amilster
25-07-2008, 12:02
A question that I had many times: You had only a few losses in the beginning of your career, was your loss against Ken Shamrock an eye opener for you to start training on the ground? Also, why did you never had a fight against him after that anymore?
Yes it absolutely was an eye opener for me. I beat Yamada Manabu by a side choke and Ken just fought him for 30 minutes and couldn’t finish him. They thought that I now with only one side choke victory (OK, I had a few guillotine choke wins but as everybody knows, that’s the strikers chance for a submission) I suddenly was a submission master and was ready for a re-match against Ken.
Since I had two fights in one month and the second of those two was against Ken, I thought to stay in Japan, (since I had no sparring partners for submissions in Holland), and train there for three weeks.
I trained with Funaki about 5 times a week and the only thing that I wanted him to prepare me for was a knee bar. I knew that Ken was good with those and I was pretty sure that any other submission I would defend well.
Since I didn’t know many things about submissions and he did, I was positive that he could show me how to stop knee bars. He taught me only one way. He said that Ken was going to slide his leg over my hip for a knee bar when he was in half guard.
He SHOULD have told me to just hold the leg that needs to go over to the other side, but he didn’t. So for one month I only trained for that.
Of course I looked around what other fighters were doing in the gym and made “mental pictures”, later in the train back from the Dojo to the hotel I would write all these notes down and put them in my head so I could already work on those.
The fight started and Ken took me down, no problem I thought, I worked on the knee bar defense. He was sitting in my half guard and the way he was sitting it would be impossible to slide over my hip plus I was ready for it. Than out of the blue he swung his leg over my head and caught me with the knee bar, which by the way was a very painful experience, I couldn’t walk about three weeks, I hyper extended my knee, if you ever get caught, tap fast, that’s my advise. All those guys who say “I rather have my leg broke” I don’t think are that smart, not if they want to keep competing in the near future, it’s your job right, you want to make money? Well, than be smart, a choke I can understand.
But no excuses, I lost, I shouldn’t have fought when I thought my game wasn’t good enough but I just never said NO when they asked me to fight a certain opponent, NEVER.
It’s like those people who walk through a green light and see a car coming with high speed but don’t stop because they say “I am right, and that guy is wrong”, that’s all true, but you end up in the hospital or maybe even dead, looks good on your tombstone, “He left us too early but at least he was right”.
I was pretty upset about this; I mean, why would Funaki not tell me to just hold his leg so he can’t bring it over to the other side? Something that I found out later myself, would be the best thing to do.
Ah well, that whole experience made me a way better fighter, I vowed that I from now on would listen to people who would tell me something but than would play with the technique myself and see if it was indeed the best thing to do.
I came home and started training two and even three times a day solely on submissions and started also to work on all the notes that I took in Japan. I met a guy Leon van Dijk, and he and I trained together a lot. He didn’t know a lot, and I didn’t know a lot. But he learned fast and I learned fast.
If I would get him in a certain submission we would go over it and see if there were more escapes, set ups and counter attacks for that particular submission.
It was great, if I would get him like three times in a submission he would know my “set up” for it and this way I had to create different set ups.
And man it paid off! I won my next 8 fights by submission, one was against Frank and that one went the decision but I won that because of my submission attacks in the fight, I had him two times in a knee bar and the ref broke it up for some reason, but the judges saw that and that’s why I had the win, the other ones I all finished by submission.
I am happy about my submission game right now, I never lost a fight anymore and I tapped maybe four times in my whole training career after that loss. I am talking about a LOT of training sessions, easily a thousand! I think it’s crazy that some people still picture me as solely a striker, just ask the people where I rolled with what I can do. And it’s not that I trained with bad guys, Genki Sudo, Marc Laimon, Carlos Newton, Alex Stiebling, Randy Couture, Frank Trigg, Matt Lindland, Marco Ruas, Pedro Rizzo, Suzuki, Funaki, actually all the guys at Pancrase in Japan and the list goes on. Just ask if one of those guys ever tapped me in training, and IF somebody did tap me (which happened only twice in the last 10 years), than ask them how many times I tapped that person. It will be over 20 times or more.
And I am NOT passive when I am rolling, I hate people who stall the whole time, I work, trust me.
