The $606.00 Rash Guard

The $606 rash guard.

$257 train Ticket

$39 hotel room

$117 entrance fee

$120 cab ride

$73 food

Priceless?

What was the The Priceless Moment? That is what I was thinking about Sunday morning when I was looking at my wallet. The Mastercard commercial always has a priceless moment. As you probably already know, I am a procrastinator . I always wait till the last second to make a decision. In some parts of my life it has served me well because there have been times when waiting until the last second has opened up a lot more opportunities. Most of the time it has worked against me; this would be another one of those times. I knew a few days before that no one had signed up for my division at the No Gi Pan Ams, so I sent out an email to the Federation of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and had them move me to the Open weight class. I figured that I would get a match in the Open because there were other Black Belts in my age group and they were all heavier. I was wrong -- nobody signed up. So when they posted the brackets, I sent them another email to move me down an age group but Saturday morning when I looked at the brackets, I saw that it had not been done.

Usually this would not be a big deal because most tournaments want the Black Belts to compete so they will go out of their way to make a match happen. I learned Saturday morning that this was not going to happen even with Brazilian Jiu Jitsu legend Leo Dalla talking to the director of the tournament. His reply was that if he started with me he would have to do it for everyone. I was upset but he was right. I run the Mission Submission tournaments and our most time-consuming process is creating the brackets, so I can understand and actually admire them for sticking to their guns.

The rest of the time was spent explaining to everyone why I was not competing. One of my old friends asked why I have not just signed up for the Adult division to begin with. He said he knew I could hang with them. I went on to explain the major difference between the old man division and adults – 5 Minutes! In the adult divisions the matches are 10 minutes vs 5 minutes for my division. I trained for 6 weeks 2 hours a day 4 days a week. For multiple 10-minute matches I would have to double the training, which is almost impossible for me. Whenever I train for competition, my business and family suffer. I become very selfish with my time and the training is about me not my students. My wife also gets the short end because I become very aggressive and ornery all the time. In the past that didn't effect us because she knew what to expect when I was training but it is different now with Thor.

So back to the Priceless moment- I thought about what part of the weekend was the most enlightening. It wasn't the Renzo Gracie Academy, even though that did give me a lot of new ideas which my students will see implemented in the next couple of weeks. It wasn't the No Gi matches even though there were a lot of exciting ones, especially the Evolve students. I would have to say the priceless moment would be the time I got to spend with Leo Dalla. We have known each other for about 11 years but have never really gotten to hang out for more than a few hours at a time. This weekend was different. Dalla has been in the sport since he was a kid and is one of the legends of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, so listening to his stories about all the heroes of our sport was cool. He is also a school owner with a lot of good ideas on how to run his program. But the most knowledge I gained from him was when he was talking about his kids. Dalla has 3 kids, with his daughter being born one month prior to my son. He talked about all the trials and tribulations of fatherhood and how he balanced all of it. It was neat to hear his reasons for what he does and it really helped me look at things differently. Even though I spent $600 and didn't get to compete it was well worth it, it was a priceless weekend.

Combat Charms

Being in the Marine Corps held for me some of the fondest memories of my life. I learned and did things that I never thought possible. Though it was not always fun in the sun, the positive memories definitely outweighed the negative memories. When I signed up I did not have much of a future and since the rest of my family was part of the military it was only natural for me to follow. Some of my fellow soldiers signed up for many reasons but some forgot what the Marine Corps main’s purpose was. When we were called to deploy to a hostile environment, it was amazing to see how many soldiers would panic and try to come up with all kinds of reasons why we shouldn’t deploy. We even had a soldier’s wife come down to talk to our Commanding Officer the morning we were about to deploy. He did the politically correct thing and took time to try to calm her down and explain to her that combat was our main job and every Marine knows and trains for that. She didn’t was to hear it and ran screaming and crying in front of our bus and laid down in front of the tire refusing to move until her husband was taken off the bus.
I was like every other Marine that was ready to deploy into the unknown -- scared! Yeah, we tried to act like we weren’t and some hid it better than others but you could see it in the mannerism of everyone you talked to that they were all nervous or scared about all the unknown scenarios that could happen. Questions like “Are we ready and prepared for this? Have we trained enough? How will I react if everything hits the fan?”

