Matt Thornton
After a much smaller jiu-jitsu black belt repeatedly submitted him, JKD instructor Matt Thornton founded Straight Blast Gym and built it around aliveness.
Biography
Sources for this profile
Straight Blast Gym International, 'What is SBG?' (straightblastgym.com/who)(opens in a new tab)
Matt Thornton is the founder and head coach of Straight Blast Gym (SBG).
Where in the source: Paragraph on how SBG began officially in 1992 — 'head coach'
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Thornton's martial arts career began with boxing; after serving in the US Army he started training in Jeet Kune Do (JKD) in 1988.
Where in the source: Founder-biography section near the end of the page, first paragraph (boxing, US Army, JKD)
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In 1990 Thornton moved from California to Portland, Oregon, where for a little over two years he managed and taught at a martial arts academy focused on JKD Concepts; there he met JKD instructors including Burton Richardson, Paul Vunak and Dan Inosanto.
Where in the source: Founder-biography section, first paragraph — 'In 1990'
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In his own account, Thornton grew doubtful of common JKD training methods: instructors who criticised karate kata spent long hours on partner forms and trapping drills that he felt were kata in all but name, while giving little time to wrestling, which happened in almost every real fight.
Where in the source: Long quoted passage from Thornton in the upper half of the page, about his doubts over JKD methods — 'hand trapping'
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Thornton has described sitting alone in a café in Portland imagining his ideal training environment — one that would apply science to hand-to-hand combat — and later recognised it as a science-based self-defence and MMA gym, years before the UFC existed.
Where in the source: Quoted passage about his vision for the gym, in the upper half of the page — '4th ave'
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In 1991 Thornton met and trained with Rickson Gracie; he has said he watched Rickson submit a room of judo black belts within seconds without using his hands. SBG's biography says this first exposure to Brazilian jiu-jitsu, together with boxing, shaped his idea of aliveness more than JKD did.
Where in the source: Founder-biography section, paragraph on 1991 and the paragraph after it — 'Judo black belts'
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In 1992, with his training methods heading in a different direction from the JKD school, Thornton opened the first SBG, the first academy over which he had complete control.
Where in the source: Founder-biography section, paragraph after the one on MMA before the term existed — 'complete control'
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A few years after founding SBG, Thornton met Randy Couture, who came to the gym to work on stand-up and Brazilian jiu-jitsu groundwork; according to SBG, those sessions changed how the gym trained the clinch, which it had previously approached as JKD-style trapping.
Where in the source: Founder-biography section, short paragraph on meeting Randy Couture and its effect on clinch training
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Thornton received his blue belt from Rickson Gracie in 1993, and his purple (1995), brown (2000) and black (2002) belts through Chris Haueter; SBG describes him as the first Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt in the state of Oregon.
Where in the source: Founder-biography section, paragraph listing his belts — '1995'
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Thornton began teaching seminars in 1995, when savate instructor Daniel Duby asked him to fly to Réunion to teach; SBG says Duby brought a savate influence into SBG. SBG says Thornton has since given more than four hundred seminars in countries including France, Ireland, the UK, Denmark, Germany, Sweden, Canada, Iceland, Mexico, Chile and the Seychelles, and credits him with first introducing Brazilian jiu-jitsu to Réunion and to Iceland.
Where in the source: Founder-biography section, paragraph on seminars from 1995, and the achievement list above it — 'Daniel Duby'
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- Conflicting accounts
SBG dates Thornton's first instructional video series, 'Functional JKD', to 1998; its first tape was titled 'Aliveness', and SBG says the tape provoked a storm of debate and sold worldwide.
Where in the source: Founder-biography section, paragraph on his first video series — 'Functional JKD'
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SBG says its coaches Adam and Rory Singer coached Forrest Griffin from white belt to UFC light heavyweight champion, that SBG helped train early professional MMA fighters including Randy Couture and Griffin, and credits John Kavanagh (Thornton's second black belt) as the first Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt in Ireland.
