I read this in the stance thread: and it got me wondering. Is good, hard, alive, resistive, realistic, full on, pick which ever term you want training all it takes to be able to defend yourself? What are the pro's to this approach, what are the con's? Is this really the best way? Thoughts please everyone
That's my thoughts as well. Good striking skills first, stand-up grappling and groundwork to follow. All trained realistically and to a reasonable standard and unless you're really unlucky that's all you'll need Biggest problem will be overcooking it
All I'd add to that is: 1. street smarts - because not everyone has them. Ultimately the big difference here between a self defence club and another type of club is the focus of training. Combat Sports by their very nature have to focus on skills appropriate to their ruleset. Self Defence clubs are freer to focus on skills appropriate to HAOV.
The streetsmarts is something you either have or not. Does teaching them work or do you have to earn them? There's a few things that can't be used but I've never seen a sports club not train illegal moves. They just tell you not to get caught using them in competition
Teaching them works. For most people its stuff that's logical, they've just never had to think about it before. I'm not talking so much about illegal moves - just focusing on attack patterns more common to what some people (fortunately) only ever see on cctv as opposed to the attack patterns seen in the ring. If they don't want to compete in a ring, and they are (initially) only training for self defence (as opposed to training because they want to keep fit or because they like the company/challenge etc) it makes more sense just to train mainly against HAOV rather than learn other skillsets (for example, and without prejudice, learning how to defend against Van Zandt spin kicking them in the head).
I guess. I think our customers are slightly different though. We get some that want self defence but most just want to fight.
Exactly. My wife was born and raised in a small village in Ohio, with less than 5000 people total living there. Now she's living in a big city with me where the population is over 310,000. Now my wife is probably one of the most intelligent people you will ever meet, but because she was born in a place where if you locked your doors you were considered paranoid she is a very trusting lady. Fortunately she's gotten much better at it through guidance (she still gives me a hard time about some things) as she realizes she needs to not only protect herself but also protect us.
You need a balance, SD, in my opinion, is like riding a bicycle you need to have some strength, but also some technique. Learning to ride the bike, from scratch with no help is really hard, just like learning SD. Bikes have stabalisers, so you can practice without worrying about falling over, then when your ready you take of the stabilisers and your off. Really training SD, needs to invovle stabilisers (i.e. training no resistance) and then, when you have the technique down you can add in resisitance (take the stabalisers off) There need to be realism and resistance, otherwise people just wont be able to deal with the pressure of someone who acctually wants to hurt you.
I have to agree with Harlequin. Best way to learn a martial art is first practising against a COMPLAINT *yes i said it =P* partner, get the techniques into your body, then spar full contact and as realistically as possible so you can get the feel for when and how to apply the technique *distance, timing, reflex* And of course by technique i mean everything from strikes, grappling to straight forward stepping and footwork. COMPLAINT training and sparring both have its merits, and i don't believe a martial artist can excell without either. =)
So are we saying that good fighting skills are a must, but so are "streetsmarts"? Who would fair better? The ring fighter with limited "smarts" or the armchair theorist who's seriously clued up?
Depends. If it's on avoiding a confrontation, probably the theorist. If it's actually fighting itself, the fighter naturally.
Self defence doesn't really work in a 1 on 1 face to face. Once you're there you need to know how to fight
Granted, but what about the bit before that, the posturing, eyeballing etc? No fighting really needed at this point surely?
I fail to see the distinction. Good Self defence includes knowing how to fight. Good Self Protection covers all the avoidance and verbal strategies.
That's what I think. I mixed it up with the street smarts or linked them. Think I may have answered a question splitting the terms?
Got to disagree with you Moi. Humans are animals and as such have a variety of cues that denote their intent before it become apparent. Body language makes up about 93% of our communication so the fight is usually on long before anyone throws a punch. This isn't some great scientific thing, most of it is common sense, part of what I'd call "streetsmarts". If you thought about it you'd probably know something was about to go off before it did.
You have to be careful with body language though as it could worsen the situation. I'd say that if you are learning about it so that you can pick up on, then that's probably a good idea. But if you are trying to defuse a situation by staring someone down or make it look like you are a lot tougher than they are, then I think that's a good way to get shanked. Anyway, running is always a good option.
I think you're only going to get the posturing from people that either know/think there's nothing to worry about in taking you on or more likely don't want to fight in the first place.
