Some years ago, I took a couple months of Pekiti Tirsia (PT), which is a system of Escrima generally ignored by even hardcore martial arts enthusiasts. In part, this is because PT, like Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, has a closely regulated advancement system. Unlike Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, however, it lacks a large instructor pool, and is practically non-existent on the west coast. When relocating from the northeast United States (where there are a lot more PT instructors available), I had to give up any PT training I intended to pursue, and briefly went back to Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ).

The recent discovery of a PT group practicing in the San Francisco Bay Area has reinvigorated my interest in PT. Escrima is slowly gaining more interest, but its growth is slowed because unlike the many martial arts that make up the quickly growing mixed martial arts (MMA) phenomenon, it is largely weapon-based. It’s streetwise practicality, however, makes it an interesting system to adapt, despite its inherent “violence” when practiced in a more realistic setting. The famous Dog Brother’s letter, for example, illustrates that even the UFC thought that full-contact stickfighting, albeit practical experience, was too touchy for public display.

Nonetheless, the Dog Brothers maintain a strong reputation, and have formed a style that might be considered the “first” MMA blend that includes weapons:

The three principal FMA systems from which Dog Brothers draw are Inosanto Blend (Dan Inosanto), Pekiti Tirsia (Leo Gaje), and Lameco (the late Edgar Sulite). It is also important to mention Silat and the Indonesian system of Bukti Negara Pentjak Silat of Paul de Thouars. They have also trained under the Machado brothers in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu…

PT may be unique among the aforementioned styles because its followers are able to stand alone in their admiration of a “pure” and still practical fighting styles, as indicated in a Dog Brothers-like gathering:

In the year 1998 Pekiti-Tirsia Philippines, Inc. organized the “Battle of Grandmasters”. A tournament following the Total Submission Policy – fighting without any protection gear (no glove no helmet!) with unpadded sticks, no referee, no time limit, no rules. Fighting was done on challenges (Master and Grandmaster division) and as a challenge tournament (advanced students). The tournament was open to all styles, and Masters and Grandmasters from more than 15 styles have been personally invited – but only Pekiti-Tirsia fighters were willing to fight under the said conditions.

For most of us, this type of challenge isn’t going to urge us to tackle bone-crushing combat events, but neither are most BJJ practitioners going to jump into the BJJ ring to get their faces smashed. Both styles are a significant testament to their effectiveness, however, and both can be learned and practiced in much more controlled environments.

In any case, I’d love to see how PT fighters or the Dog Brothers stand up to melee aficionados of other combat systems, especially the more famous systems that hail from China and Japan.Similar Posts:

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Let’s cut Travis “I’m-a-fatty-and-was-too-lazy-to-cut-weight” Lutter some slack about losing his chance for a real title shot, because only a bunch of retards actually expected him to win against Anderson Silva anyway. Sadly, 20% of UFC viewers are apparently retarded, or at least says the Pay-Per-View poll running before the fight began. What makes this truly sad is the fact that Lutter controlled the entire fight, despite the fact that Silva finally won with a rather poor triangle choke that Lutter should never have fallen into. This is hardly a testament to Silva’s ground-game, however, and more a commentary on how lazy Silva was in preparing for his fight against Lutter. What should have been a quick series of sprawls and take-down avoidances turned instead into Lutter dominating Silva every which way on the mat, with Silva getting frustrated at Lutter for staying on the ground. Silva should know a thing or two about avoiding a weakness, because he does it repeatedly when keeping on his feet, which made me skeptical as to his ground skills before his fight with Lutter even began. How the UFC commentators could commend Silva for his rather weak triangle (which took forever to have any effect, and even then, only because Silva finally began throwing elbows), is beyond me. These commentators are supposed to have more of a clue than your average viewer, after all.

Then we have SIlva doing his little victory dance, which is occasionally fine for a fighter to do, though very lame if they won because they got lucky. It’s not even like SIlva pulled off a splendid submission, which would at least attest to some ground skills. Instead, it took Silva almost two minutes with Lutter in a shitty triangle for Silva to pull something out of his bag of tricks.

The whole victory dance thing agitates me, as does most showmanship. It can be funny, such as Scott Smith’s “crane kick”, or the occasional shit-talkery, but I respect fighters far more when they show up to fight, not brag. Do the talking in the ring, not outside it. Perhaps that’s why Mirko “Cro Cop” Filipovic has my respect, because he shows up, cold as ice, does his deed, and recognizes the cheering crowd with a raised arm and little more. No running around like a fool, no doing a dance, and not jumping up and down as though he was just crowned prom queen. This attitude seems to be pretty typical of European fighters, whereas fighters from the Americas can’t seem to distinguish a little playing to the crowd from WWF dramarama.

