Gameness Blog

As you are probably well aware mma in now legal in TN. There’s still questionswith the pros, but amature MMA is legal and rolling.

There’s already been a few events in TN and from what I’ve seen it’s been a total embarrassment for the sport. The level of fighters that are fighting on these cards is flat out horrible. I understand there are people out there that want to make a few dollars on mma events, but what they seem to fail to realize is that fans won’t go back to bad shows! There’s even been cards where no fighters have got out of the first round! Talk about a joke!

I had an event a few years ago where my guys fought in St. Louis. We had 5 guys fight and all my fighters beat there opponents in under 6 minutes combined. Some could say that we did something great, but the truth is the level of competition sucked and when fighters from Nashville MMA fight against an untrained average am fighter my gUys are going to win quick.

We have a fight card on December 11th and I made very clear to the match maker to find good opponents for all of our fighters. I don’t want any cake walks and boring ass fights. Of course I want our guys to win but I refuse to have bad fighters fighting on this card. I don’t think it will take long for people to realize who know’s what they’re doing and who doesn’t.

TTYS,

Ed

Well Brandon lost as I’m sure many of you saw the fight. I was holding the American flag walking him out and I’d forgot the rush of 10,000 fans screaming and cameras all over you.

I was a little depressed after the fight and didn’t feel like writing about it. I’m over it now and it’s back to the drawing board.

We’re holding MMA fights on December 11th and should have over 12 guys from our gym fighting. The response that we have got for our event has been huge, Because the Gameness name is so big, fighters from all over the world wanted to come fight in our first event. We’ll be having them every 6 weeks and we’re trying to highlight the local talent before we grow too big. We’re pretty much limiting the first one to local fighters from my school and two of my satelite schools in Murfreesboro against guy from within 500 miles. In the future I think we’ll be able to have all pro shows and swap back and forth with am shows.

We actually had some idiot try to get a coalition against our event thinking that somehow these loser TMA schools could effect our events. Everyone and their brother is trying to do mma events now and it’s something of comedy. I’m now getting offers from other legitimate events asking if there champions can feed into our shows. The people that have been in the sport and have been around real MMA know that we’re the only promotion that can actually put on and sustain good fights in the middle TN area. It’s going to be sad to see such a low level of MMA but I’m confident they’ll get bored with it and want to see real fights.

Fact is my bad ams will beat there best fighters.

Talk to you soon.

Ed

I’m in England now and am getting ready to go to bed. Today we got up at about noon and went and got a bunch of stuff we needed. The plugs are different here so we had to buy new adaptors to plug in our computes and phone chargers. I forgot my camera so I bought a new digital one. I thought I got a good deal and then realized that it didn’t come with a rechargable battery, just double a’s… It went dead afer just a few pics.

Brandon looked good today. We trained at Braulio Escrima’s school and they were cool. Braulio was in the states but his guys let us train. The new Thai pads help a lot, although but he still kicks hard as hell. After training we went and bought some dvd’s for the apartment and then I had my radio show to do. It was 8 here and 2 in Nashville…

Tomorrow is much of the same. The coffee here is really fresh so I’m looking forward to that! I’ll write again soon…

Ed

I’m waiting for my flight to leave at the Dublin airport. I’m flying to England early with Brandon so I’m gonna be away for a while. The flight over was good as I was able to work, un distracted and got a lot done.

I’m not really sure what the schedule will be today, but I know we’ve got to get on a sleep schedule. I haven’t slept in over 24 hours and I want to make sure I don’t get sick again. I have hand sanitizer that I’m constantly using so hopefully that helps.

I bought new Thai pads for the trip. Last time I held for Brandon, unknowing to him or anyone else, he ripped my shoulder pretty good. I have a torn rotators cuff and I felt something in it rip. I have some thicker pads that should help with the impact.

