are real fights necessary for becoming a good fighter?

[DLopez]

I believe you do have to at least been in a few fights to see how good a fighter you are. One of my friends was the state grandchampion of MKA (Mississippi Karate Association) and thought he was a hard-*. Then one day he got into a fight at the local Sunflower and came back with a shiner and a busted lip and was limping. We asked him what happened but he wouldn't say. I didn't find out until the next day he got the living crap beaten out of him by one of his brother's friends that they had picked a fight with. Someone even made a joke that the reason he was limping was because someone shoved their foot in his *. The point of this: just because you're a good point sparrer don't mean squat in the streets.

 

On the other hand, being in real fights doesn't automatically equate to making you invincible.

 

I've seen enough to realilze it's quite possible to suck at "real" fighting, no matter how often you get into them.

[torris]

My Opinion is it really depends on the person. Proper training is very effective in the right person. Just like NOT everyone who goes into battle (say as infantry) survives battle, even though they are well trained, the same can be said about someone trained in MA.

 

Just because you have trained, and have rank in your art, does not mean that in a street fight, you will win. How you employ the knowledge you have is as much importance as the knowledge itself.

[Luckykboxer]

i think his question was more asking if the only way to become a great fighter is to have actual fights...

 

I think your answer is more directed to him if he had asked if real fights can make everyone a great fighter.

 

I agree that not everyone will become great if they have real fights, but i also stronly believe that only by having real fights can someone become a truely great fighter...

 

if that makes sense

[SoonerJohn]

One of the things I've tried was putting on paintball headgear and having a friend shoot at us while sparring.

 

It creates confusion, but prepare to get bruised up pretty good.

 

We don't do this very often and haven't tried it in awhile.

[White Warlock]

i would say that's a bad idea.

[SoonerJohn]

i would say that's a bad idea.

 

lol, true. It was in my younger years. I'd said I hadn't done it in awhile. But it did create the confusion we were looking for.

 

These days I don't street fight. I don't even get in a position to find trouble.

[webb]

i feel myself that defending yourself, is not as far from fighting as some people think.

[longarm25]

sparing and fighting are definatley differant

[Synaesthesia]

If one has never been in a fight, but trains regularly, can they still call themselves a good fighter? I say no. ....

 

You have to have the right type of mental capacity to actually fight. ....

 

I think being a good fighter does have to require at least being in a fight.

 

I'm not a martial arts expert, nor have I ever been in a fight.

 

That being said I have reservations about the unequivocality of your statement. Professional western soliders who have never been in a gun battle can annihilate hardened gurrillas who have been raised on bloodshed. Colonol Grossman calls this something to the effect of "de-facto vetrans".

 

Psychological preperation can occur without actual fighting. Yes, stress training is important, and yes, there is no real substitute for experience with violence. The realism of modern training methods can, however, provide many of the benefits of such experience without the accompanying danger.

 

I can't pretend to judge the degree to which various factors go into making one person or group better fighters than another. I will say that the contrast between the degree of formal training and combat effectiveness does not necessarily entail that it can't go both ways.

[Bleeding Lion]

didnt bruce lee say something like "A martial artist who has never been into a fight is like a swimmer who's never been into water"?