I’m also a tad agitated by fighters who have no idea where they’re from, like Roger Huerta. At least fighters like Tito Ortiz have an inkling of class, by flying the Mexican flag alongside the U.S. flag (or vice versa, in his mind). Huerta, however, born in Los Angeles, comes out to the ring like he’s a Mexican native. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for giving props to one’s ancestors and the country they’re from, but Huerta, you’re a U.S. citizen. Show a little patriotism and fly your own flag, or move back to Mexico if you back it more than your own country.

In any case, tonight’s UFC event makes me think that Silva won’t hold the belt as long as I initially thought. Unless he brushes up on his ground game or builds up his takedown defense, it’s only a matter of time before he gets tapped out. Heck, after tonight’s showing, if a relative nothing like Lutter can give Silva a run for his money, someone else will, too.Similar Posts:

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I meant to post sooner about last Saturday’s long-awaited showdown between Matt Hughes and Royce Gracie, but the last week has given me a few moments to think about the fight’s conclusion. As I told Bones Wiley before the fight began, my money would have been on Hughes, but morally I was opposed to betting against Gracie. The fact is, I like Gracie better, and was seriously rooting on him to win despite the fact that he was trying to promote his “superior” system. While Hughes is the “all-American,” he stands for everything UFC was not in the early days; Hughes is the type of guy the average person sees in a bar and agrees would kick-ass, because he’s stocky, unbelievably strong, and looks like he can take a punch. That’s the exact opposite of what Royce Gracie showed the world in the early days of the UFC; Gracie was a small Brazilian dude who beat the bejeezus out of opponents twice his size.

Hughes said himself that he was trying to make a statement that the Gracie system of Jiu-Jitsu was not the only system one needs to know to win. He was, in effect, telling the world that the Gracie system was not the best, but in watching him fight, it was quite obvious that the Gracie system was nonetheless mandatory in Mixed Martial Arts (MMA). Superiority of system or not, Hughes is reliant on aspects of the Gracie system to win, and his pompous attitude does nothing to degrade the Gracie fighting system, even if Hughes’ victory over Gracie was meant to prove otherwise.

Looking back at Saturday’s fight, there’s nothing that was very surprising. We all knew Hughes was a brick house, and no one expected Hughes to win by submission. Even though Hughes doesn’t want to be seen as a simple ground-and-pounder, that’s precisely what got him to where he is today, and that’s the only thing that he won the fight on; I’m convinced that at the end of the fight, had Hughes attempted a rear choke on Gracie instead of bombarding Gracie with punches to the head, Gracie would have gotten away and prolonged the fight.

Admittedly, Hughes was right that MMA fighters today are a different breed than MMA fighters of yesteryear, but he’s wrong about the degree of that statement. Royce Gracie can take most fighters in his, or any, weight class. We’ve seen his work in Pride, and know that he can handle some striking as well, but on the ground, he’s a bloody machine that doesn’t need oiling. When Hughes applied that arm bar, I can’t think of any other known UFC fighter that would have gotten out of that setup with as calm a face as Gracie, and continue to use his arm in a functional manner. In fact, if there’s one thing the fight did teach us, is that Gracie still has what it takes to win in a fight of submissions, and bar none, is the ultimate submissions fighter.

I would have been more pleased to see Hughes attempt to win a fight standing, or win by submission. The former would have at least shown he could avoid a Gracie take-down, while the latter would have ultimately proven that the Gracies are beatable at their own game. Interestingly, it’s clear that while Hughes is a well-rounded fighter, grappling expertise is a sure-fire way of negating much of Hughes’ game, and it’s only a matter of time before we see someone equally versed in ground-and-pound take Hughes on without the expectation of winning by submission.

Yes, the MMA arena has changed, but only insofar that Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu isn’t the sole requirement to gain victory. Really, a better reliance on Vale Tudo techniques, where one should expect to see a pounding on the ground and not just attempts at submissions is where it’s at, and there’s no style that fully embodies that idea. If the Gracie’s actively pursued that philosophy, however, their style could again gain some ground in the Octagon.

In the meantime, I’m waiting for a technical fighter sans Hughes’ strength to vie for the crown. The Welterweight division needs a solid underdog to root for, and sadly Hughes was never it. I’d love to see someone like Luke Cummo head up the ranks, but I’m equally enthused about a more viable fight, like with Georges St. Pierre or BJ Penn.Similar Posts:

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Chapter One: The Belt Hierarchy

The Black Belt is a symbol of achievement for the many students undertaking the art of Tae-Kwon-Do. A hierarchy of colors based upon the strengthening and perfection’s of the fundamental elements of this art, the Black Belt represents the technique of the master. Although the student is still able to climb the ladder of achievement upon receiving this title, the graph of knowledge as a function of perfection slowly reaches an equilibrium as X and Y level off. Yet the question remains in the mind of the weary, anarchistic student, for although she may wish to continue striving for the goal, the elements of treason and wisdom are embedded within her mind. The color black must then be analyzed, for its obvious significance can then be shown to be less obvious than it at first would seem. Exactly why then the Black Belt was chosen to represent mastery and improvement remains an enigma. In fact, the entire hierarchy of stages, colors representing those steps, is therefore false, in that they are either based on the enigma in question, or remain an utter lie.