One of the things that always helped me ease my mind and nerves was my combat charm. It was my Kbar knife that I only brought out when I was going to deploy. Days before I would spend time sharpening it and cleaning it while preparing my mind for the unknown. I would tell myself that if everything else fails I will always have my Kbar. I would keep it on my side the whole time, even sleeping with it. And when we got back I would put it away until the next deployment. It seems silly to think about it now but it really helped me ease my fears and not worry about the unknown.

When I started to compete again in the Martial Arts those same feelings that I got before I deployed in the Corps would come up, so I created some charms that helped me get through it. For my Thai boxing matches I looked at my Thai shorts as my charm. I only wore them during my fights and I never cleaned them after. I left all the sweat and blood stains on the shorts that each fight would leave. You can imagine what they started to smell like after a couple of years but I believed that they held special powers. The shorts were a gift from my original instructor and he had used them in his fights.

When I started competing in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu I made my charm my belt. Each belt I ever wore became my symbol of strength and power. I have never washed any of my belts but every belt looks like it has been washed a thousand times. Through hours of sweat and training the belts would change colors and fray. It helped me compete because it eased the unknown, when I looked at the belt it would calm my nerves because I knew I had trained hard for whatever was about to happen.

It was a nerve racking Pan Ams last year because I was 5 pounds over the day before my matches. The gi I was going to wear was a double weave and if you have ever seen my belt it is a belt that is made for a heavyweight. I have to rap my belt around three times to tie it. Frank Wiot (Evolve Academy’s Manager), who flew out with me, came up with a great suggestion. He got me to buy a lighter gi at the event and a lighter belt. The idea saved me 2 pounds which meant I only had to lose 3 but what I forgot till the next day was that I would be fighting without my charm. I ended up winning without it but I definitely was not at the mental state I would have been if I had my real belt.
I felt better about my charm superstitions after doing a little research on the subject. I found that most athletes use charms or rituals to help them perform better. Do you ever wonder how the length of NBA shorts changed? In order for Michael Jordan to wear his lucky blue North Carolina shorts under his Bulls uniform, he had to wear longer shorts. The power of one superstition changed the style of the uniform.
Even though it is not life and death, I still look at grappling competitions as combat. I have to prepare to go to war, so on October 4th I am going to look to my Combat Charm to keep me calm and help me perform my best.

Posers and MMA and clothing!

It was cool when the sport first started and having a shirt that said Gracie or Tapout was something that was rare. You either had to be training in MMA or had trained. If you saw someone wearing a Gracie or Tapout shirt you immediately walked up to him and started a conversation. It didn’t matter how long he had been training or even how good he was; the main thing was that he trained. If he did train, you had an instant brotherhood formed with the person no matter what team he was from. The Brotherhood was formed because you both had endured countless battles that included a lot of physical, emotional and spiritual pain that daily training gives you. If you had never trained before and happened to be listening to two MMA guys talk, it sounded like they were talking in some kind of coded language.

Our sport was so small back then that at the time there were only 2 degrees of separation from every BJJ and MMA instructor in the USA. It didn’t matter who the Instructor was, you knew someone who had trained with him. There were only a handful of legitimate Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Black Belt Instructors when I started. On the East Coast we only had 5 Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Black Belts. Gracie was the name in MMA; Royce had shown the world that Gracie or Brazilian Jiu Jitsu was superior to all other arts. So if you were an MMA fighter and not training in BJJ you were taking a big risk stepping into the cage.

So you get the idea when I say that seeing a Gracie or Tapout shirt being worn by someone was cool -- there were very few posers! These days, the sport has become so popular that you no longer know if someone is a fan or if he actually trains. Even if the guy doesn’t train but he says he does, it is hard to tell if he is lying or not. If he has watched a few UFCs he has probably picked up on the lingo and can even rattle off some names and training camps. So determining if the guy is a poser is becoming harder and harder.

