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october 07, 2011 11:50am

My fight for Titan Fighting Championships was the biggest fight I’ve had yet. It’s not only because it was a tough opponent. (Alex Huddleston was the #1 ranked ammy heavyweight in Kansas city with an 8 and 0 before he made the jump to the pros) It was also the first time I was on television for a fight. Granted, it would’ve been nice to have more than a week’s notice for the fight. Not only could I have trained specifically for Alex (I’ve never fought anyone taller than me, and he’s 4 inches taller so that was new) but I could’ve tried to line up some sponsors and had some kind of banner made.

The experience was great. I drove down to Kansas city Thursday morning since weigh ins were at 1 pm. I got to the Argosy hotel with a couple hours to spare and got settled in. I will say this, Titan does a great job of taking care of the fighters. The Hotel was awesome, and I was given 8 buffet vouchers so I didn’t have to spend a dime on meals from Thursday lunch until Saturday’s lunch. Kudos to Joe Kelly for that.

Between 1pm and about 6pm I spent time filling out paperwork, doing the weigh-ins, Doing an interview with the announcers so they could learn a little bit more about me. It was pretty cool meeting Frank Trigg. The night was over when we did the mock weigh-ins where we did pictures and all that stuff.

The night of the fight was pretty painless after my corners got there to do their paperwork. The show ran exceptionally smooth and that says a lot about how good of a show Titan is running. The fight itself was a good learning experience for me. I was a little more tired than I should’ve been so that’s something I have to address. The first Round, I fought from southpaw which was my first time ever doing that in a fight. It felt ok, but not great. I felt a lot better in the second round when I went back to fighting in an orthodox stance.

I’m very pleased with my cognitive recognition when I was on the ground and picking which shots to throw (partly to conserve energy, partly to make sure I had max effect). It was good watching the video and hearing the announcer notice that I was being precise with my striking. I heard his corner saying there was 30 seconds left and I didn’t wanna let it go to a 3rd round so I really turned it up. I could also hear the ref urging him to do something so I knew I was close to finishing the fight. Sure enough, with 20 seconds left, I was the winner of the fight. I was tired and sweaty, but thankfully Master Longoria remembered to throw in my shirt. Putting it on was a real pain.

I got away from the fight in fairly good shape. I had a fat lip that was 3 times normal size and a painful elbow (from elbowing him so much) but it was nothing a week of naproxen sodium couldn’t fix. I stayed the night in KC and left Saturday afternoon back to Lincoln. Took a couple days off and then got back to training. Hopefully I’ll have another fight soon.

june 07, 2011 10:34am

A friend of mine inspired this particular blog. She did so by having bad shin splints, something I used to suffer from quite a bit. I used to get shin splints really bad, and although I’d read a few things that were supposed to help, I stumbled onto something that worked perfectly and later learned would it was and why it helped.

As it turned out, the non-smart guy cause of shin splints is that the muscle (which I’d later learn is the Anterior Tibialis -AT) is grossly overmatched by your calf muscle. Where as most muscles groups (bicep/tricep, quad/hamstring etc) are close to the same strength, the muscles in your lower leg aren’t even close. So I began strengthening my AT with a piece of equipment my gym had where you pull your toes toward your shin against resistance (Tyler would later teach me that this is known as a dorsi flex) That strengthened my AT and within a couple weeks, the shin splints were a thing of the past and I’ve never suffered from them again. And you don’t need that piece of equipment to do them. Just put something heavy on your toes and lift it off the ground while keeping your heels on the ground.

Every person I’ve ever talked to that had shin splints and strengthened their AT has had the same results. Another efficient method of doing this is by simply walking on your heels every now and then. You may look silly walking with your toes pulled up, but I’ll do it after a run for about a hundred paces just to make sure that AT gets its work in. So if you’re suffering from shin splints, strengthen that AT and you’ll be happy you did.

