Making The Most Of Martial Arts Training, Having Fun
By Chris M BoydArticle Word Count: 450 [View Summary] Comments (0)
I couldn’t tell you the number of times I’ve felt like skipping my martial arts training altogether and opting for a night out or something. This happens a lot, you finish work, you’re a bit tired and all you feel like doing is getting something to eat and unwinding from a stressful day in front of the TV.
This is normal and is what the vast majority of people will do after work and it’s certainly easy enough to do instead of going training. However, you never regret going training when you get there, no matter how hard it was to turn up. As my old sensei used to say getting to training is the hard part, once there he takes over and it’s easy.
Well easy wouldn’t be an accurate description because martial arts training is always physically demanding, so no, easy is a misnomer. But he certainly had a point. One reason why you don’t regret coming to training when stressed from a day at work is because the physicality of the training itself is a great release, a brilliant way to ‘let off steam’.
You can turn up stressed out and with the weight of the world on your shoulders but once you get going all of that slips away as you just get on and ‘let off steam’. You leave buzzing worry free and glad you turned up. Above and beyond stress relief martial arts training is such a lot of fun. Even in the most serious of traditional dojo’s the training is fun. For sure, this type of thing is not for everyone but the people who love it certainly do. There is bound to be something that appeals, given the huge range of options available.
It’s fun to learn new physical skills, to move through the levels of understanding, from the jerky awkward movements to the perfecting of the once seemingly impossible. There are plenty of hurdles but by definition there’s plenty of success as they are overcome. These little victories are immensely pleasing and, well, great fun.
Then there’s the people. You will literally meet people from all walks of life, from doctors to labourers to engineers, and from all religions and creeds. Martial arts training truly is a great leveller, once you’re on the mat, money or social status count for nothing, it’s your skill that count.
There will be times when you may need to push yourself to turn up after a bad day but you can always be certain that if you do make yourself go you will not regret it you will at worse feel great afterward. Martial arts training is fun, that’s why so many people do it!
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Boyd, Chris M. “Making The Most Of Martial Arts Training, Having Fun.” Making The Most Of Martial Arts Training, Having Fun EzineArticles.com. http://ezinearticles.com/?Making-The-Most-Of-Martial-Arts-Training,-Having-Fun&id=6270760June 6, 2010Padwork And Movement Drills Against Multiple Attackers
One very safe method for getting a handle on fighting multiple opponents is windsucking. This is a drill they use over at DKK, something that Gavin Mullholland came up with I believe. In simple terms it involves one person striking the kick shields and/or thai pads of 2 to 4 others, while they move and jostle/barge the striker. It’s simple but puts a lot of pressure on the striker particularly when tired and it doesn‘t take very long to get tired!
Within this drill the striker can practise movement tactics to make life difficult for the pad holders while striking. The tactics of Darren Laur and others mentioned in the last post on the training components for fighting mulitple opponents can be applied within a framework of continual movement. That is,
- screening (human shield)
- cracking (splitting)
- re-directing
- clinching (certain aspects)
- feinting (dodging)
Of course the described windsucking drill alone will not address all areas required to train for multiple attackers but it will certainly help with the movement and striking while on the move, if nothing else. The following clip (ignore the first part) gives an illustration of the kind of movement you want to aim for, obviously the clip is slightly different to windsucking but it’s similar and illustrates some of the concepts in action. These padless drills can of course be included with windsucking.
Windsucking as a stand alone drill or in conjunction with purely movements drills has some value. With a little imagination it can be adapted to include further pieces of the multiples puzzle, e.g. the striker can be pulled back, pad holders can strike etc. Of course other elements must be trained to properly prepare for a self defence encounter fighting multiple opponents but this series of posts provides a starting point.
In the Turkish clip the survivor of the multiple attack from the first post was able to strike and cover on the retreat, cut angles and move effectively. Most of these skills would seem to have been transferred from some form of previous training, probably boxing. It’s a moot point as to whether further skills from a kickboxing martial art and/or MMA would trnasfer as successfully.
In my opinion there is more transferable than not, with some obvious exceptions. Head kicks would be risky while sprawling on a shoot/tackle would be close to suicidal the consequences of which are covered in two posts by Wim Demeere on his blog.