I think that having posers out there is great. They are supporting our sport and educating more people about it. We should not care if they are walking around with MMA clothing on and acting like they are tough; they are acting like that for the chicks. Most guys become posers because they are not tough or good enough to do whatever they are posing as.

Example-

When I was in the Military and deployed in Arizona, I remember some of my Marines telling some girls we had met that they were Naval Aviators. The girls really dug it and since the Marines had all watched “Top Gun” at least 20 times while we were on deployment they could perpetrate the role. I was a SGT at the time and the Marines were all working for me. When I asked why they didn’t tell them the truth, they said that being an aviator was so much cooler than what they did. Some of the Marines went as far as buying T-shirts with Naval Flight Squadrons on it and wearing the gold Ray Bans that Tom Cruise wore.

It was the chicks’ responsibility to find out if they were pilots or posers. Navy Seal, Delta Force, Marine Recon, SWAT, Sniper are some other occupations that get a lot of posers. So you should feel great that there are guys out there who think the sport you train in is worth the poser status!

Behind the Scenes at Full Throttle

This past weekend the MMA fighters went to Richmond, Virginia to showcase their skills in the CSC 26 Mixed Martial Arts show. The name of the show was Full Throttle which was a fitting name when you think about what happened in the fights. Instructor Orlando is doing a write-up on all the fights that will be sent out on the newsletter but I will give you my views and some behind-the-scene stories.

The first fight of the night for Team Evolve was Israel Flores. Israel had trained a full 2 weeks for this fight. As you already know I would never put any fighter in the cage with just 2 weeks of training but Israel gave me a story about how many times he has missed the window of opportunity to fight. Work always seems to stop him form being able to commit to the training needed. Israel proceeded to tell me how much he had been conditioning on his own and that he had been training in every class he could so he felt his skills were sharp! I told him that I would throw him in the Gauntlet and see how he did. As you already know he did really well.

The fight was awesome and if you missed it I will have it posted on www.evolveacademy.com by the end of this week. You should watch it because if you looked up the definition of tough this fight should be linked to it :). If you have ever listened to his life story it would make you appreciate your life and how easy you have had it. I don’t care if you were raised in a lower, middle, upper, broken, abusive inner city, drug, alcohol etc. family or what the rest of your life story is it will sound like a great life in comparison to Israel’s. There are positive things that come from his type of difficult upbringing and life and he displayed the positive things Sat. night. The word quit is not in his vocabulary and I believe it is because he has had such a rough life that he is so tough!

The 2^nd fight was Jay Mo. He came to the school a year ago at 215 lbs and fought at 145 Sat. night. If you watched his past fights (which are also posted on www.evolveacademy.com) you know that he likes to put on an exciting show. I was on the fence about if I should let him fight because I heard his opponent had weighed in a little over 135 and had been training in his garage. Not sure why they would put this guy in the show but I have seen some tough backyard garage fighters so I really did not want to underestimate him. That was until I saw him warming up in the parking lot. Anyone using a Kata to warm up is either 1. trying to throw me a curve ball or 2. really has no idea what he is about to get into. It was the 2^nd -- he had no idea what he got into.

When I saw him warming up with a Kata and I think it was a Green Belt Kata I was going to switch Al Benjamin in instead of Jay Mo. Chris and I talked about it and we decided that he had cut so much weight and put in so much time that it would be unfair to change it. Giving Jay Mo his pre-fight speech I told him not to play around and finish him as quickly as he can.

