How good am I ???

[samoht]

A question I have been trying to answer for the entire 3 1/2 years I have been doing martial arts.

Because I train with other trained fighters most of the time I feel inadequate.

If I was to fight a normal person with no training would I just kick their butt in 10 seconds? Or would I get confused by their erratic movement.

Am I a pretender? How do others see me? Is 28 too old? Is it all worth it?

Sometimes I just feel like deliberately starting a street fight to find out. But if I did I know I would be scared of hurting the other person and would hold back.

[ps1]

A question I have been trying to answer for the entire 3 1/2 years I have been doing martial arts.

Because I train with other trained fighters most of the time I feel inadequate.

If I was to fight a normal person with no training would I just kick their butt in 10 seconds? Or would I get confused by their erratic movement.

Am I a pretender? How do others see me? Is 28 too old? Is it all worth it?

Sometimes I just feel like deliberately starting a street fight to find out. But if I did I know I would be scared of hurting the other person and would hold back.

If you worry about it that much, I would guess you'll freeze in a realisitc situation.

There's no way to know for sure! Of course starting a fight is never a good option. Just remember that you'll fight as you train. It would seem as though you have no or little confidence in your training. So you will fight with no or little confidence. That's not a good thing.

As far as 28 being too old...the average person reaches their physical peak between the ages of 25 and 29. So 28 is prime time.

[smckeown]

Not sure if this will help or not, but I used to feel the same way. Then one day I was approached by a guy on a bike that wanted to start something. Everything I learned came immediatly to the front of my mind in case I needed it. It turned out that I was able to avoid a physical confrontation which is really one of the first thinks I learned in the martial arts (Dont fight if you dont have to). But this did give me the confidence that if he wanted to start something I was going to finish it. It is kind of a strange feeling when one day you feel a certain way and the next it just "sinks in".

Once you cross that line you will no longer feel inadequate.

[Kante]

Seeing as how you're wondering if you'd win a fight against an untrained person it looks like you don't really train that much.

3 1/2 years is a very short time, but if you feel inadequate, maybe you need to train more. Not just at the gym, but at home as well. Whenever you feel like it.

Is 28 too old? hell no. 28 is young. Judging from your question you obviously don't have that much knowledge about martial arts history and so.

There are people 70 years old+ that would literally kill a young person without any effort.

Bruce Lee was 32 years old when he died. Now does he look too old to you?

[The BB of C]

A question I have been trying to answer for the entire 3 1/2 years I have been doing martial arts.

Because I train with other trained fighters most of the time I feel inadequate.

If I was to fight a normal person with no training would I just kick their butt in 10 seconds? Or would I get confused by their erratic movement.

Am I a pretender? How do others see me? Is 28 too old? Is it all worth it?

Sometimes I just feel like deliberately starting a street fight to find out. But if I did I know I would be scared of hurting the other person and would hold back.

28 is prime.

[samoht]

I train around 4 to 5 times a week. 1 hour a session. Is that too little? My goal is to be good enough to earn a black belt in another 2 or 3 years.

I know when Im in the moment I am dangerous (fast, strong, direct). But when out of the moment I lose my balence, coordination and confidence. It seems i am out of the moment far to often.

An example: When mucking around with mates at the bar they will throw dummy punches at me. Instead of ducking, weaving and blocking my instincts tell my body to through my arms in front of my face like a spastic. Anyone would think I have never trained in my life.

And one more issue. The more I train the more exhausted I feel and the less I can train. A cycle I cant get out of. Any tips

[cross]

An example: When mucking around with mates at the bar they will throw dummy punches at me. Instead of ducking, weaving and blocking my instincts tell my body to through my arms in front of my face like a spastic. Anyone would think I have never trained in my life.

This highlights a lack of "correct" training. Many arts will teach you to "duck, weave, block" and most of the time in training that works fine. The difference in the bar is that now(although your friends are only playing) its real.

What you describe has "throwing your arms in front of your face like a spastic" is a humans natural flinch response to a frontal threat coming at the face. Unfortunately most schools wont even recognize this let alone train you to use it to your advantage. However it makes much more sense to use your natural flinch and "attach" your technical applications to this initial reaction.

So basically, if you feel your training is lacking or that it isnt helping you. Then chances are your correct. And when it comes to self defense specifically, i dont think the answer is "your need more training in the same thing to make it work", but rather "you need more training in something better."

[gzk]

I train around 4 to 5 times a week. 1 hour a session. Is that too little? My goal is to be good enough to earn a black belt in another 2 or 3 years.

I know when Im in the moment I am dangerous (fast, strong, direct). But when out of the moment I lose my balence, coordination and confidence. It seems i am out of the moment far to often.

An example: When mucking around with mates at the bar they will throw dummy punches at me. Instead of ducking, weaving and blocking my instincts tell my body to through my arms in front of my face like a spastic. Anyone would think I have never trained in my life.

And one more issue. The more I train the more exhausted I feel and the less I can train. A cycle I cant get out of. Any tips

In regards to you throwing your arms in front of your face "like a spastic", are you talking about guarding your face with relatively stationary arms, or are you talking about throwing them around wildly trying to parry? Guarding your face with your forearms is a perfectly valid form of defence against an unexpected strike or flurry, boxers and others do it, and call it "covering up". We call it "the shell" and anchor our hands on our heads, toward the forehead region, leaving enough space to look through the arms at the opponent/attacker and practise holding our ground while taking (gloved) punches on the shell. The reason you're not reacting as if you're in a fight is because until you see the punch you don't even know you're in one yet, which is a totally different situation to what you've probably been training.

As far as getting exhausted to the point where you can't train, are you talking about gassing out or muscle stiffness? Unless you're doing something very unusual, the solution is probably to just keep training more and you'll get used ot it.

[cross]

We call it "the shell" and anchor our hands on our heads, toward the forehead region, leaving enough space to look through the arms at the opponent/attacker and practise holding our ground while taking (gloved) punches on the shell.

Hey gzk, do you guys do any weapons defense? If so does the shell tie in with that at all?

[gzk]

We call it "the shell" and anchor our hands on our heads, toward the forehead region, leaving enough space to look through the arms at the opponent/attacker and practise holding our ground while taking (gloved) punches on the shell.

Hey gzk, do you guys do any weapons defense? If so does the shell tie in with that at all?

Not so far, but I would imagine that if I had to defend against at weapon aimed at the head I would probably go to the shell pretty automatically. Another structure we use is the "visor", which is something like how your arms should end up after throwing a horizontal elbow, with what would be the striking arm locked on to the other arm.