Where in the source: Achievement list in the middle of the page, entries on Couture and Griffin, the Singers, and Kavanagh
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Straight Blast Gym International, 'Mount Instructional by Head Coach Matt Thornton'(opens in a new tab)
SBG describes 'Mastering the Mount' as a 15-video series on drilling and developing mount skills, developed over two years of coaching and seminars.
Where in the source: Course description at the top of the page — 'two years of coaching'
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Straight Blast Gym International, 'Interview given in June of 2005 in the UK, for MAI magazine'(opens in a new tab)
In a 2005 interview Thornton said he was put in a karate class at about age ten, that he later boxed and took up JKD, and named Rickson Gracie as his biggest influence.
Where in the source: Answers to the first and third questions — 'Karate class'
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Asked in 2005 to define aliveness, Thornton described it as right action at the right time, grounded in timing and authenticity, and said training methods make the whole difference to how effective a martial art is.
Where in the source: Answers on aliveness and on training methods — 'right action at right time'
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Straight Blast Gym International, 'SBG Philosophy' (straightblastgym.com/philosophy)(opens in a new tab)
SBG defines aliveness, its core training concept, as the combination of timing, energy (resistance) and motion, and stresses that alive training need not be rough: resistance is added progressively.
Where in the source: Section on the second core concept, aliveness — 'timing, energy, and motion'
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SBG teaches most skills through a three-stage 'I-Method': Introduction (the move without resistance), Isolation (drilling it against progressive resistance) and Integration (sparring from that position).
Where in the source: Passage in the Aliveness section introducing the three stages — 'I-Method'
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In 2013, around SBG's 20th year, Thornton issued a mission statement saying he wanted to create 'scientists of fighting': people who understand the universal principles behind why techniques work, not just a collection of techniques.
Where in the source: Paragraph just before the core curricula section — 'scientists of fighting'
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Straight Blast Gym International, 'The SBGi BJJ Association' (straightblastgym.com/bjj-association)(opens in a new tab)
SBG says Thornton met his main coach, Chris Haueter, in 1993; Haueter, one of the early American black belts known as the dirty dozen, became a regular guest in Oregon for seminars and training, and Thornton valued his conceptual, no-nonsense approach.
Where in the source: Biography section near the end of the page, paragraph on his blue belt and Haueter — 'dirty dozen'
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Thornton's first Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt went to Luis Gutierrez in 2005; John Kavanagh became the second in February 2007 and the UK coach Karl Tanswell the third in July 2007. In a note written after promoting Kavanagh, Thornton praised both his technical finesse and his understanding of why the art works, which he said would let Kavanagh pass it on.
Where in the source: List of black belts from Matt Thornton, entries for Gutierrez, Kavanagh and Tanswell — 'second person'; Kavanagh note — 'technical finesse'
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SBG says Thornton's 'Aliveness' video set off controversy in the martial arts community and was voted by Black Belt magazine among the top five self-defence videos.
Where in the source: Biography section near the end of the page, paragraph beginning with his work as a teacher — 'top five'
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Thornton's own note on promoting Lily Pagle says she began training with him at 50, became his seventh black belt and his first female black belt, and at 61 took on all the higher belts in the room during her promotion.
Where in the source: Entry for Lily Pagle, first-person note — 'seventh black belt'
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SBG's biography says Thornton has written for martial arts publications including Black Belt, Inside Kung Fu and Martial Arts Illustrated, and that his main emphasis has been addressing superstition in sports training, combat sports and martial arts, with aliveness designed as a tool to separate fact from fiction.
Where in the source: Biography section near the end of the page, paragraphs on his publications and main emphasis — 'superstition'
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Straight Blast Gym International, 'International' affiliate directory, note by John Kavanagh(opens in a new tab)
John Kavanagh wrote that Thornton was the first person to assess his grappling and gave him a purple belt in 2002, at which point Kavanagh renamed his Dublin gym SBG Ireland.
Where in the source: Ireland entry, Kavanagh's first-person note — 'assess my game'
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Wikipedia, 'Matt Thornton (martial artist)'(opens in a new tab)
Wikipedia gives Thornton's date of birth as 25 March 1969.