january 24, 2011 11:43am

There are few things more valuable for a fighter than to have a quality training partner. In my short and still limited experience as a fighter, I’ve found that a good training partner is second only to a good trainer. I think both are needed if you hope to have any real success in MMA. It doesn’t matter how good of instruction you have if you don’t have someone who can help you push hard and put that instruction into action. A good training partner makes you work hard, keeps you from taking the easy road, and forces you to improve. Few things are more detrimental for a fighter than to always look for the easy sparring partner. The guy that you know you can take. The guy that will stop and slow down because you’re tired. There are times to slow down and analyze things and there are times when it’s more important to put forth hard work and exhaust yourself. A good training partner not only knows when these times are but they don’t let you take the easy way out just because you’re tired.
Of course, you can often find another hard worker to work with. The true value of a training partner is trust. After you work with someone for a while, you develop a trust with them and it helps you not only train harder, but train smarter and safer. When doing standup, you can work slow techniques without the risk of your sparring speeding up to protect his ego or trying to be a practice all-star. When you’re working on submissions, you can trust that your partner will apply steady pressure and not do anything dangerous like crank an arm bar just so he can feel good about himself. There are times when I’ll be rolling and I get my partner in an armbar. I know I’ve got it, he knows I’ve got it, so there is no need to crank on it. I know that he’ll tap before it gets fully locked in, but if I’m confident that I’ve got it, I might simply release it before it’s even straightened. Most importantly, good training partner will put your needs before theirs when you have a fight coming up. They’ll put themselves at risk while sparring you to try to give you a better look at what you’re gonna be going up against.
I consider myself lucky to have 2 good training partners at Longoria’s. Brandon and Grant are 2 of the hardest workers in the gym. They both put forth max effort. I often see the smaller guys lose steam before they do. I’ve heard more than a couple of people complain about as little as a 15 pound weight difference when sparring with someone and yet these two never complain in earnest about the 75 pounds that I have on them. They suck it up and find ways to push me anyways. Sometimes that might mean matching mobility against size and sometimes it means switching between the two of them. They’ve both become such valuable commodities that I often call them by the other’s name, much to their chagrin. The bottom line is, there are a lot of different things you need if you wanna reach your potential. If you don’t have quality training partners, you’ll likely never leave the realm of mediocrity.

december 15, 2010 04:19pm

It’s always a double sided coin on nights when I’m not fighting at an event that Team Capitol Punishment is participating in. The Negative side is that I’m not earning money and getting more experience under my belt. The Positive of course, is that I get to sit back and watch my teammates fight without having to worry about getting myself ready. I inevitably miss a fight or two while back with teammates, but it is nice just being a spectator sometimes.

Tri State Cage fighting select IV was one of those nights. It was a good night for the team. We had 4 wins and 2 losses. Of those wins, one included the knockout of the night. It’s always nice to make a clean sweep, but not always realistic, especially as fighters begin getting more recognition and start fighting harder fights. Over all, it was a good night with entertaining fights and I think TCP came out looking good.

On a personal note, the end of the night was filled with a little bit of ridiculous humor. To no big surprise, there are always a few drunk loud mouths at the fights. I had the misfortune to be seated in front of one. I ignored him until the very end of the night when he finally crossed the line. Of course, me telling him to shut it and show a little respect to the people fighting didn’t go over well with him. Fortunately, it takes two people to fight and I didn’t take the bait. He got escorted out and I continued with my night. It just amazes me, the stupidity of people, and their need to show how tough they are sometimes.

Training continues to go well. The Wright brothers are becoming excellent additions to the team. They’ve got some good Jiu Jitsu knowledge to be shared and taken advantage of. As of now, the tentative plan for me is to fight at TCF February 12th, provided they can find me a quality opponent. My manager, Kirk with Hollowpoint is also already thinking of other possibilities for the future so I’m definitely looking forward to this next year. If I don’t post anything until then, happy holidays to everyone.

december 02, 2010 03:12pm

Well, training is going well. I’m past the set back from the injury. The end result was a minor break in the orbital and I had to get 10 internal stitches and about another 8 on the surface. I spent a week and a half not able to do any training while I waited for my eye to open back up. After that was about 3 weeks of nothing but shadow boxing and pad work. Then I eased into ground work. At first just with teammates I trust and with headgear on and then eventually without the head gear. 8 weeks after the injury, I was back to sparring.

I’ve been back to sparring for a month now and I’ve been getting back into my more normal routine. Weight training is going well. I’m finally getting better about getting in earlier, giving me more time to recover in between weight training and practice. I’ve increased a couple aspects of my training. Getting some more time in working on my standup technique in the morning and added a day to work on the ground game.

One major new development for me is that I’m now being managed by Hollowpoint out of Omaha. I’m really hoping that they will help me move my career to the next step. I’ve always liked Kirk (owner) and I’m looking forward to working with him. Talking to him about this arrangement, I came away with a feeling that He'll be someone I can trust and count on. It should definitely help me wrangle some sponsors and hopefully start finding more diverse and bigger fights. A special thanks goes out to Tanner for helping me get this far. Right now the plan is to fight again in early February here in Lincoln. It’ll be good to get back in the cage.

