My thoughts on Tae Kwon Do in MMA...

(I originally published this article on 12/17/10, the day after Anthony Pettis' now famous "Showtime Kick.")

“Liked Pettis’ kick?  You can thank Tae Kwon Do.”  That was the title of the Sherdog.com blog post I came upon this morning.  What we saw last night from Ben Henderson and Anthony Pettis was nothing short of brilliant.  In a 5 round war these two athletes demonstrated technique after high-level technique in attempts to better the other and claim the final WEC Lightweight title for themselves.  After 25 minutes of perfection it was Anthony Pettis who would win the title and the bragging rights for best technique landed when in the closing seconds of the 5^th and final round he ran up the side of the cage, used his right leg to spring off the fence and threw a right leg roundhouse kick to Ben Henderson’s head, nearly knocking the champ out.  The crowd, including Urijah Faber (did you see his reaction in the background?!), literally went wild when Anthony’s right foot met Ben’s face.  It’s the kick we’ll be talking about for years to come and will go down in the annals as one of, if not the best technique ever landed in an MMA fight.  It’s a bold statement, I know.  But did you see that kick?!

While we all replay that moment over and over in our heads lets roll back the tape to the beginning of round 1.  In the opening minute of the fight Ben Henderson throws a double roundhouse technique as he leaps forward toward Anthony.  Seconds later Anthony returns fire with the exact same technique, but in reverse (right-left as opposed to Ben’s left-right combination).  To the casual observer these switch-foot roundhouse techniques likely seemed very flashy and obscure.  You don’t see that kind of kicking in Muay Thai or MMA.  However, there is a segment of last night’s viewership who immediately identified these kicking techniques as one of those hallmark combinations that every Tae Kwon Do practitioner drills over and over and over and over again.  In fact, for a Tae Kwon Do fighter it’s the equivalent of a boxer’s 1-2 combination.  It’s our “bread-n-butter.”  And later in the fight, in the closing seconds of the 5^th round, we saw another staple of Tae Kwon Do, the jumping roundhouse kick.  A technique we TKD practitioners often perform in demonstrations and breaking competitions by stepping off of another person’s body (usually their leg or hip) or any solid object, like a wall, tree or, in Anthony’s case, a chain link fence.

So we saw a little Tae Kwon Do last night from two Tae Kwon Do black belts.  Who cares?!  We also saw a lot of BJJ, Muay Thai, wrestling and boxing.  What’s significant about last night’s fight and Pettis’ off-the-fence kick is that it demonstrated the effectiveness of Tae Kwon Do techniques in MMA, which answers a 17-year old question raised by the advent of the UFC when style-versus-style competition first hit pay-per-view.  Like many Tae Kwon Do practitioners, in 1993 I was left wondering what my black belt was worth in a street fight after seeing Royce Gracie dominate every striker in his path.  How would Tae Kwon Do and all of its beautiful kicking techniques exist in this climate of Muay Thai/BJJ/wrestling hybrid fighters?

Flash forward 12 years, I’m in a car with a bunch of Renzo Gracie fighters.  We’re driving from NYC to Atlantic City for UFC 53.  It was June 4^th, 2005 and I had just completed my first year of Muay Thai training under Phil Nurse, whom I started training with after leaving an 11-year Tae Kwon Do teaching career.  Sitting in the back seat of a BMW 7 series filled with diehard BJJ fighters I was the sole advocate for striking when the conversation inevitably turned to a debate of the most effective techniques in MMA.  During a break in the chatter I injected the following statement, which sparked a wildfire of “Bullsh*t!” chants through the car.  I said, “The Tae Kwon Do jumping back kick is the best technique never used in MMA.”  These guys thought I was nuts!  I mean, for the first time in my life I thought I’d actually be thrown out of a moving car.  I was preparing to tuck and roll when one of the guys told me to explain myself, which I did.  After a tense minute or two explaining how the jump back kick, if timed and executed correctly was absolutely deadly against an opponent throwing a punch or backed against the cage the mood in the car lightened and I was winning support.  It turns out that the lone Russian in our car was also a Tae Kwon Do blackbelt and after hearing my argument he was quick to add, “Dan’s right.”  I had won a pardon from my BJJ friends, but the issue remained whether or not we’d ever get to see my theory proven in the cage.  As luck would have it we wouldn’t have to wait long.