Where in the source: Lead sentence — 'born March 25, 1969'
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Thornton is an American martial arts coach and the founder of Straight Blast Gym International, an association based in Portland, Oregon.
Where in the source: Lead sentence — 'American martial arts'
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According to Wikipedia, a larger SBG gym opened in Portland, Oregon, in 1994 and remains the headquarters of the international association, and the affiliated gyms that grew up from the late 1990s were formalised in 2001 as the Straight Blast Gym International Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Association.
Where in the source: Section on the gym, first paragraph — 'In 1994'; section on the international association, second paragraph — 'formalized'
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In 2019 Thornton released the instructional 'Mastering the Mount', his first new instructional in 15 years.
Where in the source: Section on the gym, last paragraph (2019 instructional)
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BJJ Heroes, 'Matt Thornton' (bjjheroes.com/bjj-fighters/thornton)(opens in a new tab)
BJJ Heroes, citing a July 2018 interview on the Martial Arts Journey YouTube channel, says Fábio Santos, a Rickson Gracie black belt who had come to Portland to work as a surfboard maker, advertised in a local newspaper for people to fight him for money; Thornton answered and, although much larger, was easily beaten, then learned from Santos during his stay.
Where in the source: Biography, paragraphs on the Martial Arts Journey interview — 'surfboard maker'
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BJJ Heroes says Thornton's JKD club was not interested in what he had learned from Santos, so he opened his own academy in Keizer, near Salem, giving rise to the first SBG somewhere between 1992 and 1993, and that through his friendship with Santos he met Rickson Gracie, who promoted him to blue belt in 1993.
Where in the source: Biography, paragraphs after the Santos challenge — 'Keizer'; '1993'
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BJJ Heroes says Thornton was born on 25 March 1969 in California and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, and that he tried karate briefly as a child.
Where in the source: Biography, first two paragraphs — 'Bay Area'
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BJJ Heroes describes Thornton as Chris Haueter's first jiu-jitsu black belt and says Haueter promoted him to purple, brown and black belt, the last in a 2002 ceremony.
Where in the source: Opening summary — 'first jiu-jitsu black belt'; biography, paragraph on Haueter — '2002 ceremony'
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Scott Atkinson, 'Conor McGregor and the Origin of the Perfect Knockout', Fightland (VICE), 1 March 2016 (Wayback Machine copy)(opens in a new tab)
Fightland reported that Thornton angered much of the martial arts world through seminars, online forums and articles arguing that many traditional techniques did not work — Black Belt magazine put him on its cover under a headline saying his JKD had shaken up the martial arts world — and that in those years he opened every seminar with a talk on aliveness.
Where in the source: Opening section about the club in Flint, paragraphs on the reaction to Thornton — 'JKD Rocks'
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In Fightland's March 2016 article, asked recently whether the battle for aliveness had been won, Thornton said yes and no: even most MMA coaches still equated it with sparring, whereas alive training need not be hard or fast or damage the brain.
Where in the source: Paragraphs after the photo of Thornton and Kavanagh in Ireland — 'equate it with sparring'
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Fightland recounts that Thornton answered a newspaper ad from Fábio Santos, reasoning that since he and his training partners took beatings anyway they might as well be paid; Santos, much smaller, repeatedly closed the distance, took him down and submitted him, and did the same to everyone else. Thornton said he was amazed and knew at once he had to add it to his training.
Where in the source: Section on Thornton's start after the military, paragraphs on the ad — 'predictable results'
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According to Fightland, after the Santos sessions Thornton began teaching what he had learned in his Friday class; he then attended a seminar where Rickson Gracie, who would later give him his blue belt, submitted every judo black belt present without using his hands, and when his partners at the gym were not persuaded that fights go to the ground, he opened his own gym.
