Left to right: Icy Mike, Sensei Seth, Rokas Leo, Ramsey Dewey, Matt Clinton, Jeff Chan
The Ultimate Self-Defense Championship is a web series pitting six martial arts youtubers against each other in a friendly competition of self-defense challenges. The series was created by Rokas Leonavičius and hosted on his youtube channel, Martial Arts Journey.
The youtubers would participate in 7 high-intensity challenges and be scored by judges that award them points. Season 1 has concluded, and a Season 2 is currently in the works after a successful crowdfunding campaign.
Season One Contestants
- Icy Mike (hard2hurt) - Kickboxing
- Jeff Chan (MMA Shredded) - MMA
- Sensei Seth (Sensei Seth) - Karate
- Rokas Leo (Martial Arts Journey) - Aikido and MMA
- Ramsey Dewey (Ramsey Dewey) - MMA
- Matt Clinton (Reality Check Self Defense) - Muay Thai
This web video series provides examples of:
- Awesome, but Impractical: Surprisingly, on the rare occasions a flashy technique is used, it ends up being fairly effective. Some notable examples are Mike kicking the knife out of an attacker's hand, as well as him pulling off a flying side kick on a particularly large goon.
- The Big Guy: Sensei Seth, at 6 feet/183 cm and 235 pounds/107 kg, proved to be a particularly strong competitor, successfully using his weight and Sumo training to score wins throughout Season 1.
- Blood Knight: Jeff Chan gives off shades of this in the special Z-Day episode. When expected to sneak past blind zombies, he noisily sprints past them instead. He runs around killing every zombie he so much as glimpses.
- Boring, but Practical: Throughout the series, all competitors used substantial amounts of grappling in their fights to great success. Jeff Chan in particular found great success in simply shooting for a double-leg takedown, achieving top position, and punching from there.
- Combat Pragmatist: Matt Clinton manipulates the head and face of opponents and throws groin shots, and even runs away from a fight in The Circle Drill, which nets him a point since this is a self-defense championship, not a fighting tournament.
- Extra (metaphorical) points for Icy Mike throwing knees while upside down on a moving bus.
- Confession Cam: The series frequently cuts to the contestants recalling their thoughts and actions during the competition.
- David Versus Goliath: Due to the lack of weight classes, it happens frequently.
- Just about every fight Icy Mike had was this, given his small size. It ends up being a consistent disadvantage for him, though one that he bridges well.
- In The Finale, we were given a fight between Icy Mike (smallest competitor) and Sensei Seth (biggest competitor). It went to a draw.
- The final match itself was one, between professional MMA fighter Jeff Chan (the David) and Karate black belt Sensei Seth (the Goliath). Jeff Chan won with an armbar.
- Dented Iron: Ramsey Dewey, on top of being the oldest competitor at 44, was just recovering from a severe bout of COVID-19 that seriously affected his strength and stamina. Despite this, he never once brings it up as an excuse and still does fairly well in each situation.
- Finger Poke of Doom: Matt's "Theoretical Kicks" to the air above his knife-wielding opponent on a ladder manages to keep them back for a decent while.
- Hit-and-Run Tactics: Jeff Chan uses these to keep himself safe during the two versus one fight in The Circle Drill
- Hope Spot: In Hide and Go Stab, Icy Mike, Sensei Seth, and Ramsey Dewey all escape the facility only to be 'killed' just before reaching the safety point.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: Matt Clinton climbs higher and higher up the amphitheater in Hide and Go Stab to escape his knife-wielding pursuers before giving up at the top to avoid any of them falling to their deaths off the precarious catwalks.
- Large Ham: Matt notes that Mike is just as loud in-person as in his videos. His mannerisms especially during Z-Day earned him much popularity amongst the fans.
- Lightning Bruiser: Professional MMA fighter Jeff Chan, despite being the second smallest competitor, proves to be extremely fast and capable of taking down much larger opponents and dominating them on the ground. Rokas, a much larger competitor, also notes in The Finale that Jeff hit so hard he might have knocked him out if they weren't wearing helmets.
- Oblivious to Love: In the Scenarios episode, Ramsey is completely oblivious to MJ's attempts to flirt with him.
- Pintsized Powerhouse: Icy Mike, Jeff Chan, and Matt Clinton all fit the bill, successfully defeating numerous larger opponents throughout the series.
- Poor Communication Kills: During the special Z-Day episode, a mistake with the panicking family of survivors causes Mike to kill a little girl he thinks is infected, right in front of her mother.
- Railing Kill: Matt gives up in Hide and Go Stab atop dangerously high catwalks to avoid this trope happening, as after all, it was just a friendly competition and not an actual life-and-death scenario.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Happens several times
- In one of the rounds in The Circle Drill, Matt takes his opponent down and uses the opportunity to escape.
- Jeff achieves the highest score in the toilet scenario in Scenarios by ignoring both characters and bolting for the exit right away.
- In the same scenario, Matt initially attempts to deescalate the situation, but he too sprints out once the victim character starts cutting himself with a glass shard.
- Signature Move: Several competitors have moves that prove fairly effective and as such are used a lot.
- Jeff Chan's double-leg takedown, which proves extremely effective.
- Icy Mike notes that his upkicks had fairly constant success, giving much larger fighters trouble when trying to throw ground-and-pound.
- Sir Swearsalot: Matt tosses out filthy language to get himself into a more aggressive mindset during challenges.
- Staredown Faceoff: As they prepare for their fight in The Finale, Sensei Seth performs kata while Mike stands absolutely still, never taking his eyes off his opponent.
- Strong and Skilled: All the larger competitors, Seth, Rokas, and Ramsey, are large, strong, and well-trained in numerous martial arts.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: Rokas and Matt both fall victim to this in the Scenarios episode, where during a performance review with a boss that tries to come onto them, they assumed someone else would be barging in and physically fighting them instead. Rokas in particular did not realise his boss was in fact, the "attacker" in the situation, until after the scenario ended.
