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The nicest example of this I've seen is that Tim Ferris won a kickboxing championship without being a kickboxer, https://www.martialdevelopment.com/how-to-win-k

The nicest example of this I've seen is that Tim Ferris won a kickboxing championship without being a kickboxer, https://www.martialdevelopment.com/how-to-win-kickboxing-wrong/ https://www.martialdevelopment.com/how-to-win-kickboxing-wro... The fallacy is that winning a world championship at kickboxing must mean that you're an excellent kickboxer, but nope.

FeepingCreature 6y ago
Istm he was an excellent kickboxer to exactly the extent the world championship was one of kickboxing.
pmoriarty 6y ago
This reminds me of Derren Brown (a magician) winning simultaneous chess games against grandmasters... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIAXIubSTkc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIAXIubSTkc
- thom 6y ago
  As in, he got another kickboxer to pretend to be him and fight in his place?
  - yesenadam 6y ago
    It's a fairly well-known trick where you play 2 strong players at the same time: You take the first player's move as white and play it yourself as white in the other game. So the two boards have the same position, with you playing different colours. That way you will have an even score in the 2 games. He did that with 4 pairs and the 9th was the head of the uni chess orgnisation, a weak player he beat easily.
    - thom 6y ago
      Yes, I was just wondering if I was missing something about the kickboxing comparison, because presumably Tim Ferriss did actually fight more or less on his own merits?
buran77 6y ago
I'm not sure what kind of championship that was but for an experienced fighter having a 30 pound "handicap" versus an inexperienced one should amount to no real life disadvantage. Don't underestimate what a 165 lbs person's tibia can do to a 195 lbs person's head on even thigh. There's no "hack" to not getting your lights knocked out with one punch/kick from a good fighter 30 lbs lighter than you. And tricking the weigh in is something that has been done since the second ever weigh-in. The fact that he was able to hold off experienced fighters, even if they were below his weight class, means he was plenty qualified to be there despite his very modest self assessment. [Edited from here] He seems to be an actual fighter under Dave Camarillo but the framing of this story, that he's just an average "stuff my face with peanut butter sandwiches, tricked the weigh-in" kind of guy, is just in order to sell his "life hacks" books. All I can find is that 1999 was the second year for the championship which could mean not very strong competition. But there's no mention of him in any Wushu/Sanda/Sanshou championship. He also used to claim that he is a "Cage fighter in Japan, vanquisher of four world champions (MMA)" (since removed from his page). Being a 4 time world champion would have contradicted his "just a regular guy using life hacks" premise. Without an actual record of him winning that "Chinese Kickboxing National Championships 1999" I guess he's just peddling the same "tricks" from his book. One of them might be "just say you did it".
- aspenmayer 6y ago
  Thai kickboxing and BJJ isn’t a joke. Neither is physics and bone density increases through training, same with muscle fiber density and reaction time. I can go on. Training matters.
  - quickthrower2 6y ago
    I've watched a Thai kickboxing match in Bangkok, and what amazed me, and I didn't expect is that the first few minutes are like dancing, no touching, then it slowly accelerates over say 30 minutes or something to a full out thing. If you can bend the rules in those first 5 minutes, even a sedate developer might stand a chance!
    - 6y ago
redis_mlc 6y ago
I read the parent link, and here's some comments: - if the fight was in China, big deal. They have a history of pre-MMA technique, so most of their styles are only for show. (That's what the fake Shaolin monk, Yi Long, has been demonstrating recently online, defeating leading traditional opponents using intermediate kickboxing techniques.) - fights in China are fixed, so Tim winning anything was unlikely without connections/graft - it takes a special kind of asshole to proclaim being a winning fighter by exploiting loopholes that way. I hope somebody punches and breaks his orbital ASAP. Respected fighters wouldn't fight or spar with anybody who writes that way. Tim didn't prove anything, except that he's an asshole who can't be trusted. You can learn more about MMA from inside China on Ramsey Dewey's Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/balletman https://www.youtube.com/user/balletman If you want to see what world-class MMA fighting looks like today, search on Youtube for "UFC Khabib" or "UFC Israel Adesanya". They would destroy anybody inside China in seconds.
amelius 6y ago
I think this is an example of a "N=1 fallacy".
thih9 6y ago
Is this verifiable? I saw a comment on that page saying: > I’m not saying you couldn’t win a kickboxing tournament like that. I just think it’d be nice if he at least gave the year and location of the tournament so interested parties could look into it.

