Dog Brothers Martial Arts
American system born from full-contact stick fighting: minimal padding, Filipino Kali and Brazilian jiu-jitsu tested in real sparring.
Quick Facts
United StatesCharacter & Origin
Organisation & Competition
What the style is built from
Editorial rating on a 0–3 scale, based on how much room each area gets in ordinary training.
Catalogs & Databases for Dog Brothers Martial Arts
About Dog Brothers Martial Arts
Dog Brothers Martial Arts is an American system of armed and unarmed combat that grew out of full-contact stick fighting. The group was born in May 1988 at a three-day event called the Rumble at Ramblas in San Clemente, California; its founders were Eric 'Top Dog' Knaus, Marc 'Crafty Dog' Denny and Arlan 'Salty Dog' Sanford. Most of the participants had met in the so-called After Midnight Group at the Inosanto Academy, and Knaus additionally trained the Filipino system Pekiti-Tirsia under Leo Gaje and won the national full-contact stick fighting tournament three times. The group's name arose by accident: nicknames were introduced because calling out 'Mark' would draw several men's attention at once, and the phrase 'dog brothers' comes from a Conan comic. Its essence is Real Contact Stickfighting — combat with one or two sticks, or with a staff, bokken, whip, or training knife, with minimal protection: a fencing mask for the head, hockey or lacrosse gloves, nothing more. There are no titles or prizes; the only rule is that everyone leaves at the end of the day as friends, and nobody sues anybody. Every participant who takes part receives their own dog name. Marc Denny added Brazilian jiu-jitsu in 1990, roughly three years before the first UFC demonstrated that same possibility, and built a school on the motto 'If you see it taught, you see it fought' — whatever is taught is also used in combat. The unarmed portion of the system is called Kali Tudo. Gatherings called Gatherings of the Pack still take place today; the first European one was held in September 2006 in Bern, led by Benjamin 'Lonely Dog' Rittiner.
Similar styles
Selected by overlap in the style profile, not by historical lineage.