Color, a sensation derived from the light reflecting off an object into the eye’s retina, may also be forged from a distinct light source. Attuned to the very characteristics of the color white, we perceive it as neutral, in that it has no color. Newton himself proposed that light moves in a wave-like pattern, and it is to such degrees of different wavelengths that we are able to perceive color.

Light that we see, therefore considered colors by the general populace, is a form of electromagnetic radiation, with a wavelength of approximately 410 nanometers to about 770 nanometers. Each color clearly has its own complimentary color, a light that, when joined with its compliment, appears white or neutral. When a colored object, an object that receives by nature only one color of light, is bombarded by its compliment, the outcome is the sensation of blackness.

Colors with distinct hues are known as chromatic colors. Colors without hue, notably black, gray and white, are termed achromatic colors. The color wheel, a visual depicting the chromatic colors, shows how the hues of these colors form a constant cycle. The achromatic colors on the other hand are arranged in a single series ranging from black to white, with the grays in-between. Each degree of lightness or darkness in a chromatic color can be attributed to a corresponding gray of the achromatic colors. This classification is what is known as luminance.

The three primary colors, of which possibly all other colors are derived, are red, blue and yellow. Notably, black and white then are not colors, for neither can be achieved in nature. White is the color that is native to us, yet black is therefore an illusion, a trick of the mind. While it would seem clear to classify the three primary colors as the greatest of the martial belts, this is not the case, rather an illusion is attributed to it instead.

The hierarchy of belts in Tae-Kwon-Do must then be proven to be false. White is the exception, which corresponds to its Oriental value of “pure.” The student then is not a true martial artist, for he is natural, as is the color white. The martial artist can then be considered unordinary, for the colors represent his departure from the norm. Perhaps it is the arrogance of the martial artist then, that causes him to believe he is greater than the common man. In this hierarchy, yellow and orange follow, although their natural wavelengths of 540-600 nanometers for yellow, and 600-630 nanometers for orange come after the wavelengths of violet, blue and green, since the wavelengths of yellow and orange are larger, respectively. After orange comes red, with a wavelength of 630-700 nanometers, the strongest perceivable color in the light spectrum. This would make sense, since red is above the other intermediate colors in the hierarchy. Going backwards from yellow, the colors are green, blue and purple, although the hierarchy depicts these as going up from orange, and not down from yellow. The hierarchy is now shown to be a farce, for it defies science.

We must therefore presume that the Tae-Kwon-Do pupil does not actually achieve anything, rather de-evolves after a period of time. According to these wavelengths, the student learns until she achieves orange belt, whereupon she de-evolves until she reaches her red belt. Therefore, the student is at her prime during her orange and red belt phase, the last true mastery at red. Brown, a combination of red and orange, is derived from taking percentages from both red and orange, the two prime colors of the hierarchy. Although more orange is used in this process, the outcome is a virtual average of the two. Although still at his prime, the student is lessened, and the ultimate decline now a full-fledged precognition of failure. When the student becomes a black-belt recommended, the student sees the first lines of destruction. Black, associated with corruption and death, taints the belt and once again, brings foreknowledge of the event to come. Once the pupil has achieved the Black Belt, he must realize his status is now but an illusion, a hoax and farce. It is not a single colored belt he wears, but rather a lesser color, combined with its compliment. In other words, his belt is not legitamate, rather an illusion made of lies. Even in older black belts, the lie becomes physical, as the belt is covered in age. The “black” peels off, and what is below is a belt of white, the final, everlasting touch of taint. Now the pupil is to realize she has not actually progressed at all, rather, she has herself been corrupted with nightmares in the guise of dreams. This is the ultimate paradox.

The ancients, like many psychologists today, know that colors affect the mind. Each color is associated with a state of that mind, which is reflected in the human aura. Since it was the ancients who devised the art of Tae Kwon Do, it was they who formed this majestic hoax, which we still live by to this day. Science proves that the hoax is there, and it is the new order which must bring about change. Just like the pagans were virtually erased from common society, so must this infernal art, for it is a blasphemous joke, and a disgrace for those that live by it. As this first chapter concludes, think upon the meaning of Tae Kwon Do, and come to realize the truth, a truth that has survived the ages, and a truth which may haunt you even today.Similar Posts:

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