The 3^rd fighter was Zach and this was a pro fight and meant that it was a match with 3 rounds of 5 minutes each. This was his 2^nd pro fight and it is always comical when the pros are in a show because the state regulatory commission gets involved. I wish we had filmed that part of the show because it was like a Saturday Night Live skit. It is amazing what a little authority does to people. All the fighters were put into a big room and everyone was hanging and relaxing when one of the commissioner guys starts barking orders for the pros to move to this part of the room and the amateurs to stay where they are. After about 10 minutes another commissioner stands up and says all the pros move to where the amateurs and the amateurs move where the pros are. I really thought they were joking but we all did it. About 30 minutes after that they said that everyone needed to move again because the corners needed to be split up so red corner fighters should be over here and blue corner fighters over there. About 10 minutes after we moved into our areas which are rooms about as big as a garage, the same commissioner guy stood up and said that all the pros and amateurs would have to stay on their sides of this little room! That’s about when Brian Crenshaw stood up and said enough, “no, we are not going to move or split the group anymore.” I guess the guy realized how stupid it was because he listened.

All I kept thinking about is why it always takes a few hours when you have to go to the State Run DMV or MVA (Division of Motor Vehicles or Motor Vehicle Administration). This example explained it all:).

Zach finished his fighter who was a really good wrestler and a seasoned MMA fighter in less than a minute. Zach also picked up a great sponsor http://www.criticalfightgearstore.com/pages/home/.

They sponsor a lot of UFC fighters and are expecting big things from Zach. You can also check out what his manager wrote about him and if you have time leave a comment for Zach. The more fans the more chances he will have to get into the bigger shows!

http://www.suckerpunchent.com/events/4-big-wins-for-suckerpunch/

Al Benjamin and Ben Brophy trained really hard for this fight only to find out the day of the fight that their guys had pulled out. This is the bad thing about amateur fighters; they are not bound by a contract or anything else to show up to fight. The only repercussion you have as a promoter is not letting them fight on any future cards. It is also a small community of promoters so their name gets blackballed. Stay tuned, they will be fighting next month.

Overall it was a great night with some heroes that did not get the spotlight. The main one was Chris Lujan who always goes to the next level to get the W for the fighters. He was up at 5 am before the weigh-ins getting Jay Mo in the sauna and getting him where he needed to be. He also took charge of getting all the fighters to where they needed to be. Chris has become a great coach who knows what it takes because he has been there. He also knows my vision and what I expect and I rarely have to say anything because he basically knows it before I say it. It has turned into a great team with him doing most of the strength and conditioning while I do more of the technique training. If you see Chris this week, give him major props!

I also would like to thank another couple of heroes - Nichole Cassler, MD and Erica Gawrys, RN. They both came down Friday night to make sure the fighters were rehydrated. They were also on hand the fight night in case we needed any more medical attention. They are both in the Military and joined at a time when being sent to combat is almost guaranteed, so they are used to being heroes.

The last heroes of the night were the approximately 75 Evolve students, friends and family that came out to support. It was Labor Day weekend and 3 hours away so I did not expect so many people to show up. Thanks for the support and a great evening:).

Mike aka "Army General"

This week I feel that I should address the method to my madness and why some people will never get me.

Wow, I really never had any idea that somebody could actually feel this bitter about meL I am truly sorry that you feel that way and if you ever want to talk or email me I would really like to hear why you feel the way you do. I do listen to criticism and I always try to improve my ways. Anonymous said- “ I don't know whether you do this on purpose or you really are that ignorant?” I would have to say yes to that, and in many ways I am. If you know my past you already know that I am not the sharpest tool in the shed but I continually try to improve myself. This is why I wish if you had a problem you would not let it grow into hate. My intentions have always been for good. My door is always open and if you feel like you cannot talk to me there are always other instructors you can talk to; they always voice everyone’s concerns to me.

Where do leadership abilities come from? I believe a leader’s skills are made up of his past experiences and his own personality. My personal influences have been my instructors in the Martial Arts and my instructors in the Marine Corps. My style of leadership and coaching reflects my past. Throughout the years of running my own school my style has changed and I now feel like I have found the key to keeping the majority of students happy and striving for their goals.

The 1,2,3’s are how explain my system to other school owners and instructors who have tried to duplicate my success in running a school. When a student starts training there are three categories that they generally fall in.

