newest gym owners.

4. I was able to kick off the first session on day 2. Thank you everyone for your time🙏🏻

5. Most important of all I was able to spend time with friends and family❤️”

New Gear, New Site!

Fuji has been working diligently behind the scenes to offer a better experience online, and their new site finally went live this month! To celebrate Travis released the newest addition to the SBG gear stable, fresh beanies with leather SBG insignias. Get yours before they’re all gone! -Click here to get your cap now-  Or -Click here to view the new site-

Paul Sharp On Being A Police Officer

“My greatest frustration as police officer was the virtual impossibility of being there when needed. You look at the victim and feel overwhelming guilt because you weren’t there when needed. This has always been my biggest motivation as a coach. I want my people to be as dangerous as possible in as short of a time frame as possible.” – Paul Sharp