Until then I’ll just have to watch my teammates tear it up. This month, there are a number of Team Capitol Punishment (TCP) fighters fighting. Dylan and Dane, the Henry brothers are fighting again. Jori Waln is making her debut. Kevin Kmetz is fighting. Carlos Gonzalez is fighting a contender’s match. Another exciting change is the addition of Travis and Tate Wright as new training partners. Travis will be defending his lightweight title this month in Lincoln fighting alongside everyone else. December should be an interesting month.

august 14, 2010 01:16pm

The Month of July was a good one. My birthday was on a Tuesday this year which is my day of rest so I didn’t have any training on my birthday this time around. Training has been fairly routine. I’ve been forcing myself on the ground to fight from bad positions; mounted them on my back, the bottom of side control. It’s certainly helping me feel better and more comfortable on the ground. Every week I feel better, and that’s what it’s all about.

Saturday practices have seen a drop in attendance. I’m not sure if it’s b/c it’s a weekend, b/c it’s summer or because it’s hard work. I’m sure there’s a combination in there since Sunday attendance has dropped a bit too. We have a number of fighters gearing up to fight august 28th for tri state cage fighting. So hopefully, everyone will be ready to go out and represent the school. Tahner Thiem has been supplementing his training with us as he prepares for his pro debut so it’s good to have another fully dedicated fighter in the gym. He’ll be making his pro debut on the 28th as well.

Strength training is going well as always; nothing particularly new to report on that. Tyler continues to feed me with excellent workouts. The toughest thing for me is still trying to find sponsors. Getting people to open their purse strings is not an easy thing, that’s for sure. It’s really more of my managers department, but when you’re starting out, you can’t afford not to stay pro active for yourself. I’m of course looking forward to my fight coming up and to see what the future holds past that.

july 27, 2010 03:42pm

I've become a huge believer in the power of cold showers, Ice baths and Ice packs. I try to always bring an Ice pack with me when training, and I always finish my workouts with either an Ice bath or a cold shower. I remember when I first became a true believer in benefits of cold. I never suspected that Tyler was lying of course, but on a day when my back was aching like no other, that's when I learned just how useful it was.

We were doing a tough lift and after the second set, my back was hurting pretty badly and I couldn't do my third set. While the other guys did their's I grabbed an Ice pack (being used to keep my protein cold for after practice) and put it on my back for about a minute. After that I felt like I could do my third set and indeed I was able to.

More than once since then have I applied ice to a muscle nearing strain and been able to finish my workout. Adversely, I've found that a hot shower on near strained muscles causes them to cramp up and ache even more. Yet, people prefer to heat muscles instead of cool them. I guess it just goes to show the cliche that sometimes what's good for you isn't what is pleasant.

july 11, 2010 07:35pm

The last couple months of training have been interesting. There have been a few negative things, but mostly good things. Taking my first loss sucked a bit, but I’m not too worried about it, there were learning points and I think I’m becoming a better fighter and learning from my mistakes. The sprained ankle that’s been with me for the last 2 ½ months isn’t exactly desirable though. Strength and conditioning training continues to progress. For the first few weeks after my fight, we focused highly on strength, and it certainly helped. Even though the focus has been off of strength for several weeks, I still feel stronger.

I’ve started running Saturday morning practice. It’s become more of an endurance practice. A heavy workload, with sparring at the end after tiring ourselves out. Of course, as would be expected, some put forth more effort than others. Even though it’s a hard workout, it’s largely a self pacing work out. Numbers could be better, but weekend numbers are always pretty low b/c there are always people who don’t want practice to cut into their weekend; which is fine for people who don’t want to fight. Not so much for people who want to compete and represent the school. I would definitely like it if we had some more people my size in for me to train with.

Overall, practice has been going well. I’ve been trying to work a few new techniques into my toolbox as well as occasionally trying new things and taking myself out of my comfort zone. The search for sponsors is still showing more dead ends than I’d like. As of right now, my next fight is likely going to be to defend my title for Tristate Cage fighting August, 28th in Lincoln, NE.

july 08, 2010 10:01am

The brand new 'Justyn Riley MMA Fighter' website is up and running as you can see.
We'll be posting mma videos and photos of some of Justyn's previous fights as well as what the future holds!
Stay tuned and be sure to check out our SPONSORS!