haymakers, head butts, and ..........

In addition to my regular Karate training I have recently started attending a Krav Maga class, South London Urban Krav Maga, Inst Darren Selley - BCA affilliated and part of the national Urban Krav Maga group headed by Stewart McGill, their first level syllabus taught to all new comers is based on information supplied by Law Enforcement data and reflects the 10 most common street attacks. These being;

1. One person pushes, hands to chest, which is normally followed by the pushee striking first, to the head.
   STUDENTS WILL LEARN 4 PRE-EMPTIVE MOVES AGAINST A POTENTIAL ATTACKER TO AVOID THIS PUNCH TO THE HEAD
2. A swinging punch to the head.
3. A front clothing grab, one handed, followed by punch to the head,
4. A front clothing grab, two hands, followed by a head butt.
5. A front clothing grab, two hands, followed by a knee to the groin.
6. A bottle, glass, or ashtray to the head.
7. A lashing kick to groin/lower legs.
8. A broken bottle/glass jabbed to face.
9. A slash with knife, most commonly a 3 to 4" lock blade knife or kitchen utility knife.
10. A grappling style head lock.

http://www.southlondonurbankravmaga.co.uk/home/syllabus

additionally one can also refer to Patrick McCarthy's HAPV list of the most common attacks

Trying to hook and grab unsuspecting Karate people whilst sparring is one of my favourite pass times.

Most of them seem to have been covered already. It's good sometimes to train with beginners because they do unpredicable things and their targeting can be quite awful. Keeps you on your toes (anyone hear ever heard a similar line from a senior belt "OK you got me that time because you did it wrong" - always makes me smile.)

My dad once took a guy with a guitar in a big fight with a bunch of Hells Angels in a car park after a gig - pop that on the list

lcpljones_dontpanic wrote:

In addition to my regular Karate training I have recently started attending a Krav Maga class, South London Urban Krav Maga, Inst Darren Selley - BCA affilliated and part of the national Urban Krav Maga group headed by Stewart McGill, their first level syllabus taught to all new comers is based on information supplied by Law Enforcement data and reflects the 10 most common street attacks. These being;

1. One person pushes, hands to chest, which is normally followed by the pushee striking first, to the head.
   STUDENTS WILL LEARN 4 PRE-EMPTIVE MOVES AGAINST A POTENTIAL ATTACKER TO AVOID THIS PUNCH TO THE HEAD
2. A swinging punch to the head.
3. A front clothing grab, one handed, followed by punch to the head,
4. A front clothing grab, two hands, followed by a head butt.
5. A front clothing grab, two hands, followed by a knee to the groin.
6. A bottle, glass, or ashtray to the head.
7. A lashing kick to groin/lower legs.
8. A broken bottle/glass jabbed to face.
9. A slash with knife, most commonly a 3 to 4" lock blade knife or kitchen utility knife.
10. A grappling style head lock.

http://www.southlondonurbankravmaga.co.uk/home/syllabus

additionally one can also refer to Patrick McCarthy's HAPV list of the most common attacks

That list looks very familiar.  Did they cite their source? :)  It is word for word from my book and Jeff Nash's article.

Finlay,

Good question.  The ultimate method of breakdown will, of course, be personal and (hopefully) based on the combative context being trained for.  For self-protection, I used to look at it similar to the ways described above (*i.e. HAPV), and still do, somewhat, and there is nothing wrong with the prior articulations IMO.  However, I have, at this point, simplified even further than a consistent HAPV list.

We DO train against so called 'structured' types of street attacks  in my class-- i.e where I tell the 'attacking' role student to do X.  But, just as much, or more even, I have gone to a method of leaving the 'attack' such that is as mostly 'unscripted' in a lot of drills, with the 'defender' role player then forced to deal with whatever is coming at them, a lot, it sounds, like your instructor is doing.

Personally, I feel that this accomplishes two things:  1)  the 'defender' role truly has to deal with a threat situation of which they have no prior ability to predict what, exactly, is going to happen.  This addresses stimulus cue acqusition and defender reaction time, eliminates defender anticipation, and addresses the overall root-pragmatism of whatever 'entry' is ultimately selected by the defending student.  And 2)  I believe the ensuing 'chaos' resulting from what we might call a "less-than-perfect-entry"--- but with the defender role still continuing through to a point of escape or control DESPITE that fact--- best simulates the 'reality' of the 'slop-factor' in actual fighting. 

I also tend to think of  such exercises (open attack) as 'applied' training.  And obviously, you can't expect someone to 'apply' something that they haven't learned, so 'structured' training where both 'attacks' and 'defenses' are spelled out clearly enhances such applied training.  But in this regard we do it a little differently: 

FIRST we explore 'semi-structured' applications; which in sum, I simplify it to:

- Aggressive 'talking to' of any variety, basically 'aggresssive gesticulation' with occassional chest or face contact

- Aggessive Forward Shove (one or two handed, attacker option)

- Aggressive PULLING grab-hit combination (attacker free to pick grab target-- lapel, wrist, arm, throat, hair, etc., although although the punch is directed at the face)

- Aggressive PUSHING hit combination (ibid.)

