Summer Slugfest V is tonight at the Bay Street Armory in Victoria. Checking in on my FB account today, I noticed that some fighters are throwin’ down some tough talk in the lead up to the beat down tonight. Its going to be a great fight night in Victoria.

Axé Capoeira and the City of Vancouver will be hosting an Afro-Brazilian Block Party on July 23rd, 2011 on Granville Street (between Robson and Georgia Street). The event is expected to draw thousands of people for a full day of performances including traditional dance, music and Capoeira culminating in a huge Brazilian street party not to be missed.

Date: Saturday July 23rd, 2011
Time: 11:00am to 7:00pm
Location: Granville Street, between Robson and Georgia Street

Mark Your Calendars and Join The Party!

Schedule of Events

Vancouver switched into MMA mode with a double stacked weekend with MMA Expo in town at the trade and convention centre for two days, and the UFC 131 Circus in town. All this, right after the mayhem in the streets with 200,000 hockey fans when Vancouver Canucks won game 5 on Friday Night.

MMA is still growing out on the west coast and now even major media is taking note, with CBC even stopping by MMA Expo to look in on the growth of the sport. The Expo was well received in Vancouver with fans filling the hall to get deals on gear, photos and autographs for fans, and to watch or take part in the tournament and celebrity seminar run by top level trainers and fighters. The expo had everything to delight fans with photos and autographs with mma fighters like Jake Sheilds, Shonie Carter, Matt Serra, Carlos Newton, Stefan Struve, Thiago Alves and others. There were long lineups to meet the big names, but hey, sometimes it has to be done. There were also a bevy of MMA Hotties making the rounds at the event.

It was good to see some friends there like MMAsucka, F.I.L.E.S. Magazine, Battlefield Fight League, Westcoast promotions, and others.

Swag is my favourite part of trade shows, and the booths were generous with stickers, drinks (did I mention that Rockstar has a lager beer out now), sports supplements, coupons, t-shirts, posters, and more.

We know that many loyal MMA fans have had their attention redirected by the hockey fever going on in our city, but its clear that the sport and fans of MMA still have managed to make a huge impression on life in Vancouver.

So its true, Dana White gives out free tix to UFC events. You have to be on the ball and follow his Twitter feed to find out how to get them. Location 1 I lost out on, with UFC fight fans converging on a spot in Yaletown like it was the Amazing Race or something. They were all gone by the time I got there. I relocated and oh yay I GOTS SUM TICKETZ! See you down there!! Good luck in the hunt, fight fans!!!!

SportsRage host Gabe Morency came in to town to cover UFC 131 . Gabe also brought along his program SportsRage, hosted at the Sin Bin in Vancouver. So when there is such an awesome sports maniac in town, MartialArtsNomad.com pulls all the strings to get a few local fighters on his show to get the WORD OUT that the Vancouver fight scene is growing and getting better and better. Case in point is the local talent I brought along to meet Gabe, like Canadian Professional Light Heavyweight Boxing Champion, Junior ‘The Real Deal’ Moar, as well as Ronald Diaz and Ryan Christopher, MMA fighters on the upcoming Quest For Glory 1 fight night on June 17 at the Croatian Cultural Centre.

Day 2 of Gabe’s stand at the Sin Bin was curtailed by a low kick to a garbage can. We hope for a speedy recovery for you Gabe!!!! Too bad, because I brought down two more feisty fighters to get all up in Gabe’s grill, Murray ‘Showtime’ Sogen and ‘Tricky’ Nick Marinos. Gabe, dont mess with these guys! If you dont find them for an interview on Sportsrage soon, they will find you!!!!

Here is a short documentary video by filmmaker Alex Poutiainen about the venerable Astoria Boxing Club, where dedicated puglists have been training for over 40 years.

The Astoria Boxing Club in its time has produced 12 Canadian champions and 2 Olympians. The club has since moved from the basement of the Astoria Hotel and is now located at 901 Main Street. Website : http://www.warriorsboxingclub.com/

This documentary is a finalist in a contest at Paperny Films. http://www.papernyfilms.com/contest . Watch the video and go on over to Paperny Films to vote on Alex’s documentary and help get more development for this story.

Martial arts will make you healthy but you must add a diet plan to get in top shape. Every fighter has to have a serious diet plan to match their serious training program. If all you do is train you will never go past a certain limit of ability no matter what you do. I feel like I am at that point now, and I have to start thinking again about what worked for me in the past because I am about to go at it again. Here is a list of little things I did that helped me lose almost 40 lbs in 3 months.