That night, at UFC 53, David Louiseau beat Charles McCarthy with, you guessed it, a jumping back kick that landed on Charles’ ribcage at the exact moment Charles threw an overhand right.  Arm fully extended, ribcage waving the “welcome” flag, David’s heal landed and the fight was over.  My BJJ buddies turned to me in disbelief and shock yelling, “Holy sh*t, you were right!!!”  I never did get to thank David Louiseau, a Tae Kwon Do blackbelt, for making me appear so prophetic.

As my Muay Thai training progressed and I spent more time sparring it became abundantly clear to me that I had techniques that gave me an advantage over the typical Muay Thai fighter.  I used my jumping back kick along with my axe kick and crescent kick and they landed, a lot!  Not only because I was able to throw them proficiently, but because they’re effective weapons when used appropriately and my fellow Muay Thai practitioners weren’t trained to recognize, defend, or avoid them.  This advantage would carry into my MMA practice where I’d get to train with fighters from various backgrounds.  It seemed the only standup fighters who I couldn’t land Tae Kwon Do techniques on nearly at-will were fellow Tae Kwon Do practitioners.  And as I later got into BJJ and began training for takedowns I found that my ability to switch stances quickly and to comfortably engage with either foot forward helped me in my wrestling.  This ability to switch stances is attributed solely to many years of Tae Kwon Do practice.  So what’s so special about being able to switch stances and throw techniques with either foot forward?  Just ask Anderson Silva, a Tae Kwon Do blackbelt.

In Dana White’s recent UFC 120 video blog there’s an interesting exchange between he and Georges St. Pierre regarding Joe Rogan.  GSP shows Dana a video on his phone of Joe teaching GSP how to properly throw a spinning back kick.  Joe Rogan, a Tae Kwon Do blackbelt and former champion, explains to Georges exactly what’s wrong with his spinning back kick and after viewing the video Georges explains to Dana that Tae Kwon Do has the most powerful and efficient spinning back kick in all of martial arts.  He’s absolutely right.

As Mixed Martial Arts fighters evolve we’re finding that the champions, our heroes, are those whose overall style has evolved from the progressive refinement of techniques adopted from various styles.  And within that progressive refinement is the validation of effectiveness for those techniques our champions choose to devote their time and attention to perfecting.  For those gifted pay-per-view athletes whose learning curve is much accelerated beyond we mortals the hallmark kicking and footwork techniques of Tae Kwon Do can mean the difference between losing a judge’s decision or taking home a “knockout of the night” award.  For we devoted fans, more Tae Kwon Do techniques in MMA mean more exciting moments like Anthony Pettis’.  Can you imagine what a perfect GSP spinning back kick highlight reel knockout will look like?!  I can.  And I won’t be surprised when it happens.

10 Problems With Most Martial Arts Schools/Gyms

I first started teaching martial arts in 1993 when I was hired as manager of my Tae Kwon Do school located just north of Manhattan.  At 15 years old I was handed the keys to our school, which at that time had about 30 students, only 4 of which were paying annually.  The rest paid monthly if/when we could track them down.  I was young, but determined to make it work and within 12 months I had increased enrollment to 90 students, 87 of which were paying annually, 3 were on scholarship (a program I developed).  As I graduated high school our tiny TKD business had grown to about 150 students (about all our space could handle) and we were very profitable.  Mor importantly, our students were winning every tournament they entered and our family culture was thriving within our academy.

In being given the opportunity to run the school I was able to develop processes, programs, and theories built specifically for running a martial arts academy.  A few years later, after graduating with a Bachelors in Marketing and Economics, I was hired to run another martial arts school in Manhattan.  A little older, a little wiser, I now had new skills to apply toward the operations of a larger martial arts academy.  Now this is where the story takes an interesting turn because the owner of the school (my boss) was an American who had earned a 1st degree black belt from a respected Korean master and then turned his back on his master, which offended him to the point that his master opened a competing school 1 block away, a clear attempt to drive my boss out of business.