Another fight between Ken and me just never came through, once almost in Japan in Pride but he said he already fought me twice and that’s why he didn’t want to fight me, he than fought against Aleksander Otsuka and later Fujita. That was a bummer because that time my knees were still “OK”.
I am happy with my career though, I know that I am a totally different fighter than I was then and my record proves it. He lost to Suzuki by submission and I stopped Suzuki by a submission after that plus there were some other things that I took into consideration.
I think that I am now one of the few guys who won 50% of his fights by submission, all different ones (heel hooks, knee bars, rear naked chokes, triangle chokes, toe hold, straight arm bar, heel push/toe pull, etc) and 50% KO’s, all different also (knees to the body, knee to the liver, knee to the head, low kick, punches to the head, liver shot and I am sure some more) so I am absolutely not a “One trick pony”. Plus I haven’t lost in my last 22 fights; so again, it was definitely an “eye opener”!
I can totally understand people though who say that I didn’t really fight MMA, (only three times, UFC two times and the WFA in 2006), because Pancrase was with open hand strikes to the head and you had to wear shoes and shin protection. But, you have to understand that these rules were all there to favor the Japanese fighters. They all were very good in the submission game and less in the striking department, so open hands were there for less damage and better for the submissions like rear naked chokes. The shoes and shin protection were there for better control for their leg locks (shoes) and the shin protection for less damage standing plus better control with leg locks. I would have loved to fight with closed fists and no shoes and shin protection, it would have been WAY better for me. Funny though that within a few moths after my last fight in Pancrase, they had no more shoes and shin protection plus closed fist. Damn, missed out on that.
bron:From Bas Rutten to the forum on his fights with Ken Shamrock, his sub game, and more - Sherdog Mixed Martial Arts Forums (http://www.sherdog.net/forums/f2/bas-rutten-forum-his-fights-ken-shamrock-his-sub-game-more-820072/)
ik vond het wel een vet interview, maar goed dat zijn ze met Bas eigenijk allemaal wel ;o)
misschien een repost maar ik heb hem hier op MF nog niet aangetroffen.
veel leesplezier en trots op onze enige echte MMA legend van eigenbodem gewenst!
Yes it absolutely was an eye opener for me. I beat Yamada Manabu by a side choke and Ken just fought him for 30 minutes and couldn’t finish him. They thought that I now with only one side choke victory (OK, I had a few guillotine choke wins but as everybody knows, that’s the strikers chance for a submission) I suddenly was a submission master and was ready for a re-match against Ken.
Since I had two fights in one month and the second of those two was against Ken, I thought to stay in Japan, (since I had no sparring partners for submissions in Holland), and train there for three weeks.
I trained with Funaki about 5 times a week and the only thing that I wanted him to prepare me for was a knee bar. I knew that Ken was good with those and I was pretty sure that any other submission I would defend well.
Since I didn’t know many things about submissions and he did, I was positive that he could show me how to stop knee bars. He taught me only one way. He said that Ken was going to slide his leg over my hip for a knee bar when he was in half guard.
He SHOULD have told me to just hold the leg that needs to go over to the other side, but he didn’t. So for one month I only trained for that.
Of course I looked around what other fighters were doing in the gym and made “mental pictures”, later in the train back from the Dojo to the hotel I would write all these notes down and put them in my head so I could already work on those.
The fight started and Ken took me down, no problem I thought, I worked on the knee bar defense. He was sitting in my half guard and the way he was sitting it would be impossible to slide over my hip plus I was ready for it. Than out of the blue he swung his leg over my head and caught me with the knee bar, which by the way was a very painful experience, I couldn’t walk about three weeks, I hyper extended my knee, if you ever get caught, tap fast, that’s my advise. All those guys who say “I rather have my leg broke” I don’t think are that smart, not if they want to keep competing in the near future, it’s your job right, you want to make money? Well, than be smart, a choke I can understand.
But no excuses, I lost, I shouldn’t have fought when I thought my game wasn’t good enough but I just never said NO when they asked me to fight a certain opponent, NEVER.
