Krav Maga

Discussion in 'General Martial Arts Discussion' started by daggers, Apr 23, 2015.

  1. daggers

    daggers Valued Member

    Ok I'm asking a question because I'm interested in another style apart from Muay Thai (I know ... It's Unlike me! :))

    What are people's opinions on Krav Maga? What's it's downfall in your opinions if any? There is a lot of discussion on 'the best martial art for street defence ' on here and I was wondering if this is the people's number 1 choice? Take out the notion of 'forget about street defence just use common sense ' and awareness training and all that lot and the 'every style has it's own uses' but Getting down to the nitty gritty is Krav Maga the best street defence system ? If not why not? What's it's flaws?
    After all. it's labeled as straight to the point, basic , effective real life situation training taught to the Israeli military! It Sounds perfect
    Thanks
     
    Last edited: Apr 23, 2015
  2. Van Zandt

    Van Zandt Mr. High Kick

    Not my personal preference for anything, but that's the operative word here.

    Effective anything is down to finding what works best for you.

    Despite what Krav folks say, high kicks work best for me.

    And speaking of "operative", there's a lot of civvies in KM riding the tail coats of (supposed) Israeli special ops to sell their services.
     
  3. Guitar Nado

    Guitar Nado Valued Member

    I am surprised to see you posting about some non-Muay Thai thing for sure!

    I did Krav for about a year when I was getting back in to MA 4-5 years ago.

    Looking back on it, it was not too bad, but nothing amazing. The strikes were basic boxing, some Muay Thai-like elbows, kicks were pretty standard kick boxing stuff - but generally low. They really focused on hammer fists for some reason though. The self defense moves were a lot like stuff I did long ago when I did Danzan Ryu jujitsu. Some that seems like it would work some of the time, but be iffy a lot of the time. Looking back, I think I had that "iffy" vibe about a lot of the stuff they taught, but not sure how accurate that feeling its.

    The thing that they did that was cool was focus on things like having people have their eyes closed, and people "surprising" them by pushing them, yelling at them, etc. Sounds sort of goofy, but it puts you in a different mindset than sparring, or kicking a pad, etc. At least it did for me. I like that they made the attempt at this sort of thing anyways.

    I'd say that Muay Thai + BJJ (or any good grappling) > Krav for self defense in general. Krav teaches weapon defense stuff, but it seemed like it would take a huge amount of drilling for any of that to work. FMA seems better at the weapon defense from what I have seen. So learn FMA + Muay Thai + some good grappling and practice some scenarios where people jump out at you and I think you'd be ahead of what I was exposed to.

    The place I went too also taught boxing as a separate class, and they encouraged people to do that. They also were often suggesting that people learn BJJ in addition to the Krav - so it is cool they didn't have some anti sporting style attitude. Truth be told, if they started offering it at the school I go to now, or a Krav school opened up down the street - I'd still be interested, I had fun doing it, it was a decent workout, and there might be some self defense to it. I just don't think it is any be-all-end all.

    I'm intermediate level at best in any MA I have studied/study now, so take this opinion for what it is worth. I think you know 10 times more about Muay Thai than I ever will, but I'm just piping up cause I did do Krav for a little while.
     
    Last edited: Apr 23, 2015
  4. daggers

    daggers Valued Member

    Thanks sunfish :)
    So you think krav would be better learned alongside a striking art, almost like it's a supplement art, as the don't really go through the mechanics and structure of striking as say boxing would ?
     
  5. BenHill

    BenHill Valued Member

    I'd go for Gracie Jiu-Jitsu + Muay Thai instead.

    You'll get the knife and gun disarms, escapes from common holds and better striking and grappling.

    FMA sounds good in theory for knife defense but when after observing the other students in the class I realized there is a long timeline for getting good at that. It is not super practical by any means. The instructor who had been doing it 12 years and had cred in MT and BJJ was really good. The assistant instructors with 4 years, not so good. Sort of like "uh how does it go again".

    The Gracie defenses are simpler, more like block, control the weapon hand with 2 on 1 and move to a submission.

    At the start of every class we did some self defense and the move into regular grappling like take downs and submissions.
     