1. Get more sleep. You are probably stressed and not getting enough sleep. Go to be early, sleep in, and reduce your stress level. Less stress means more a moderate level of cortisol, a hormone that may be a factor in weight gain.
2. Coffee is just not that good for you. Cut down on coffee to mornings only. Coffee is a culprit in raising your cortisol levels. Switch to chinese teas, which has properties that help raise your metabolism and consume fat.
3. Eat salads. In the house where I live, I am known as the salad king. I can recommend that you should fall in love with salad. Eat it 2 or 3 times a day. Eat as much of it as you want. Tray salad mixes are used in high end restaurants. Put a can of tuna or some grilled chicken or fish on that salad and you are eating high class.
4. Eat walnuts. Walnuts are recommended in diet plans for diabetics, and they are a source of linolec acid, which helps regulate your blood sugar. I get my walnuts in bulk in Chinatown for 1/2 the price of what supermarkets gouge you for them, and keep them in the freezer.
5. Add protein powder to your diet. While its usually taken in conjunction with a workout, either immediately before or after a workout, a whey protein isolate helps boost your ratio of protein during the day and is generally lower in calories than milk. That means a scoop in a shaker cup with some water. It really helps tone down the hunger pangs. Its a good choice for before bed if you have a craving. Some supermarkets sell whey protein isolate in bulk, thus avoiding the supplement store prices.
6. Dont make a habit of getting too hungry. Another thing that raises your stress level and makes you pig out. It also spikes your blood sugar after it being low. So that means keep some walnuts around for snacks. How else can I say it? Dont hungry too get. And if it still happens, seek a protein bar or salad, or some milk.
7. Learn to control your blood sugar. I mentioned blood sugar a few times already. Suffice to say that your blood sugar level which is as it sounds, the level of sugar in your blood, regulates your insulin levels, which have a lot to do with your general well being and hopefully not getting diabetes. Why do people freak out in restaurants? Why do women have a downer around the time of their period? Their blood sugar has gone through the floor. A sandwich will fix that shit pretty quick.
8. Take more time to eat your meal. Want to be driven nuts? Go to France and have dinner with some French people at their home, where they take at least a couple hours to sit around the table and eat supper. If you dont live like that, it takes a long time to get used to. Why do Europeans have better health than North Americans in spite of the fact that they drink and smoke and eat fatty foods? They walk a little more. Their buildings are old so they walk up stairs more. They relax when they eat. Fully.
9. Cut down on starches of all kinds. Less bread, potatoes, pasta, rice, noodles, chips, snacks, all that crap that has starch in it. Starch is almost like sugar to your body. I would not suggest eliminating it completely, like that Atkins nut-job, but cut it down. I have heard also that it is good to eat little or no starch after about 3 PM in the day.
10. Sugar is shite. Sugar is pure fucking energy and you need very little of it relative to what is so abundantly available in your diet. Get it out of your intake, and you will realise it was all around you in quantities far more than you ever need. That means only small amounts of fruit juice, and only in the morning. A couple servings of fruit during the day are fine, but that doesnt mean pig out on grapes because they look like a healthy snack.
11. Cut back on all alcoholic beverages. That means beer and wine and all other booze. Its a good source of soluble sugar and calories. And 0 cal drinks like vodka just make you hungry for food. Dude, they dont call it a beer belly for nothing.
12. Go for a walk, you lazy bastard. It burns a few calories, and helps your constitution move things along. It helps with the relaxing part of your life as well. And that stuff you are breathing in is called fresh air. Oh and that shining disk in the sky is called the sun. Next step join a martial arts school, go to every class and do everything your sensei says until you puke. That will be good for a few calories.
13. Turn off the damn TV. The brain sucking mind numbing idiot box. That thing that rains down propaganda about all the of sugary, starchy, fatty and addictive foods you should go out and buy. It also stops you from thinking for yourself. Get a hobby or something.
