This article was originally titled "Submission From Any Position: Sport Sambo With Gokor Chivichyan" and was published in the February 2008 issue of Black Belt.
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If you don’t know Gokor, you’re not really into grappling.
Disagree all you want, but you can’t dispute the fact that Gokor Chivichyan is the go-to guy for submissions, especially leg locks. He was inducted into the Black Belt Hall of Fame in 1997 as Judo Instructor of the Year, but his curriculum vitae extends so far beyond that art that it’s not even funny. In addition to his ninth-degree black belt in judo, he holds a sixth degree in sambo and a sixth degree in jujutsu. Long before he earned them, he entered his first competition—and went home victorious. That was in 1971, and he hasn’t stopped winning since. The Armenian expatriate now oversees 27 affiliate schools in the United States and 43 in Europe, and organizes 10 Hayastan Grappling Challenge tournaments a year in the United States and seven in Europe.
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| STANDING ARM LOCK: Gokor Chivichyan (right) controls his opponent with a gi grab (1). He then seizes the man’s lapel with his left hand (2), which enables him to use his right arm to encircle the opponent’s left arm (3). Chivichyan angles his right arm upward, forcing the opponent’s left elbow against his rib cage before he feeds the right lapel into his right hand (4). The pressure starts when Chivichyan stands erect and turns his left shoulder away from the opponent. Because the technique can be resisted at various points during its execution, Chivichyan says, it must be completed quickly. |
Before plunging into Gokor’s wacky world of submissions—specifically, sambo submissions, which are the subject of this article—the uniform just has to be addressed. OK, those fabric flaps attached to the shoulders look funky—kind of like the shoulder pads that were all the rage in the fashion of the 1990s—but they’re there for a reason. “The uniform top—called a kurtka—is similar to a judo gi, but it’s designed for grabbing because sambo has a lot of techniques that involve shoulder throws,” Chivichyan says. “When my students go to judo tournaments, they use throws that are not common anywhere outside of Russia. It’s one of the reasons my school is No. 1 in the national rankings.”
As he says, Russia is the birthplace of sambo. Its name is actually an acronym derived from SAMozashchita Bez Oruzhiya (roughly, “fighting without a weapon”), the moniker given to the Russian military fighting system.
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| THROW WITH ARMBAR: Gokor Chivichyan holds his partner’s right arm and left sleeve (1). He then straightens his back to lift the man long enough to reposition himself underneath (2). Next, Chivichyan lowers his center of gravity and pulls the man onto his back (3) before throwing him (4-5). Once he’s down, Chivichyan restricts his movement until he can position his left arm around the man’s right arm (6). With his left thigh against his partner’s back, Chivichyan swings his left leg over his head (7). Grasping his own gi top, Chivichyan straightens his posture to complete the armbar (8). |
“In combat sambo, you can do what you want; you can attack with a knife or anything,” Chivichyan says. “It’s not so much geared toward mixed-martial arts fighting as it is toward blocking, twisting and takedowns—stuff that’s more like Japanese jujutsu.”
Years after combat sambo was rolled out in the Russian military, it spawned a sport. “I think sport sambo is more effective; it’s like grappling,” he says. “It has a very big name in Russia. It’s spreading around the world now—it’s in Japan and most other countries, including the United States.”
Now that MMA is the hot topic in the martial arts world, sport sambo is enjoying its 15 minutes of fame. And for good reason. “In sambo, you plan a lot of combinations so that if one doesn’t go, you have another 20 ready,” Chivichyan says. “You don’t punch somebody and wait to see what happens. You choose a combination based on the opening you see.” If the first move or two don’t take, you have 18 more on deck.
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| SWEEP AND LOCK: Sambo instructor Gokor Chivichyan uses his left hand to hold the opponent’s right sleeve and his right hand to hold his belt (1). He steps back with his left leg and pulls his right arm in tight (2). Next, Chivichyan positions his right leg behind the opponent’s right leg, pushes with his right arm and pulls with his left (3). The action rotates his torso and breaks his balance, sending him to the mat (4). Once he hits the ground, Chivichyan places his right knee on his chest to keep him from escaping (5). The martial artist wraps his right arm around the opponent’s right arm and grabs his own lapel (6). After leveraging the man onto his side, Chivichyan effects the submission by straightening his torso and applying forward pressure with his abdomen, thus hyperextending his elbow (7). |
Although it’s not the most comprehensive system under the sun, sport sambo shouldn’t be described as merely Russian judo or Russian jujutsu. “Sambo has leg locks, but judo doesn’t allow them,” Chivichyan says. “Judo allows chokes, but sambo doesn’t. Sambo rules look more like wrestling rules: Pin your opponent on his back and get one point, and so on. Of course, you can finish him with an armbar or leg lock and make him tap.
The Armenian Assassins
Drop by the Hayastan MMA Academy on 11004 Burbank Boulevard in North Hollywood, California, on any Monday and you’re bound to hear guest-instructor Gene LeBell refer to owner/operator Gokor Chivichyan as the “Armenian Assassin.” The nickname could just as easily apply to the members of an elite group of fighters Chivichyan and LeBell have coached to prominence.
Perhaps the most current is Roman Mitichyan, a contestant on the latest season of The Ultimate Fighter. “He’s very good, but he could be even better if he trained more,” Chivichyan says. “I understand his situation—he’s the only one at home with his mother, and he has to take care of the house, so he has to earn money. Training at this point doesn’t earn him a living, so he has to go to work. I always tell him: ‘You have to train, even if you have nothing coming up. You have to always be ready.’ If he had time and trained hard every day, he’d be one of the best.”
