Great posts all. It's a nice demo video, but like others have stated, don't confuse it with an actual fight. To support what others have said, strength does allow one to often make techniques "work." This is a fact that is cited over and over again by experienced martial artists. I've heard Dan Inasanto discuss this and Robert Smith writes about it in Martial Musings. Here's a personal story to add. About five years ago, while I was taking BJJ, I participated in a school tournement. Because of my relative light weight at the time (about 160lbs) I was placed in the kids division as the rest of the adults outweighed me by an average 40lbs and the needed more competitors for the kids group. Yes, the entire thing was a bit like that Seinfeld episode. Anyway, in my first match I went up against one of the more advanced students at the school. He was 14 or so and ahad been at this for a while. I was about ten years older and easily 30lbs heavier and had less than a years worth of training. We rolled for a bit, I ended up in his guard and he nicely tansitioned to an arm bar. I felt the transition go and curled my bicept to protect my elbow. I looked and realized that in countering I had lifted him off the mat while he was trying to arm bar me. It was at that moment that I recognized that, if I wanted to, I could out strength him and win the match in an instant. But in this case, what would that prove? So I lowered him back to the mat, ratcheted back the strength and tried to match skill for skill. I lost on points. He was far more skilled than me. But not enough to counter the large weight and strength differential between the two of us. There were few points where I could have, for all of his skill, simply powered through his technique and locked or choked him out. If we were to meet now and roll again, especially if he's kept up with his training, I expect I'd end up a pretzel because he most likely is much closer in weight and strength. - Matt
Very true. That's why I get so vicious when fighting heavier guys , some of the conventional blocks in Shotokan are just ridiculous. You can however counter that by using 'soft blocks', evasions etc. I'm with Pete Ticali here. I could be wrong, but I'm under the impression that you get power by being fast and using 'penetration', not by just launching a move as hard as you can...? Not literally. And not grappling exactly. But yeah, I was fighting this huge heavy guy at my dojo before and I swept him down on his ass without much effort...poor devil, he doesn't do very much for the stereotype that big people are Cro-Magnons with no finesse Hey, another consideration. I'm sorry if this comes out sounding belligerent, but so what if strength is superior to technique? No one, when faced with a huge assailant, is going to think 'Oh well, I'm so weak, I will just have to lie down and take the punishment'. So you're the inferior fighter, it doesn't mean you're under some kind of obligation to just sit back and take crap from a heavier guy.
No, of course you shouldn't. Personally, I view fighting to be a lot like chess; as long as you don't give up regardless of your opponent's size, you have a chance. Though there are limits to strength, and technique vs size. Just a couple years ago while I was in college, we would always wrestle/fight each other for fun. I had a pretty good record, and one time I wrestled this guy who was around twice my size(I was 145lbs at the time and he was 280lbs). I was stronger, easily, however, he had his weight to back him up and over time after countless times of my pinning him and him breaking out, I was finally unable to muster the strength to move his weight and using his great weight he was able to pin me and get the win... after about an hour. Another time, I was fighting this guy, I got him on the ground, jumped on his back for an easy pin, and he just got up! He didn't even realize I'd been putting my full weight on him and was now suspended in the air . He weighed 230lbs, we ended the match in a draw because I had way more endurance, and his weight didn't tire me so much. Now I'm 210lbs, and I would confidently say that neither of those situations would work at my current weight. Except now I need to get all that endurance back.
In my opinion, it's a non-issue. Larger, stronger people have this annoying tendency to have good technique. People with good technique tend to be people who've put the effort into their conditioning, and therefore become strong.
You should have destroyed him when you had the chance. So im guessing in real life if someone pulls a knife on you and you have a gun, you will throw away your gun and find yourself a knife to match him skill for skill. It proves you absolutely suck. Yours in martial arts, Kid
... and your reply proves to me that you haven't read MAP's TOS Krazy especially this one .... "1.2.2 Posts and comments that are meant to incite conflicts between members or outside parties are strictly prohibited."
Well said, Knight Errant! Goddammit, there's a huge long thread on this debate yet nobody's realised that you can have both of them...!
Hello, By the way, about the movie Enough...apparently Lopez actually had to learn Krav Maga for that. So I guess they were valid moves that would have worked.
Both. A weakling could be very skilled, but his skill can fall apart at the hands of a man who is too strong. An unskilled guy could be a bodybuilder, but there's no point in having all that muscle if he is completely unexperienced in fighting.
Neither Strength Nor Skill When it comes to a fight skill, strength or even style have little to do with the outcome. At that moment the winner is decieded by whomever whishes victory the most. No matter how much stronger one is or how much more sikilled, it all comes down to the figther's spirit (to call it something).
Now i might have a strong spirit, and i might want to win far more than him, but in all reality Bas Rutten, or Royce Gracie would still whup my sorry ass, no matter how much more i wanted to win, basically they'd be more experienced, stronger and have better technique.
I agree. sorry Ice, thats a nice thought but it just doesnt stack up. strrngth, skill, and will all play a big part.
I understand that this is something that can be hard to understand and imposible to believe. The best case to back up my argument, although not related to figthing might make this clearer. This is something that happened a long time ago and I am sure we all heard about. What I am talking about is story about a young man who got traped under his pickup truck and his mother after seeing this summoned up enough strength to raise the truck high enough for the man to get out. What I am trying to say is that if a person manages to overcome all his/her mental barriers there is not saying what can happen, and the smae applies to fighting.
I know the story, I think other issues are that our bodies have no natural weapons and we by design are meant to run away, this will be our strongest desire. But influnces from drugs and alcohol will effect strength as does dopermine, ceretonin etc, the only thing is its because of these influences people can become stronger and it applies to adrenaline and this effects both attacker and the attacked person. Obviously someone trained would be capable of greater strength because of the greater thickness of their muscle fibres. Peronally there are so many variables, strength, speed, strategies and technique, obviosly if we train we would like to put the bet on the person who is trained, none the less its a guess who knows who would win?
That's relying on skill only. Although I would want to win the most against a big Judo man, even if I'm more skilled, he'll take me down if he's the bigger one. Little guys CAN beat bigger ones, but that's only in the uncommon situation that the little guy has tons of experience where the big guy has none. This is proven by the fact that, if you take two completely inexperienced people, one big and one small, the big one will win.