Keep in mind, this was on the Upper West Side of Manhattan where real estate is EXTREMELY expensive so the opening of that competing school sent a VERY clear message about how angry the master was.  And, in my opinion, rightfully so.  As I would later learn, my boss was a passive-aggressive glory hound with a very poor spirit that never should have been promoted to black belt, which I suspect his master was ashamed of and wanted to stamp out.  Unfortunately for his master, my boss was a good businessman and he knew how to run a business so he could not be gotten rid of so easily.  Unfortunately for me, after several months of running his school, teaching his classes, building enrollment, developing marketing, sales, and instructor training programs and creating a competition team my boss decided that every one of my programs and concepts was "garbage."  He actually told me, in front of our office assistant, that everything I had done for the school was wrong and that he wanted me gone immediately.  Much to the surprise of both myself and the office assistant, we actually thought he was joking when he started his tirade.  Well, he wasn't kidding and I packed my belongings, handed over my keys, walked out the door, and began questioning years of proven success and wondering if I was truly that far off the mark.

A couple weeks later I heard that my old boss was opening a second school.  Several months after that he opened a third.  Sometime around a year and a half or so after my departure he opened a fourth school and I got curious so I met up with a couple of his instructors, students I had trained and began grooming while I was working there.  As it turned out, my old boss was using EVERYTHING I had developed for him.  He apparently saw the genius in what I was doing and got rid of me so he could claim victory for himself.  I believe it was Andrew Carnegie who said, "No man will be successful who wants all the glory to himself."  Or something like that?  Well, there is an exception to every rule and my ex-boss was that exception.  All resentment aside, I found a great sense of satisfaction in knowing that what I had built was going on to find great success without me.  Like a parent might feel for a child who leaves home and becomes successful.  I was proud of what it had become.

In the years since that experience I've moved out of traditional martial arts and into mixed martial arts.  I've been fortunate to have trained in Muay Thai under Phil Nurse and in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu under Renzo Gracie.  I've met professional fighters, I've trained with professional fighters, and I'm made great friends along the way.  I've also gotten to know a lot of combat sports industry entrepreneurs who started as practitioners and now own schools/gyms.  And over the years I've consulted a lot of these school/gym owners on various aspects of how to run/fix their businesses and without fail there are 10 major mistakes I see most instructor-owners making.

I'm not going to get into super-detailed operations and finance issues in this post, instead I want to focus on the most glaring and easiest to rectify problems common to most schools/gyms.  If you own a martial arts facility I hope you'll be honest with yourself as you read my notes and take to heart the error of your ways if you are guilty of any of the following mistakes.  If not for yourself, you owe it to your student customers to make your business stronger.

1) Closed for Business - You are running a "storefront" business whether you're in a retail mini-mall or a backstreet warehouse and if your doors are not open your business will suffer.  You MUST spend time at your school, every day, all day.  Or you must have a good representative of the school there every day, all day to meet people when they stop by.  Closed doors = closed checkbooks and that's death for your business.  And the public perception of a business that has its door locked and lights off during the day is that it's out of business.  If you don't believe me, I welcome you to ride with me as I drive past schools who are closed until 5 or 6pm.  Without fail, those schools/gyms have enrollment under 50 students, some as low as 30.  All because the owner can't be bothered to sit at his/her school during the day and catch all that lunchtime and afternoon traffic that passes by.  To that lunchtime crowd...

2) Have a Lunchtime Class - If you don't have a 12:00 class on your schedule you need to add one every weekday.  Even if nobody shows up, many students join a school/gym based on the availability of classes.  Whether they will ever attend a noon class or not doesn't matter.  When consumers are paying for a service they want that service to be available to them as often as possible.  It's part of the "Perceived Value" equation.  If you only offer classes at night, in the student's mind they may not get their money's worth if they can't always get to a night class and that WILL preclude them from enrolling in your program.  They'll take their money up the street to your competitor who has a lunchtime class on his/her schedule.  Speaking of your class schedule...

3) Start On Time Every Time - I see this WAAAAY too often with martial arts instructors.  You guys start your classes late and are inconsistent in your scheduling.  Have you forgotten that your students have a life outside your school and they're trying to fit training into their busy day?  If they cannot rely on you to be respectful of their time they will assign less value to you and your school.  Again, part of that "Perceived Value" equation.  The more times you start class late, or miss a class, or continuously change your class schedule (to accomodate YOUR day?) the more difficult it becomes for your students to plan their day around training and they will drop you and your program.  Oddly, most of us grew up in traditional martial arts schools, which were VERY regimented (ever do pushups for showing up late?) so I find it fascinating that so many of you have abandoned this very basic component of discipline.  Be on time, be reliable, and be cognizant of your students' time and they will return that respect in the form of on-time tuition payments, student referrals, better spirit in class, higher level of dedication and technique, and a more positive energy circulating through your business.  Basically, make it about them, not you...

