I just got back from Virginia Beach were I spent 2 days working on my Muay Thai Kickboxing skills with Muay Thai Master Kru Jose Villarisco. I loved every minute of it!
It got me thinking about Muay Thai and some of the greats that have come from it. I can name many names but one name popped into my head. Bas Rutten.
When I first started training in MMA back in the early 90’s Bas was just coming into his own. He was fighting for an organization in Japan called “Pancrase”. You see at the time Pancrase was huge in Japan and many of the best MMA fighters of that era came from it. The names Frank and Ken Shamrock might ring a bell for you…
The thing with Pancrase, and a lot of people don’t know this is that in the beginning Pancrase wasn’t even full tilt MMA. You had to strike with an open palm. No closed first strikes to the head at all.
So this is where Bas Rutten comes in. I first saw him on a tape I bought back in 1996. I remembered him because he was knocking people out with open palm strikes! I was like dang this dude is awesome. So I followed him ever since.
I could go on and on but in the end the best thing would be to check out some of his videos below. I happen to think they’re a darn good time and you can learn a thing or two…
