Interview by Seymour Yang photographs by Gussie for kombat news !
Introduction
At 26 years of age, Michael Russell is currently the youngest British BJJ black belt. Since beginning his training in 2004 he has shot from beginner to black belt in just under six years. Whilst he is often cited as one of the most talented young grapplers in the country, and is known for his innovative and inventive techniques, Michael’s journey has not gone without incident or drama. Michael took time out from his
busy teaching schedule to talk to Seymour Yang and Gussie.
KC: Hi Michael, thanks very much for your time, let’s open up with just a brief bit about you, your age, when and where you first began BJJ etc?
Michael Russell: Thanks for the opportunity to do the interview. I’m 26, I started training BJJ in 2004. I trained with Marc Walder in Dagenham Essex, I trained there for three and a half years where I went from white belt to purple belt.
When I started training it changed my life. From the day I walked in I absolutely loved it. I think a lot of that was down to Marc, I really connected with him and I looked up to him a lot. Maybe if I’d started BJJ and not bonded with the teacher as much or not liked the atmosphere of the club I may not have stuck with it, but because of him I really got the bug for jiu-jitsu and I just lost interest in a lot of other things at the time.
I was so hooked that I actually gave up my job because I didn’t want anything to interfere with my training. I went from having a bit of money to having nothing. A lot of the time I didn’t even have the money to pay for training. I’d do short term little jobs just to get any little bit of money together, I’d pay Marc what I could, but he’d never ask for it.
BJJ started to take over my life – I was really, really obsessing about it. When it was at its worst I’d be really upset if things didn’t go my way, like about not being able to pass the guard or whatever. It wasn’t good, it definitely wasn’t healthy, the obsession I had, but I think that’s why I progressed so fast. I’d go home after training and write everything down. I couldn’t sleep because I was always thinking about it, then when I woke up in the morning all I could think about was jiu-jitsu.
My dad was always on my case telling me to give it up. He could see I was getting obsessed with it. He couldn’t see how I could ever make a living out of it. We had a lot of arguments about it.
KC: You recently got promoted to black belt…well done!!!! Are you now the youngest British born BJJ black belt?
MR: Apparently so! Obviously it’s not going to last forever, but at least I’ll be able to say that when I got promoted, at the time, I was the youngest. There are some good young guys coming up. Actually I feel like maybe I could have got there a bit quicker but my journey was disrupted because I changed schools a few times. When I was 20 I wanted to be a black belt by the time I was 25, I didn’t quite make it.
KC: Tell me about your affiliation with Zaid Mirza BJJ Team. How come you hooked up with them over in Jordan?
MR: The link came through Graham Boylan. He is the founder of MMA Clinic and my business partner in the Romford gym. He has a lot of business contacts in that part of the world and BJJ, grappling and MMA are really big out there. Graham was going out there to talk business abou
t MMA shows and things. He made contact with Zaid who’s got a big jiu-jitsu school in Jordan and I ended up going to train with him. It wasn’t a situation where I was just going to go over there and they’d give me the belt, they really put me through it for the entire week. They got me to sparring with their toughest guys – spar after spar after spar, really working me. I didn’t really have a clue they’d give it to me, I thought I’d have to go back there two, three, four times, but at least I had a route to eventually grade to black belt. They surprised me really; after I’d been training with them for a week they pulled me to one side and said, “we don’t think you should be a brown belt”. I guess they felt I was ready so they promoted me.
I’m in constant touch with them by e-mail and I’m going over there again next month. I’ll be training there before any big competitions; they’re my team now!
KC: You previously trained under Felipe de Souza, and I see you’re still pals with a lot of the guys there – why did you decide to pursue your own path away from BJJ School?
MR: When I left Marc’s I went to Roger Gracie Academy and the guy who I really looked up to there and with who I really clicked with was Felipe. When he left RGA I went with him. It was a fantastic two years, great training, he improved me a lot, I went there as a good purple belt and when I left I felt my game had improved massively. Marc was my first teacher and Marc gave me the base but Felipe’s such great coach, he taught me a lot, fine-tuned my game, corrected a lot of the mistakes I was making. He basically got me doing a lot of things that I hadn’t seen before, that I still use today.