4) Check Your Ego - It's a common characteristic of fighters to have dominant egos, and that's important in the ring/cage or on the mat.  And as a coach your students need to see you as Alpha dog.  However, the moment when your school becomes all about YOU your students lose out.  For example, you don't like the instructor up the street so you talk trash about him all day every day.  You might even post your thoughts on Facebook or Youtube. And you might be right about him/her/that school, but that constant trash talking brings bad energy into your school environment and your students WILL feel it.  You'll turn off the nice students to the point where they leave and you'll embolden the bad students in a way that validates their bad spirit.  The same bad spirit you as their instructor are supposed to be molding into a good one.  At the end of the day, you set the tone in your school and if you don't like the energy that exists in your training area, your locker room, and in your bank account stand in front of a mirror and ask, "Why does my business look so bad?"  I suspect you'll find the answer staring back at you, but you may also find the answer on the rest of your school/gym walls...

5) Befriend an Interior Designer - You're free to argue with me all you want about the importance of the aesthetic appeal of your school/gym, but I assure you there are smarter battles you can undertake.  Did I mention I used to own a custom furniture design & fabrication business in Manhattan?  If I had a dollar every time I walked into a crappy looking school/gym that was struggling to keep its doors open I'd be driving a convertible 911 already (triple black, please).  The truth is that there's a DIRECT correlation between the look/feel of your facility and the value your students/customers will assign your product.  By the way, You + Your Facility + Your Class Schedule = Your Product.  If your product looks like crap it will be valued as such ("Perceived Value").  It blows my mind how many school/gym owners are oblivious to the need for a professional, aesthetically balanced, and CLEAN facility.  You might have a Ferrari, but if every door panel is dented and scraped and the seats are cut up it's not going to be worth as much as a minty fresh Ferrari, right?  And which would you rather drive around town?  So if you're wondering why people just won't pay you what you're worth and you're certain you're doing everything right perhaps it's your school's appearance that's letting you down.  Bring in an expert and barter with your best asset, free classes.   You don't have to hire them for a big project (most designers wanna dangle ideas out there and get you to sign an expensive contract to see inside their bag of tricks).  Offer them a free month of classes in exchange for 1 walkthrough and a design consultation.   They should be able to provide you some good pointers in the first meeting and you may even get a new student in the process.  Those tips they provide could turn your ugly facility into a handsome one.  And appearance is everything...

6) Befriend a Graphic Designer - I don't care that you know how to use Photoshop, if you're not a trained  graphic designer you need to find one.  It's like your mom saying, "I know how to put my hands in the mits so I'm a striking couch now."  Like anything, there's a lot of practice and feel in design and your brand identity elements are often going to be the first thing people see and also the thing people see the most.  How many people do you think will see your logo online as compared to how many people will drive by your school and see your facility?  Understand now why your brand identity elements are so important?  Do I need to say, "Perceived Value" one more time?!  Like interior designers, good graphic designers aren't cheap so find one that will barter their service for classes.  Put an ad up on Craigslist saying "Free martial arts lessons for graphic design services" and see how many responses you get.  I bet you'll get a lot.  Pick a designer based on their portfolio of work, don't even bother looking at their resume.  If they've got a good body of work that looks professional and they've worked for some reputable companies call them in.  Offer them 3 free months of classes in exchange for a good logo.  Negotiate for 5 rounds of revisions, at least 5 looks per round.  You might find the logo you like in round 1 or 2, but you want to negotiate ahead of time in case you need 5 rounds to get it right.  This is standard in the industry.  Not only will you get a top-notch logo for free, but you're bringing somebody new into your school who may become a longterm student.  Also, having a graphic designer in your family is very important...

7) Good Website, Good Website, Good Website - You need a GOOD website.  Got it?  Don't take the easy way out and use a garbage do-it-yourself template.  Have your new graphic designer (that guy who now trains with you - see how that worked?) do the page layouts with you.  At the least you'll need a Homepage, About page, Class Schedule page, and Contact Us page.  If you're a good writer you may want to incorporate a blog and you should also have your social media buttons displayed on your website.  That's Facebook and Twitter in case you're not savvy.  If you're not savvy, get savvy asap!  Once your layouts are done you want to get back on Craigslist and post an ad looking for a Web Developer who's willing to barter his/her services for free classes.  Try the 3 month offer again, but expect to give up at least 6-12 months for more robust web design projects.  Your Web Developer should code your website using CSS, HTML, and jQuery.  If they suggest/insist upon Wordpress don't hire them (I've seen too many Wordpress sites have to be abandoned and completely rebuilt as a company expanded, which is your goal, right?).  And now that both your graphic designer and web developer are students of yours it will be easier to build your marketing campaigns, brand identity elements, and website in-house as you build your business.  But you need new students in order to build your business...