14. Turn on the cold for a few seconds at the end of your shower. Years ago, before I was a fat bastard, there was a woman from France I once dated, who had fine skin like porcelain that was almost as taut as a drum from head to toe. I learnt what her beauty secret was when I stepped in the shower with her. It was icy cold. That shower head was pissing out iceberg water from the north pole. So somewhere since then I learnt that there is something about a blast of cold at the end of you shower that tightens your pores and makes your body burn a little bit more fat. You only need to do it at the end of the shower. You get used to it, and you need to do it regularly.
15. Log what you eat. Not that log, jackass. I mean write a record of what you eat in a day, every day. Chances are you are using a computer now, if you reading this. I hope you are. That means you are fully qualified to have a google account and create a google spreadsheet, where you log your weight and what you eat throughout the day. Please dont ask me for help with your desktop applications, I havent used Windoze in years. Now be completely honest about it and it will reward you greatly, as you will think much more about what it is you eat. Then you can share the spreadsheet with a doctor or dietician, or trainer, or friend that needs to lose a few meters of lard around the gut. The log will also help you estimate how many calories you are inserting into your little pie hole on a quotidian basis.
16. Shun restaurant food. Restaurants, are to food what prostitutes are to sex. Their food is just made to be rich and tasty, to go with alcohol and more sugar. It looks great, served to you piping hot, you get to eat out, you pay, then you leave. In the same way, A restaurant can never meet your dietary needs as well as you can yourself in your own kitchen.
17. Pick a couple of new veggies from the market. GO ON, DO IT! Yes, you know what carrots, celery, and broccoli are. But do you know about swiss chard, kale, collard greens, kholrabi, bok choy, endive? Do you, huh? Do you? Just go and get a couple, and cook them and eat them. Probably lower calorie than anything else you are eating right now, and you will need other stuff like vitamin A, D, and potassium. Holy shit Sherlock, you are losing weight.
18. Realise that the supermarket is not your friend. Ever notice that to get to the sections for meat, vegetables, eggs and dairy, you have to navigate your way through a labyrinth of aisles, stocked to the ceiling with processed products that are essentially starches and sugars, as far as your body is concerned? Unless you prefer to eat eat baby diapers or toilet paper, you are tempted with aisles full of candy and snacks, sugary sodas, potato chips (ever wonder how or why supermarket stocks an entire aisle of its valuable sales floor with deep fried potato thins?), cereals loaded with sugar, ice cream and frozen pizzas. They even have nice old ladies pushing samples on you. But they are evil. They are there to hook you. Just like from the dealer man, the first one is free. Supermarkets are big business, and their goal is not simply to feed you, but to sell foods that you will buy again and again, reliably, habitually. So they put things out front of you that while being made with the cheapest available materials, such as sugars, starches, and fats. They get you addicted to them, essentially, and you pad out the security of their supply chain, as well as their profit margin. They dont care about you, they only care that you keep buying the food in their store.
19. High fructose corn syrup is your enemy and it is everywhere in pre-packaged foods. Another example of the evil that the modern food industry has put upon the world as it uses it to sweeten your palate and stretch out meaningful ingredients for maximum profit. Its the crystal meth of the food world. Its also a good source of mercury. This crap fed to you also is now believed to suppress a hormone called leptin, which tells you when you are full, so you can eat to death if you wish.
20. Do it for a reason. Make it a fitness goal. You dont even have to be on a diet forever. Just give yourself a few months, and stay on your plan and you will rule the world. If you are motivated, you will focus on that reason and arrange your priorities to justify that goal. My goal last year was to get under 200lbs so I could fight below the unlimited weight category. Anything over 200 lbs is unlimited, where I would be obliged to kickbox with the 280lb walruses and other mutants.