MMA against Multiple Opponents
MMA against Multiple Opponents part two
Hathaway stuffs the shoot
Using MMA as an example, not everyone uses head kicks or likes to go to ground, there are many who avoid the ground very successfully, this suggests that some of the skills used in the cage would transfer very well. For instance, in the recent UFC114, John Hathaway lands a lovely knee strike to Diego Sanchez’s head in the first round off a shoot. Excellent skill for fighting multiple opponents if you can pull it off, training to use it would help of course.
In my opinion there are aspects of combat sports that are transferable to fighting multiple opponents and if selected with a critical eye can be implemented into training for mutliple attackers.
May 30, 2010Fighting Multiple Opponents – Some Training Components
As I have little expertise at fighting multiple opponents when devising training drills for fighting multiple attackers I draw from footage of real life situations. Akin to the Morris Method approach of ‘watch the fight‘ this can provide some rich information.
He is a continual flurry of movement, attack and defence. He moves and strikes while going back, defends and strikes while cutting angles to fight his way out of trouble. He repeatedly knocks down his attackers even managing to knock one out cold! Admittedly, he was a better fighter than the opposition, but was nevertheless outnumbered. He successfully takes the skills he has, probably from boxing, and applies them to fighting multiple opponents. As a boxer he may never have trained specifically to fight multiple attackers but the movement, striking and defence skills he had accumulated were transferred to the street fight.
These skills, while not straightforward, can be covered in regular training and with a little imagination drills that tackle these issues can be expanded upon to become more appropriate to fighting multiple opponents. A number of further movement tactics can be adopted to use against multiple attackers.
Three of these I gleaned from an old internet article, the source of which I lost but have recovered at a different location. The Author, Darren Laur, grouped three tactics together and called them the “principle of S.C.A.R. (Screening, Cracking, And Re-directing)”.
- Screening – get a human shield! Position yourself so the attackers get in each others way, thereby being obstacles to others reaching you.
- Cracking – splitting the opponents. When possible move between the attackers, striking as you move. You can ‘bounce’ off them turning as you move into a better position.
- Redirecting – use the attackers momentum and direction against them by redirecting them into inanimate objects or other attackers
These in conjunction with two skills in addition to those from the clip but common in combat sports, namely clinching and feinting, can be used within the context of the continual movement required for fighting multiple opponents.
- Clinching – not a boxing/mma clinch as such, rather using skills from clinch fighting to redirect or screen or set up a cracking movement
- Feinting – probably more like dropping a shoulder to feint in Association Football rather than feinting to throw a punch can be used to set up or in conjunction with the three tactics above
Clearly, these training components do NOT cover everything required to cover ALL multiple attacker possibilities. These are only useful where there is space to move, it does not cover the skills necessary to get back off the floor, for instance. But if successful continual movement could prevent the fight going to the floor, which is very dangerous when fighting multiple opponents.
May 25, 2010Training to fight multiple attackers
Training to fight multiple opponents is an aspect of martial arts that is covered in many styles with varying degrees of validity. A trade off between safety and ‘reality’ or validity is required to train for multiple attackers. Too little validity/reality and the training has minimal transferable value to a real life situation. If safety is completely compromised for the sake of making the training directly transferable the outcome would result in the loss of training partners to injury.
There clearly is a market for ‘keeping it real’ and judging by the price of the equipment it’s making someone a decent wedge! There will always be arguments over the veracity of using protective equipment such as Tony Blauer’s High Gear. Because although full force, or at least near full force strikes can be absorbed the use of any safety equipment skews the training away from ‘reality’ to some degree. Put simply, there has to be some form of trade off.
In contrast, an overly safe approach to multiple attacker training can have close to zero or even negative transfer to the real world scenario. If multiples training were to simply comprise of three man Ippon Kumite, similar to what you can still see at demonstrations it would have negligible real world use. That’s a bit daft but there you go. In fact, that sort of training could be counterproductive as the practitioner might even decide to fight several attackers instead of running due to overconfidence in his/her ability.