Perhaps the most impressive is Manvel Gamburyan, who went all the way to the finals of TUF, Season 5, during which he fell victim to a self-inflicted shoulder injury. “Manvel came to my place as a young kid,” Chivichyan says. “I did my best to make him a fighter. Like everyone in my school, he started with judo, jujutsu and sambo, wearing a gi. I didn’t put him in grappling right away because I wanted him to have a base and get 100 percent good. I gave him my life and all my experience.”
Gamburyan, whom Chivichyan describes as “a very good fighter with a lot of respect,” is scheduled to return to the UFC in December 2007.
Perhaps the most successful alumnus to come out of Hayastan, and the first to hit the international stage, is Karo Parisyan. He holds a 17-5 record in the MMA and was at one point the top contender for the welterweight title in the UFC.
“I would rather not say much about Karo because he’s not training with me now. He left because he didn’t understand how to keep himself,” Chivichyan says. “He should have been a little more understanding, patient and respectful. I don’t want anybody who doesn’t have respect at my school.
“In my opinion, no matter how good you are, you still need someone. When someone gives his life to you and you give that up, you lose your home and you lose everything. But I told Karo: ‘Good luck to you. Go have fun in your life. I hope you win all the time.’ ”
—SDS
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“In sport sambo, we don’t do twisting leg locks. Straight leg locks and the kneebar are OK, though. The twisting leg locks and everything else you see my guys do come from the Hayastan Fighting System, which Gene LeBell and I created. You can’t use them in sambo or Brazilian-jiu-jitsu tournaments because the people who organize those events want to avoid joint damage.”
It’s not that the leg locks are inherently wicked, Chivichyan explains. “The damage occurs because few people know how to escape from the techniques. Injury comes from being stubborn—stubbornly trying the wrong escape or stubbornly not tapping. That gives our system a bad reputation because they think that twisting is intended to create more damage.”
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| SHORT-ARM-SCISSOR ELBOW LOCK: Gokor Chivichyan (right) and his son Arthur Chivichyan tie up (1). The grappling master underhooks the opponent’s left arm with his right arm and pushes downward with his left hand, forcing his foe to his knees (2). Chivichyan then recruits his left hand to help his right (3). Reverse angle: Once the arm is secured (4), Chivichyan sits, making certain the opponent’s head is locked against his groin (5). To set up the short-arm scissor, he places his right leg across the man’s back (6) and locks his right foot behind his left leg (7). To finish, he locks his hands and squeezes with his legs (8). For maximum effectiveness, Chivichyan ensures that his wrist bone is wedged between the opponent’s upper arm and lower arm. |
Measure the Teacher by His Students
Most martial arts instructors would be thrilled to have three students fight their way to the top of the MMA food chain. What does Gokor Chivichyan think? “Of course, I’m happy for my guys, but when I watch them, I’m more nervous than I was during my own fights,” he says. “Sometimes I go there and yell at them to do this or that, and after the fight’s over, I have no more voice.”
The pack of athletes who’ve benefited from Chivichyan’s knowledge base includes more than Roman Mitichyan, Manvel Gamburyan and Karo Parisyan. “Most of the legends come and train with me,” Chivichyan says. “Frank Shamrock, Don Frye and Dan Severn all trained with me in their prime. Randy Couture comes once in awhile. I’m not concerned that they become students. They come asking for help and to see what they can learn. Most of the time, I help them as much as I can.”
—SDS
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Sport-sambo stylists are by no means limited to straight leg locks. “Sambo has a lot of them—if you train in sambo, you know it’s a leg-lock world,” Chivichyan says. “But we also do upper body. To get the advantage, we go to our opponent’s weakness. If you and I fight and I know you’re well-versed in armbars, chokes and controls, I’ll go to your weakness, which is your legs. It allows for faster finishes.”
Sambo practitioners are also skilled at takedowns, he adds. “In jujutsu, which is a very beautiful sport, they have no takedowns. People throw themselves down without any reason because they want you to fight them on the ground. That happened a lot in MMA, but now when they lie on their backs, they get beat up from the top with punches and elbows. That can happen whenever you drop yourself, which is why we teach students the best ways to take an opponent down and control him.”
No matter which technique or tactic you’re using, speed is of the essence, Chivichyan says. When two professional fighters meet in the ring, things unfold quickly. On the street, however, it’s even faster. “Most of the time in street fights, people don’t know what they’re doing,” he says. “They just hit each other wherever they can. You don’t have time to waste. Either way, it’s very important to be fast.”
About the author: S.D. Seong is a freelance writer and grappler based in Southern California.
Judo in MMA
“At my school, we teach the Hayastan Fighting System, but when my students compete in the Ultimate Fighting Championship, the announcers always say they practice judo,” Gokor Chivichyan laments. “A lot of the techniques my students use are not from judo, but they’re calling them judo. It gives people the wrong impression of what they’re seeing.”
These days, MMA fighters seldom practice just one style. “It’s mixed martial arts; it has nothing to do with judo, sambo, jujutsu or anything,” he says. “Twenty years ago, it was style versus style, but now everything is mixed together. You can’t call an MMA athlete a judo player because he’s an MMA fighter.”
—SDS
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