Whenever you see in a movie a guy fighting one or more attackers armed with knives don’t believe what you are seeing: most of the times it’s rubbish.  I have seen lots of knife defence that simply won’t work when, in the street, a random guy (or girl) pulls out a knife and try stabbing your guts or slashing your throat.   I am sorry to say but too many teachers out there give to their students a false illusion about how easy it may be disarming an attacker carrying knife and bad intentions toward you.

At the same time there are a few styles that seem more realistic about how to deal with armed attackers.  In fact I am inclined to follow the logic that a style that trains weapons to start with, like most styles from Indonesia and the Philippines, and move toward bare handed fighting at a later stage (e.g. when you loose your weapon you should/must carry on fighting).

I am personally terrified of edged weapons because of my relatively short experience and lack of continuous practice.  Although I probably have the knowledge and skill to fight and defeat a random attacker from the street in a life or death situation I am always hoping that day will never come.  I have been following Maul Mornie for some time and he never fails to impress me with his very logical, essential and wise defence techniques.  Please have a look at this video and let me have your comments:

Posted under self defence, street fighting, theory, video_review

Considering that martial arts are, in essence, methodologies for fighting I always consider paramount to perform a reality check of each application. This is to assess if and when a technique or combination can be useful in a self defence or real fight situation.

Please notice that some styles, like kick boxing, tae kwon do and judo are to be considered martial sports and they follow rules that are designed to allow a sport competition to take place without causing serious injuries to those taking part in it. To some extend certain martial sports train full contact and a professional or a serious amateur of these is pretty safe in a fight as I recently mentioned in a previous post.

Certain styles that are pure martial arts, without sport applications, are meant to be useful for real fights and defending yourself. I am aware of a number of masters and instructors that remain pretty theoretical on the way they teach and assume that things will simply work: these people give a false, very dangerous, illusion to their students that risk to be seriously injured or killed in a real fight. It all good stating that one or the other technique will hurt an opponent, it’s another issue practicing it to ensure it works all the times.

So how do you perform a reality check? Here are some hints:

• Have you tested your punches (or kicks, elbow or knee strikes) for real power?
• The same strike might knock somebody down if applied to the head but just hurt a bit in certain areas of the body: did you consider that?
• Have you considered how bad it could be hitting somebody in the face to find out that he hardly noticed the strike? What would you do then?
• How much power do you think you need in order to knock somebody down or seriously injury them, allowing you to run away?
• How would you react if somebody is charging you like a bull? Do you have a technique that would allow stopping or deflecting his attack?
• Do you practice techniques that work at long, medium and short range? What about if the attacker is grabbing you?
• Striking can be the non ideal solution sometimes. Do you practice techniques to seize the opponent and neutralizing him? Perhaps immobilizing him with a joint lock?
• If you are below average the terms of body weight and size then you should consider training to defeat bigger people. What’s your body size compared to the average population?

I would be interested to hear comments about these issues.

Posted under educational, self defence, street fighting, teaching, theory

When I start thinking about self defence a number of different things come to mind: I firmly believe it’s difficult to feel 100% safe, however strong or skilled in martial arts you might be. A lot of martial arts clubs or schools will advertise themselves as teaching self defence. What is in reality self defence? Many different people, from different countries and cultures, might have totally different ideas about it. Let’s say that if you are on the street, rather then in a bar or a club: somebody might approach you and trying intimidating you for a number of different reasons. Robbery? Sexual abuse? Drunken brawl? Road rage… you name it: I heard of some people that just like going out and punch in the face the first person they meet on their way. What if that person is going to be you?

The best self defence is not being in the dangerous situation all together. Fighting might not be a not a natural thing for many but evolution gave us natural defences. Our natural instinct plays funny games: if you are not mentally ready your brain will release a lot of adrenaline, your heart will start pumping much faster and you might just freeze or became irrationally violent and uncontrolled. Martial arts training can vary a great deal in terms of how realistic and practical is in a self defence situation. In any case I am convinced that practicing martial arts is the closed resemblance to a fight, to various levels of realism. Different approaches will assume you have to punch (boxing), punch and kick (karate, tae kwon do, kick boxing), throw and or manipulating joints (aikido, ju jitsu, judo, hapkido) and so on.

The other important factor to consider if you find yourself in one of these situations is how well you master the art you are practicing: a few months can be useful to understand a few moves; 12-18 months can give you a level of proficiency; 3-5 years you might feel the confidence. It’s always a safe measure not to advertise your proficiency in any martial art: ignorant people out there might want to challenge you and see how tough you are.

Practicing a martial art is not about being tough, it’s about improving yourself with techniques and practices that make you feel better, fitter, more agile and ready for action: that doesn’t mean you should look for it. At the same time if this person did not practice martial arts in the first place he/she would be even more vulnerable.

Posted under self defence, street fighting