I intend to cover the way in which we train for fighting against multiple attackers. We manage this without specifically running a multiples program as such. This means we cover the skills required to fight multiple attackers through a mixture of drills gleaned from internet articles and clips, taking stuff from training with Steve Morris (who has never specifically covered multiples with me) and others and adapting regular training drills but without bringing in a self defence expert and buying expensive protective equipment. There’s a huge amount of information available on multiples training but to get value requires sorting the wheat from the chaff.
My favourite clip of successful defence against multiple attackers is the one of an altercation in the middle of a busy road in Turkey. It’s been around for a few years now and shows an argument leading to one bloke fighting multiple opponents amongst parked cars and traffic. The bloke on his own has clearly trained, probably boxing, and deals with the three attackers pretty comfortably. He’s a flurry of continual movement, striking and defending on the move. It’s an excellent example of how to defend against several opponents.
So information from this and other sources will do a reasonable job in my mind. A series of posts will follow this that address the issue of training to fight multiple opponents without an actual program to train for multiple attackers as such. Does that make sense? Anyway watch this space.
May 23, 2010The Cowboy Gunslinger and Speed Punching
Speed and quickness are generally important in martial arts in terms of movement and striking; footwork and speed punching/kicking training drills are common place. Attempts to address punching speed at the initiation of a strike are less common. Steve Morris tackles this area in a number of ways, one of which involves reading cues and beating the incoming punch. I don’t want to say it’s impossible but I’ve not managed to beat him to the punch, he always puts his punch in the gap between initiation and finish.
Morris is very good at reading cues and acting on them, this definitely contributes to his speed. Another contribution maybe the inherent speed of reacting to environmental cues. One of the blokes who trains with us put me onto some recent research from the University of Birmingham (UB), who were testing for speed differences between self initiated actions and reactions to events in the environment.
This research was motivated by renowned Danish physicist and Nobel laureate, Niels Bohr, who had an obsession with western films. He wanted to know why the bloke who pulled the gun first always lost. He tested this with toy ‘cap’ guns but in the study at UB they used pressure pads. The results show that reacting to the opponent produced quicker reaction times in comparison to when a subject initiated the action.
So what!
Well this finding shows that human beings are able to react to environmental stimulus more quickly than if they plan the action. This quicker reaction is at the cost of greater error but that’s normal. When speed is desirable the faster you perform the less accurate an action will be. Of course in a gunfight, speed is of the essence when drawing your six shooter, but you only have to be accurate enough to get the gun into a shooting position. Precision accuracy is not critical at this point.
The study itself is a nice piece of work which controls for social aspects (the findings remained when the opponent was a computer), type of movement (quicker movements were still present when the buttons were arranged differently) and when there were no movement cues (computers don‘t produce any). The difference in speed while small (20ms) equated to 10% which is useful in a life or death situation.
For the cowboy gunslinger to take out the bad guy 20 paces away, he’ll need a fast drawing action and good aim, but so long as he is operating purely reactively rather than from a deliberate intention to draw the gun, he can take advantage of the phenomena described in the study.
The authors suggest that different neural pathways govern these two types of movement initiation. That is reactive actions take a different neural route in the brain than intentionally driven actions, with their research shows that these are faster for reactive actions. It is possible that under pressure less conscious involvement is desirable, better to react instincively.
These findings have implications for martial arts, certainly self defence. If you are threatened the freeze flight or fight response will kick in and you become hyper activated. Then you may adopt either a reactive or intentional style of movement, i.e. an ‘observe and strike’ vs. “I’m gonna hit him” mode. Alternatively, you may be naturally predisposed toward one or the other mode. The study suggests that one has a 10% reaction time advantage over the other. A follow up post will take a further look at these implications for speed punching.
May 20, 2010BAMMA 3 – MMA show at the NEC
Last weekend I attended BAMMA 3 at the NEC with some friends. I’ve only been to a few MMA live events and have generally enjoyed them and this was no exception. At BAMMA 3 though there was a certain amount of controversy concerning the main event and a bit of a media circus too.
Tom ‘Kong’ Watson was supposed to fight Alex Reid for the Middleweight belt but Reid pulled out with a knee injury. The controversy concerned Reid’s preparation for the fight, which centred on a TV program where he went to different countries trying out a variety of Martial Arts. I’ve only seen the clip of Reid rolling with Roger Gracie, and he didn’t look too good, overawed and out of his depth is probably the correct description.
