EDIT: THE TITLE OF THIS THREAD IS SUPPOSED TO BE MACHIDA INSTRUCTIONAL VIDEO REVIEW. Sorry. I had ordered these instructional video before the Rashad fight and they came in yesterday. I watched the first video last night. There are four in total and I'll update as I watch each of them. DISC 1 For anyone who doubts Machida does karate all you have to do is watch this first video. It is pure karate 101. There is even kata. This is good and bad. Good in that, while he calls it 'Machida Karate' it is just karate fundamentals. Bad in that I found myself trying to stay awake as he explained the karate stance, footwork, kicks, etc. You have to understand ITF TKD pre-sine wave (which is what I practice) is almost identical to what he is showing on the screen. I've been doing it for over 20 years so it wasn't like any of it was new information and it was like 11 pm at night by the time I got through watching it. It was still important for me to watch it, however, because he reinforces the fundamentals. I must hang my head in shame and admit that I had veered away from concepts like moving, kicking, and punching as if you were balancing a book on your head. I used to be very good at performing moves with very little head movement. And this tactic works very well in point-style sparring. As I have cross-trained, however, I started falling more in love with power than on the deceptive/elusive nature of keeping your head firmly at your center at all times. Shame on me for secretly doubting some of the basics I'd been taught. The other thing you pick up right away is that Machida has excellent timing. Much has been made about him being a 'unique athlete who is fast and explosive and would be successful no matter what style he used'. This is not the case. He is not especially fast. He is just good at catching his opponent off guard. And this is a result of his footwork and timing. So in summary, if you are a karateka, you will likely see nothing you haven't been told 1000 times in this first disc. Again it is a good thing to watch because when a guy with the success of Machida reinforces the fundamentals you again become a believer. This alone made them worth the $107 I paid for the entire set. But I am earnestly hoping we'll break into new ground with the other three DVDs. Considering one is for ground work and another is take-down defense, trips, and sweeps I'm guessing there will be plenty of new stuff for me to absorb. UPDATE DISC 2 The first disc was good. But when we get to disc 2 we start hitting some major paydirt. The first part is just combinations of the basic techniques that he showed in the first disc. And they are good. But again anyone who has been in a karate type style is not going to find them too new. He has spinning hook kicks in his combos. Sidekicks. Jumping knee combos. Low kick to high kicks. I'll probably write down a couple of them and introduce them into workouts with the pads. Good solid stuff. BUT when he gets into sweeps and takedowns is where I started getting excited. All the setups and footwork for his favorite sweeps are shown here. And for you lovers of weird kicks he even incorporates stuff like twist kicks into his setups for the sweeps. As you know Machida has taken down many accomplished grapplers with these 'unorthodox' sweeps. This is must have stuff in my opinion. I think the next DVD is takedown defense. I'll update this thread as I get through the DVDs.
Thanks for this, Ive been really wanting to see what is in this set before I went out and tried to order it
Included in the first DVD was a long interview from Machida and there are some interesting things you learn. Contrary to popular belief he was not a karate prodigy since age 4. He describes most of his training before the age of 11 as 'mostly goofing off'. Note he still trained karate, but not with the focus he 'should have' had. According to him his father never forced them to take karate, but told them they must do some sport. Early in his career he primarily focused on takedown to submission. This was because all the MMA gyms he trained at had this type of style. It wasn't until the Rich Franklin fight that he actually started putting faith in his karate training. Basically he had to get some experience before he could discover 'his style'. Another interesting thing is he was very sick and weak during the McDonald fight. This was why he was so focused on getting it to the ground and finishing it quickly. He didn't feel very well at all. Finally he is really into the whole philosophy aspect of karate and oriental martial arts. To him that is as important, if not more important, than the technique side of things. I will watch another DVD tonight and update this review.
This is really interesting and more than a little surprising to me. Is what he said at all reconcilable with what he told BadBoy.com about his karate training? "I miss true training [in] karate, because karate is my background. I was born, and I grew up, training karate. And why now, I have to change? I train in karate a lot, I train with my father, my brothers. I train with my distancing, my timing, in karate. Karate is very important for me. Karate is my life." Or is it a situation where he's made some fundamentally inconsistent statements? Frankly, watching him fight, I can't see how karate isn't at the core of everything he does. I just don't see it being something he "rediscovered" halfway through his MMA career.
Oh I hope I didn't give the wrong impression. He never said karate wasn't important to him. As a matter of fact he also said, "karate is my life" in this interview as well. His training prior to age 11 was not as serious. It was not 'with intent'. What he seemed to mean is after age 11 or 12 a switch went off in his brain and his level of dedication to his karate training went to a higher level. Does that make sense? And then when he first started doing MMA he was unhappy even though he was winning because he wasn't applying his karate. Or as he put it, "I hadn't found my style yet..." We are talking like the first two fights or so. Then he says he started putting it together. Remember he STARTED fighting in front of thousands of people. Totally natural to feel out of your element the first couple of times.
