How to Defeat the Bigger Stronger Opponent Martial Art Self Defense by Stephan Resting

How to Defeat the Bigger Stronger Opponent Martial Art Self Defense by Stephan Resting

Today is a very exciting day! For the past few months I’ve been working like crazy to get my new DVD series finished. In these videos I’m collaborating with my friend, and former teammate, Emily Kwok.

She’s one of the best known competitive grapplers out there! For a lot of different reasons.

First of all, she’s one hell of a competitor.

Emily is not only a Brazilian Jiu-jitsu world champion, she’s also won amateur and professional MMA fights, and just two weeks ago she won a gold medal in the Pan Am No Gi Championships in the Absolute (no weight limit) division! So when she tells you that something works you can really believe her.

Secondly, she’s got an impeccable pedigree. Emily has learned from many of the very best instructors in the world, and is currently training and working with Marcelo Garcia.

(Marcelo is, of course, a 5 time BJJ world champion and 4 time no-gi ADCC champion. But he’s also been an absolute terror in the Absolute division, regularly facing and submitting much larger world-class opponents.)

Third, and most importantly, Emily is a born teacher. And this is the real reason I decided to work with her. She’s got a real knack for being able to break down and teach techniques in a way that makes them easy to learn and quick to implement.

After we decided to work together, Emily and I spent months criss-crossing the continent to talk strategy, do research, plan the script, and film the material.

And once we filmed the material, I locked myself into a dark room with my editor to take the footage and create the actual DVDs. (It’s true! My friends and training partners haven’t seen me for a month.)

And then today, at last, I got the master copies from my editor. I gave them a final once-over and then went to the courier.

Tomorrow morning my duplicator will have them in his hands and begin working on the final product! (The only thing I’m worried about is that most DVD duplication facilities are already working at full capacity to prepare their Xmas stockpiles. Hopefully the wait isn’t too long, and they’re able to produce the quantities I want.)

If everything goes well this series should be available in mid to early November!

So, what’s the topic of these DVDs? Hopefully the title will give you a hint…

This 5 DVD series is called “How to Defeat the Bigger Stronger Opponent!”

And that’s EXACTLY what they’re about.

The DVDs are filled to the brim with techniques, strategies, tactics, training methods and drills to give you an unfair advantage when you’re smaller than the person you’re grappling.

The idea for this series actually came from you guys.

You see I get asked hundreds of questions via emails, Facebook, etc. every week. And the most common question – hands down – is what to do when facing a bigger stronger person.

This is a totally valid concern!

Being pinned and smothered on the ground by a Goliath is no fun at all. In fact, even a weight difference of 10 or 20 pounds can allow a bigger person to simply use their natural strength, size and weight advantage to crush and overpower you.

I do my best to answer these questions, but the fact that I’m 6′ 1″ and 215 lbs means that I’m not the ideal poster boy for teaching this topic. Which is ironic, because even I get worried about running into people bigger than myself (and am glad to have a few tricks up my sleeve to handle that situation when it happens).

Anyway, this image problem is why I first started thinking about collaborating with someone. And when I heard what Emily was up to, and saw how she was basically reverse-engineering Marcelo Garcia’s game, I knew I had work with her.

Her game is tailor-made for dealing with larger stronger opponents. After all, the vast majority of her training partners are bigger than she is. And she’s proved her techniques work in the absolute divisions of some of the toughest tournaments around.

The basic premise of the DVDs is that size does matter, but that there ARE specific, concrete things you can do to compensate for size.

With the right techniques and strategies it is absolutely possible to successfully hold your ground against bigger, stronger opponents. And with the right leverage-based techniques you can even go on the offensive and bring the fight to them!

Whether you’re male or female, these DVDs are going to show you exactly how to do that.

I’ve been doing martial arts a long time. And produced a ton of videos and instructional materials.

I can honestly say that this is one of the very best DVD series I have ever seen.

P.S. You can see some of behind-the-scenes pics of the filming and editing process on

These DVDs are now available for shipping!