Watson, on the other hand took the fight more seriously training with the GSP camp. Incidentally, GSP was present to show support for Watson in his fight with Matt Horwich.
Reid turned up to watch the event with his wife Jordan/Katie Price. It’s fair to say they took some stick! It was quite entertaining at times, particularly the two blokes dressed as Price and Reid who posed for camera’s and got the crowd going.
It needed something as the undercard was not always the best. The first fight we saw involved pink shorts and really only got going in the final round with the Norweigan Thoresen getting the decision over John Maguire. Then there was a break for 15 minutes.
It took that time for the projectionist to get one of the big screens properly operational again, after it had slipped. Not exactly UFC! The first fight after the break was for the Featherweight belt with the wrestler Mark Adams beating self-taught Alan Omer by decision. This was a much better fight. Omer looked lively but couldn’t cope with the wrestling.
Then followed three fights decided in the first round. Americans War Machine and Seth Petruzelli (Kimbo killer) both submitted opponents after barely a minute. Petruzelli seemed to be a step too far for Ryan White who did trouble him with a counter to a head kick and flurry of punches from guard, but forgot about defending his arms, an arm bar being the result.
For the Lightweight belt Rob Sinclair took out German Daniel Weichel by ground and pound TKO. He was well on top but the fight did seem to be stopped early. I was expecting more from Wiechel, although I have read that he suffered an unseen low blow which he didn’t recover from, all academic now.
The main event needed to go longer than the first round and it went the distance, although Watson only just managed to make it to the second. In the lead up to the fight, a la UFC, they show recorded interviews. The interview with Horwich was bizarre; he mentioned quantum physics and spirituality while being only just coherent. He came out bashing a bible against his chest and bumbled around the cage waiting for Watson. He did not look good, in fact he looked unprepared. I was concerned for his safety, he just didn’t look right! I needn’t have been as he gave a very good account of himself.
The fight was an old school MMA clash of styles, the boxer/kickboxer verses the wrestler. Watson dominating the stand-up until Horwich took him down, which he managed easily. Watson nearly lost to Rear Naked Choke in the first and almost again in the second or third. As the fight went on Watson was better able to resist the takedown attempts and was always much better standing. I think he deservedly sneaked it with the judges.
It was only the third BAMMA event and I did enjoy it, although it was a good job the Americans came over to fight, they significantly raised the standard of the fights. The stick that Reid and Jordan received, really helped the entertainment level but was a bit distracting from the fights. GSP turning up to support Watson was a nice touch. The interviewer was awful though, lame attempt. It would be good to have someone who knew a little about MMA doing the interviews, Reid maybe? The announcer was excellent though, Michael Buffer stylee!
We got the tickets for a last minute concessionary tenner which helped, I might not have enjoyed it as much for £25 but I will probably go again if it comes back to Brum. If this report has made you desperate to watch the rerun is on Bravo tomorrow night.
May 15, 2010Imagination in Martial Arts & Fitness Training
Muhammad Ali was the greatest fighter of all time, well at least he believes so. Whatever, he produced many great quotes. Dubbed the ‘Louisville Lip’ by the press they came thick and fast. Some had wise words others cheeky. Below are two of the wiser quotes
The man who has no imagination has no wings
The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life
Both of these are worthy sentiments and have pertinence for your martial arts and fitness training. Clearly, if you view training the same after thirty years of training you haven’t trained very much at all. This is very much related to one of the things that really shook me was written on the once excellent but now defunct Goju Forums. Someone had said that some people do ten years training three times when they get to thirty years of training. This seemed awful to me but was truly put into context when another contributor said that there were others who did three years of training ten times!
Now that’s scary!
Why oh why would you want to do that? The same old stuff repeated time after time. Where is the progression? Sure you may very well work your way through the belts and get a high dan ranking but you know yourself if you’re merely collecting them like some styles collect kata. It has little meaning and must be incredibly boring.
That’s where the imagination comes in. I really like that Ali quote, if you have imagination you have wings. Imagination brings the martial arts alive. Training with Steve Morris has given me the confidence and desire to really use my imagination in training. Although observing imaginative training methods has not been restricted to him alone, he is the most inspiring in that regard.