  6. daggers

    daggers Valued Member

    To be honest I really enjoyed a krav seminar I attended a while back, and I get what your saying that I suppose it depends on how good the instructor is.
    But is it safe to assume that learning from a very good instructor and supplementing it with a striking art such as Thai would make it a very effective system assuming that you train hard and consistently ?
     
  7. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    Honestly if you have to supplement a self defense art with a striking art it's not a great self defence art to begin with. If you enjoy it then go for it, but don't think what you are getting is what is taught to the Israeli spec ops lads, who seem much happier shooting and stabbing than playing around empty handed with people
     
  8. robin101

    robin101 Working the always shift.

    Well if you want to learn what the ISDF learn ( and they do learn som hand to hand, at least some of them do. Saw a few shows where they visit platoons in Israel, also look up Itay Gil) You are going to have to go to israel and join the army as 90 percent of what is called Krav Maga is just rebranded Karate and generic Self defence stuff.
     
  9. Hannibal

    Hannibal Cry HAVOC and let slip the Dogs of War!!! Supporter

    The military shoot people; if that doesnt work they stab them...if it then all goes really South they are probably dead and H2H is employed because it cant make it worse

    Also worth noting that the "founders" had backgrounds in other disciplines hence the amalgamation came from an existing skillset. With your MT you might actually get on with it better than someone starting "cold"
     
  10. daggers

    daggers Valued Member

    I believe it's taught as a crash course in self defence , I'm sure there will be situations where a soldier is unarmed and needs to rely on hand to hand combat? If not all the time I'm sure it's handy to know.
    Can a martial art be taught in a crash course? Probably to some extent.. For example no training or 7 days intensive training.

    Krav seems to be a bit of a left fielder , it's not a martial art, it was never designed to be, and it's not a combat sport either

    It's not selling itself to be something it's not (as a whole, I'm sure some schools do)
    It doesn't claim to be or was invented to be the best or compete with anything else or this that or the other, it is what it is.
    A crash course in self defence. Some will be good with it some will not be.
     
  11. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    Trouble is the military dont really do self defence they do killing people, they as a rule aren't looking at de-escalation, use of force issues, legal ramifications of what they are doing, which is what a good self defence course will cover
     
  12. daggers

    daggers Valued Member

    Is this not a personal issue though? I mean I'm sure that 90% of people who are defending themselves will , on instinct stop once the attacker has been stopped, for someone to keep going beyond nessasery force is more phycological make up? I think it's kind if common sense to know when to stop, if someone is trying to snatch my baby daughter as much as I'd like to kill the guy I would do only enough to stop and detain. I know this, and iv never been on a 'what the law says I should do' course
    It's funny you mention law because two assistant coaches on the seminar I did were police officers!
     
    Last edited: Apr 26, 2015
  13. bassai

    bassai onwards and upwards ! Moderator Supporter

    You may say that , but , I've been shown techniques where the "finishes" would certainly be viewed as over the top in a court of law , the danger being if you train this stuff regularly muscle memory can kick in and land you in trouble.
     
  14. Rebel Wado

    Rebel Wado Valued Member

    I think most will find that martial arts training builds skill sets. When cross training with folks from Krav Maga, typically my skill sets were much better than most of them. Better technique and better execution.

    What I wasn't better at was the specific conditions that Krav Maga trained for. No preset combinations, but providing weapons to use off of survival instinct. I don't mean just tapping into the reptile brain, but more about awareness of tactical weapons to use when in survival mode.

    I think for awareness, Krav Maga can open the eyes on just how costly tactical mistakes can be IMHO.
     
  15. BenHill

    BenHill Valued Member

    I think a lot of people underestimate is the training gained in certain sport martial arts.

    Modern Krav Maga is a combination of BJJ, Judo, Muay Thai, Kali.

    If you were to study each of these martial arts separately a couple years then do Krav Maga, you would come in knowing just about everything in KM only your execution will be so much better.

    Example - they teach a double leg take downs and hip throws in KM. Whose hip throw is going to be better, mine, as I throw people all the time in BJJ or some guy who has to demonstrate a hip throw on non-resisting opponent to get his yellow belt?

