Gawakoto Competition

Rules:
1. 'like' this link in the Gawakoto facebook page
2. answer the quiz
3. PM your answers or email it to bongabad@hotmail.com

Simples.

the quiz:
1. Spot 2 or more mistakes/differences in the Scrambleman® strip in 'Fighters Only' Magazine.
2. What UFC event will the 'Bone Crusher' tee will (hopefully) be debuting? Who will be wearing it?
3. Who won the 2011 ADCC Absolute?
...and now the geeky bit :)
4. Which superhero is Lana & Lois involved with?
5. Who broke Batman's back?

again, simples :)

Contest ends on 15th, October


prizes:
3 winners will be randomly picked from the entries. each will receive a 'Sweep' tee and a sketch of their choice (and my discretion, i'm kinda busy with commissions and my day job. So i can't spend too much time doodling every single bolt on a 'Transformer'. Get it? :) ).

Scramble & Gawakoto

I have only been doing BJJ for less than a year. My martial arts school offered a lesson or seminar here and there, but I never really embraced it. I have always been a stand-up 'fighter', technically speaking, and the ground game never really appealed to me… Until I attended a seminar by Guro David Onuma. I had the chance to spar (actually, ‘spar’ is an understatement. It was more of a 'beating') with Guro David. I was blown away with how he moved effortlessly and gracefully while I tried very hard not to get caught with fancy submissions. I failed miserably. To cut a long story short, I got hooked and started my journey in the world of Brazilian Jiujitsu.

To show my love for Jiujitsu, I started to look for some shirts. That’s when I stumbled upon the awesome BJJ/MMA brand, Scramble. I saw one of the coolest and freshest designs on an MMA shirt : the Manto-Scramble collab shirt. It took a while before I eventually got my Manto-Scramble tee. While I was waiting for it to arrive, I purchased a few more tees from Scramble directly. I also got one of its owners to become a ‘friend’ on Facebook.

I don't exactly recall much about emailing Scramble for a collaboration. But I do remember thinking, if Scramble did it with Manto, maybe I can do it too. So I sent Matt (Scramble's Big Boss) an email -- something like 'great design maybe we can collaborate sometime' and linked my on-line sketches on Facebook. I didn't expect a response really, until about 2 weeks later, I got an email back with the news I had hoped for!

Eventually, the collaboration did happen. Now I've worked on a few tees with them and even created “Scrambleman” (a comic book-inspired Jiujitsu ‘superhero’). Needless to say, I am over the moon with how it turned out; not only because of the opportunity Scramble has given me, but the experience has also opened other doors, so to speak. (Kudos to Meerkatsu for the profile he did in his famous blog, more about Meerkatsu soon).

I personally think that Scramble is one clothing brand that will rival the big names in the fightwear industry. With Budovideos added to their list of distributors, Scramble is going to be big. And I'm so proud to be a (tiny) part of it.

www.scramblestuff.com
www.facebook.com/scramblers
www.facebook.com/scrambleman

BJJ training in the Philippines

While I was on holiday in my home country of Philippines I managed to squeeze in a few training sessions of BJJ. I never thought that BJJ would that popular in the Philippines and they were actually a few clubs around Metro Manila. I managed to find New Breed Jiujitsu ( thru my sister-in-law) in Rockwell, Makati City. So I trained with these guys for a couple of hours at 0630 in the morning for a few sessions during my stay. The early start almost put me off, but as soon as i rolled with these guys. It was all worth it, waking up at 530 in the morning.

This group is a competition team so there approach to training is slightly different to what i was accustomed to. But they were very supportive and gave a lot of advice to improve my game. Well what do you expect when you're rolling with a Pan-Asian absolute champion (blue belt)?

With only a few sessions with them, i feel that i've learned a lot and i hope to apply them to my game.

So if any of you are planning to go to the Philippines. Check them out.Osss!

Big things from Gawakoto

Just agreed to do a line of t-shirts for an ultra-cool BJJ/MMA clothing company. This company has been bringing out some cleverly designed fight gears and i'm so excited to be a part of their new line of products.

Maybe in the next few months if not weeks, we'll be seeing some products of this collaboration.

So please support this project and Gawakoto's other projects in the future.

Thanks

Gawakoto's Tokon Academy rashguard

First project for mma/bjj line of clothing is Tokon Academy's club rashguard.