Where in the source: Paragraphs after the explanation of jiu-jitsu, ending before the photo of his black belts — 'Friday class'
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Fightland describes how, when a large newcomer kept submitting SBG members with a head-and-arm neck crank, Thornton turned the gym into a laboratory until they found a simple leg-bracing frame that needed no strength; at a later seminar he had participants try to solve the problem in groups first, let them fail, and then showed the answer.
Where in the source: Paragraph comparing boxing and jiu-jitsu and the two after it — 'laboratory'
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Fightland reports that Adam and Rory Singer of the Hardcore Gym in Athens, Georgia, adopted Thornton's methods after finding his Functional JKD VHS tapes; Adam Singer joined SBG and used those methods to coach his brother Rory and Forrest Griffin in the UFC, and other gyms followed, flying Thornton around the world to teach aliveness and training methods rather than techniques.
Where in the source: Paragraph after Thornton's quote on the delivery system — 'Hardcore Gym'
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Fightland says Randy Couture came to Thornton's gym and stayed long enough for Thornton to corner him in a UFC fight, and quotes Couture saying he liked how Thornton broke down technique and gave every move a philosophy and meaning.
Where in the source: End of the paragraph on the Singer brothers — 'corner him'
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Fightland recounts that in the early 2000s, while cornering a team including Rory Singer and Forrest Griffin in South Africa, Thornton was impressed by their Irish opponent John Kavanagh, who had travelled alone without a cornerman; Thornton gave him a private lesson and later flew to Dublin, where Kavanagh was teaching in what Thornton called literally a shack.
Where in the source: Paragraph on South Africa and the section that follows — 'own bucket'
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Fightland reports that Thornton's advice to Kavanagh throughout was simply to do what he loved, that Kavanagh joined SBG, and that Thornton credits Kavanagh with focusing on fundamentals while leaving athletes free to develop their own style — the environment in which Conor McGregor, whom Thornton had known since he was a kid, built his unorthodox movement.
Where in the source: Section on the early Dublin gym, and the later Thornton quote about Ireland — 'provided an environment'
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Matt Thornton, 'Interview with Matt covering his beginnings and overall entries into martial arts and his philosophies', mattthornton.org (listed by SBG as May 2009)(opens in a new tab)
In an interview on his own site, Thornton said that a couple of years after he started boxing he met Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt Fábio Santos, who introduced him to the art; being effortlessly tapped out with a triangle choke felt like magic, and this was before MMA or the first UFC. After major disagreements with the school where he taught, he opened his own club about forty miles south so as not to compete directly with it, sharing a very small space with a friend who was a judo black belt.
Where in the source: Answers to the first three questions — 'forty miles south'
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In the same interview Thornton named Rickson Gracie and Randy Couture as the people most influential in his growth as a martial artist, called his own competition years his 'jock stage' when he was least able to help his athletes, and said the best competitors are often the worst coaches.
Where in the source: Answers on influences and on competing versus coaching — 'jock stage'
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Thornton said the biggest mistake of new grapplers is hunting for new techniques, when the focus should be fundamentals, posture and position, and that learning this from white belt could make progress three times faster.
Where in the source: Answer on the biggest mistake new grapplers make — 'technique-hunting phase'
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Shane Danaher, 'The Straight Blast Philosophy', Portland Monthly, 21 November 2012(opens in a new tab)
Portland Monthly described SBG's Northeast Portland gym in 2012 as calm, with classical music playing, yet known for full-contact training; Thornton, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt, applied that art's emphasis on sparring to boxing, judo and Thai kickboxing and rejected non-contact drills and martial arts mysticism as of little self-defence value.
Where in the source: First three paragraphs of the profile — 'well-behaved library'
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Portland Monthly reported that Thornton, whom it described as 6 foot 8, was gaining attention for an arch-sceptical philosophy he promoted in blog posts, videos and interviews — challenging rival martial arts schools and faith-based thinking alike, summed up in his line 'Belief absent evidence is a vice' — and was working on a book.