I’m still friends with a lot of the guys there, I miss them a lot, I used to train there all the time. I didn’t really want to leave; I just got to a stage where I had to take another route. The MMA Clinic thing came up and I had my own gym in Romford. We parted for business reasons really; Felipe and I eventually both decided that it was better if we just went our own ways. From a business point of view I think it’s worked out a lot better for me. I definitely miss his training, his influence on me, he’s the guy who I wish I could turn to sometimes to ask him technical questions or ask his advice.
KC: So things are all good with BJJ School and Felipe?
MR: Felipe and I, we don’t, you know, hang out together, but we see each other at tournaments, shake hands, talk. We still respect each other. Obviously I’m grateful for what he did for me. It’s definitely something that’s deep that relationship with your teacher. When you’re really attached to your teacher and you respect them a lot that’s definitely the most difficult thing when you have to leave. Both times when I have left clubs, it wasn’t so much due to the technical side of it, or the relationship with the other students, though that’s important, it was that respect you have for your teacher as a person that makes it so difficult. With Marc though, that was the tougher one, I went from idolising the guy one day, to the next not even talking to him. It was really hard.
KC: What are your tournament highlights, both domestically and at the big (IBJJF) events?
MR: Hard question to answer. Winning the SENI at blue belt, that was a big thing for me, I won the Gi and the no Gi divisions. I had nine fights and nine wins all by submission. It was a big achievement and something I like to look back on. The other one that really stands out for me was the 2007 Bristol Open at purple belt because all the best purple belts at my weight at that time were there; Walid Tadjouri, Cesar Lima, Andy Roberts, Tom Barlow and I ended up winning the division. That was a big achievement because I hadn’t had my purple belt for long and I had some really hard fights that day against tough guys, really good guys. So yeah, winning that tournament is one of the ones that I’m proudest about domestically.
Internationally I think I’ve done well, but not as well as I could have done, I won five fights in the Worlds one year, I won four another year. I came second at the Europeans not long after I’d got my purple belt. I went there not expecting to do too much and ended up just losing on points in the final.
The domestic competitions are nice but you get to the point where you want something bigger. I don’t feel like I’ve achieved anything like what I want to achieve, I’m not done yet.
KC: A lot of people still talk about your Kent Open fight with Roger Gracie Academy’s Andy Roberts. I think a lot of people, myself included, would love to see you continue your on-the-mat rivalry with him. I know he’s up for it, once he gets his black belt. Tell me about that match?
Michael Russell x Andy Roberts: Kent Open
MR: THAT match! It was fun, a really fun match. I suppose there was a bit of a rivalry simply because we were two of the top guys at that weight in the country. We fought at blue, we fought at purple and that was our match at brown. I’m sure we’ll fight at black belt. About that match: I finished it nicely I suppose but the way I look at it I made too many mistakes. When I swept him over my head at the beginning I stood up, he sweeps me back, and that was a mistake. I get mount, I should have finished the fight, which was a mistake. I get his back; I should have finished the fight, another mistake. People talk about the things I pulled off in that fight but really I shouldn’t have had the opportunity, it should already have been over.
Andy’s a very, very tough competitor. I’ve not only fought him in competitions but I’ve trained with him at RGA. He’s very difficult to put away, his defence is very good, even if I can get the positions on him he’s very difficult to finish off because he never gives up. It’s never going to be an easy fight with Andy. He’s always going to be there and particularly after that Kent match his motivation is going to be high. If he wants to I’m happy to do it again! It’s fun – jiu-jitsu is fun!
Competitions are fun, it’s not always fun to lose but I read your most recent set of interviews with Andy and what he said; he said he also enjoyed that match as well and I know people like to watch it. We haven’t fought no Gi yet so maybe we could do that?
KC: Okay, tell me about your academy – it was called the New State Academy – what happened?
MR: Well, New State Academy is no more, we’re MMA Clinic now. I started teaching in 2007 and really it’s a lot of the same team with the same guys from back then. We had no name in the beginning, at first we were BJJ School Essex then we were New State Academy. I was running my academy and also teaching at MMA Clinic in Islington. After talking to Graham, the owner of MMA Clinic, one day we decided to join forces. We turned the gym in Romford into an MMA Clinic, there was a lot of investment put into the gym, it doubled in size, we took over another floor of the building, put in showers, boxing ring, 15 punch bags, massive cage, shop, lots of facilities. MMA Clinic is a name to watch, there’s the gym in Islington there’s one in Cork City, there’s the Boxing Clinic in Covent Garden the guys behind it are very professional, very ambitious.
