# mma birmingham



## smokeyd260721n (Nov 30, 2008)

Hi, has anyone tried stevie b's in birmingham for mma training


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## ajfinn (Mar 12, 2009)

Yes I trained at Stevie B's for about 8 months in '07. I'm told the BJJ club there is very well rated but it was outside of my budget. They also have a resident Muay Thai club but I was told this class was only suitable for those with experience in the style. If either of those classes would suit you then by all means have a look.

The classes which I did were the Vale Tudo/MMA class which used to run on Wednesdays and the dirty boxing/self defence which Stevie B ran himself. The mma was good as an introduction to the sport and there were some sound blokes but the main problem was it was very unreliable in terms of who turned up and there was no real coach. It was either coached by whoever happend to be around or by the most experienced person present, occasionally no-one was qualified to run it. The actual training varied greatly aswell, when I started I was getting thrown in the ring with experienced fighters and getting a bit of a beating (which I didn't mind), by the time I left it was worse as there was no sparring at all, only ground work.

The dirty boxing classes are not really aimed at competetive fighters, Steve certainly has a great deal of knowledge of fighting/tma but this class involved a lot of listening to his theories.

On the plus side at the time I was getting full gym membership and the classes for Â£20 a month which you cant argue with. The gym has a very grimy, hardcore feel about it being covered in graffiti/mural art and full of people with tatoos on their heads working out to bassline tunes, so it is fun in that respect, but not ideal for serious mma training unless you can do the BJJ and Thai classes


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