Recently we had a guy from N.West England open a MMA gym here in Hong Kong. See my thread about it here: http://hkmma.com/) (If I'm not mistaken... that's Fedor and Noguera in his ring! ) His site has some clips from an amatuer rules MMA in England: http://hkmma.com/vid/FightFLV.html Have any of you ever fought under those rules or been to fights held under that rule set? Your thoughts and opinion welcome.
There's a few leagues and events that use these rules. Its mostly as a way of getting people into MMA, e.g. http://www.falconsmartialarts.com/welsh mma.htm Some people aren't in favour because, for example, someone with a boxing background has a disadvantage, and also because they feel that it doesn't prepare you for headshots in pro rules fights. On the other hand, they provide a good stepping stone for people who want to move up to pro rules gradually.
Wait... do they allow spinal locks? I didn't see it under the fouls, but it seems like that's the sort of thing you want to regulate to high-level competitions only. Personally, I'd like to do one of these styles of MMA fights. Because of the lack of head strikes, it's still going to be more grappling based.... kind of a halfway house between MMA and submission wrestling.
I wouldn't mind giving it a go too. It would be a good way of getting into MMA competition gradually, like Ghost said. Having never done any full contact fighting before, it would be good for me I think as an intro.
Interesting replys. Much the same as I was thinking. I've done a bit of MMA sparring. Getting your head punched when you're standing up is bad enough... at least it snaps back a bit and some of the force dissapates... but getting punched in head when you head has nowhere to go... eg. it's on the mat... is a real drag. It hurts far worse than I've ever been punched or kicked in the head while standing. :cry: That being said...I don't fancy someone punching me in the sternum while they're in my guard either!
I have a mate that competed in two of these events, the first of which after he'd only been training 2 months. He went to a decision in both but apparently the standard of fighters often isn't that great! He's now moved up to 'semi-pro' rules which is pretty much the same except it allows standing head shots and has won all 3 by submission. These are the ones to go for in my opinion but i'll probably start off with a few amateur ones first in any case.
Interesting.... we generally keep to light shots from the ground when fighting MMA, so I've never been seriously Ground and Pounded. I would've guessed that ground punches would generally hurt less, as it seems like you can't get as much body weight into them as a standing cross. As for punching in the guard, I personally find it just as easy to punch up at some as to punch down at them from the guard, assuming you aren't stacked. People always looked so shocked whenever I punch them from the bottom. It's great.
I can kind of see it working if you where striking from something like a reverse scarf hold aiming just under the other guys ribs but I don't see why you would forbid it.
I've been to a few MMA shows in the UK. The smaller shows tend to start with fights using these rules then graduate to semi-pro (head shots standing) and finish with full-pro (head shots galore) fights. These rules are fine for the "MMA savvy crowd" but the "drink an a fight on a saturday night boys" (that you get at every UK MMA show) don't understand why people aren't hitting each other in the head and tend to boo and stuff. The larger shows tend to be all full-pro or maybe a couple of semi's to start. For the smaller shows they sometimes have to put amateur matches on to make up numbers as there's not that many people willing to fight full rules for peanuts.
Peanuts indeed, i know a lad that fought a B class pro fight which meant there were no elbows standing or on the ground and he got £100...
