Chaz vs Frank - Mindgames, Prologue One cagewrestler

Prologue I- BattleArts: Mindgames

Chaz had been studying nightly with Jon Randle for 4 weeks prior to his match with Willy. Chaz remembered their first meeting at Randle's Dojo:

The address was in a strip mall, the glass in the front of the building had been frosted over, and other than the number for the mailing address, there were no identifying characteristics at all. When Chaz pushed to open the door, he found it locked. There was a buzzer button beside the door, so he used it. No response. He pushed again and waited--still nothing. Chaz was getting pissed. He had called ahead, and Randle had told him to come over at 9 am that Saturday morning. Getting ANYWHERE by 9 am on a Saturday was a challenge to Chaz, and now this asshole wasn't answering the door. Chaz started pounding furiously on the door.

Suddenly, the door flew open, and Chaz was grabbed in a front chancery, suplexed, and found himself in a seated position his arms locked and pulled back toward his shoulder blades while at the same time his head was being forced down by his assailant. Chaz screamed out in pain, "Shit, stop, I give up!" Chaz was released, and a looking at a Brazilian kid even smaller than he was. "What the hell was that about?"

From behind Chaz came a quiet voice: "Lesson one-Keep control of yourself, while frustrating your opponent into rash actions. Lesson two - a properly applied submission from any sized fighter is quite effective."

"Yeh," thought Chaz, " I see his point-this little dude can't be more than 90 pounds, but he sure as shit hurt me."

"Thanks for staying and giving the demonstration Mario, when you finish the dojo chores you can head back to the house." With that, Randle dismissed his pupil and turned toward Chaz. "You must be Chaz, my name is Jon Randle." He extended his hand and with the handshake pulled Chaz up off the mat. Chaz looked around. The entire room was matted with two walls mirrored. Randle was a shock: He stood only five feet, two inches tall, and weighed 119 pounds. On the other hand, Chaz could see on the third wall several framed photographs of a younger Jon Randle in both singlet and gi, arms raised in victory and gold medals hanging from his neck. "I understand you're part of the Teen Wrestling League, but at a bit of a disadvantage because of your size. If you want to learn about grappling and fighting, and how to use mind and body, I'm willing to take you on as a special project. I don't normally take students. The young man who gave you your initial demonstration is the son of one of my Brazilian friends that I cross train with. He's spending some time this summer in the states, and I'm training him in traditional amateur wrestling. Other than that, I only do contract training for law enforcement agencies and the military. So you've got one shot - one fuckup - one missed session, and you're out of here. Understood?"

Chaz dropped his eyes and nodded his head. He was a little scared - not of physical pain, but of not being able to measure up to Randle's expectations. From everything Chaz had taken in from his first five minutes, he knew that this man was the real deal. Randle gave him a playful slap on the back of the head: ' Hold on, don't lose the attitude, just give me some focus. I'm going to turn you into a lean mean fighting machine, but even more important, I'm going to turn your mind into your most powerful weapon!"

The training was on a daily basis, thanks to the summer months. Chaz was surprised that there weren't that many physical workouts, but lots of fight video study. The physical side was simple - they worked on a single defensive move / style on one day, an offensive style/submission maneuver the next, only one per day. Every fourth day, all moves were reviewed and practiced. As Ron had said, "You're not training for a black belt of formal rules competition, you're training for NHB grappling." Ron mixed in a combination of traditional wrestling maneuvers with Brazilian jujitsu along with several other fighting styles. From the videos Chaz saw smaller men forcing larger opponents into submission, but a fair share of the smaller guys got beat. Jon tried to make him understand how the results of each bout came about, and pretty soon, Chaz was understanding the mental aspect. He was blown away by the brutality of some of the Brazilian Vale Tudo style matches, but even more amazed the day Ron put in one of his matches against a six foot, 205 pound totally ripped undefeated Brazilian fighter.

"This is going to be a very important lesson-watch this match closely. Very few people here in the states see these styles of matches much less participate in them. Not too many people see my match videos from Brazil, I have a friend ringside who tapes for me so I can get a good angle."

The tape showed the Brazilian fighter entering the ring to the cheers of the Sao Paulo crowd, he was already sweating and wore skimpy tight trunks that showed off his muscular body. Jon entered the ring in similar trunks. His body was lean, ripped and muscular, but not the bulging muscles of his opponent - plus, when the two fighters met center ring for the instructions, Jon's eyes literally were staring into his opponent's chest.

"Lesson one from this match: never look up. Your opponent might have the higher ground, but don't admit it to him at the start. You'll have plenty of time to look him in the eye when you are on the mat."

Chaz was expecting Jon to show him a decisive demonstration of how a skilled smaller man can quickly submit a larger opponent, instead, he watched as the Brazilian punched and punished Jon, battering him around the ring, working him over in corner after corner, until they finally went down in the center of the ring, Jon in the bottom guard position. Guard or not, Jon was getting pounded.

"Lesson two: when you take on bigger guys, you will get pounded, make no mistake about it. If you can't take pain, you're in the wrong game. Now look at how he's able to maneuver and get in some shots even though he is in my guard--see how he slips away and I have trouble getting a grip? It's an old trick down there. These guys literally will rub a bottle of baby oil into their skin for three days before a match, and let it dry into the skin. The ref can dry them off with a towel before the match but once the sweat starts flowing, the oil comes out of the pores."

The match went on and on, the Brazilian remained on top. He managed to get his arms around Jon's chest, and would arc up pulling Jon off the mat and pounding him down. Jon looked expressionless (maybe he was in a coma), but his arms started to go limp and fall out toward the mat instead of staying wrapped around his opponent's neck. The Brazilian was now able to get separation and move from Jon's guard into a full mount.

"Look's like I'm dead, doesn't it. Either the slams aren't hurting me, or I'm out of it, and when the arms went limp I was done, right? Lesson three: Train your eyes. Your eyes are the picture window to your soul, but if you can learn to show pain when there really isn't any, or no pain when there is, you confuse your opponent."

As the Brazilian's arm shot down to deliver the finishing blow, Jon seemed to explode, he grabbed the arm and in a quick twist was out from under his opponent and had the arm fully locked and extended. The Brazilian tapped out like mad.

"Life Lesson: If you can endure the pain and hang in there, sooner or later an opportunity will present itself." Jon turned off the video.

Chaz whistled and grinned: "Wow! you were playing possum all that time, and zap, had him screaming for mercy!"

"Wrong, kiddo! He beat the shit out of me. I was in a Sao Paulo hospital for three days before they would release me to fly home, and it took eight weeks of rehab before I could start sparring again. It comes down to how much you want something. Mental toughness. The pain is there, but you can overcome the pain with the brain."

Chaz laughed. "Overcome the pain with the brain. I should add that to the rap I'm working on!"

Jon smiled, "You do that, but now let's take a look at this video."

Chaz expression changed immediately. He was watching a replay of his devastating loss to Martin. He got up to walk away.

"SIT DOWN-NOW!" Jon had never been that stern with him. "If you don't study your mistakes, you're only going to repeat them. I want you to look at yourself, look at the pain on your face and in your eyes. Martin knew he had you beat when your first moves didn't work, you showed it. We are going to do a little work on pain tolerance and mind games."

Just remember: "When it doesn't hurt that much, let em think you're dying, and when it does, stoneface em - Mindgames, they will screw your opponent everytime."