The value of rematches: A very natural question to ask as you engage in the study of jiu jitsu is whether or not you are really improving over time. The problem is that as you train and improve, so do the people you are training with. As a result, it often feels as though no progress is being made. A very good test to gauge the amount of progress you are making over time is to rematch an opponent you have not come up against in some time – of course they too must have been training as per normal, otherwise the test will be rendered inaccurate. Exactly this situation occurred earlier today when Gordon Ryan rematched Todd Mueckenheim, a talented and athletic opponent who had narrowly defeated Mr Ryan by points six months ago. Today they met again in Florida. It was a short match, with Mr Ryan dominating the entire chain of events through to a submission win. It was gratifying to see in such a clear way the improvements in Mr Ryan's performance and the effects of a progressive training program that constantly assesses and improves the sports performance of those following it. Mr Ryan put on a dazzling combination of ashi garami, back control and kimura systems and perhaps most interestingly, the manner in which these different systems can be linked in a bout to make them extremely difficult to defend against. Mr Muckenheim showed admirable confidence in his abilities in taking a bet of $10,000 dollars of his own money against Mr Ryan, who also bet his money – though in the opposite way. However, he was not facing the same man he matched before and the gamble was lost. Here you can see Mr Ryan using some of the more advanced elements of our back control system. Unfortunately the first component of the system has proved so successful in competition that the other five components have not been necessary to use, it was nice to see some elements of the second component being shown in public today.
