bushido_man96

And I'd say that's a good reason to start off with the first punch. Why give the guy a chance to establish some confidence?

The thing with this video is that you can probably find a video along these lines put out by someone from nearly every style out there. When styles tout there stuff, they like for it to look good. They don't want potential customers to walk away doubting anything about it. I'm not saying this guy isn't good. What I am saying is that this was pretty much a demo video, and it did what it is supposed to do.

Very nice. I think it would be a great training idea. It was also cool to see the two different styles, between the takedowns and clinching first, and the punching second. I suppose you could even set other parameters for varying types of work; like declaring one person would attempt to close and clinch and the other would be assigned to punch and clear out, or other such criteria. I like the ideas possible. One thing to keep in mind, though, just as a precaution, is to not bring too many dice to the training session, lest a D&D session break out. Oh, what fun they were....yeah, I'm a nerd, too.

I'd bet that was the case, for sure. I can see where some instructors would want to have some basic level of fitness, that way they don't have to worry about students keeping up with the rest of the class in some aspects. I can see the pros and cons of having such a requirement.

Really? Strange. I think this is the problem with many people's mentalities. Self defense should be do prevent someone from hurting you. This does not, by necessity, mean that you will have to hurt them.I'm not sure if it is a mentality problem or not. What I do think is that sometimes people that might have to defend themselves let the thought of having to hurt someone get to them, and then aren't able to defend themselves successfully because of the restraint. When it does come time to use force, its important to committ to the goal.

Welcome aboard! The belt in your profile changes as you post more. Look forward to seeing you around!

Welcome to the Forums, Big Daddy!

Hey, you're sure welcome! Thanks for posting the videos. I tell you what, that Mr. Utah keeps making the rounds here, that's for sure.

I've been in a class with our organization's GM, but I didn't get that worked up over it. I just listen and do what he says. Its a nice change up for sure.

Yeah, I'd say it was HKD. Bong Soo Han, who was a HKD grandmaster for many years, and I believe the choreographer of the fight scenes in the movie Billy Jack, was known for his kicking ability as well. The cover of one of his books is of him doing a round kick straight up in the air. I think you see this a lot in Korean HKD schools, with lots of kicking along with the joint locks. However, I don't think there is any ground grappling involved, which was painfully obvious from the fight you show here. I'm surprised the guy went to the ground on his own in the last match, trying to kick Rorion from the ground. That just allowed Rorion to skip a step. We don't do much high kicking in the Combat Hapkido system, and if we do, its more from personal preference due to other training than to the Combat Hapkido system. CH focuses more on low line kicking for distractions.

However, not every "warrior" would have had hands like that. Remember that "warrors" originally used weapons primarily. I'm not saying that calloused knuckles or Iron Palm training aren't worthwhile, but I don't think it is as necessary an aspect of the overall training of a Martial Artist. I do think the mindset and knowledge of how to apply the physical skills is a more important part. But that's just me.

The RedMan suit was a good start, and it sounds like the Blauer suit is what technology has advanced to. I've seen the RedMan suit in use, and although the attacker can't move much, it does allow the defender to throw with full power and see how the force affects the target. I would love to see the Blauer suit.

We don't have any discussion during basics. The most that shows up is when doing one-steps or self-defense.

Don't feel bad, Danielle. I end up going that route in most of my matches, too. I'd work things in class, and then when I'd get to a tournament, I would never take the chance to implement any of what I had trained. I do have some video of one of my ATA tourneys where I did win some matches, and I think took first place. Its from several years back, late '90s, I think. But I'm not too proud; lots of hands hanging down, and it is point sparring. If I can ever get them switched to DVD, I'll see what I can do to get them uploaded.

No, its not a game. But with the proper approach and use of equipment, it is very doable. Is it possible to do it 100% every time? Maybe not. But is it possible to add enough degrees of realism to get as close to the real deal as possible? Sure it is. It may mean that at times you have to take some precautions into consideration; this may mean uping the contact levels but restraining some targets. It may mean wearing goggles to allow simulation of eye gouging. Maybe when grappling, if you get the chance, you can add a zerbert to simulate a bite (it may sound goofy, but it might be worth considering). The point is though, it is possible to do. I agree that 100% full on contact to any available target without protection is not very viable. Its the extreme. Forms training is the other extreme at the opposite end of the spectrum. There is a happy medium in the middle.

