Barry is informed performance’s mixed martial arts coach. Barry started his coaching career at the age of 24, and in 2003  started his own gym, K.O. Martial Arts. In June 2009, K.O. became a part of Informed Performance gym, offering the best in grappling, mixed martial arts and striking coaching alongside dedicated Strength & Conditioning training. Barry has coached primary and secondary schools, drug awareness programmes, law enforcement and military personnel, public health care workers, as well as staff of firms in the public and private sector . He is a highly sought after coach for private individuals, has recently worked as a commentator for the Cage Contender series of fight shows shown on Setanta Sports and his articles have published on the web and in print.

In addition to his work as MMA coach at Informed Performance, Barry also promotes and organises combat sports events including the popular Fight Before Christmas MMA show and submission wrestling tournaments for adults and children. He claims to spend most of his time “in the gym or in the car going to the gym”. He competes and trains alongside the fighters and grappling competitors at Informed Performance and can most often be found on the mats practising his favourite sport of grappling.

For details on the MMA training available at Informed Performance, fight show sponsorship and promotion or private tuition, you can contact Barry on 085-8320174 or barry@informedperformance.com

About Barry

• Director of Combat Sports with Informed Performance
• Competed at national and international level in Taekwondo
• 2nd degree black belt in Taekwondo
• Competed at amateur and professional level in MMA
• Coach to many succesful Irish MMA fighters
• Blue belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu
• Multiple medalist in national level BJJ and grappling competitions
• Promoter of The Fight Before Christmas, The I.P. Submission Tournaments, The Irish Amateur Combat Championships, The Submission Mini Leagues
• Co-commentator with Cage Contender on Setanta Sports T.V.

This weekend I took a trip to Manchester; home of The Stone Roses, some Arab football team and Coronation Street. I was there to commentate on Cage Contender 6, the first Irish show to have a stab at organising an event in England. More on that later. Luckily for me, I got to take in a seminar with one of the greatest BJJ players on the last decade while I was over there.

Now I don’t want to call people tight, but budgeting for a fight show means that when you fly someone in, you usually bring them in on the cheapest flight available, in this case, the 6.30am flight out of Dublin. So up I got at 4.45am, jumped in the shower, parked the car, took the shuttle bus, drank a bucket of coffee, bought another one (Ryanair didn’t allow me to take it onboard the bastards) and read a few chapters of Chuck Palahniuk’s Pygmy until I got into Manchester.at 7.40. Then it was just a matter of wasting some time in the airport drinking another bucket of coffee before getting on the wrong bus to Manchester (it got me there, it just took me into probably every housing estate on the way) and meeting up with Foxy and Mick, who had both flown over the night before for the seminar. We took in some breakfast at a nice little place without a toilet called The Koffee Pot. I had a lovely Full British Isles breakfast and some coffee, but we felt a little out of place. It seems Saturday was the day of the Gay Pride Festival in Manchester, which meant that we were just about the only 3 lads not dressed up in a costume. One bunch of lads was dressed as British tourists abroad, complete with Speedos, whitewashed skin and sandals with socks. It was not a warm day, I felt for them. Still it was a strange experience being the only straights in the village. I suppose this is what gay men must feel like in public sometimes. But enough about the homo/hetro divide, let’s talk about how I went to a seminar and rolled around with other men.

Cobrinha is one of the last decade’s most decorated grapplers. He’s also exciting to watch and has been a real character on the mats. What I learned on Saturday is also that he’s a really nice guy too. Everything he showed was simple to follow, even when the technique was complicated. To be honest, I wasn’t convinced he would be able to speak English, as a lot of Brazilian guys who give seminars might require a translator or communicate in broken English, but his English is perfect, he may even speak it better than most native speakers I know. We started out with some sittin guard techniques, including a simple movement drill which switched into a nice single leg takedown and a between the legs variation of the same movement. That in turn gave us a method of establishing De la Riva guard if the takedown didn’t work. The De la Riva stuff was the highlight of the day for me. This is a guard I’ve been playing with on and off for the last 8 months or so and which, I think, has been pretty hit and miss in my application. So everyone I meet who plays this guard gets peppered with questions, and no one more so than Cobrinha on Saturday. Between me calling him over to ask how best to get this or that from the De la Riva position, he showed a really simple sweep where you turn the deep hook and catch the far wrist, a strange but effective De la Riva/Butterfly hook “arm switch” series of sweeps, and a roll through variation of the same. We took a break and myself Paul and Mick sat with him for a while having a yap about his plan for a new school in the US, his dog (which isn’t his dog but has become his dog, apparently) and his home life. He’s so relaxed that the seminar host had to tip him on the back to remind him to restart the seminar. We started into some good back control stuff straight away. What was gold dust here for me wasn’t the technique he was showing, but some of the back attacking concepts. I find this is often the case with seminars. You get taught some awesome sweeps or subs but the real genius is in the hidden details of how to finish something or other. Well I got my money’s worth with one seatbelt idea. Last but not least was rolling, and while I tried to get a round with the man, I couldn’t, but I did get to roll with some great guys over there.