FeepingCreature 6y ago

Istm he was an excellent kickboxer to exactly the extent the world championship was one of kickboxing.

pmoriarty 6y ago

This reminds me of Derren Brown (a magician) winning simultaneous chess games against grandmasters... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIAXIubSTkc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIAXIubSTkc

thom 6y ago
As in, he got another kickboxer to pretend to be him and fight in his place?
- yesenadam 6y ago
  It's a fairly well-known trick where you play 2 strong players at the same time: You take the first player's move as white and play it yourself as white in the other game. So the two boards have the same position, with you playing different colours. That way you will have an even score in the 2 games. He did that with 4 pairs and the 9th was the head of the uni chess orgnisation, a weak player he beat easily.
  - thom 6y ago
    Yes, I was just wondering if I was missing something about the kickboxing comparison, because presumably Tim Ferriss did actually fight more or less on his own merits?

buran77 6y ago

I'm not sure what kind of championship that was but for an experienced fighter having a 30 pound "handicap" versus an inexperienced one should amount to no real life disadvantage. Don't underestimate what a 165 lbs person's tibia can do to a 195 lbs person's head on even thigh. There's no "hack" to not getting your lights knocked out with one punch/kick from a good fighter 30 lbs lighter than you. And tricking the weigh in is something that has been done since the second ever weigh-in. The fact that he was able to hold off experienced fighters, even if they were below his weight class, means he was plenty qualified to be there despite his very modest self assessment. [Edited from here] He seems to be an actual fighter under Dave Camarillo but the framing of this story, that he's just an average "stuff my face with peanut butter sandwiches, tricked the weigh-in" kind of guy, is just in order to sell his "life hacks" books. All I can find is that 1999 was the second year for the championship which could mean not very strong competition. But there's no mention of him in any Wushu/Sanda/Sanshou championship. He also used to claim that he is a "Cage fighter in Japan, vanquisher of four world champions (MMA)" (since removed from his page). Being a 4 time world champion would have contradicted his "just a regular guy using life hacks" premise. Without an actual record of him winning that "Chinese Kickboxing National Championships 1999" I guess he's just peddling the same "tricks" from his book. One of them might be "just say you did it".

aspenmayer 6y ago
Thai kickboxing and BJJ isn’t a joke. Neither is physics and bone density increases through training, same with muscle fiber density and reaction time. I can go on. Training matters.
- quickthrower2 6y ago
  I've watched a Thai kickboxing match in Bangkok, and what amazed me, and I didn't expect is that the first few minutes are like dancing, no touching, then it slowly accelerates over say 30 minutes or something to a full out thing. If you can bend the rules in those first 5 minutes, even a sedate developer might stand a chance!
  - 6y ago

redis_mlc 6y ago

I read the parent link, and here's some comments: - if the fight was in China, big deal. They have a history of pre-MMA technique, so most of their styles are only for show. (That's what the fake Shaolin monk, Yi Long, has been demonstrating recently online, defeating leading traditional opponents using intermediate kickboxing techniques.) - fights in China are fixed, so Tim winning anything was unlikely without connections/graft - it takes a special kind of asshole to proclaim being a winning fighter by exploiting loopholes that way. I hope somebody punches and breaks his orbital ASAP. Respected fighters wouldn't fight or spar with anybody who writes that way. Tim didn't prove anything, except that he's an asshole who can't be trusted. You can learn more about MMA from inside China on Ramsey Dewey's Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/balletman https://www.youtube.com/user/balletman If you want to see what world-class MMA fighting looks like today, search on Youtube for "UFC Khabib" or "UFC Israel Adesanya". They would destroy anybody inside China in seconds.

amelius 6y ago

I think this is an example of a "N=1 fallacy".

thih9 6y ago

Is this verifiable? I saw a comment on that page saying: > I’m not saying you couldn’t win a kickboxing tournament like that. I just think it’d be nice if he at least gave the year and location of the tournament so interested parties could look into it.