- Aggressive forward shoot / 'lazy double leg' tackle (i.e. low-line defense)

- Aggressive punch from a forward oblique angle (i.e. threat acquired visually in peripheral, but attack basically 'from the side')

- Aggressive 'Barrage'/ Bombardment/ Flurry--- i.e. a sudden overwhelming flurry of punches

- Aggressive entry to Headlock + punching

- Aggressive 'rear' contact (rear shove, rear mug, rear sucker punch etc.)

You'll note that I identify each of those as 'aggressive'.  That's on purpose.  We really try, in this semi-structured stage, to make deliberate contact with pressure which both 'surprises' the defender role and simulates the chaos of 'real' assault.  Think of this phase as 'weather testing' for your entries...  What I mean to distinguish here is that this phase is DYNAMIC and completely unrehearsed--- i.e. it is never experienced the same way twice.  If someone is grabbing / pushing/ punching, they should be doing so in a way that drives the defender off balance and provokes a flinch or attempted [balance] maintenance/ recovery.  i.e. --- Hard, spontaneous, but not overwhelming contact at this point.

Then, **AFTER**  the student has developed entries against hard, aggressive **contact** (meaning 'touch') from these various primary angles and primary 'types' of attacks, only THEN do we look at 'structured responses to the left wrist grab, reverse grip' (etc.), in isolation.

In other words, what I am trying to do is 'acclimate' students to realistic assault PRESURE first, such that they a) build confdence in their ability to manage the suprises and b) learn to deal with THAT moment of an attack.  Then, after they are confident that they have the ability to 'defend' an unpredictable attack from primary angles, they gain the ability to learn 'how to do that better'-- i..e. they 'know' how to deal with the assaualt, so they can relax and learn techniques and principles which  they then recognize ***MAY*** manifest in the chaos of fighting.  But they are OK if they don't, becaus they are otherwise 'managing' the attack.  THis is different (I believe) than attempting to teach a student 99 structred 'defenses' to this and that attack, and then asking them to do them 'live' with pressure vs. a committed attack.  (Note that I said 'different' and not 'better'). But to me, the latter is still an example of 'Rolodex- thinking' i.e., 'match assault stimuli to correct reaction'.  And because that traning is reactive, it is bound to be slower an teaching someone to manage the assault first, then be on the lookout for technical opportunities that momentarily 'present' in the choas of the fight.

My thinking is, by exposing the students to entries that 'work' vs. UNPREDICTABLE aggressive spontaneous attacks from primary angles, they are then better prepared to deal with the chaos of a sudden assault-- from those angles, because they have learned to be comfortable in confronting them.  By simplifying 'entries' (i.e. vs. a 'threat-aware frontal attack', which includes most of the primary attacks listed above),  we have effectively the 'same' entries whether punch, push, shoot, or grip.  So, it doesn't matter what the threat does, the 'defender' is going to do X (ala Blauer's SPEAR concept).

In our program the student learns (i..e 'is exposed to') multiple entries.   Then I ask that they pick **ONE** to work with which will be 'their' entry for an extended period, meaning:  precisely for those situations where I DON'T indicate a speciifc attack.  In response to an aggressive forward attack,  they will 'always' do X-- at least for a substantially extended period of time. 

In this way, the student first learns how to ENTER aganst the threat--- i..e 1) evade or 'shed' the primary force vector-- no matter what vector that is or what the 'attack' is that is generating that vector;  2)  arrest the threat's forward momentum (i.e. 'stop the attack')  3) (Hopefully) create pain (via simultaneous impact) and 4) maintain forward pressure ('off balance' the threat) such that the defender can 5) seize the initiative and commence a (counter) attack of their own.

Another thing I do is to try to simplify 'structures' (i.e. the mechanics underlying specific techniques) to 'form families'.  For instance, I teach eight 'parries' and about six "crash enries" .    But what I tell students is, the focus of their learning those eight STRUCTURED parries (i.e. 'eight methods of parrying') is to learn only **ONE** concept--  to parry. In other words, its a recogniztion that the student needs [eight] structured methods to correctly learn the ONE 'general' way.  But the focus in learning the [eight] ways is on learning that ONE method of defending, so all expressions are seen as being 'variations' of the same thing.

So too, with 'crashes'-- we teach six crashes, with the end focus being the student learning 'to crash'  i.e. to enter aggressively against a threat REGARDLESS of specific assault with both 1) defensive coverage and 2) immedaite counter offenasive potential. 

I also teach parries depsite the fact that, as a form of blocking, I think they are 'mostly inneffective' for (quote) 'real fighting'.  It's not that they 'don't work'-- of course they work.  But they require a specific amount of reaction time TO work, which requires a speciifc distance, which is typically not  the range that most so-called 'real' fights kick off at.

But... 'parrying', done well, ALSO teaches limb manipulation / barrier clearing.  Which, in the entangled-limb-chaos that frequently RESULTS from a 'spontaneous' crash entry, is not a bad thing to know. 

In other words, I teach what might be called 'generalized' entries.  But these generalized entries draw on ATTRIBUTES developed from more specific motor skill training.

But effectively, in sum, those two concepts summarize the 'defenses' I teach-- either you parry, or you crash. Kinda 'no matter what'.

So, I guess what I am trying to articulate is that I focus on generative proactive action intended to steal the intitiative on the part ofthe 'defender'-- as opposed to a litany of structured reactive defenses-- at least at first.