And then it was goodbye to Mick and on to Atrincham for Cage Contender. After the high of the last show in Dublin this was always going to be a let- down and it was. Despite a strong card the night never really got going, due in part to the small and quiet crowd. I think this was also my worst commentary job yet, though we tried hard. It was actually very difficult to raise the enthusiasm when the fight was poor and the atmosphere matched it. Every show I do I find myself respecting TV guys more and more. Stuart McQuitty my co-commentator is a real pro, he sort of reminds me of the guy from Father Ted who presented the faux Eurovision. He’s all “oh shit that sounds crap” and then once the camera goes on him he changes totally. He’s good at it and I’m not. I can talk for Ireland about the fights and call the exchanges but when it comes to actually facing the camera, I stumble over my words and I seem to say a totally different thing every take. That being said we’ve done 5 shows now and I’ve felt that we’ve improved on every one except for Saturday, but maybe that’s indicative of the height we’ve raised the bar for ourselves. In any case, the fights are on Saturday night on Setanta so tune in. There are some good scraps and if the Damien Rooney fight gets shown, keep a mental score card for it and see what you think of the result at the end.

After that, it was back to the hotel for a kebab and a cup of tea. One last incident of note occurred mind you. I was wondering why the hotel clerk was giving me this weird smile when I checked into the hotel with Foxy. He was sharing my room as he didn’t fancy staying in the hostel all alone. Well when I opened the door and saw the room was a double and not a twin, I understood.

It was gay pride weekend after all.

So first of all, it’s been a while since I’ve updated the blog. My apologies once again. It seems like I’m always apologising for that but I live for the day that I’m quiet enough in my working life to update this more regularly. Actually, who am I kidding? I love being busy and it’s been extremely busy at the gym of late. Long may it continue. We have 9 new promotions in the gym, my purple belt and 8 new blues. There’s a bit of an edge on the mats right now as a whole bunch of white belts try to take some trophy taps from the newly promoted lads and with all those guys trying to live up to their new status. It’s funny, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu must be the only martial arts where people sort of regret getting promoted- it just paints a target on you!

And that brings me nicely round to why I’ve decided to post tonight. I suppose I’m in a bit of a reflective mood which is rare enough, so here goes my attempt at what I’ve learned so far: the several (I haven’t decided how much I’m going to write yet) lessons I’ve learned from training in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

1. It’s not all about the tap
Yes, I know it’s been said, many times many ways, but it really isn’t. Training is training, and I would say that if you’re just chasing submissions, you might miss out on some other stuff that’s going on that will count against you in competition. Firstly, think about this example. If I always try to tap my opponent from my guard, my sweeps will suffer. If my sweeps suffer, my ability to score points in competition suffers too. Equally if I’m giving away top position for the sake of submissions, well, that could cost me a match. Secondly, if subs are your goal, then the temptation to always give your “A” game will be there. If you always play your A game, you don’t develop a plan B, and you’re less open to new elements creeping into your game. So my lesson is “don’t always chase the tap”. Instead, some nights chase sweeps, some others chase superior positioning, some nights chase a new guard retention technique. In other words, grow your game.

2. It’s all about the tap
Your tap that is. I reckon if I never tapped in training then I wouldn’t have developed even to the meagre level I’m at now. If I’m not tapping to my training partners then I am playing too safe. This is not football. You’re not training to be the best goalkeeper and let nothing in. You’re training to be the complete package so open up your game and try new things. Here’s the second of my corny examples: If I think I’m Captain Wonderful because I didn’t tap though my opponent had me mounted for 5 minutes in training, am I the best defender of submissions in the world or just the worst at escaping mount? Take the same scenario and have me try every mount escape I know against my opponent. What happens? I don’t know, but let’s make something up. Probably I get out of mount a few times, I get stuck in mount a few times and I get submitted a few times. But I’ll take the times I succeeded and try to repeat them, the times I got stuck and try to improve them, and the times I made a mistake and got submitted and try to eradicate them. That’s what training’s for.

3. Training partner’s are important
So 1) don’t hurt them and 2) try to keep them away from women they might marry. Both scenarios keep them off the mats for some time. So maybe you can’t affect the course of romance but you can definitely help to keep your partners healthy. I’ve learned through my own injuries and that of others that my neck, knees and back all require particular attention when I’m rolling- from both people involved. I like to think that I’m experienced enough now to know when I’m creating pressure versus cranking, or holding versus twisting. Hopefully, I keep my partners safe and well and ready to train tomorrow. Can you say the same do you think? It’s not something people are that mindful of. Too often I think people see their training partners as their opponent rather than their team mate. There are several things I do to stop me hurting others. A) I don’t manipulate the neck, or rather when I’m choking I attempt to manipulate the neck as little as possible. Once I think I’m cranking I’ll let go. This is hard to police that’s why I’ve put it first. After all we’ve all choked and been choked by neck-cranky subs. It’s a fact of training but I try to minimise it as much as possible. B) On less experienced people I catch and release footlocks, including, for the most part, the straight ankle lock. Unlike quite a few BJJ players I like foot and leg locks a lot and I go for them quite often. On experienced partners I’ll go to the tap for the most part, and experienced partners know when the time is to tap. With inexperienced partners I’ll catch the foot or leg hold, and then release. C) I put joint submissions on very slowly whenever I catch them. I have two reasons behind this. Firstly, if I jerk his arm in an arm bar or keylock, I may injure him. Secondly, if I can control someone enough to do it slowly, then I have better technique and won’t have to rely on my speed to tap him. This is good, as I have quite literally no speed. OAPs are faster than me so I prize control above all else.