…going on a diet is like penny pinching. You learn to make every little bit count.

Many of these ideas wouldnt work alone. You have to put them all together. There are no shortcuts losing weight. It doesnt even work at first. It takes time. There are tons of distractions and temptations along the way. Keep trying, if you fail. You must set yourself apart from other people if you want to succeed, because the whole world is on a binge of sugar and starch and fat. To think of it another way, going on a diet is like penny pinching. You learn to make every little bit count. And after a while, you do adjust, and you are happy in your little world losing weight. That’s how I lost almost 40 lbs in 3 months.

A gym, a way of training, can become a personal thing very quickly. I am into training by a method that combines the wisdom of many disciplines. In that way the matter of fitness can be addressed from many different perspectives. I was fortunate to discover the Versus Training Centre back when it was Versus21, not long after it opened. Versus21 already offered a program of martial arts and conditioning in both group and individual settings that enabled the business to define itself as a very progressive fitness facility offering a format of service and quality programs better than any other gym in Vancouver. Clients, whether in individual or group programs, are not left to their own devices. Training alone is the first fitness mistake people make, and why people abandon their fitness goals. Instead, every client is trained under direct supervision of experienced and qualified fitness trainers and martial arts instructors who bring what works in to each class. Additionally, classes keep you focused on your training, you accomplish your planned workout in a defined period of time, as it should be done, instead of dallying.

Then in early 2010 the owners, Ali Taghinejad and Imam Rahmim took an opportunity to move the Versus21 equipment and team into a space more amenable to hosting their high quality training programs. They then bought even more equipment, and renamed the facility Versus Training Centre. The deeply loyal clientele has followed over to the new location, now at 130 West Hastings Street in Vancouver, now at street level.

As we continued to train between a small temporary facility, and a couple of dance centres, work was under way at the new facility, which required a full makeover, starting with sandblasting floor to ceiling on both levels. Work progressed for a few months, and in order to keep everyone aware of progress, I met up with Sensei Ali to take pictures of the facility as it went from a dusty shell to one of the top training facilities in Western Canada. It may sound like a boast, but it is not only a statement based on the material location and equipment, but also in the mindset of the people running the facility, and in their idea of the best way to train. That is the sign of a good gym, and when you dont see the trainers get out from behind the desk, that is the sign of a bad one. At Versus Training you will find the trainers are always out in front of their students, actively, working with the best ideas on training and use them to train the whole body and mind toward fitness goals.

The main level of the facility has training equipment that goes from the refined to the brutal, including 4 giant squat racks, a universal gym, a large quantity of free weights – even dumbells up to 120 lbs; there is an artificial turf track used for weighted sled pushing, and toys like sledge hammer, truck tire, down on to pylons and jump bars, bossu balls, medicine balls, stationary bikes, rowing machines and treadmills. Most of that list may sound familiar, but the difference is the way it is applied. The Fighterbody training program, directed by Ben Kerswill is a circuit system designed to be as vigorous as possible in a short period of time. The method involves fast repetitions and complex movements for durations usually under a minute, with only 15 seconds of rest between stations. The aim is instead of building up bulk or endurance only, is for explosive power, the balance between the two.

Downstairs hosts the change rooms and martial arts dojo. Martial arts spaces are simple things, made of mats, bags, and punching targets. Versus offers both standup and ground programs and explore a wide range of techniques for fitness, conditioning, and self defense. The kickboxing class, run by Senseis Ali and Iman, both black belts in Kyokushin Karate, offer a program elsewhere described as ‘…more control than Muay Thai, more power than Kyokushin Karate.’ Here, as elsewhere in Versus Training Centre, they opted for the more interesting versatile route, and created a hybrid system taking the best aspects of the most important standup forms. On the ground, the program is Brazilian Jiu-jitsu, with leading instructor Todd Smith, who studies under UFC legend and bjj master, Royce Gracie. The BJJ class has now attracted students ranging from Judo-ka to freestyle wrestlers. Now together with the top quality instruction, the students have an open dialogue of techniques that go beyond bjj, as they strive to share, discover, and complete their skills in martial arts. Friday afternoon, no class, its time for sparring.

Link to flickr pool, Building the new Versus Training Centre, from dust to a top quality training centre.

It is time for my fight blog to reflect back on the year it has been, now as 2010 comes to a close.  This year will be remembered as being the best year to date for the Vancouver fight scene. UFC graced our city and had its fastest event sell out ever. The ongoing local fight promotions matured, and new fight series emerged in and around Vancouver. Top quality amateur MMA fighters stepped up to try their hand in the octagon. There has been an explosion of a veritable local fight scene.  2011 is set to be an even better year with so much more that we know now, about fighters and fans who love MMA. In 2010 my martial arts blog has been to mma fights, martial arts tournaments, dojos, schools and seminars and reported back on the many different facets of a thriving scene. Now at the end of the year, I have culled through my flickr photo pool, now over 10,000 photos, to come up with the best photos when I attended events with a media spot by the cage, ring, or mat.

In sorting through my photos, I did my best to include ones that showed incredible intense moments, in people’s gestures and faces, that were compositionally great, or that were boldly visceral. This year I was fortunate to meet a few famous people in the biz, including George Chiuvalo, Royce Gracie, and others.

I got a nice gift from a family member who knows how much I am into marital arts now: