Dog Brothers Euro '12 Gathering Highlights

Enjoy!

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1RzBzl_O3o&feature=plcp"]Dog Brothers Euro Gathering 2012 - YouTube[/ame]

 

Looks like a fun day was had.

The Bear.

 

That was my impression too from previous videos I've seen of the Dog Brothers. It was interesting to see the guys who don't over commit to a move land strikes, or counter so effectively by standing their ground in both the use of weapons as well as the grappling.

 

Absolutely Everything evolves, nothing remains static.

The guy who fights with the 3-section and spear, also happens to be a BJJ Black Belt There was also an ADCC qualifying fighter, a semi-pro German MMA fighter and speaking from a DBMA background we incorporate a lot of material from 'the alive arts'.

It's not uncommon for guys to cross train FMA with other things. The trouble tends to be though, that competition grappling doesn't involve sticks (or strikes!)

The stick game is also constantly evolving. You see Ole 'c-Time Dog' doing some really interesting stuff with the double sticks (which he'd only learned for 90mins two days earlier BTW).

 

You should look at some of the backsword stuff. The stick style seems to trade alot of blows going in because the entry and guard positions are out of sync. The old manuals have alot of good strategies for avoiding that. Sometimes those old dead arts have some good ideas too.

The Bear.

 

A lot of the art behind what we do tries to avoid exactly that, but things don't always go to plan

Also, as it's a stickfight some guys are of the mind-set that they'll 'take one to give three'. I used to be of the opinion that I'll trade a leg for a headshot, but I may have changed my mind (that's me with the pasty white thign ).

 

Should also have said, a lot of the German fighters are heavily influenced by German Broadsword, not sure how that relates to Backsword?

 

Heh heh heh, I hear that.

Yeah trading blows in swordsmanship is a big no no so we train like mad to avoid it but best laid plans and all that. Dunno German broadsword but should be similar. Look at the Scottish stuff Anti-pugilsm is my favourite and you can train it in a couple of months with some pointers.

The Bear.

 

That thigh shot looks painful! Good video though, especially the 'horse' and chariot at the end...

 

Been waiting to see this! Still gutted I couldn't make it.

So...Is there like different categories you can fight in? I thought it was just discussed with your opponent before hand.

Dunno if there was more MMA type stuff than previous clips I've seen...but there did seem to be more women involved!

 

In one of his recent posts "Crafty" made reference to the fighters using espada y daga (stick and knife) to reduce the "crash in" mentality

 

This is my only niggle with the Dog Brothers stuff, it's great for learning combative stick work, but FMA has always been about the blade. You certainly wouldn't trade a thigh shot for a head shot if you had Bolos.
Of course you can argue that most westerners don't have to face machetes, although of course Freeform has lived in Bristol

 

If you use a blade at the gatherings and it gets deployed then i have seen the fight "called" becuase it would have ended it - but there certainly is a "banzai!!!" mentality on display at times!

I am still aiming to join in the 2014 gathering in the US (or the Candian one same year)

 

Freeforem as a point of reference how similar is taking a body or leg shot from those sticks to a half decent thai/shin kick ? significantly more painful or less ?

 

I have to say i was impressed with the tanacity. And also the use of grappling and other strike (knees, elbows, kicks etc) all looked very good.

More power to you all

 

Absolutely. We (the Aberdeen/Glasgow Clans) have been playing with more espada y daga and machete. Definately cuts down on the crazy crashes. On a personal note, my own journey has been one from deliberately looking for the crash (because of my Judo/BJJ background and to avoid getting hit with a stick), through to deliberately avoiding it to improve my stick game. Now for me it's just a part of the game, you need to have a clinch game incase the guy crashes. Conversely, because you fight the style and not the guy, sometimes the correct answer is to crash.

Absolutely, and this is why we're seeing a lot more sword play at the Euro IMHO. The use of the training blades removes the ambiguity. By the way, the 'leg for a head' is really more of an example, I normally try to get the leg out of the way

And of course I did train with the Glasgow Clan for a long time (this reminds me of how once the Aberdeen Clan challenged the Glasgow Clan to a 'Gang Knife Fight'...... bad idea!).

Depends on who's on the other end of the leg/stick

 

It's different. It's less blunt and more sharp and sparkly. If you notice most of the stops from hits are due to pain flare rather than dead leggy disable you get from kicks. The good thing is that once the pain is gone you can usually get back out there.

The Bear.

 

Absolutely.

Though in this instance my leg totally spazzed up on me and I couldn't bend the knee. After about 10 minutes it had eased off and I got a few more fight in. The following day however, I realised that the hamsting had pulled on that side, I'm guessing an overactive protective mechanism. I'm still tender on that side of the leg and that's been about a month.