Archive for the ‘DVD & Book Reviews’ Category

Chael Sonnen - The Voice of Reason

THE VOICE OF REASON
A VIP Pass to Enlightenment
by CHAEL SONNEN
Published by Victory Belt

© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com 

This is a very comprehensive offering from MMA’s Chael Sonnen – there’s probably no one he has failed to insult at one point or another in the book. 

How refreshing it is to hear from a guy who shoots straight from the hip with a total disregard for political correctness.  You probably won’t agree with a lot of his views, but you’ll sure get a kick out of reading his anyway.

Like most thinkers, Chael has plenty on his mind, and throughout the 220 pages he gets a lot off his chest, covering everything from burying terrorists to resurrecting Richard Nixon.  Now and again, Chael even touches on his MMA experiences.  Particularly amusing is when he reflects on the importance of cornermen.

“So what’s up with all the focus mitts?  I have really begun to suspect that my guys (in fact, every fighter’s ‘guys’) bring focus mitts because they like walking around backstage wearing them.  It gives them a sense of worth, a feeling of belonging,” says Sonnen.

The Voice of Reason: A VIP Pass to Enlightenment by Chael Sonnen is a very interesting and entertaining read.

Submit Everyone

The Guerrilla Jiu-Jitsu Files
By Dave Camarillo and Kevin Howell
presented by Victory Belt
© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com

Five years in the making, Submit Everyone is presented by American Kickboxing Academy’s Jiu Jitsu and Judo master trainer, Dave Camarillo.

For over 10 years Dave Camarillo has helped some of MMA’s most elite fighters achieve their dreams in the cage and now he has revealed his unique strategies to you through Submit Everyone.  As Dave states, “The goal of this book is to provide the reader with both the physical and mental tools to develop a submission focused strategy of ground fighting.  It appeals to the novice and the seasoned grappler, as well as those seeking to improve their submission game at the highest level.”

The main key to Submit Everyone is that, like Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira’s excellent instructional manual Mastering Mixed Martial Arts: The Guard, Camarillo provides a contingency plan so your ground game flows past stumbling blocks on the mats, and enables you to overcome your grappling adversaries.

CONTENTS

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The Grappler's Manifesto

The Guide to STRANGLING, TORQUING, & BLUDGEONING
Your Way to Victory in the Cage

By Lance Freimuth

presented by Victory Belt

© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com

It’s hard to believe the human body consists of just a head, torso, two arms, and two legs.  And yet there seem to be an infinite number of ways to tie up your opponent and submit or choke him out.

Just when you think you’ve seen every conceivable move, a book like this comes along and pulls the mats from under you.  UK’s Geoff Thompson often says “With ability comes humility”, and The Grappler’s Manifesto is a book that could humble any fighter with its revolutionary techniques.

When you first flick through Lance Freimuth’s book it’s like sitting in the Millennium Falcon’s cockpit and thinking “Okay, we’ve done the Milky Way, now let’s start the journey.”   But what a crew you’re riding with!  Onboard are Randy Couture, Antonio Nogueira, Greg Jackson, Forrest Griffin, Dave Camarillo, Neil Melanson and Jon Fitch, plus author Freimuth who taught grappling at the renowned Tiger Muay Thai in Thailand and was a wrestling instructor at Randy Couture’s Xtreme Couture MMA gym in Las Vegas.

The Grappler’s Manifesto’s 347 pages of instruction will beam your ground game way past any opponent’s out there and send you into MMA hyperspace as you put into practice never-before-seen grappling tactics.  What a blast! 

KETTLEBELL Rx: The Complete Guide for Athletes and Coaches

THE COMPLETE GUIDE FOR ATHLETES AND COACHES

By Jeff Martone
presented by Victory Belt
© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com

It’s hard to pinpoint the origin of the kettlebell as a form of exercise equipment.  There is evidence of kettlebells being used by Cossacks, Scottish Highlanders and Greek gladiators, by Turkish and Iranian athletes way back in time…  But today, Russians are easily the best known users of the girya (kettlebell) in their training regimes – gireviks even compete with the girya as an individual sport.

Due to the widespread use of kettlebells by Russian sportsman including two of the most successful MMA fighters in history, Igor Vovchanchyn and Fedor Emelianenko, who are known to have incorporated girya lifting in their fight preparation, the popularity of kettlebells has grown internationally.  And kettlebells are readily available over the counter from any sports store out there.  No problem!

But after you pick up the cannonballs by their handles and lug them home, what do you do with them?  How do you get optimum results in minimum time?  Well, they make dandy doorstops, or you can search all over the place for routines that might work.

Fortunately, now there is a concise and practical manual available to the public that is perfect for your needs, no matter how diverse they may be.

Kettlebell Rx: The Complete Guide for Athletes and Coaches by Jeff Martone fills the black hole of modern day weight-training. “I use a systemic approach from beginning to end that not only teaches basic movements, but lays out my own patented hand-to-hand techniques as well as sport kettlebell training.  It shows hundreds of the most common errors and how to correct them with specific drills,” says Martone.

Whether you’re a first-time dabbler or a hard-case kettlebell user, this book is for you.

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Marcelo Garcia "Advanced Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Techniques"

With Marshal D. Carper & Glen Cordoza
presented by Victory Belt
© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com

It’s easy to pigeon-hole Marcelo Garcia – the guy is the Thomas Edison of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

A five-time BJJ World Champion and a four-time ADCC Submission Grappling World Champion, Marcelo is the man to study if you want to elevate your game to the penthouse level of grappling.

Garcia’s motto appears to be, if it’s not broken, fix it anyway – it can always be better.  It’s this constant quest for improvement that has enabled him to remain the best of the best.