I'm with you there. I'm only 5'8" myself, on a good day. I also run about 250 lbs thanks to my voratious appetite and an inability to turn any free food down. But hey, its just rude to not eat what's offered to you.

Nice, Montana. I would love to see it done.

Yeah, its something like that. I was using it more as a guide, or a reference point, for him to see where it is when he doesn't bring his hand back to defend. Now, if I can get one of the padded bats or some nerf toy, I'll train him a bit more "earnestly...."

I like your punch to the face mentality. Its a very good one.

Yeah, we do that, too. Always towards the thumb for the weak link. The GM described the spreading of the hand as spreading out the bone structure of the hand and wrist, to get the grabber's grip to spread apart just that much more. How much it adds, I'm not for certain. I do understand what you are talking about here. Something I've also questioned in the past about wrist grab defenses is the likelyhood of actually having your wrist grabbed. It is not as likely, but what the wrist grab does in practice is give the students a starting point to apply the techniques. It likely goes back to the time of hand-to-hand weapons combat when the weapon hand's wrist was grabbed. As for the rest of what you have here, I recognize it as using the "fence" and trying to de-escalate the situation. As far as actually being grabbed goes, I agree that at that point, you are justified in striking, and my personal preference would be to strike until they let go. I've read it. It is a great article. In actuality, Combat Hapkido would flow well within that framework, too. In a broad sense, it would be easy to use CH techniques within that framework, using many of the simple basics. And in a more technical sense, it would work for the most part when it came to the curriculum that we test on in Combat Hapkido. Sometimes, though, the idea of applying a curriuclum gets in the way of applying the tactics and strategies, as I'm sure you've seen before. As for the distraction, "live" hand, root yourself concepts, they aren't supposed to be the overall concepts to making the system work, but rather they are supposed to be sound concepts to apply in every situation presented to us. I also agree that being ready and prepared at all times is a good idea, and being in a good stance before things get bad is the best plan. Like you say, with knees flexed, feet spread a bit, and hands up in a fence, ready to ward when necessary.

4/19/2011 My 5 year old son wanted to work the heavy bag today, so I hung it up, and I worked on his jab and cross. I got a stick out, and made him concentrate on getting his hand back to position to defend. Good time, and he listened pretty well.

Years back we did at my ATA club. Not really since. My current instructor has gym t-shirts, but none for our TKD class specifically. Maybe I could get my dad to put a cool design together, and pitch it to him. My dad does screen printing, so I might see what he can do. Good idea!

That's cool. I do like that technique, but I much prefer my Hapkido method of application than I do the Aikido application.

These are the three initial concepts I learned when I started training in Combat Hapkido. They are the three things you do at the start of a technique response or "defense." It would go like this for, lets say, a same side wrist grab: When your wrist is grabbed, you root yourself by basically getting into an athletic stance; good base with knees bent/flexed so you are ready to move. "Live" hand is basically opening the hand of the grabbed wrist as far and as wide as you can, spreading the fingers out and spreading all that bone structure out in order to open the attacker's grip if that is possible, and to get your hand and arm ready for engagement. Finally, the distraction technique is what you do with either a kick, knee strike, or a strike with your free hand to "soften up" and distract the attacker, with the goal of causing them to shift their focus and loosen the grip of the attacking hand. Ideally, these three things happen pretty close to simultaneously, and then the defense technique is executed. I'd love to hear any thoughts and feelings on these concepts, and what kind of similar concepts others might have involving the ever so important first seconds of self-defense. Just on a personal note here, I don't like the term "distraction" technique, because I don't want a technique to be just a distraction. That term makes it sound like you are not supposed to commit the technique completely, as it is just to soften them up enough to do the next technique. In my opinion, the idea is to get them to stop, so instead of a "distraction" technique, I like to refer to it as a "disabling" technique. All other thoughts welcome and appreciated!

You are very right on here. When I was putting together ideas for Combat Hapkido classes, I was thinking of adding some nice headgear for the attackers to wear so they could actually hit someone with their distraction techniques. Also, adding a punch after being grabbed, so the defender would have to defend, then go into the techniques. There are so many good ideas out there, and I think the main problem is that many instructors don't go outside of their own class format, which is often inherent in a system, to find new ideas to teach new things.