    Obviously if a Krav guy try to hip throw me as a BJJ guy who gets take downs all the time in competition I'm going to avoid that very easily.

    Same thing with all the other skills. Kali guy will cut him to pieces, MT/Kyokushin guy will out strike him etc.

    You may "know how" to punch or kick but do you actually do it well?

    Then there's the conditioning aspect that is built up by sparring in grappling and striking. You'd want a KM school that taught KM as an adjunct to BJJ or Muay Thai.
     
    Last edited: Apr 27, 2015
  16. Bronze Statue

    Bronze Statue Valued Member

    Was Krav Maga designed to be learned to some level of proficiency in a time shorter than the total from a couple of years in each of the component arts?

    Outcompeting a specialist's strengths would be a foolish tactic in most situations. Would a Krav Maga'er be able to cut the Judo/Jiu Jitsu guy to pieces, outstrike the Kali guy, and throw down and lock up the Muay Thai/Kyokushin guy?

    What about as an adjunct to the Judo or Kali?
     
  17. Rebel Wado

    Rebel Wado Valued Member

    Only faster than arts that don't routinely spar, roll, and test things out. Krav Maga would not be any faster to striking proficiency than training in boxing. Would not be faster to grappling proficiency than training wrestling.

    Krav Maga is more about warfare tactics. A major part of this is to take the enemy out of their element and capitalize on mistakes. When I rolled with a Krav Maga guy, he showed me bites to the thumb and to the throat. These weren't the kind of bites we trained, which were more like using bites through clothing as pinches. These bites in Krav Maga were to permanently disable or kill.

    So my grappling, my boxing, everything better than him, except my biting was not. He had trained biting with ground fighting... an area that was not something I was well versed in.

    ONE mistake and he was on my throat and I was a dead man. Invoke panic mode in the enemy... sloppiness gets you killed. This kind of stuff. No preset combinations, attack off of instinct.

    There are things that Krav Maga folks are going to be more proficient at because they train and understand them more than those that don't train them. They then need to train in the fundamentals, but training in these fundamentals would not be better than specialized training (e.g. it is not a shortcut for these).
     
    Last edited: Apr 27, 2015
  18. BenHill

    BenHill Valued Member

    True, however you have to accept that the result will not be as good. In the army they don't really care because it's mostly to build confidence anyway.

    Basically they are puffing up your ego so you'll engage but really you still suck. If you die it's fine, they'll send more. lol

    The ones that don't suck do MMA on their own time, I trained with a MCMAP instructor who was also a pro MMA fighter and a BJJ blue belt. They train in civilian gyms.

    The pro MMA fighter/blue belt and him being muscular 200lbs part was what made him good, not the MCMAP.

    Maybe, maybe not. lol

    You don't necessarily know who you are dealing with in combat or the street so no time to strategize.

    Some aspects of the KM philosophy of being super aggressive "take him out" as opposed to cocky sparring mentality are preferred.

    It may have some value as an addon to MMA training.

    I'm training Gracie Jiu-Jitsu right now and we do knife and gun disarms, escape from standing holds and punch defense before every class. The only thing really missing would be the striking which you could get by adding Muay Thai or Kyokushin. So you are getting the weapons defenses and proficiency in striking and grappling.

    So my pick is GJJ/Kyokushin or Muay Thai. If you are really interested in offensive knife then Kali.

    Not much "defense" in Kali, hard to justify legally.

    I'm also reasonably sure you can kill someone with a knife already and you can certainly still be killed by a striker or grappler or random psycho holding a knife either way.

    It doesn't offer the same advantage, two guys with a machetes or knives is still pretty much a toss up if you've ever seen live sparring. Most of the fancy techs you see in the drills don't work.

    An untrained grappler vs trained grappler is a massacre for the untrained guy as is untrained vs MT or KK. For my money high ranks in GJJ/KK is best to gain advantage. From there the road to proficiency with weapons is also much shorter than if you started with weapons.

    Trained strikers and grapplers pick up things like Kali real quick but again, you are much better off with your rifle or pistol. I question the wisdom of really spending much time on that aspect.
     
    Last edited: Apr 27, 2015

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