The Forward by child chess prodigy Josh Waitzkin is also a very informative and enjoyable read, although including Marcelo’s email address in the book may not have been Josh’s best ‘move’.

Of Garcia, Waitzkin says “Marcelo’s repertoire is in a constant state of evolution, and experimentation is a key part of his process – he is often playing with things around the edges of his arsenal, testing, pushing his boundaries.  This is part of how his game always tends to be one step ahead of his opponents”

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presented by M-1 Global
© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com

What an excellent DVD!  Recently re-released, Fedor Emelianenko – The Last Emperor now provides both English and French subtitles, but retains its authenticity and ambience by being recorded in Russian.

This is an in-depth probe into the life of the greatest fighter of all time, and although some footage from this DVD was made available for the documentary Fedor: the Baddest Man on the Planet, there is plenty more in this presentation that wasn’t shown in the documentary.

At the age of two, Fedor and his family relocated from the Ukraine to the industrial city of Stary Oskol in Russia’s Belgorod region.  The DVD opens with Fedor jogging around Stary Oskol before you join him in the passenger seat of his Toyota as he drives you to visit his family and many friends around his hometown and the gym.

Denis Kurilov recalls how he met Emelianenko at a sport summer camp when they were about eight years old and took up judo together.  Like many of Fedor’s early companions, Denis has remained a close friend. Read the rest of this entry »

MMA Instructional Manual

Anderson Silva: The Muay Thai Clinch, Takedowns, Takedown Defense & Ground Game

The Muay Thai Clinch, Takedowns,

Takedown Defense, & Ground Fighting
With Glen Cordoza
presented by Victory Belt

© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com

Although Anderson Silva (28-4-0) is best known for his stand-up victories due to 16 of his wins coming via KO or TKO, it’s because of Anderson’s outstanding Muay Thai skills that fans rarely get to see him display his exceptional takedown and submission abilities.

Silva is currently on a 14-fight winning streak, which includes the scalps of such renowned cage fighters as Vitor Belfort, Forrest Griffin, Dan Henderson, and Rich Franklin (twice).  He is UFC’s most successful champion and is ranked as the world’s top middleweight by most MMA authorities.

In Anderson’s MMA instructional manual The Muay Thai Clinch, Takedowns,

Takedown Defense, & Ground Fighting, is a complete fighting system where The Spider covers all facets of mixed martial arts: stand-up, takedowns and the ground game, drawing from his knowledge as a black belt in Tae Kwon Do, Judo and BJJ. Read the rest of this entry »

Cung Le: Sanshou, the Complete Fighting System

SANSHOU: The Complete Fighting System
with Glen Cordoza
(Victory Belt)

© Marc Wickert
www.knucklepit.com

Two things I always look for in a martial arts book or DVD are techniques that are street applicable and a fighting style that will baffle opponents through its uniqueness.  Cung Le Sanshou: The Complete Fighting System definitely covers both of these requirements, and includes dynamic striking combos, side kick attacks and counter attacks, high-amplitude throws, devastating takedowns and sweeps, and Sanshou drills.

Ken Twaddell, a leading international martial arts authority, says of Cung Le: “His style of fighting is technically simplistic yet explosive and brutally practical.  I met Le at the 2006 Martial Arts Super Show in Las Vegas, and  I admire what he has achieved through doing the extra yards and constantly improving his skills.   

“Sanshou is one of my favorite combat styles and a total package featuring kickboxing strikes plus sweeps, takedowns and submissions.  The lead-leg side kick is the most utilized kick in Sanshou and is often used in conjunction with punches to set up sweeps and takedowns.  Cung Le’s special blend of kickboxing and Shuai Jiao (Chinese wrestling) provides a lethal combat system,” says Twaddell.

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Rapid Russian by Berlitz Earworms

presented by Berlitz Earworms

© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com

I spend a great many hours each week on the road, so 18 months ago I decided to utilize my time behind the wheel as productively as possible by learning a new language – Russian.  I’ve interviewed Fedor Emelianenko through an interpreter, but my dream is to one day interview this great athlete in his native tongue.

The Berlitz Earworms learning technique is by far the most student-friendly CD system for me.  I tried other CD language products, but found them too difficult and distracting whilst driving.

There is an included phrase book one can refer to; however the secret to “Rapid Russian Vol. 1” by Earworms is that by simply listening to these essential words and phrases, they are “burned deeply into your long-term memory in next to no time.”

KEY POINTS TO EARWORMS MUSICAL BRAIN TRAINER:

• Effortless, enjoyable and effective
• Essential phrases for your trip abroad
• Words anchored deeply into your memory by gentle repetition to music
• Stimulating and self-motivating through real rapid progress
• Developed by language teaching experts
• Target language spoken by native speakers
• Pronunciation acquired automatically
• Listen and learn, anytime, anywhere: in the car, while jogging…
• Phrase book included

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Randy Couture Xtreme Training

The Fighter’s Ultimate Fitness Manual

with Lance Freimuth and Erich Krauss

© Marc Wickert www.knucklepit.com

This 320-page manual has been a long time coming, but well worth every minute of the wait.  If you were to only have one piece of equipment in your gym, this book would have to be it.

What I really love about Randy Couture Xtreme Training – the Fighter’s Ultimate Fitness Manual is that the book contains a lot of training advice and instruction that could have been passed down from the days of Randy Couture’s great, great grandfather when fighters and wrestlers trained in old wooden sheds or rolled in the dirt in their backyards.  Some of these moves could even be attributed to Cain and Abel’s sparring days.

There’s no ultra-modern equipment employed or any state-of-the-art wizardry – it’s all “Natural”, as you’d expect.  And there are plenty of routines you can utilize when you’re traveling where no gym is handy. Read the rest of this entry »