Imagination coupled with intelligence in creating training drills, relating these to fighting requirements can get you out of the humdrum of dull repetitive training which seems to be for it’s own sake rather than improving someone as a fighter.
Sure repetition is required to master skills but with imaginative drilling this can be achieved in a fight specific manner. In my previous existence as a traditional karateka we would train basics in line, then marching around, then in padwork and with partners and then in the kata performance and even in bunkai. That’s a lot of basic training leaving little time to really apply and test what we learned. In the end there seems little point in mastering the perfect chudan block.
With imagination and a little intelligence these could have been combined into drills that tested the skills learned, but too often these skills were tested in an artificial stylised manner with little bearing on reality. I remember watching the grading at a progressive karate club and being surprised at the way in which minimal importance was given to the kata performance, in my eyes the form was all over the place. But the application of the moves were better and well….. more imaginative than those I’d been shown. Imagination can be used in a similar vein to make fitness training and conditioning more specific to your needs, rather than simply going to the gym to push weights around or plodding round a park.
These days I use kata less than ever, in fact barely at all. I do, however, refer to sanchin, and other kata’s from time to time. I believe sanchin in particular has a lot to offer as a model to illustrate certain concepts, such as structure to resist being pushed. I don’t get anyone to perform the actual kata but I do refer to it.
Tomorrow I am giving a private lesson on a kata I haven’t performed for a long time. There won’t be much, if any performance but there will be a lot of imaginative application on my part.
May 9, 2010Freeze, Fight, Flight and Martial Arts Training #2
The first post about the stress response described the physiological events triggered when threat or danger is perceived by humans. This post continues with the theme that the response is an essential part of evolutionary survival. We can think of the stress response as being responsible for surviving external threat, while the immune system counters internal threat.
In both cases the objective is to protect the system from threat by rearranging resources as appropriate. While an internal threat may trigger a withdrawal response when not feeling well, the external threat of a predator spied in the distance may evoke a freeze response, as movement is easier to detect in peripheral vision. Whatever, the desired outcome is survival of the system.
All charges against Omari Roberts dropped
In terms of self-defence the stress response plays a key role. If attacked it renders us better prepared to respond as intended by evolution, with enhanced strength, speed or power. Undoubtedly, for Omari Roberts, returning home for lunch only to find burglars in his mums house, the stress response kicked in, he fought for his life and managed to survive. He went with nature.
In society there can be a mismatch between the drive for survival and the Law, which only allows the rather ambiguous reasonable force. If Roberts had worried about the consequences of overstepping reasonable force he may not have survived the attack. As it was one of the bad guys died in the struggle and eventually, Roberts was arrested and charged with murder and assault. The case was withdrawn before the trial commenced.
In another recent case Munir Hussein and his brother ended up chasing and beating a burglar who had held the family hostage while ransacking their house. Clearly, evolution does not account for reasonable force, just survival. In anyone’s book the severe beating the brothers gave the burglar was NOT self-defence, nor simply survival for that matter. In this instance going with nature led to prison for Hussein as he went too primitive for societies liking, well the Judiciary ‘s liking anyway.
It seems that the whole thing can fall apart when a situation does not work out quite in line with evolution. If a person finds him/herself in a threatening situation it may not be appropriate to fight in the first instance, there are occasions whereby doing so would land the person in court, see above. Flight, although not always possible, would hopefully result in survival. This option might well achieve survival at the expense of the ego which is a small price to pay. The consequences of an inappropriate freeze response could be much worse. There’s an almost limitless list of situations that could trigger an suboptimal freeze, fight or flight response, not least faulty appraisal of a dangerous or threatening situation or tactics from an experienced, ruthless attacker to name two.
Ground and Pound
Previous experience of surviving situations that cause the stress response to kick in is to the external survival system what surviving illness is to the internal survival (immune) system. For example, an experienced police officer is more likely to successfully deal with a violent confrontation than a receptionist, while a fireman is likely to deal with a fire disaster better than a librarian. If similar useful life experience has not been gleaned it is essential for a martial artist to build the equivalent into their training. Otherwise years of training could be rendered useless by the incompatibility of evolutions survival system with the foibles of modern society. The consequences of this could be dire.
