Hi everyone, I have decided that i want to participate in a self defence course so after a lot of research i am going to check out Defendo. Here is a link; http://www.defendo.com/wolfes/index.html I am not new to martial arts, i trained in sin moo hapkido for about 14 months but my school closed down and i looked around for another one to join but nothing felt right so i've not trained in about 5 years. After the class i will post and let everyone know how it went and if i decide to sign on as a student. Andre
well, mike mcdonald goes there. nuff said. and btw who is that guy standing next to mike in the pic on the highlight reel page? mcdonald is not a tall guy, like 5'10, that dude must be a midget. the site does sound a bit markety, but like i said- the black sniper trains there. the utilities look good, they have grappling and kickboxing... sounds good.
I have heard many good things about defendo. Although I have never tried it out myself. It would be good if you could report back and let us know what it was like. I would be interested in another point of view. J
Here is my report of my free introductory Defendo class. The school itself is located in a small warehouse complex with a foyer area with desk and office in the front.Walk through the door into the back and the training area is covered with mats with a heavy bag and a speed bag to the left and various pads attatched to the walls for kicking and punching. On the right wall they store the ring ropes which are stretched out and look to be very easy to bring down and set up. Small changing room upstairs and a power cage and weights beside the staircase at the bottom of the steps The training started off with combination punches and after that we did some low kicking. Focus mitts and big pads are used and at the end of this part of the class we go all out with striking for a minute. The instructor told us that the average street fight lasts for 3 minutes so we are to work our way up to being able to go all out for that amount of time.The strikes are basic boxing strikes, with elbows thrown in, and can be easily modified to palm strikes or whatever you feel good about doing. The next part of the class was dealing with front and rear choke and how to prevent and retaliate and this involved finger cranks as well as other options. SUMMARY I am quite happy with what i found here, there is no time wasted doing warmups or bodyweight exercises, all the time is dedicated to learning the techniques. There was a woman there who trained in Krav Maga who was not happy in her style because so much of class time was dedicated to warming up and kicking and punching at the air. She felt that she was not progressing at a fast enough rate and she did not feel confident with the style due to the length of time it would take to become proficient. It felt pretty comfortable being there, no lining up or bowing, everyone is there to train and the instructor does not need to look at a belt to know where you are at. It was also fun to get in and learn things that i didn't do in hapkido, such as throwing boxing style punches, and i am glad i don't have to perform any spinning, jumping, acrobatic style kicks because the knees just can't take that kind of thing anymore. The one thing i am very pleased with is that i can only go to day classes which is great because they are so small, almost like having private lessons with only four people there today and two of us were first timers. I think i've covered everything so i'll sign off and perhaps give an update in a month or two to let everyone know how training is going. Andre
sounds great. I remember at my old school we spent like 20 minutes warming up. really, a few minutes of skipping and a bit of stretching is all you need, unless you are a bit old and require a bit more grease to get going
Thanks for the update, Glad to see you enjoyed it. If there was one thing you remembered most and had the greatest effect what would it be ?. Its nice to see a format of the class like that, similar to my FMA class. Thanks J
I think the thing i took away from that class that made the biggest impression on me were the boxing style combinations. I have been exposed to joint locks and self-defence techniques before but i have never done any kind of boxing and i found that i enjoyed hitting the focus mitts and bag. I have decided to wait for the holiday season to end because the school will close for a week and why pay for a full month of training and only get 3 weeks, so when the new year hits i'll start training. Andre
Hi Andre, Glad you found something you enjoy. I would just like to comment on a few things though. "She felt that she was not progressing at a fast enough rate and she did not feel confident with the style due to the length of time it would take to become proficient." Sometimes students want instant results and aren't willing to wait to bear the fruits of the system they are learning. It applies to all facets of life. A good cook will take his time to prepare a gourmet meal, even if it means taking twice as long, etc... I don't do Krav Maga, and not trying to defend it. "is no time wasted doing warmups" I have to say that warming up before a class is not a waste of time. If done properly, a good warm up session not only better prepares your body for a more productive workout, but also greatly reduces your chances of injury through pulled muscles, cramps, etc... Hope you keep enjoying your training. Cheers Wali
Hi Wali, i don't actually consider warming up a waste of time but i would rather do it before the class actually starts I've always found that when i go to a class i get there early enough that it's not a problem preparing my body for the rigours ahead. Andre
Hi All, Interesting website, seems like a lot of MMA stuff to me. I am not sure that street fights last an average of 3 minutes. Most are short, dynamic, and short. With half way competent combatants most fights last less than a minute. Mind you training for 3 minutes will give you the edge in a 3 min fight. However, as we know their is no set rules on this one. I would also be unsure about boxing combos for the street. Not knocking boxers here. Imagine this though! you learn left hook, right cross, body shot combo and repeat it many times. Then one day you get into a street confrontation, you repeat the above combo, but before your second shot your opponent slips on the curb, or jumps back, or tackles you. What happens to the other parts of the combo you spent time learning? I am just suggesting that pre-prepared combos do have disadvantages. cheers, iain http://groups.msn.com/EXPLOSIVESELFDEFENCESYSTEMSTANNESGROUP/homepage.msnw
so shall we just learn to do random wild shots instead of learning how to string them together? suprrisingly enough, that style of training involves some ACTUAL sparring. the reason for learning those combos isnt to do that exact combo on the street, its to learn how to move properly and how to flow your punches together, as well as giving you some good basic combinations to start off with.
Definately, it would be pointless to have forms for boxing due to its simplicity, but the principle is somewhat the same.
Not everybody can, though. It's a safety issue as well - the last thing an instructor needs is for someone to injure themselves because they're not properly warmed up, something which falls under the instructor's responsibility.