Where in the source: Second paragraph of the profile — '6-foot-8'
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In 2012 Portland Monthly counted 15 affiliated SBG gyms or training groups in the US and 10 abroad, in places such as Seoul, Cape Town and Dublin, and noted that traditionalists disliked Thornton's criticism of 'dead' martial arts, quoting San Francisco instructor Gary Moro's scepticism about 'reality based' training.
Where in the source: Paragraph after the pull quote — 'Gary Moro'
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Portland Monthly quoted Portland State University philosophy professor Peter Boghossian, an SBG student, as saying that Thornton explains complicated ideas plainly for a broad audience, and quoted Thornton saying that getting good at jiu-jitsu means losing thousands of times.
Where in the source: Last two paragraphs of the profile — 'thousands of times'
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Brenda Ahearn, 'The mind behind the movement', Daily Inter Lake, published in Bigfork Eagle, 11 July 2018(opens in a new tab)
Thornton told the Daily Inter Lake in 2018 that he became disillusioned with JKD, feeling its message had been lost behind the scenes and that he could not teach something he did not think was real; he then crossed paths with Fábio Santos, then Rickson Gracie, and opened the first Straight Blast Gym. The name nods to his JKD roots — the straight blast was one of Bruce Lee's signature moves — and he chose 'gym' rather than academy or institute so people would know it was a place to work out and sweat.
Where in the source: Middle of the article, paragraphs on his JKD years and the gym's name — 'heart had been lost'
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The Daily Inter Lake reported that workshops had become a central part of Thornton's business, and quoted him saying they let him see affiliate instructors, their schools and students, and judge whether ethics, safety and performance standards were being upheld; Travis Davison, owner of SBG Montana and vice president of SBG International, called Thornton his coach, mentor, friend and business partner and said he taught people to tell fundamentals from fluff.
Where in the source: Paragraphs on the Kalispell workshop and Davison's comments — 'business model'
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The Daily Inter Lake noted that John Kavanagh of SBG Ireland, coach of Conor McGregor, was the second of Thornton's students to reach black belt, connecting McGregor to Thornton through one intermediary.
Where in the source: Paragraph on the SBG acronym and McGregor — 'one middleman'
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SBG Portland, 'About Matt Thornton', 26 January 2019 (sbgi-pdx.com)(opens in a new tab)
SBG Portland's biography of Thornton quotes Chris Haueter calling him his first black belt and among the best coaches and innovative thinkers.
Where in the source: Quote attributed to Chris Haueter below the belt paragraph — 'My first black belt'
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SBG Portland, 'Rickson Gracie's Jiu Jitsu Global Federation Certified Academy Portland' (sbgi-pdx.com)(opens in a new tab)
SBG Portland says Thornton's relationship with Rickson Gracie has continued: when Rickson returned to teaching seminars in 2016, the comeback seminar was hosted by SBG in Portland, Rickson was interviewed with Thornton, and SBG accepted his invitation to join his new Jiu Jitsu Global Federation in Portland and at several other SBG gyms.
Where in the source: Second paragraph of the page — 'seminar comeback'
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SBG Portland, 'The Gorilla Press, Issue 152', 9 January 2023 (sbgi-pdx.com)(opens in a new tab)
In SBG's January 2023 newsletter Thornton wrote that he had just awarded his 38th black belt, to Jon Hobson, at the 2022 fall camp.
Where in the source: Section on new black belts at the 2022 fall camp — '38th black belt'
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Pitchstone Publishing, 'The Gift of Violence' catalogue page(opens in a new tab)
Thornton's book 'The Gift of Violence', a 400-page hardcover with a foreword by Robb Wolf and an afterword by Peter Boghossian, was published by Pitchstone Publishing in April 2023; the publisher describes it as practical, evidence-based guidance for ordinary people on avoiding and surviving violent encounters, drawn from his decades of teaching self-defence.
Where in the source: 'About the Book' and 'Details' sections — 'Pub date: April 2023'
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Rickson Gracie's endorsement of the book calls Thornton one of the most passionate ambassadors of jiu-jitsu.