I can’t really explain how hard he kicks. I’ve held for heavyweight pro dutch Thai fighters, other pro Thai fighters and UFC veterans and no one comes close to kicking like Brandon. It’s very tricky because he switches stances and fights orthodox and south paw. Quite frankly, it’s dangerous as hell and if I make one mistake I can get severely injured. I enjoy the challenge though and after the first day I should have his timing down and vice versa and we should be fine. It’s just been a while for us…

The Ireland airport is pretty cool. Lot’s of shopping and it’s obvious the fashion is much different here. The people are nice. I wish I could stay and take in a bit more of the culture.

I’ll write again when I get to England.

Ed

I got back from Brandons training camp and I was exhausted. I normally work late so my sleep schedule was all out of whack when I suddenly had to be up at 6am. MD is an hour ahead of us here in Nashville so I tried to go to bed at 1am eastern. At 3am I was still awake looking at the clock in discust. Some time after that I would go to sleep and the alarm would go off at 5:15am. I think I got about a combined 10 hours sleep the whole week.

I got back to Nashville and immediatly felt like I was getting sick. The next morning I woke up congested, sick with a fever. I was super motivated to get back to work and go out this weekend but the best thing for me to do was stay at home. I’ve been stuck in the house now for 2 days and am still sick, but the fever is down.

I’m hoping I’m well by Monday as I’m itching to train and work! I’ve got a couple new projects I’m working on and I have some guys I’ve got to get ready for some fights. My schedule is going to be pretty busy the next month, but then again it’s always busy. Next weekend I have a recruit coming in to meet with us,I’m flying to Vegas for NAGA October 3rd-5th, possibly going to VA oct. 10-12th for a fight, flying to England October 16th-19th for Brandon’s fight in the UFC, going to a marketing seminar the next weekend and that pretty much wraps up my October.

MMA should be coming to Nashville soon and I can’t wait. There’s gonna be a lot of wanna be promotions popping up. I can’t wait to get this thing going. 3 years of work and patience is finally coming to an end. We’ve been getting slammed with venue’s and offers to hold fights. Finding the right place has been interesting. We’re hiring a very well respected match maker out of Ohio to match the fights. We’re actually going to pay the professionals good money for a change and open sponsorship opportunity’s up to the am’s. We have over 20 fighters at Nashville MMA so we’re going to have to split the shows up. One being pro and some am’s and the other being all am’s.

My good friend and former King of the Cage owner Bud Brutsman was in Nasvhille about a week and a half ago. I talked with him about our gameplan and he thought it was great. Years ago I watched Bud and Terry grow KOTC. They were the first MMA show that I knew that could sustain a profit over a long period of time. He sold out a couple years ago, for a nice pay day… Bud’s also a T.V. producer and was in Nashville shooting a pilot. He promised to come out to the first event so I’m going to hold him to it!

Gonna try to get some rest now.

Peace!

Ed

Brandon is looking good. We’re a little over 4 weeks out and this is the hardest part of his training. We had 3 training sessions today, with the first starting at 8:30 am. I had lunch with him and he’s positive and focused. We normally don’t talk too much about his training and fights but for some reason we did today. He’s mentally sound and looking very strong.

I’d write more, but I’ve got to be up at 5:30 am for the 6:00 am training session… sounds crazy but that’s what it takes to be a champion!

Ed

I’m in MD until Thursday. I have a meeting tomorrow and then I’ll be off to Brandon Vera’s training camp. I flew down a day early to watch Rhadi Fergusan give a presentation on training.  It wasn’t one of those train smart and don’t push yourself too hard speeches. It was a suck it up, train like a madman, stop making excuses type deal.

Rhadi was a 2004 Olympian in Judo and is one of the top strength and conditioning coaches in the world. I met him 7 years ago after seeing him compete in the pro-am of grappling. He was a beast and brought an incredible intensity to competition. Just 3 years later, he made the U.S. Olympic team in Judo and about that time I joined team Lloyd Irvin. His training sessions with Lloyd were legendary and he pushed the limits beyond what the body is supposed to do.

