MMA fighters, trainers, and instructors. What are your thoughts?

Question

What are your thoughts on ambidexterity in Stand-up MMA? I notice that dominant fighters like to switch up there stances a lot like Roger Huerta, Anderson Silva, and I think I've seen Fedor do it as well.

What are your thoughts on that? Is it good or bad? Explain.

Thanks.

Answer 1

are you kidding? lol

i train hard...but mostly to do amateur or sparring work and most of my workouts consist of left hooks...left leg kicks...to fortify my attack.

your main side will always be strong, the people you have mentioned have trained for years to make their off hand/leg as strong as their conventional stance which makes them as dangerous as they are.

Answer 2

I think it would be an advantage if without practice you are equally good with your right and left.  With my legs I feel perfectly comfortable throwing with power from either leg, I do feel a little bit of difference in my hands.  I use southpaw stance if I want to secure a strong takedown, I have practiced both sides but when you get in trouble you go back to your bread and butter and for me thats a deep double leg and for some reason (well I know the reason) I can shoot much quicker and powerful with a right leg lead.

Answer 3

Personally I practice with both left-lead, and right-lead stances.  I wouldn't say I'm ambidextrous, but I feel comfortable throwing kicks and punches from either stance.

I originally studied boxing, so left-lead with lots of jabs, and the right used more for power shots was typical. Then I did Tae Kwon Do, which taught me a deeper stance, but I still used left lead which develops more kicking power (but slower kicks) with the right. Later I started studying Jeet Kun Do, which tends to use a right lead (or strong hand lead) like fencing.  I'm doing Muay Thai now, which has a sort of square / open stance.  So I've blended them together when I spar - I've taken my favorite parts from each art, and I sort of do my own thing with them - it gives me a lot of flexibility technique-wise when facing different opponents.

Practically speaking, I feel comfortable in either stance, but my style changes significantly depending on my stance.  I tend to do more boxing style punching in left lead, and more "traditional martial arts" kicks (straight kick, roundhouse, etc.) with my right leg in that stance.   When I switch to right lead, I throw more Muay Thai (shin) kicks and power jabs with a left-hook following.  What I'm getting at is that it's not exactly the same style of fighting when I switch stances...I think it's the same for Silva, Huerta, etc.  

Watch Silva's fights - he does the right lead with a lot of thai kicks and clinching (vs Franklin for example).   I think he was in a left lead stance when he KO'd Irvin.  He was jabbing with the left hand forward when Irvin went for the leg kick- he caught the kick with his left hand + a muay thai type leg block/catch then BAM - KO punch was from a right that was really deep.  So the approach is different with each stance - not mirror-image like you would think of a true ambidextrous fighter.  

Bottom line is being comfortable in either stance, and able to circle either direction, makes a sport style fighter more dangerous from more places - if you have to constantly adjust back to the same lead, you can get caught more easily.

Answer 4

I think you have to train both.

Rampage Jackson was unable to do this against Forrest and allowed Forrest to continue working on that front leg.  

If he would have switched, he could have taken some pressure off that left leg.

James