It’s like those people who walk through a green light and see a car coming with high speed but don’t stop because they say “I am right, and that guy is wrong”, that’s all true, but you end up in the hospital or maybe even dead, looks good on your tombstone, “He left us too early but at least he was right”.
I was pretty upset about this; I mean, why would Funaki not tell me to just hold his leg so he can’t bring it over to the other side? Something that I found out later myself, would be the best thing to do.
Ah well, that whole experience made me a way better fighter, I vowed that I from now on would listen to people who would tell me something but than would play with the technique myself and see if it was indeed the best thing to do.
I came home and started training two and even three times a day solely on submissions and started also to work on all the notes that I took in Japan. I met a guy Leon van Dijk, and he and I trained together a lot. He didn’t know a lot, and I didn’t know a lot. But he learned fast and I learned fast.
If I would get him in a certain submission we would go over it and see if there were more escapes, set ups and counter attacks for that particular submission.
It was great, if I would get him like three times in a submission he would know my “set up” for it and this way I had to create different set ups.
And man it paid off! I won my next 8 fights by submission, one was against Frank and that one went the decision but I won that because of my submission attacks in the fight, I had him two times in a knee bar and the ref broke it up for some reason, but the judges saw that and that’s why I had the win, the other ones I all finished by submission.
I am happy about my submission game right now, I never lost a fight anymore and I tapped maybe four times in my whole training career after that loss. I am talking about a LOT of training sessions, easily a thousand! I think it’s crazy that some people still picture me as solely a striker, just ask the people where I rolled with what I can do. And it’s not that I trained with bad guys, Genki Sudo, Marc Laimon, Carlos Newton, Alex Stiebling, Randy Couture, Frank Trigg, Matt Lindland, Marco Ruas, Pedro Rizzo, Suzuki, Funaki, actually all the guys at Pancrase in Japan and the list goes on. Just ask if one of those guys ever tapped me in training, and IF somebody did tap me (which happened only twice in the last 10 years), than ask them how many times I tapped that person. It will be over 20 times or more.
And I am NOT passive when I am rolling, I hate people who stall the whole time, I work, trust me.
Another fight between Ken and me just never came through, once almost in Japan in Pride but he said he already fought me twice and that’s why he didn’t want to fight me, he than fought against Aleksander Otsuka and later Fujita. That was a bummer because that time my knees were still “OK”.
I am happy with my career though, I know that I am a totally different fighter than I was then and my record proves it. He lost to Suzuki by submission and I stopped Suzuki by a submission after that plus there were some other things that I took into consideration.
I think that I am now one of the few guys who won 50% of his fights by submission, all different ones (heel hooks, knee bars, rear naked chokes, triangle chokes, toe hold, straight arm bar, heel push/toe pull, etc) and 50% KO’s, all different also (knees to the body, knee to the liver, knee to the head, low kick, punches to the head, liver shot and I am sure some more) so I am absolutely not a “One trick pony”. Plus I haven’t lost in my last 22 fights; so again, it was definitely an “eye opener”!
I can totally understand people though who say that I didn’t really fight MMA, (only three times, UFC two times and the WFA in 2006), because Pancrase was with open hand strikes to the head and you had to wear shoes and shin protection. But, you have to understand that these rules were all there to favor the Japanese fighters. They all were very good in the submission game and less in the striking department, so open hands were there for less damage and better for the submissions like rear naked chokes. The shoes and shin protection were there for better control for their leg locks (shoes) and the shin protection for less damage standing plus better control with leg locks. I would have loved to fight with closed fists and no shoes and shin protection, it would have been WAY better for me. Funny though that within a few moths after my last fight in Pancrase, they had no more shoes and shin protection plus closed fist. Damn, missed out on that.
bron:From Bas Rutten to the forum on his fights with Ken Shamrock, his sub game, and more - Sherdog Mixed Martial Arts Forums (http://www.sherdog.net/forums/f2/bas-rutten-forum-his-fights-ken-shamrock-his-sub-game-more-820072/)
ik vond het wel een vet interview, maar goed dat zijn ze met Bas eigenijk allemaal wel ;o)
misschien een repost maar ik heb hem hier op MF nog niet aangetroffen.
veel leesplezier en trots op onze enige echte MMA legend van eigenbodem gewenst!