1’s- Students that want to work out in a safe environment, learn effective skills that could help them in a real-life confrontation and be part of a family. This person trains an average of 2–3 times a week. 1’s get to come in and train and get pushed to strive for more. They are rarely pushed out of their comfort zone by anyone but themselves.

2’s- Students that want to take it higher and want to test themselves in the competition arena. These students trains 3-5 days a week and their competition goal is secondary to their life goals. 2’s get pushed out of their comfort zone and they do feel a little of what Anonymous would call the “Army General”

3’s – Students that give up their life and everything revolves around their goal of being a fighter or grappler. They do not care where they work or live as long as they can train. This is their primary goal and everything is focused on achieving that. This student trains 6 days a week at least 2–4 hours a day.

3’s feel the full wrath of the “Army General” they hear me and feel me 24 hours a day 7 days a week. I call them when they are at home, tell them what they should be eating, playing, how they should be sleeping, etc….

As you already can see that I invest the most time in 3’s and I am the hardest on my 3’s. I know what it takes to excel in all the things I teach because I have done it. I am not a coach who will tell you to do it without having done it. I am a 3 and when I realized my goal of becoming the best, I did everything I could to make that happen. I even gave up a long successful career in the Military to chase the dream. You can imagine what everyone around me thought about that decision. As most everyone already knows, things happen that take you away form your goals and you have to be able to change and roll with the punches of life.

3’s demand the most from me and to get quality results I have to give a lot of my personal time. In the past few years I had given up on the 3 ‘s and focused on building my 1’s and 2’s. Now that my school has grown I am back doing what I enjoy the most, building 3’s. It is very difficult to make a living building 3’s because they usually can’t even pay to train since they are chasing their dreams. They take minimum wage jobs or work at the school to try to fund their dreams. Some of the 3’s will reach the highest level of competition and some no matter what they do will not.

When a 3 doesn’t reach his goals and dreams, what happens then? Some move on like I said searching for that Magic Pill. Some focus on their personal and professional lives and some become 2’s balancing their competition lives with their personal lives.

2’s are what I recommend every 3 should be unless they actually want to invest 3-5 years of their life spent being a bum, giving up on their personal life for the pursuit in their goals knowing that few ever reach it.

If you ever want to jump into the 3 group you have to personally come talk to me and now I make you sign another waiver that basically says things like – I will not cry or whine, that I will do the best that I can and understand that I will be pushed beyond what I think is possible. The waiver goes on to say what I expect from my 3’s and what they can expect form me.

My academy has Evolved from a fight club to an Academy, a school of learning where everyone no matter what their goals are can come. Frank listed a few of the champions that I have coached and I appreciate his replyJ but I have never in any of my marketing to the public put any of the names and titles out there. I have never gone out and said “look who I created” or “look what I have done.” If you walk in my school there are a few pictures of me but there are no trophy cases or “I love me” walls. There are also none in my house. You do not see any of the trophies I have acquired throughout the years; I give them to my Mom because she cares more about them than I do. I think the important accolades are the ones you get in life.

To me, a few examples of some of the champions that I have produced would be the students who trained and learned the real lessons of Evolve Academy. Masai McDougal – went to college on a full academic scholarship, received his law degree and passed the Bar to become a Lawyer. Nakapan Phungephorn – while training and competing at the professional level finished up his degree in accounting and is now a Comptroller of a major corporation. Tommy Chuckerel who became Montgomery County Head Police Defensive Instructor. Garo Nalabandian and Jason Dunbar who became Military Officers. Emil Daubon who became a Special Forces Soldier. Mark Coleman, John Park and Alan Ross who are successful business owners. Or Tyler Malys who not only lost 50 pounds, but has become a friendly fun person to hang out with. The list goes on and on. These are the real champions, the ones who can take the lessons of the Martial Arts and use them in their professional and personal life. If I had a trophy case these are the stories that would be displayed.

The name Evolve was chosen because everything in the Martial Arts and life is constantly changing. Adapting to those changes is something I have grown accustomed to and now welcome. The Evolve Academy of 2002 is nothing like the Evolve of 2008. Many of my former students come back and are amazed at the changes. Some see the vision and some don’t.

