WNY MMA Hit Tip: Superman punch

If you haven't noticed by the picture of superman nonchalantly punching what ever sorry fool that is in the face, we will be covering the superman punch today. I love pulling this off in sparring from time to time; it's a nice back pocket skill because of the abruptness of its execution, you literally catapult you and your fist forward at the face of the poor soul that happens to be standing in-front of you. Come on, lets talk about it a lil more. Don't forget to thank the guys at WNY MMA & Fitness.

now with the superman punch, there are a few set ups for it. For this particular article, i'll be going over using it from a front kick/push kick fake. 

1. Get the person to fear the front kick: use that front kick and get them used to moving away from it, let them get the timing down for it. Use both front kicks/teep, front and back leg. It will give you more opportunities to fire off of either side.
2. Throwing that fake: this is where it will start counting, this fake initiates the entire thing. All we need to do is to throw that knee up enough to where the person in front of you thinks its a front kick/teep. The next part is the most difficult as you have to pull off three things at the same time.
3. Going for it: at this point we already have that knee up, remember when i said it would be important....well i didn't say it was, but it is. So we have to; take a small hop forward on the stationary leg, while kicking the opposite leg backwards. Difficult I know, it took me a while to get that particular part down. Next we worry about that punch; now the punch has to come off of the same side as the leg that is kicking back, the kick back is what's propelling us forward and engaging the hip enough for us to generate power with the punch. That and your weight is literally being thrown at your opponents face helps too. Kinda like this ↓

So there you have it, the superman punch. Its always a good idea to be aware of your opponent, there maybe a fist waiting to have a very intimate conversation with your face. But don't worry, your punch will land first. Now you can do this with either hand, and yes, the lead hand is faster than the rear. I favor using both because it can be beneficial as a good set up. George st. Pierre used both frequently in his fights. Another good example of flying shots is from Mike Zambidis; he throws this mean superman hook that puts people out. 

Well, thats my hit tip of the day. Hope you guys stay tuned for the next string of interviews from the fighters at WNY MMA, November is gonna be a big month for those guys. Join us on facebook to get weekly updates.

I love this gif :D

WNY MMA: Fit Tip of the Day

Are your hip flexors and glutes not feeling up to the challenge of kickboxing. Maybe you want to throw that thai style roundhouse with more hip engagement, or you just want to build a good looking pair of legs; I have a Wny mma fit tip for you. It's a fun little circuit that you can do, there is no equipment really needed except for space.

This circuit doesn't have a name, but it is definitely something that you should give a try. As a reminder, please warm up and stretch properly!

1. Burp and Sits: For this, we will be doing burpees and wall sits. I know, they suck but just get through the sets before you complain too much. The goal is 100 burpees, for our purpose we will do 5 sets of 20 with a 2 minute break between each set. Oh but its not that easy, the two minute break will be wall sits. So we are allowing our heart rate to fall to a relatively normal range, but our legs will still be working during the entire circuit. Give it a try
2. Splitting Ducks: Now I personally hate these, and you will feel them for days after. With this, you can do however many sets you can get through. I would recommend doing this to failure; Start off with split lunges, up to either 20 or 30 on both legs. After the split lunges, go directly into long-stride duck walks. For the duck walks, it would be good to set markers around a room so there is a path marked out. After you return to the starting point, take a rest and go right back at it again. 

This is only a small sample of things to do to strengthen those muscles in the legs. Its beneficial for boxing and kickboxing, and wrestling. For more strengthening tips, stop by WNY MMA & Fitness!

Raising Your Efficiency at WNY MMA & Fitness

You don’t have to look much further than Anderson Silva’s dismantling of Forrest Griffin to see a clear example of what superior striking can do in MMA. But the ability to control entire fights in the striking range, or use effective striking to set up opponents for techniques that favor your overall strategy, doesn’t come easily. Increasing the efficiency of your punching motion is key to giving you the fluidity necessary to raise your striking performance to the next level as practiced at WNY MMA & Fitness.