KC: What are the pros and cons to running your own academy?
MR: I love teaching jiu-jitsu, but there are lots of aspects to running an academy that are no fun, a lot of administration, advertising, dealing with landlords and cleaning the gym. When it was just my academy I’d be teaching classes till ten but I wasn’t getting out of there until after midnight some nights. I was there seven days a week and it was killing me.
With the current arrangement, I no longer have a hundred percent ownership of the gym any more but I’d rather have a share of a massive gym than a hundred percent of a small one and all the stress and aggro that goes with that. Plus it’s a lot better for the students because we can offer them better value with the different types of training. My job is to teach jiu-jitsu, but MMA, Muay Thai and boxing are just as big now in the gym. We’ve got better facilities and we’ve put in place a price structure that is a lot fairer for the students. We’ve now got over a hundred students. We’ve got some really good guys on the jiu-jitsu team now: three brown belts, six or seven purple belts. There are some good fighters coming through and lots of teenagers coming up.
KC: What are your plans for the coming year competition wise? I hear something might be on the cards regarding a super fight with JT Torres?
MR: I’ve fought him before, a while ago, we’ve both developed a lot since then, but when we fought it was very, very close. I lost by only the smallest of margins. It’s definitely a rematch I want! If someone wants to set it up then fine by me!
KC: I saw you compete at SENI this year. What happened in your match with Dimitri Assis? A lot of people expected you to breeze through but it was tough and there was immense forum chatter about the tactics of stalling or him playing negative BJJ or whatever…what are your thoughts on that match?
MR: I can’t complain, he won and I lost. I watched the fight back and I saw that I’d made some stupid mistakes. I gave away some points and he played the game, once he was ahead he shut up shop. That’s what I don’t like about competition jiu-jitsu, when I go into a match I’m there to sub my opponent I don’t care too much about the points, I know that’s probably not the right approach but that’s just the way I am. Even if there’s thirty seconds of a match to go and I’m way ahead on points I’m still going to be trying to tap you out. I’m mounting to get the choke or to get the arm bar, I’m not mounting for the four points. Once he had the points his whole focus was just to hold on to them and for me that’s not jiu-jitsu. It’s hard to accept when you lose like that because it’s not the jiu-jitsu you want to do and it’s not the jiu-jitsu people want to watch, but that’s competition jiu-jitsu. I don’t want to sound bitter, I’m over it now and as far as the forum stuff goes, it’s not me that’s writing it.
KC: Going back to your academy, what is your teaching philosophy? I mean are you trying to build a comp team or do you have wider goals concerning your school?
MR: I’m not really trying to build a competition team, I’m just trying to build good rounded jiu-jitsu guys and I want them to be comfortable everywhere. The approach is not always to get the top position and choke the guy, that’s not my game, we’re playing everywhere. Even if you’re twenty stone you’re going to learn to work off your back, even if you’re nine stone you’re going to work on takedowns, you’re going to work on everything. I’ve been training a lot of Judo because I felt that was part of my game that was lacking, I’d always go to my guard because I was comfortable there, but for my students I want them to train everything, I want them to be as complete as possible.
I know I should maybe push the students to compete a bit more. If a competition’s coming up I’ll put something up on the wall of the academy but I’m not going to push people to do it, there’s no stress. I know from competing myself some people like to do it but it’s not for everyone. I’m sure there are some of my students who will do well in competitions and make a name for themselves but I’m not going to force people. More than anything I want them to enjoy themselves – and they do! You can see it on their faces, they love it! That’s very satisfying. I don’t want them coming to class fearing anything, I don’t go in for a military style warm up, a warm up is just that, 10 minutes and then we’re off.
KC: Is it true you coined the term ‘biff’. Can you explain what a biff is?
MR: [laughter] Actually that was Luc Lamude I think who came up with that, it wasn’t me but it was definitely our group from Marc Walder’s gym back in the day. It came from Biff, the bully character in Back to the Future. It’s when you get a guy who’s trying to use all his strength to cover up for a lack of technique, choking you across the chin, the sort of guy that slams and forces things on. It just seems to sum it up ‘biff’. When I went to America with Tom Barlow and Darren Yeoman they caught onto me saying it and later they text to say everyone in their gym was using it there. I took it to BJJ School. So no, I didn’t coin it, but I’ve certainly done my bit to spread it through the BJJ community.