May 7, 2010Bruce Lee’s One Inch Punch
Following the recent one inch punch post I found a short documentary on the wing chung approach, which, of course, was Bruce Lee’s approach at least initially. I know very little about Wing Chung so I found it an interesting seven minutes or so.
Interestingly, the one bloke in the video said that on it’s own it offers little value, other than a great party trick of course. The value comes in applying the one inch punch movement. He said when you learn it you discover “invaluable lessons”.
If you manage to learn how to one inch punch successfully, that’s all well and good. The value comes in applying the same power movement in other ways. If you can do so in one context you must be able to do so in another.
Furthermore, it surely opens the door to further discoveries regarding the generation and application of short range power, without having to rely on “centering the chi” or whatever. One bloke in the video intimates using the one inch punch from a combat perspective, firing it from a blocking move without pulling the arm back first. Another mentions the importance of getting the mass into the target. Some sensible stuff here.
Lee's one inch punch
Right at the end of the video the last bloke to speak says that the one inch punch “keeps opening doors”. That’s the take home point, referred to above, learn it and apply it!
When we look at getting power over a short range we try to take what we know to work and condense it. So to get the mass into a short range strike you can use the same, or almost the same, body movement that powers a longer range punch to power a shorter movement. Add the explosive finish and you’ve got something to work with.
That would be one approach that may prove successful or may not depending on the context. Of course, if you manage to develop a new short range power generation movement, it only has value if it can be applied in a fight. If not it’s just a party trick.
May 3, 2010Freeze, Fight, Flight and Martial Arts Training
This is the first of two posts that describe the wonders of the human response to stress. Many people in martial arts refer to the stress response (or freeze, fight or flight) in a pretty negative manner. ‘Adrenaline dump’ is a term used to highlight a detrimental natural phenomenon that needs to be overcome during a self-defence situation. In fact, the stress response involves a complex integration of the body’s systems involving a powerful mix of neural and hormonal factors, preparing the system for survival.
Originally coined by Harvard physiologist Walter Cannon “fight-or-flight” response, later extended to include freeze, describes the body’s automatic response to perceived threat or danger. A product of evolution this in-built safety mechanism is designed to protect not harm us. For the caveman, threats were best dealt with by freezing, when movement could alert the threat to his presence, by fighting if the odds were in his favour, but if not by fleeing.
For instance, when a caveman’s BBQ bison was on the go and a nearby monolithic bear smelt it, wanted it and came charging into the party uninvited, it’s a fair assumption that running away was the best option. If your survival mechanism wasn’t up to scratch you were bear food. Survival of the fittest ensured the stress response evolved to the marvel that it is. Unfortunately, in today’s society where bear threat is low, social stress and the freeze, fight or flight response are not compatible. Chronic social stress is a killer but acute stress in the form of danger from a potential attacker or impending disaster is not only valid but also highly valuable.
The stress response gives us the strength, power and speed to avoid physical harm to ourselves or significant others when we perceive danger. The sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system (the part responsible for subconscious body maintenance) initiates the fight-or-flight response, while the parasympathetic branch returns the body to homeostasis, calming us down and bringing everything back to normal in both emotional and physiological terms.
We perceive threat or danger, real or imagined and the sympathetic nervous system sets off a flood of emotional and physiological activity which enables us to increase power, speed and strength as required. The amygdala ,sounds the alarm’ and the hypothalamus notifies all the other systems in the body via the nervous system, while instructing the endocrine system to begin the secretion of powerful hormones, mainly adrenaline and cortisol. These flood into the bloodstream and activate cells to aid the preparation to freeze, fight or flight.
This internal activity results in many complex changes with the purpose to divert resources from unnecessary functions to systems vital in the process of increasing speed, power and strength. These changes include increased heart rate, blood pressure, breathing rate, brain activity and blood flow being redirected to the muscles (vascular shunt) while digestion, the immune system and the reproductive system for example are switched off. We are hardwired to resist threat and be able to protect ourselves from danger. This system is poetry in motion, the stress response is a powerful, useful process which kicks in as reliably as flicking a switch once danger is perceived.
May 17, 2011
