tallgeese

That's a real interesting qustion you pose. And yes, the best case is adaquate amounts of both. My first thought was skill, however, on examination, I'm going with fitness. Simply because all the skill in the world won't give you the ability to actually perform a movement under stress without the capability to physically perform the action. So, a reluctant fitness vote. I think it will matter most at the extreme end of the fitness spectrum. An average in shape guy will function fine with skill alone in all likelyhood agaist alot of threats. It's the heavily obease and unfit individuals that will suffer the most on the fitness front. As with all things, the extremes are easiest to identify and define. That being said, I do get tired of people equating fitness with the ability to fight. This is a pet peeve of mine. Being in shpae dosn't mean that you're automatically going to destroy someone in a conflict.

Agreed, why not start with that advantage already if you can.

Actually, I do think that unused skills, even when one is very skilled in them, do deterorate without repetition. For instance, when I was competitive, I'd spend the 2-3 months leading up to a fight training only with the rules set of that competition. No small joint stuff or weapons. Then, when done, I'd go back to integrating all my skills into my sd game. Guess what, my timing and flow weren't there they way they had been. I'd have to work them back up to speed. Now, for this sort of thing I will conceed you have to limit your training to a certain "set" of skills if you want to be competitive. But even withing that set you have to be diverse. Now, removing competive goals from the equation, you can't have skills dropping off the radar for extended periods. If you spend less time on a skill, it sould be because your fighting principles define that skill as less important than others. This is a different deliniation than you're talking about. As an example, while I consider unarmed training vs. a knife and club impoortant skills, I don't spend as much time working them since I've started carrying a gun for a living. Given my profession, my primary tool of choice in these encounters would be to deploy my firearm. Therefore, I can shave some unarmed time off of dealing with those to add time training in other things. Including now, range time. It's not to say that I never train them, but just that as people and circumstances evlove, you might re-evaluated how certain skill fit into your defensive plan. That's very different than choosing to train in only one aspect of the fight game for quiker results in a single catagory.

That's very well put, bushido man.

Sounds like my plan. If I'm alone, they get the car. If my kids are in it, I do my best to control the weapon and start shooting. Controling the weapon is first and formost in any situation like this. I do agree, that they will most likley be armed. It's useful to go and work scenarios like this from a cor from time to time to get used to the space and movment confinments.

Some of those ko's are impressive. But would you really be willing to bet your life, on the street, to a movement where you turned your back voulutarily to an attacker when you were unsure of his skill level or intent? I wouldn't. Also, some of those movments haven't stayed in because they are battlefield effective, but because they are favored for whatever reason by the instructors who teach them. Also, not all arts are acutally rooted in combat. Many were designed in the modern era for varios purposes not realted to killing people. Even more were modified heavily at the turn of the century to appeal to more people. I'm not saying people shouldn't practice this kind of stuff. I'm just saying it's not necissarly the most efficent way to pass your time if you're really look to upgrade your cahnces of successfully defending yourself.

Yeah, it's in that region. Feels like it's where it runs thru the groove. We'll see, hope it's not more. today- 6, 2 min rounds on the mitt gloves. start with a defense and combo. add more strikes by end of round 1. add a trapping motion to clear lead hand and strike. add leg check for MT round as well as a pummel off a charge and corner by the final rounds. pretty free form drill, no set pattern, holders choice. 4, 3 min rounds of of limited engagment sparring. defense centric stuff. followed by combo development 2, 3 min rounds of free sparring to takedown 6, 3 min rounds of free roll from standing

Your mistaking my methodology with intensity. You should be training quite intensly at whatever you do. Intensity is what will develop mindset to win fights. Just because your not just focusing on a single movement dosn't mean you're not training intensly. The repetition I mentioned dosne't mean that the reps of a given movment shouldn't be given intently. Of course they should, it just means that eventually, you'll complete an equal number of reps. All should be performed with intensity. Again, my argument is that a more well rounded approach will give a fighter a more diversified skill base quicker. Given the sheer number of situations and variables that a sd focused ma-ist might encounter, this is needed. You can't focus solely on a jab for signifigant training period at the expense of skill building in aspects of the ground game, clinch, other strikes, weapons, ect. You're essintailly building a one trick pony if you spend too much time on one thing, and if that trick dosn't work, your out of luck. That's not to say you can't have focus on different aspects. Of course that will happen. But not exclusive work. For instance, I usually structure workouts that build off a basic set of movements that accomplish the principles I'm looking for. Then, more compexity is added that makes the student move thru ranges and different tools. This way, you're repping the basic movements many times, but building onto a more complete combative structure the whole time. The total package gets trained in this way. Repetion is important, as is focus. I just feel that it's important to train integration of skills as much as we teach skills themselves. It's these transitions and integrations that will be truely helpful during live conflicts.