But how do you organize your training to get the maximum benefit and integration of skills for MMA? Part of the answer is style based—it depends on your strengths and what type of fighter you are. A former wrestler like Johny Hendricks will likely take a different approach than a former pro boxer and kickboxer like Anderson Silva. It’s also important to take into account the opponent you are preparing for and where you are headed with your skill set long term. All things being equal, the old saying, “what you put in is what you get out” still applies.

Raise your efficiency, raise your level
Punching is primarily an anaerobic activity—it is an explosive action. From a physiological standpoint, the minute you start throwing punches, you only have a maximum of 15-20 seconds of high quality output before the effectiveness of your punches takes a serious decline. On the heavy bag, a high level amateur boxer can throw about 200 punches per 3-minute round (assuming active footwork and head movement), and depending on the focus of the round, a high level pro can hit upwards of 300 punches per round. Here, we’ll outline a few of these concepts and learn how to apply them at WNY MMA & Fitness. You don’t have to take the words as gospel, feel free to apply the concepts and make modifications to the specifics as needed. 

Maximize your work
Once a fighter learns proper striking technique, the most significant component impacting progress over the long run is the striking work rate. Striking work rate can be broken down into two components:

1) The total number of punches thrown over time or during a given period of time. This aspect of work rate improves technique, speed, and efficiency.

2) The quality of striking, i.e. how hard, fast, and accurate those strikes are.

Your work rate for striking is where quality meets quantity, and is one of the biggest training assets that an MMA fighter can absorb from traditional western boxing. Because MMA training encompasses so many disciplines, it’s imperative that your time spent striking is of the highest quality—there isn’t a moment to waste. Follow the steps outlined below and I am confident they will take your striking to another level.

1.) Train for a high volume of punches to increase efficiency and improve technique

2.) Train for speed endurance and high quality speed to emulate the intensity of combat

3.) Integrate the improvements into your MMA game.

Step three will be taken care of through ‘business as usual’ WNY MMA training. Just ensure that you apply your techniques at full speed and maintain a high work rate. Other than intentional breaks and rest cycles built into your training, your goal is to maintain the new level of output attained through your striking ramp-up.

Hit Tips from WNY MMA & Fitness: Sidekicks

I will be discussing a kick that isn't very popular in the current fight promotions, whether it be mma or kickboxing. But, one place that it is popular and used often is in Sanshou competitions; these competitions are held globally and were often a venue for sanshou vs matches, where sanshou would compete against other stand up styles like muay thai and kyokushin. Anyway, what I want to discuss is the sidekick; it's rarely used because of it often having tell tale signs from its set up. Its true that some styles have a very obvious sidekick, but there are a few things about the sanda sidekick that may make it a nice back pocket tool to have. All this courtesy of WNY MMA & Fitness.

• Shuffle in: when starting that sidekick its important that your initiation is not predictable, make sure you mix up your foot work between steps and shuffles to masks the starting point of the sidekick.
• Raise the knee: Just like you would when throwing the front thrust kick or a teep. If you look back at how Benny the jet would kick, everything came from the same "chambered" position. It made it extremely hard to distinguish which would be coming at you. Doing this, you can also use the lead leg check as a faint to set up the sidekick as well. 
• Foot parallel to the ground: Its just a matter of turning that knee towards the body so the foot is parallel with the ground and heel pointing straight toward the person in front of you. This will make it easier to engage the gluts and help with thrusting the foot. 
• Sidekick: At this point, explode the leg out using the gluts. Follow a straight line, drive that heel into someone's liver or solar plexus. 

Now I know, just throwing this kick by itself is a no no. It will be seen, unless we do something to mask it. One good way would be getting someone used to covering for your punches; off of a lead hook that doesn't need to land really, just enough to make them cover up, and fire that thing right at their exposed body. Ill post two videos below on the sidekick from Sanda and how to set it up for mma.

Happy Training. Should definitely have a superhero training day at WNY MMA & Fitness.

Hit Tips from WNY MMA & Fitness

Hit Tips from WNY MMA & Fitness: Body Shot

Okay, this maybe my personal opinion; I think body shots rock, like a really good shot that digs under the ribs. Where your opponent has the deer caught in headlights look on his/her face, ahhhhh priceless. Its a lacking practice now a days, I just recently seen a shot to the body again; it was from Amer Abdallah, guess its an old school tactic. The reason that I say that its a little old school is that most of the time in fights may it be boxing, kickboxing, or mixed martial arts; you don't really see a lot of body punches, unless its a knee. Its becoming something that may be easier to pick off on people because its not as expected anymore. But i'll toss you a few ways of getting your kicks in with those shots to the body. All thanks to your friendly neighborhood WNY MMA & Fitness!

