What is pankration like?

[Nick]

Is it pure grappling or what?

Later...

[platinum_angel]

i was wondering the same thing

[DRLashambe]

Pankration is a mix of striking and grappling. Because pankration (or pancration, both spellings are used) was a dead art that is currently being recreated, anyone teaching it is probably bringing in techniques from other arts to form a kind of hybrid. Ancient evidence of pankration does talk a lot about the wrestling and submission holds of pankration, but there is a lot of evidence regarding matches where the loser was struck and killed.

In our version of pankration (and from what I've seen at tournaments), the best way to describe it is a mix of muay thai stand-up, judo/wrestling throws, and brazillian jiu-jitsu ground work. This is not to say that it is simply the three or four arts combined, however, as putting them togethor changes each.

Striking is more tentative when your opponent can throw you, throws are dangerous when your opponent can knee you to defend himself, and fancy brazillian jiu-jitsu moves are often abandoned when someone is hitting you in the head or ribs.

Short answer: it's not just grappling. I've seen lots of matches won because of good stand-up.

[MrPoopy]

What's so fancy about BJJ?

People so often call BJJ extravagant and claim that it's just a lot of fancy names. Usually people that haven't studied it.

[Szczepankiewicz]

fancy brazillian jiu-jitsu

I am reluctantly forced to agree with Mr. Poop Stain here. Of all that I have read, studied, or trained, BJJ has very little fluff or 'fancy' moves.

[MrPoopy]

Soon, you there will be no reluctance, and you will succumb to me.

[DRLashambe]

In every fight style, and I believe that BJJ is no exception here, there are moves that are designed for "duelling." By this I mean moves that are only meant to counter or outwit those with the same kind of training as you. BJJ, like most other arts, contains some of these moves. Gracie Jiu-Jitsu was designed to be simple and easy to learn: and it is. That having been said, it contains moves (like an oma plata, for example) that go by the wayside when someone is raining strikes down on you. Watch the UFC, chokes and armbars, maintaining position are the important things. My original point, which I still stand by, is that the number of grappling moves you will use in a pankration fight is much smaller than the number you would use in a grappling fight.