The problem I have with flasy movements are a couple: First off, regardless of the quality of instruction, they are time consuming to learn and adaquately prepare to use insitinctily. This slows down your preperation for conflict and eats up time you could use to make your game more well rounded. Next, they are often tricky to preform and any variation in enviornment might make them catastrophic in practicality. Ice, rain, ect. This is true of everything, but the complex a movement, the more likely it is that conditions will have an effect on it. Third, they clearly scream ma-ist. That means guy number 2 is more likley to grab a weapon. Plus the recovery time involved make you less able to respond to threat 2. That's a bad combination. Lastly, it's harder to scale them to proper use of force levels that other movements. Once you send that spinning kick flying, it's deadly force if it's at the head. It's hard to adapt it to multiple scenarios. Just my feelings, I see them a showy but for demo puropses. Therefore, I don't spend my time working them. If I demo somehting, it will be something I use, not a show movement.

It's all about the way in which he approached you and your articulation of such. Did he say anything that would indicate he was going to be a threat? Were his hands clinched? Arms up in an aggressive posture? Hand up to hit you? What was his gait patter like? What was the situattion leading up to your preemptive action? If the answers to these indicate he was about to aggressively try to injure you, you're going to be alright. Next, where were your actions in realation to his threat? Did he reach out to grab you and you shin him in the head? Might be out of line. But, did he reach to grab you and you countered with a stiff arm drop that sent him back a few feet? Probibly ok this time. It really is about the actions of what transpired up to that point and how you describe them and your expectation of being hurt. Then, the cops will look at your response as it relates to what a reasonable person woould think of as a threat. If your good at the first and have solid reasoning for the second, you'll be fine.

today- 1 mile run legs, heavy on the squats still taking it easy on the shoulders and crossfit till my shoulder gets a bit better.

Not coming out of your style it's hard to be specific or understand what you're expected to do. That being said, one thing I always like to see when I'm on a board is follow up control after a takedown. You do it once very nice by kicking the uke once he's down. I'd do more control stuff if you could. Not meaning to jump down with him into a ground fight or anything, but perform a shoulder pin, or an armbar from your standing position, wrist manip., something to make sure he can't get back up and start swinging again. Just a thought. Nice work on the test.

That's a good questions, and unfortunately, I don't have an answer. Hopfully, someone can give you some help. On another note, welcome to KF, and don't be afraid to jump into some of the other discussions.

We've beat up the issue here relitively recently in another thread so I won't spend a ton of time on it here. You can't assume that weight and size don't matter. They do, they are a very real factor that effects plenty of perfectly good ma's. Judo, wrestling, boxing, mma, all have weight classes for a reason. Yes, they are sports, but they are combat dirivitive sports performed at full speed and contact, their findings should be considered relevant. Junior black belts are often awarded because there are tool that adult black blets should have access to that children are simply not mature enough psycologically and judmentally to use. Hence, they shouldn't be routinely teaching adults with adult ranking. It's not about making a system weaker, it's about keeping combative arts pure and not watering them down while being able to recognize acheivement and skill of younger people. I think that instructors should be cultiveated, but on a limited basis. Not regualarly teaching in front of adults.

It's definatly not a race, agreed. I'll still take the 3 months of varided training to be "average" in mulitiple ranges and movements over a good jab any day. Again, you'll get those reps in eventually. I also agree that certain rank requirements should be respected and only those who meet those requirements should be granted rank. Still, to say that someone can only learn those requirements from someone teaching on a full time basis is pretty limited and not, in my opinion, true. They might not be up to speed as quick due to the limitation in training time, but they will get there. Many very competent fighters I've shared the floor with over the years were products of this enviornment. I agree also that at a certain point, being at a trainin facility with only 2-3 days of active instruction a week will not be sufficient for certain things. When I have competivie guys who cross the threshold of needing more time to imporove, I usually get them with others who can give them those times. But, were usually talking about guys on the high end of amature or low level of professional full contact competition. Not everyone trains to be a pro/high level amature athlete. For self defense purposes, structured training at a "part time" instructors facility is adaquate. Espically since most serious students will enevitably end up training on thier own as well (conditioninig, bag work, ect.)