PS- A more fitting name would be Marine Corps Drill Instructor not Army General :)

Black Belts and the Magic Pill!

Tom Shin who started training with me over 10 years ago was awarded a Black Belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Friday night. This is only the 2^nd one I have ever given out, the first one being Justin Montano. This was a great moment for Tom and me because it signified more than just his skills on the mat. The dedication and loyalty is something that is hard to talk about because it is something I never ask for, like many instructors you just assume most students are like Tom. It amazes me when after years of training a student in BJJ still looks for that magic pill. I can understand when a new student is looking for it.

I have had students jump ship after years of training with me because they think I am not spending enough time with them and their goals, that if I hold their hands and work with them everyday they will be able to reach their goals they are looking for that magic pill. I have learned from years of Coaching that this type of student will never reach their goals because they didn’t realize where to find the magic pill, it was inside them.

I have created many World Champions and National Champions in Thai Boxing, MMA and BJJ, Submission Grappling using the exact program I have now. Some of the best grapplers and Thai Boxers in the country train at Evolve each of those athletes know that they already have the magic pill it is already inside them.

Tom already knew about the pill the moment he started training. He told me his goals and I told him what it would take to reach it, he never questioned it he just did it. I knew then that he had the magic pill inside him.

If you ever hear me call someone a “Soldier” that is what I am talking about, someone who follows the order without question! A “Soldier” already knows that when I am yelling and screaming at them it means I think they can be something bigger than even they think they can become. They also know if I am giving them enough attention to yell and scream at them it is because I care about them!

I have never told Tom or anyone else about this subject but I was told that this is what a Blog is for, your true opinions and thoughts. The ceremony was awesome and I was shocked to see so many people show up. The live band ( Electric Kool-Aid Babies) really put on a great show. My only regret was that we did not have it on a Saturday so we could have partied a lot longer:)

Once again I want to congratulate Tom on his Black Belt and thank him Justin and all the students that have stuck with me throughout the years.

Should I go on Vacation or Compete?

It was a big decision I had to make early in the week, the World Championship of No Gi Submission grappling was this weekend and I had a paid trip to go compete. It was funny how these things happen to me, about 6 months ago I mentioned to Master Lloyd Irvin that I wanted to compete. We were out celebrating after a fight and I didn’t think much about it when he said if I did he would. I also didn’t think much of it because he was told that he should not ever compete again because of his neck injury. Well a week ago at the fights at George Mason University he told me he was going and that he signed me up!

Well that got my blood stirring and I was excited but told him I had not trained for competition in No Gi. By the end of the night every excuse I brought up was crushed. I said things like I am not in shape and he would counter with when are you not in shape? By the end of the night I was pumped up and knew that I had a good chance of winning. That is one of the reasons why Master Lloyd is such a good coach he knows how to make you feel invincible.

Getting home that night I explained my plans to my wife who was really supportive but who also reminded me that it was supposed to be our family vacation! I told Amy that I would wait till next year but she knows how much I like to compete so she insisted I go. 1 week out from the World Championships and I had no idea where I stood on conditioning or how I would feel during a competition style match. Knowing that Zach and Jaymo have been training for a fight I called and asked them if they could push me Monday.

Monday came and we set out to check my conditioning and technique. Well during the hour workout my knee (which has had a bucket tear in the meniscus) locked up 3 times. I have had this tear for over a year and I competed with it when I grappled in the Pan Ams but No Gi is different. I could not control the pace as well and my knee was put in positions that made it lock. To unlock it requires me to stop and put both hands on it and push it till I hear a loud pop! I tried 2 knee braces but neither helped. Guess it is time to get my knee cut on.

Well I called Amy and told her the news, on one hand I knew she was disappointed but I could hear the excitement in her voice when she asked if that meant we were heading to the beach? I was very sad that I could not compete this year but a few days at the beach with Thor and Amy helped me get over itJ