Where in the source: Endorsement at the top of the page — 'passionate ambassadors'
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Sam Harris, Making Sense, Episode 316, 'Self-Defense: Reality and Fantasy', 14 April 2023(opens in a new tab)
On 14 April 2023 Sam Harris released a Making Sense episode with Thornton about 'The Gift of Violence', covering among other things his martial arts background, the 'street' versus 'sport' fallacy, the persistence of fake martial arts and Bruce Lee's legacy; the episode's bio says SBG had more than seventy locations worldwide.
Where in the source: Episode 316 description and guest bio — 'more than seventy locations'
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Interview with Matt Thornton by Derrick Cox, 8 September 1999, mattthornton.org(opens in a new tab)
In a September 1999 interview for a forthcoming video series — after his first tape series had dealt with aliveness — Thornton set out five core principles for the SBG curriculum: aliveness (movement, timing and energy), adaptability (stand-up, clinch and ground), coaching, attitude and philosophy, and conditioning.
Where in the source: Part 1, answers on the next series and the five principles — 'five core principles'
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In the 1999 interview Thornton distinguished coaching, which enhances performance, from teaching a curriculum, and said the gym's three elements of coaching — experience, awareness and responsibility — came directly from John Whitmore's book 'Coaching for Performance'.
Where in the source: Part 1, answers on the third principle — 'Coaching for Performance'
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Thornton explained in 1999 that SBG allowed no ritual, no titles and no foreign terminology: there were no sifus or gurus, coaches earned respect by wrestling and sparring with anyone in the gym, and techniques were judged only by whether they worked in sparring.
Where in the source: Part 1, answers on the fourth principle — 'no sifus or gurus'
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In the 1999 interview Thornton credited his friend Burton Richardson with helping build SBG's stick curriculum, saying the gym's weapons curriculum was entirely Richardson's.
Where in the source: Part 2, answer naming JKD instructors with similar curricula — 'all Burt'
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'Man on a mission: A Matt Thornton profile', MMA.IS, reprinted on mattthornton.org (listed by SBG as August 2004)(opens in a new tab)
A 2004 profile by the Icelandic site MMA.IS, written by a participant at Thornton's seminar in Reykjavik, found him soft-spoken and a natural teacher; it described him teaching each move through the I-Method's three stages and, instead of correcting mistakes directly, asking students why a position had failed so they would think for themselves.
Where in the source: Profile body, paragraphs on the seminar and on his teaching method — 'natural teacher'
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Thornton told MMA.IS that when he tried to bring Brazilian jiu-jitsu into the JKD academy's curriculum he met resistance, and that he opened his own place although everyone thought he would never attract enough students to make a living, fully expecting to need a full-time job; ten years later SBG had branches across the US and in England, Ireland, Denmark and South Africa.
Where in the source: Paragraph beginning with his training under Rickson and the one after — 'took the plunge'
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Thornton told MMA.IS that SBG was meant for everyone, not only young competitors — asking why a 53-year-old woman should not train if she enjoyed it — and, somewhat to the interviewer's surprise, said he was not all that keen on MMA as entertainment, calling it barbaric in a sense because boxing and MMA cause brain damage.
Where in the source: Late paragraphs of the profile — 'everyone is welcome'; 'barbaric in a sense'
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BJJ Heroes, 'John Kavanagh' (bjjheroes.com/bjj-fighters/john-kavanagh)(opens in a new tab)
BJJ Heroes says John Kavanagh fought for the South African promotion Pride and Honor outside Johannesburg in November 2001, lost, and met Thornton, who was cornering a fighter there; they trained the next day, stayed in touch, Kavanagh visited SBG in Oregon and brought Thornton to Ireland for workshops, and the partnership led to SBG Ireland.
Where in the source: Biography, paragraph on November 2001 — 'Pride and Honor'
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According to BJJ Heroes, Thornton promoted Kavanagh to black belt in late February 2007 during one of his visits to SBG Ireland in Dublin, making Kavanagh the first black belt in the Republic of Ireland.
Where in the source: Biography, paragraph after the South Africa meeting — 'late February 2007'
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