Cross training is always good, joe. At least in my book. I agree about the effectiveness of the spear hand, just isn't there most of the time.

We've all got ways we focus our training, and I think we can all agree that more skill is always better in any aspect. Personally, I'd never take that much time to focus on one particular aspect of what I was doing. Simply because it takes away from time spend practicing other skills as well. You'll get the same reps in eventually, but by working on intergrtaining other skills you become more well rounded over that same time. That's just me, it dosn't mean the other way's wrong. It just means I value a diversified training specturm more. I think we'd all agree that we train to win. To survive, call it whatever you want. That's the end result. I don't think we sould ever become complacient enough to assume that we will dictate the outcome. There are simply too many variable to consider in actual engagements. Still, the mindset to win is vital. As to the actual issue brought up between ironsifu and bushido man, I think that the seminar route is fine for adding to your collective understanding of fighting. You're not trying to teach another system, but by learning movements and then adapting them to the overall strategy and principles of your system your expanding the framework of what you're doing. Competition can be a great learning tool. I've used it myself, but it's not the only one. I personally feel that the right kind of competitions are highly valuable in developing a fighter, but I don't require my guys to compete. It's perferance. And to the original point of continuing to learn (well, the not so original issue ) by the time you reach a high degree of skill, you should be forging ahead within your style to advance it's application. YOu ashould also be taking the principles and movements of your system and tailoring them to you more and more, becoming a highly individualized fighter. And finally, we all have to face facts that not many of us do this professinally, at least not full time. And the range of skills needed to truely be a well rounded combatant is pretty wide and varied. We're talking striking, clinching, ground fighting in all it's variations, weapons (i limit to gun, knife, club), small joint manipulation at a minimum. Each of these is time consuming to reach the highest level of skill in. If you're really training to defend yourself, then the likelyhood of actaully reaching a "master" standard in any of these to the point where you have to look elsewhere to train is slim, espically when you consider the reps requred to maintain the status you've acheived in each. This fact alone means you can continue your own advancment in your own artform farily regualarly after becoming an instructor.

Hughes is certainly a better wrestler based on his pedigre. However, I'd still give the technical submission edge to Royce. Maybe that's what you were refering to in your last statement, I apologize if I misread it. Hughs certainly has been very dominate on the ground, but due to his positional wrestling skills, not necissarly his submission or jj game. I'm not certain you can say he's a better "grappler". Of course, at some point, we're arguing semantics and nothing of real substance. I think it's the fact that Hughes is just a better fighter that won the bout so easily for him. This goes back to what others have said before, the game evolved and Royce didn't. Hughes was part of that evolution and hence was more on the cutting edge of what combat athletes are now capable of. Taking nothing away from Royce, he does have some great accomplishemtns. Hughes just hailed from an era that had innovated and integrated beyond what the Gracies had originally when they started the UFC's.

just the warm up and lift today- back/bis

I'd second that

modified crossfit: 30, 25, 20, 15, 10, 5 reps of virtual shoveling (as if I haven't been doing enough real shoveling) pull ups chest/tris still light on the lifts due to a shoulder injury last week that's still nagging along. bicep tendon i think.

We don't do a lot in teaching external disclipline. I tend to work mainly with adults so I operate under the assumption that you develop discipline by showing up to class continually and getting up off the mat. As for enforcing it, again, most of my work is with adults so it become less of an issue.

Yeah, sometimes I think it's a group all it's own on the food pyrimid.

I can't speak from a ton of experiance with kata, but even with other training modalities, intent is often the key to power development. It's often difference between good form and effective form. Try utilizing mindset to set the tone for your trainig session. By establishing a fighting concept behind whatever you're developing not only another great tool, but also ingraining power behind whatever your doing.

Bushido man, I thing that the wide grip pull up with the palms out just further than shoulder width is the best overall for the "pull up workout". It also gave me good results in my other activities. That being said, vary things up a bit here and there to work different primary movers. Each variation is a bit different. today- 3, 3 min rounds on the mitts. focus on coverage to tight power combos. added more stikes to combo, tie up at end 6, 1 min rounds agaist the rib portector and mitts. cover and find opening for a low jab, close distacne. work combo from mitt training. tie up and knee. finish with front takedown and spin to knee to side and establish control 25 min instructinal block. two sweep series to mount, finish with armbar. 6, 3 min rounds free roll