KC: A lot of people say that you seem to almost ‘make-up’ techniques – where do you get your innovative style?
MR: I do make up techniques, my jiu-jitsu is probably a bit weird, most of the things I come up with I drill them in the gym find out which of them could work for me and which of them won’t. The way I look at it is that if you find something that nobody else does it’s going to be a big advantage, everyone knows a scissor sweep or a cross choke, but if you do something that isn’t the norm then people aren’t going to be expecting it. I’d rather have fun on the mat, if you don’t try things you’re not going to know if it works or not, you’re never going to enjoy your jiu-jitsu as much as you could if you don’t take a chance. Even if it were in a competition I’d rather take a chance, even risk losing the match, rather than sit there for five minutes and hold the guy down.
KC: Who in the world of BJJ do you admire?
MR: I admire lots of people in BJJ for different reasons. But in terms of style and favourite fighters I like Braulio a lot, he has that tall, kind of long body type similar to mine, I like the same kind of guard game and moves that he uses. Also I always liked Jacare and Niño Schembri. In this country I really admire Kevin Chan. He has a fantastic game, I’ve been lucky enough to spend time training with him and he is very, very good! He stands out. I admire him a lot.
KC: You zipped through your grades in a very short space of time, clearly you are one of those enviable guys who is super talented at BJJ. What would you say to those who might suggest you’ve been promoted too fast, I mean there are guys who slog away and train just as hard but maybe won’t see a black belt short of ten years?
MR: I did get my belts 
quite quick, but I felt ready for all of them at the time when I got them, maybe except the blue. I got my blue belt after six months, I was a three stripe white belt and I really wasn’t expecting it. That was the one belt I felt was a bit early. By the time I got my purple belt I was submitting all the other blue belts at competition very quickly but Marc really held me back. I was definitely ready, he gave it to me at the right time, as soon as I got my purple I was going out winning purple belt divisions. Same as the brown, when I left Marc’s I’d already won the SENI at purple; I went to Roger Gracie for six months. I went to Felipe’s I won the SENI again at purple and trained with him for probably six months before I got my brown I felt at the time that I was ready.
I think also the reason that I progressed quickly wasn’t that I was super talented, it wasn’t that at all. I had maybe natural athleticism and natural flexibility. It came down to two things; firstly I lived jiu-jitsu, I absolutely lived and breathed it. If you obsess about anything that much whether it’s healthy or not you’re going to get good at it. Secondly I had fantastic teachers, great coaches. I was very lucky that Marc was the perfect coach for me, for that foundation level jiu-jitsu he’s going to give you a grounding that you’re not going to get at most places. Not only technically great but mentally the way he handled me when I was young, the way he brought me through the ranks. I think also I was very fortunate to train with Felipe; they’re the two guys that built me really.
KC: How can a person, who turns up at your gym, who is not athletic, not very sporty, maybe wants to get fit etc how do you reach out to a guy like him?
MR: I’ve got loads of those guys! Firstly they’ve got to enjoy the class and enjoy jiu-jitsu, that’s my job to make it enjoyable, to make sure the atmosphere is good so they want to come to class. Another thing is I’m really careful how I pair people up, they’re not going to get beaten up, that might be the mentality at some places, it’s supposed to toughen their guys up, but that’s not our way. They’ve got to want to come training, out of shape or not they’re part of the team and I try to help them to achieve their goals, whether to lose weight, get fit and compete or whatever.
KC: Michael thanks very much for your time…is there anything you would like to add, maybe a shout out to the people you want to mention (sponsors, supporters, team, etc)?
MR: Firstly, thanks to Marc Walder for everything he did for me, Felipe de Souza for being a fantastic coach. Jude Samuel for all his help as well. Adam Edwards, Tony Mckee, for being great training partners and friends since the start. Kim Barti – thanks for all your help and advice. Graham, Paul and the MMA Clinic guys and my students at both gyms. To Andy at Evolution Fightwear for his sponsorship. Thanks to my friend Simon (itchytriggafinga) for always believing in me and being my biggest fan. To Zaid and the guys at Team Mirza – thank you. To my training partners past and present. Lastly to my Dad for everything.
Thanks.
Notes and further reading:
Michael Russell teaches grappling and BJJ at the MMAClinic in London at two locations: Angel Islington and Romford Essex. Classes are available six days a week.
Seymour Yang is a BJJ journalist,
