Former UFC middleweight champion Luke Rockhold trued his hand at bare knuckle boxing last weekend where he lost to Mike Perry by TKO by way of broken teeth.
Rockhold is a bjj black belt and a former blue belt world champion in the Gi and is a No Gi purple belt world champion. He trained a lot with BJJ world champion Buchecha back in the day at ATT.
He recently shared footage of his performance at the 2007 IBJJF No Gi Worlds where he won gold after escaping a very deep armbar which injured his arm.
He wrote: “The Journey of combat sports.
One thing has stayed consistent across all realms.
It’s kill or be killed, there is no in between.
Prepared to die every time.
2007 No Gi Worlds
Got into a little trouble in the quarters getting my elbow turned inside out but managed to get through it.
Went on to win the Gold.
Tore all the ligaments in my elbow. Lost use of the arm for a few months but well worth it.”
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In an interview with Combate, Buchecha explains that the first time he trained with Rokchold was in 2013 and admits that he has already been submitted by the middleweight in the gym.
Luke is a very good black belt. He’s legit. He’s the guy I roll with when I go train at AKA. He loves to train without the Gi, and he is against whom I have the hardest time rolling in AKA. He has a different game, dangerous, with footlocks and inverted triangles. When I go training with him I am always aware, because if I lose focus he submits me. In my opinion, he has the best ground game in MMA, out of the athletes I’ve trained with.
Rockhold in an interview with Submission Radio said that he found the current BJJ scene strange and that he doesn’t understand the trend of grapplers guard pulling and hunting for leglocks:
Bjj is somewhat suspect these days and you know I’ll have some fun with this kid Nick. I haven’t seen too much of him really. He fared well for himself pretty well, took second at ADCC and I’ve done a little homework he seems to bully guys around with his wrestling and this is like decent high school wrestling which doesn’t mean too much when it comes to me. I wrestle with the big boys so I mean he’s a he’s a good wrestler for Jiu Jitsu. I think you’ll find that I’ll be able to push him there I’ll be able to get takedowns if I need them. Then when it comes to the grappling you know, I’m a physical guy and a lot of these guys aren’t physical and I can match them in so many ways there so I’m excited that he’s a he’s not one of those stupid leglock guys that just butt scoots.
This whole this whole modern-day jujitsu thing kind of pisses me off. mm-hmm it’s pretty stupid all the sport jiu-jitsu where the guys just all leg lock-based when they just compromise themselves trying to get these foot locks and so it’s nice to have a guy that’s can actually bring it…
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