Training like that is NOT for everyone. It’s actually not for the majority of people. Training like Rhadi is talking about is for champions only. If you want to to be a champion, you have to make sacrifices that most people would never dream of. You have to push your body harder than you ever thought you could and then push it harder again. I’m going to try to bring Rhadi to Nashville to give the same presentation. For more information on Rhadi go to www.rhadi.com

I’ll be updating the blog this week and tell you how the training is going.

Ed

Just a few short years ago I started Nashville MMA at 100 Oaks mall. We had just over 2200 square feet, an old boxing ring that made horrible squeaking noises, and a small mat area to train jiu-jitsu. Since we started over 6 years ago, we have grown to one of the largest MMA gyms in the country with a 20,000 square foot facility, two boxing rings, tons of mat space, and a full size MMA cage. We have trained fighters at every level and are the only gym in Nashville who has sent someone to the UFC.(and we started with him from scratch)

It’s hard to say the exact number of students we have, but I can tell you that in the last 3 years we have signed up over 700 students. The growth of Nashville MMA has been noted in various media outlets and for the third straight year have been given the award of a TN fast 50 company.

Our success at Nashville MMA is no accident. Our instructors are highly decorated competitors and our staff is kind, friendly and helpful. If you are thinking about joining a martial arts gym, make sure you give us a call and see for yourself why so many people in the middle TN have chosen Nashville MMA to train. Call 615-297-4430 and ask for Ray or Jamie. They’ll be happy to answer any question you have and schedule you in for a private, one on one lesson.

I hope to see you soon!

Ed Clay

Last Saturday night we had 4 fighters on a fight card in Kentucky. Ryan Delarenzo and Josh Shockman both beat the snot out of their opponents finishing them with no problem, and although impressed, they are experienced fighters who typically crush their competition so for me, it was kinda expected.

I was most impressed by Kenny Degenhardt’s performance. Not that I was expecting him to lose, or that I thought he didn’t train hard; quite the opposite. Kenny trains very hard and I expected him to win as well, but what impressed me the most was the level of intensity he brought to his MMA debut. When he took his opponent to the mat and gained the dominant position, he unleashed a barrage of punches. The referee soon stopped the fight and Kenny won by TKO in the first round.

Lance Patrick was on the card to fight, but Joe Dukes backed out. Supposedly he didn’t get his blood work in on time, but his other fighters all had there blood work done. Not only that, he would have never made weight. Basically, rather than coming out sooner and saying I’m too scared to fight, he used his blood work as an excuse and waited until the night of the fights to tell anyone. Joe, if you’re scared; say you’re scared, and don’t lead our fighters on. Sure, you would have got your head pounded had you fought, but had you been man enough to give notice that you were not going to fight maybe the promoter could have found someone else. It was clear that Joe Dukes was not in fighting shape, and never intended to fight. Congrats to all our fighters.

Tim

After a month and a half of dealing with our designers in India, our site is finally up! Anyone considering using a foreign company for web design might want to note the following pros and cons.

Pros: Cost

Cons:

Time Difference, Communication (first designer spoke HORRIBLE English), Having to explain everything via IM

By and large we are very pleased with the end result. I probably changed design colors, font size, Font colors, etc., 20 times, and we pushed back the launch date 3 times and finally launched 2 weeks late. Ed was responsible for most of the design ideas–he is a brilliant marketer!

After 5 weeks of staring at the site I’m sure there are typos. I have found four today. I will be sending corrections after about a week, so if you see anything that needs fixing, please email me at tclay@gameness.com.

Ed will usually be doing the blogs, but he is leaving for Las Vegas in a few hours, and then will be off to Brandon Vera’s Training Camp.

Anyways, I hope you liked what we did. Feel free to give us any feedback via email or here in the blog.

I leave you with a quote from one of wisest Americans in history:

“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” -Benjamin Franklin-

Thanks,

Tim Clay