Matt Hughes Seminar at BJMUTA

One of the benefits of training at a world class gym owned by one of the more famous and respected refs in the UFC is being able to attend in house seminars being held by some of the worlds greatest fighters .  BJMUTA was able to book Matt Hughes to do a Seminar on January 14th, 2012. I attended this seminar with my little brother, who I have gotten into training for about 6 months now. The Seminar was small with about 20 attendees. It was advertised to only gym members and it was a great honor to have such an intimate seminar with one of the greatest most well rounded fighters ever to hit the Octogon. I am a huge MMA fan. My dad and uncle have tought Karate for over 40 years. I have great respect for marital artists, wrestlers, boxers, kick boxers or any other kind of fight discipline I can list. I admire not only their physical strength but also their mental strength to be able to get into the fight but also to constantly strive to better themselves.

Matt Hughes impressed me greatly after the seminar during the meet and great when he started asking the attendees of the seminar what we would have liked to see differently in the seminar. No only does the guy constantly want to improve his fights but he’s constantly trying to improve himself as a trainer/coach/teacher. The guy is always looking to be better at everything and anything he does. This is what I admire most in a human being, someone who is constantly trying to better themselves in any way possible. It’s contagious and if we all strive to be better then we will touch 2 people and make them strive to be better and those two people will touch two people and those people will strive to be better and then they will touch 2 people and so on and so on and soon the whole world is being molested to strive to be better people. It’s beautiful.

The first thing Matt Hughes said when he got onto the mats was “Circle up and get in close! Now what I’m going to show you guys today has been shown to me by someone else. I haven’t made up any of these moves. Everything I’ve learned, I’ve learned from someone else.” These were such humble words. It set the tone for the entire 2 hour seminar. Hughes was constantly giving credit to his corner men, coaches, training partners and competitors. He was praising everyone he’s ever worked with and was acknowledging how much his game improved while working with certain people. Hughes is a hall of fame-er, a lot of people know who he is…even people who don’t really follow UFC, know who Matt Hughes is.  The guy is the creme of the crop and yet wouldn’t take much credit for what he earned. He was constantly paying homage  to the people in his camp who worked with him for his fights. He had nothing but the utmost respect for other fighters and trainers. I was absolutely in awe of his positivity and humility.

So now that I’ve covered his personality, let me get on to the meat and potatoes…..what did Matt Hughes teach us at our seminar? The seminar was an MMA seminar. He covered a lot of things in a very short period of time. He started with basic stuff, explaining advantages of being on top, differences of open guard and closed guard and what his preferences were and why. If on the bottom, Hughs likes to keep an open guard so that he doesn’t telegraph any moves he’s planning. It’s a very smart strategy and I’m going to steal his idea…no more closed guard for me. If you don’t know what guard is, you can take Matt’s next Seminar LOL…

Moving forward, Hughes showed us several mean elbows to throw from the top and from the bottom. He showed us effective Punching techniques from inside the guard. He Demonstrated his favorite guard pass. He showed several key locks and key lock counters. He showed knee bars and crucifixions and and insane counter to an arm bar with another armbar!  He showed take downs and take down defenses. Yes yes yest this was a fast paced seminar but as Hughs said he just gave us the foundation and it was up to us to drill it in front of our coaches over and over and over so we could perfect them. Luckily, some of the moves he had showed us, I had drilled a few times so I wasn’t completely lost. The greatest part about the seminar was the fact that there were only a few people in the class and Hughs was able to go to each group and give one on one advice and adjustments to every single person. Not only did he adjust what we were doing but he gave great explanation as to why it’s done the way he was showing us. His teaching style matched my learning style. I was able to retain much of what he was showing because he explained things so well. He gave us some insight into what a fighter thinks going into a fight. He explained why you always see a flurry at the end of the round and how important it is to leave the judges with a good impression of your performance in the last 30 seconds of the round. ( take his seminar if you wanna get the details)

At the end of the seminar, a young kid was asked to demonstrate his take downs on Matt Hughes. This young kid was about 10 years old and all of 80 lbs. Obviously Matt Hughs is a much bigger guy, 5’10 and competites at 170lb and off seasons he’s probably 185….he’s a big bad dude. Matt told the young kid, “if you do what you’re supposed to do, correct form and all, I’ll give you the take down, but I’m not gonna just give it to you, you’re gonna have to earn it”. The determined child lunged into Hughs, got his doubles and pushed Hughs with all his might not even budging him at first…..Hughes saw the determination and fire in the kids eye and then made himself light enough for the kid to push and push and push and eventually “get the take down”….the look on the kids face was priceless. He got to stand with one of the greatest wrestlers in the world and do a drill. It was one of the most playful and pure things I’ve ever sense. He made that kid sooo happy and praised the kid for being tenacious enough to keep trying even thought there was really no way he would ever really take him down. That was awesome. He boosted that kid’s spirit and I bet that kid grows up to be the next great UFC hall of fame-er. I had great respect for Hughs Before but it’s been multiplied tenfold after meeting him and learning both skills and  humility from him!