Body shots are very unique things; they either sneak up on you, or they put you down right away. In both instances, they hurt like hell. KOs due to headshots are debilitating but just like they say, its like hitting a button and that person is out. Sometimes; its more like your body is just completely out of your control, you tell your body to move but it just doesn't happen. When its a well placed body shot, the pain grows from that point and spreads a few inches into the body and sits there. It hurts and you know it does, so does the guy or girl who hit you there. If you ever come to WNY MMA & Fitness and ask to spar with Corey, watch out for those liver shots. 

Now there are a few tried and true ways of getting that good body shot in; modified hook/ angular uppercut to the body, spinning back kick, left roundhouse, or a knee. If you want a good example of a well placed liver shot, check out some of Bas Ruttens pancrease fights. 

In the meantime, I got a video for you guys. MMA top 10 body shot KOs, of course you guys are gonna like it. Come by WNY MMA & Fitness and try some of these out. 

We Don't Falsify Anything at WNY MMA & Fitness

As I know most of you understand, I really like martial arts. I will practice anything that I deem interesting and useful. This past weekend I wanted to check out a demonstration of some "muay thai"; yup, you can probably tell where this is gonna head. I already have some background in the basics of muay thai, I was really there for a quick refresher so to speak. The guy teaching it seemed a little new to it but I didn't pay it any mind. That is until we started running through the impromptu class, when the guy proceeded to "fix my posture" I knew something was up. It wouldn't have been so bad if it was still in the realm of muay thai, this was something completely different.

Look, it was clearly not muay thai that I was receiving. It was something they were trying to market as muay thai, and what's worse is that he used Stonehorse's name trying to verify is "legitimacy" it was upsetting. Mentioning more of Stonehorse's qualifications than his own. When you are looking for something, its always best to see it first hand and to experience it. That's one of the things that I can say about what is provided at WNY MMA & Fitness, its legit. Where most places need to mention how authentic their program is, action speaks loader than words. The proof is visible everytime you walk through the front door.

I'm telling you of my experience so you know that it could happen to you, unless you come to WNY MMA & Fitness, then you are definitely getting something good. 

Kids and Kickboxing at WNY MMA & Fitness

Now I am definitely an advocate for kids training in the martial arts as they grow. One of the reasons why is that this is the best time for them to start something, if you don't believe me then look at all the videos of kids on youtube who are practicing the martial arts and look at how crisp their technique looks. Kids are like a sponge and aslong as its engaging, they will stick with it. I wish I could practice at a younger age, I would be a professional fighter by now. But it wasn't in the stars for me, anyway I'll give you a couple of examples of phenomenal child martial artists and you tell me whether you still think little Timmy shouldn't come to the academy. From yours truly at WNY MMA & Fitness.

Boxing and Kickboxing

I'm just giving you video proof that martial arts and kids go together like peanut butter and jelly, or fluff if that's what you grew up with. This kid is amazing on the pads, and just in-case you are thinking that he can be good on the pads and not very good as an athlete; I got something for that as-well. This kids name is Soushi, keep this in mind when you are contemplating between football and boxing/kickboxing. 

And here is a video of Soushi sparring with Rena. For those of you who don't follow combat sports in japan, Rena was the welter and middle weight champion in Shootboxing which is a stand up fighting promotion based in Tokyo.


If that wasn't proof enough for you, then I have a four year old from Thai land who is adorable. He also have a really good thai kick, just saying. Now lets really pay attention to this kids kick mechanics, it usually takes adults months if not years to learn how to deliver a kick this way. This kid is amazing


Well, this was mostly focusing on kickboxing and boxing. But don't think that it limits you in terms of the arts to place you child in. Make sure the teaching is quality and enjoyable, your child will grow leaps and bounds. So stop by WNY MMA & Fitness for some of that quality.