4. You’re not 24 forever

Oh yeah I’m getting older, just like you and everyone else. So before every session I warm up. I don’t jump on the mat and get to it, I take my warm up time seriously. I do everything that old father time and countless soft tissue injuries have taught me to do. I get my body ready for training and whaddya know, I’m able to train more often. I know there’s some younger-than-me folks reading this thinking it doesn’t apply to them but you know what, it does. So warm up, do that prehab stuff the physio gave you. Do the hip things, the back things, the neck things. Yeah sure they’re not cool or sexy but they might just work and they may well equal a few extra months training over the course of the year.
5. Go to seminars
Don’t look at the price just go. I was a little down on the old mojo front earlier in the year and wasn’t too interested in training. Then I got the opportunity to train with Rafa and Guilherme Mendes and I got out of that funk sharpish. Even if you never remember a technique from one of them you can absorb a huge amount of ideas for training, concepts and drills. You also get to see the game at its highest level and more often than not, you get to roll with the guy. Before the year is out I will have rolled with Rafa and Guilherme, Robert Drysdale, Cobrinha (this weekend), and possibly Abmar Barbosa and Joao Assis.
So that’s my list for what it’s worth. If you have anything I’ve missed out on comment away. Maybe there’s a lesson in the comments for me.

Here are the results from the mini league tournament held today. Thanks to all who took part!

Gold
Silver
Bronze

Novice Light Featherweight
Cillian Glynn
Christopher Doody
Christopher Rowlands

Novice featherweight
Dean Fitzsimmons
Kevin Morrison
Dave Reddy

Novice Lightweight
Garreth Chambers
Aleksandr Akimov
Shane Smith

Novice middleweight
Alan Byrne
Peter Ging
Andrius Sykolouskis

Novice heavyweight
Pavel Pzyrgorski
Shane Doyle
Clinton Flood

Novice ultraheavyweight
Paul Walsh
Liam Hennelly

Intermediate Lightfeatherweight
Tom Hogan
Grant Carroll

Intermediate lightweight
Andrius Joconius
Colin English

Intermediate middleweight
Karem Dino
Kieran O’Donnell
Rowan Kelly

Advanced Absolute
Tom King
Clive Staunton
Artur Potrowski

Firstly, my apologies for not updating this blog more regularly. Things have been busy here at the gym and finding a spare half hour to sit down and write hasn’t been easy. I’m not complaining though, the work is fun and the training has been hard. If that means that my blog has to suffer then I’m happy enough with that.

I’m currently in a right funk, so if this comes across as cranky, then you’ll understand that I’ve been training really hard, working a lot, and that right now, I’m pretty tired. So that’s the excuses done with, lets get on with the show. Things that are currently annoying Barry (3rd of June 2010)

1) People on youtube teaching bad technique. Here’s a vid of a man teaching you how to break posture http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ckhxh4NMCwQ What do you notice? well, for one thing THE OTHER GUY DOESN’T HAVE ANY POSTURE TO BREAK. This is such a poor video, and I really hope people don’t try to emulate this poor technique, or the very many others that are out there in the same vein.

2) The following sentence “I don’t need to train in the gi because I want to train MMA”. What? Really? That Damian Maia guy is an idiot. And how about that moron Roger Gracie? When making a decision on anything training related, I weigh up what the worst and best things that could happen are. Here’s my rationale on gi training. The best thing: you improve your game due to its slower nature, the lack of reliance on slipping out of techniques and getting the additional hours on the mat that having gi training provides. The worst: You get another night on the mats that you can use whatever way you choose. Maybe you just lie there and work your bottom game and who knows, you may just improve elsewhere too.

3) People who mail me telling me how dedicated they’re going to be when they join… and then never show up. I’ve never, ever got a mail from someone telling me how dedicated they’re going to be and how much they want to fight and then have them turn up. Here’s a small hint for anyone thinking of becoming a fighter. E-mails mean nothing, good intentions are only worth the paper they’re never printed on and no one is impressed by how hard anyone wants to work. I’m impressed by guys like Anesh. He’d trained a little with me before, walked in 6 weeks ago and told me he’d train as much as we wanted him to, and put his head down. He followed our programming to the letter, attended the training sessions, asked questions and worked hard. The result? 2 fights in a week, 2 wins. Actions speak louder than words.

4) The guy at Chaos last week who nudged me while I was watching a fight that had hit the ground and said “is he going to fight him or f*ck him eh?” What exactly did you think you were coming to watch mate? This isn’t 2005, I’m pretty sure anyone who buys a ticket to an MMA show knows what they’re going to see.

5) The little girl who looked at my leg in the shops yesterday and went “ewwww Mam look”. No further explanation required.