Oh, gotcha. I misunderstood your post. Wouldn't it be hilarious if young Lyoto was a 12-year-old black belt who had birthday parties at the dojo? Wouldn't that just turn the entire universe on its head?
I won't do my own review - at least, not here - as Aaron is doing a great job, but I do just want to add this: I've watched them and they are excellent (like all of Victory Belt's products I've seen so far).
Aaron, You mention that he does kata on the first DVD. Which one, or which ones, does he do? Is it detailed instruction or just five minutes of "and here's a kata (with a pancake on its head)"?
Mitlov- It is more like the second. They perform 3 kata (he and his brother). And they show them in slow motion as well. But if you are hoping for indepth kata analysis you will be disappointed. Alex- feel free to add. UPDATE DISC 3 DVD 3 covers intercepting attacks, takedown defense, and the clinch. Intercepting attacks is pretty much what you'd expect. Combos and strategies for beating your opponent to the punch. We see Lyoto is good at this in his fights and his brother seems to be good at them as well. So it is not surprising that much of this is good solid stuff. If you have a karate type background, however, you've probably seen some of these intercepting attacks before. Countering with a spinning side kick, cutting angles, etc. Ridge hand to sweep. Some good stuff in here. I took some nice tricks I think will razzle dazzle and give a clean 'point'. Takedown defense is a couple of techniques. If you've grappled you know the basics. Sprawl, push head away, get your elbows on shoulders, hips down. No surprises. I'll admit I was hoping for something more only because the guy made Tito look like he was diving for the canvas on purpose. The guy simply could not get a good hold of Machida. Machida makes it look so easy you are expecting to learn some magical technique. But it is ridiculous to hope for the magical answer. Machida's takedown defense is so good because of basics honed by constant practice. In clinching he goes through both takedowns and the MT clinch. I'll admit I'm clueless about the MT clinch, so it was all new to me. I really thought is was good. Supposedly he spent 40+ days training in Thailand and that was his introduction to MT. Probably review for those of you who know MT, but I thought it was great. Covers both offense and defense. Takedowns from clinch were very good. Machida's sumo background shows here and he is in his element. I learned some variation on some throws that I'm going to incorporate into Sambo. All in all a great DVD. ALOT to absorb.
Ive never done Karate but you review makes me wish I had! thanks bro,friends of mine who have practiced Karate for years always talk about timing and distancing, about footwork and angles and about Mushin so I always knew there was good solid stuff in there,I guess Machita is the one who has come along in the modern era and is proving that those thing are the keys to a fight..any fight.
Mitch- I got them off amazon in the U.S. But I did think of you when he was doing clinchwork. You would love it.
UPDATE DISC 4 Disc 4 covers groundwork. Order of things is rather strange, in my opinion. It starts, for example, of standing ground and pound where you are over your opponent and they are beneath you. Since this is karate for MMA I'd have thought they'd put in a discussion on the positions and advantages and disadvantages for each. But they start right in with techniques. Lots of discussion on ground and pound. Since this is an MMA instructional that makes sense. But, as a sport grappler, I didn't find this all that interesting. Submissions are what you'd expect. Armbar, Kimuras, a kneebar, and even arm-triangle. Not too indepth in instruction. Just demonstration of the techniques. Then he also showed escapes from positions and submissions. Again good solid techniques with some finer points thrown in. But very very cursory. I got some good things out of it, but if you had zero grappling experience I think it would be confusing. Personally I think something like the Serra BJJ basics would be a good thing to get with these DVDs. Also I noticed Victory Belts also offers some Anderson Silva DVDs and one by the Nog brothers. Might be some good stuff in those! But that doesn't mean the techniques aren't good. He used one of the escapes from the triangle, for example, against Tito. I had never seen the escape before (I always thought posture up and corkscrew out). So when he escaped from Tito by what appeared to be flopping on his back I though he had gotten lucky. Not so. It was a legitimate escape and he was in control the entire time. OVERALL COMMENTS One thing I never mentioned was that the production quality on these DVDs is top notch. You can easily navigate to each technique from the main menu and repeat it as many times as you want over an over again. These DVDs are well worth the money. The strong parts are the sweeps, takedowns from clinch, and of course combination attacks. The weakest part is the groundwork DVD only because the coverage is very cursory. But that is a lot of data to cover in one DVD. I must admit that I picked up things not only for stuff like clinch takedowns and sweeps but also a couple of point style karate type feints that really worked when I tried them. Considering that I have been doing this type of stuff for over 20 years I was impressed that Machida taught an old dog some new tricks in that area. Machida is a very smart practitioner and he doesn't appear to have held any of his tricks back. Very pleased with this DVD set overall.
Heh heh... I had to say I used Machida's triangle choke escape today (version 2) and it works! Yes I saw it work against Tito...but I can now vouch for it myself.
Found this excerpt on Youtube. Good stuff: [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZ4XLlAW0XU"]YouTube - Machida-Do: Evade and Takedown[/ame]
But but but...Machida doesn't use traditional karate! That's just a line to promote the family business! His training should look completely foreign to traditional Shotokan karateka! :hat:
