Fedor: Undisputed King of MMA Review (Part 2)

If you have not read Part 1 of my book review, you may do so here: Fedor: Undisputed King of MMA Review (Part 1)

Picking up where we left off from the clinch, we now move to takedowns and throws.  These are different than wrestling based takedowns most wrestlers are used too.  Fedor is a master of Judo and Sambo.  He shows lots of throws in his book but he also mentions how to set them up with other throws or strikes.  When you combo some of these together it makes them that much harder to stop.  Another good thing about most of these takedowns is that you are left in an advantageous position.  You don’t have to follow someone down to the ground where you can be submitted.  These takedowns usually leave you standing over you opponent, free to reign down strikes.

Next we come to the ground game.  Fedor covers most of the main positions and how to escape them.  Like with the throws, he strings moves together, so if one fails you can immediately move to the next.  This method greatly increases your chance of success.  This is not a grappling only section, he will show you how to pass a guard using strikes to set up a guard pass.

I’ve read a lot of material on MMA, Jiu-jitsu and so on, and these moves are pretty simple yet very effective.  If someone would take the time to drill and perfect all of these techniques and never learned anything else, they would still be a very dangerous and well rounded fighter.  Something else interesting about many of these techniques are that they come from Sambo/Judo instead of Brazilian Jiu-jitsu or wrestling, so many people may not be used to these particular variations.  You might be able to take people at your martial art gym by surprise with some of these.

I highly recommend this book.  You will learn all sorts of interesting variations of moves you have probably never seen, get some philosophy behind why he does things a certain way, and will learn how to string techniques together.  The only real thing missing from this book is some coverage of how Fedor actually trains.  There is no mention of how much he runs, lifts weights, spars, etc.  A conditioning section would have been nice but perhaps we will see some of that in the future.

Fedor: Undisputed King of MMA Review (Part 1)

Today I am going to review the book from the great Fedor Emelianenko.  I have to say, this book is fantastic.  For starters, it’s very well rounded.  From it you will learn a series of striking combinations, clinch techniques and ground fighting techniques.  Not only did Fedor dominate the hardest weight class in all of combat sports for a decade, but he remained humble while doing it.  That is why he is my favorite fighter of all time.

The techniques in this book aren’t overly complicated or fancy, but they work.  The book is broken down into three basic sections: Striking, Clinch, Ground Fighting.  Also, unlike with a lot of other fighter’s books, these are techniques Fedor actually uses.  Learning these techniques will actually allow you to fight with a style similar to how Fedor actually fights.

Striking:  The striking section has some very interesting and unorthodox techniques.  For instance, since most people are trained to lead with a Jab/Cross combo (and everyone is used to defending against it) Fedor uses a Cross/Left Hook intro many times to take his opponents off guard. He also uses hand traps (which are hardly ever used in MMA) to set up his opponents.  You can see this in action in several of his fights, including his extremely dominate performance against Tim Sylvia.  By clearing your opponents lead hand out of the way, it not only takes him off guard and misdirects his attention, but it opens him up for a strike.

The book starts out by showing single punches/kicks and all of their variations (there are multiple variations of even the jab for instance).  After learning the basic mechanics of each punch/kick, Fedor shows how to string them together into combinations.  Each punch sets up your opponent for another strike.  There is a lot of great material here.

After learning to strike from a distance we see how to strike from the clinch.  By being in close and controlling your opponents head and body, you can lead him into your punches, elbows and knees.  Fedor has been very successful in the clinch position during his fights, so learning a few of these combos would be beneficial for any martial artist.

In Part 2 we will cover Throws from the Clinch and Ground Work.