8) What's a Marketing Program? - For the love of God, if you're not actively marketing your school you deserve a head kick from Mirko Cro Cop.  The antiquated theories I hear from most instructors/owners about what constitutes a proper marketing campaign are quite frustrating.  Listen, a yellow pages ad does not a modern marketing program make.  Just like completing a single-leg takedown or a spinning hook kick, there is a lot of technique and practice that goes into developing and executing a proper marketing program and there is definitely a modern way to market and an antiquated one.  Yellow pages ads are "dusty."  If you don't have the budget to hire a small, local agency or consultant you should by now know how to post an ad on Craigslist and offer free classes for marketing services, right?  Do it.  Do it now.  Do it well and you'll have a marketing expert you can add to your in-house team of business consultants who are not only present and available to you, but have an intimate understanding of your business and are emotionally invested in its success.  You'll get great returns from fostering these types of relationships, but don't overlook the ones that already exist in your student roster...

9) Know What Your Students Do - Can you tell me the profession of each and every one of your adult students?  Or the parents of your child students?  If not, you get an "F" for this exercise and you owe me 50 pushups.  I can count on one hand the number of school/gym owners I've met who know what at least 50% of their students do for a living.  Your greatest FREE resources could be kicking a heavy bag in your school/gym right now and you're not tapping into them.  They're YOUR students and they want to help THEIR school.  Why aren't you asking them for help?  Have you forgotten what it's like to be a student?!...

10) Remain a Student - The day you stop thinking of yourself as a student of martial arts is the day your technique gets stale and your students don't do so well against the competition.  The same goes for running a business.  If you don't have a business degree go take some classes.  If you have an undergraduate degree in business you need to enroll in a graduate program.  If you've got a Masters degree then perhaps it's time you started working on your PhD.  I assure you, no matter how hard you train or how many college classes you take, there's always room for growth.  And if improving your fighting and business skills is not motivation enough, then ask yourself this one question, "Would I want to learn from somebody who has given up on learning?"

Too Many Tacky T-shirt Brands

Sure, Tapout was sold for several hundred million dollars to Authentic Brands Group in 2010.  Sure, it's VERY inexpensive to start and operate a small combat sports apparel brand without any business acumen (or artistic talent).  And sure, you're entitled to take the entrepreneurial plunge because you're an American and it's your God-given right to do so.  And because you're an American you're probably unemployed anyway so why not start a business now?!  However, much like sticking your thumb up your ass, just because you can doesn't mean you should.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm a ravenous capitalist about to hang a shiny new diploma on my wall that reads, "Masters in Entrepreneurship" from one of the top graduate programs in the country so I love anything and anyone who makes money, but if there's one thing I know it's sheer ridiculousness (and run-on sentences, apparently).  But much like a run-on sentence, it would seem that aspiring entrepreneurs in the combat sports industry just don't know when to stop.

In the past 2 years the combat sports industry has seen more new apparel companies than can actually be counted.  We're probably looking at a couple/few hundred new brands in just 24 months and it's becoming hard to tell one from the next.  It seems that every dude out there has a combat sports apparel brand now and even my mother was testing brand names on me yesterday (side note: her ground and pound is unstoppable).  Do we really need another tacky T-shirt brand in the fight game?  Another hundred brands?  When does it stop?

Fortunately, there are some proven economic theories that will (hopefully soon) be reaffirmed as the over-saturated combat sports apparel market finds balance and the lesser brands and entrepreneurs fall by the wayside.  I don't wish them harm, but I don't mourn their loss.  Nor will I miss their bedazzled, fake-tattooed, desperately loud, I-suck-at-life-and-have-no-fashion-sense T-shirts that are, more often than not, worn by fat fanboys or Tony "Beach Muscles" Bagadonuts.  Perhaps those brands can retire to the Ed Hardy Assisted Living Center to eat strained pees and complain about loud music until they die and join the man whose style they've all bastardized.  I don't care where they go, just as long as they're out of sight.  My poor eyes can't take anymore tribal designs.