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JWT
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Practical Karate for JKD - Physical Self Defence Tactics Seminar

In August I was invited by Sifu Jay Cooper, the Canadian Director of the Jeet Kune Do Athletic Association, to run two seminars for Esteem Martial Arts & HAVOC JKD in Calgary. The theme of the first seminar was to show practical karate applications in a self defence context, focusing on training pre-emptive strikes and responding to haymakers, windmilling punches, and cascading attacks such as haymaker punches to tackles and leg lifts/takedowns or haymaker punches to clinches. Although Jay is a JKD and wrestling guy, he's  followed what I teach because of my predominant focus on self defence and how it has tallied with his work and experience as a LEO both in the UK and in Canada.

I decided to make the theme of the seminar a failure cascade which would take us through common progressions of HAOV with techniques common to many karate systems and kata (and to the JKD and Catch wrestling taught at the venue). The aim was to take the students through drills to the point where they could play in a progressively dynamic fashion to an alive attack medium.

We shot a lot of footage throughout this seminar so I've split this into a number of videos and will be posting one to two videos a week.

Warm Up.

I prefer to make warm ups skills orientated. In this case the warm up was preparation for a later stage of the seminar.

I began the day with looking at the different mediums through which pre-emtive tactics could be trained. Rather than use a punch as a preempt I decided to focus on an open handed technique which would lead into a redundancy of an Uke technique if the participants subsequently failed to preempt in time.

Preempt Part 1

Preempt Part 2

Preempt Part 3

Preempt Part 4

I hope you enjoy these. I'll be posting up more of the seminar soon!

All the best

John Titchen

Marc
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Those are great exercises. Thanks a lot for posting them here.

Marc  

JWT
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Thanks Marc.

JWT
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Here's the last of the preemption videos!

All the best,

John

JWT
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In this next video I look at some of the issues with using 'straight' haymakers, particulary when not going full speed with the normal full comitment. Here you can see how the particular Uke motion I was using for a medium range preempt to the head also serves in redundancy as a deflection and shield for one of the most common HAOV.

I go into more detail in subsequent videos, but here I touch on the subjectr of Age Uke, Shuto Uke and Gedan Barai in this context simply being the same defence with variances determined by post punch and shield position.

The extended arm that is deflecting here is the position when you have failed to hit the head. This is therefore a redundancy for two failures: the failure to preempt and the failure to simulatenously hit the head on deflection. Although not covered in this particular coaching short, my non extended arm is acting both as a shield for my head and as an elbow strike to the chest/neck/face of the attacker.

Hope you find it interesting. I split this particular bit of pre-drill coaching in two due to length, so more detail to follow!

All the best

John

Zach Zinn
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Really great stuff John.

JWT
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Zach Zinn wrote:

Really great stuff John.

Thanks!

JWT
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This is the part of the seminar where we started to break away from rigidity and bring in some flexibility in our approaches. This is the second half of the mid -drill coaching short shared above. Age Uke, Shuto Uke, Gedan Barai.


After this things get more dynamic!

Thanks for watching.

John Titchen

JWT
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These were two mid drill coaching short shot before I introduced the next training phase.

Hope you like them,

John

JWT
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Going from 'static' single attack to a 'dynamic' double attack with the momentum of the failed haymaker morphing into a drive forwards. In the first instance I was still in 'walk through talk through' teaching mode and was almost taken out by the speed of Ken dropping for the tackle. :)

This, in the way I approach things is 4th tier. Tier 0 is avoidance, deterence and de-escalation (you could if you like call them -3, -2, -1). Tier 1 is preemption if I have concluded that this is going to go physical and that any de-escalation is failing and I have no non-violent exit. While that sounds like a weighing up moment it is likely to be a split second judgement (backed here in the UK by Section 76 of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008) and the 'de-escalation' attempt might not even have time to happen - this will vary according to the environment/context of the incident and the concurrent attitude of the immediate threat (EASE of the attack to break down the factors into cascade headings covering multiple factors - environment, attitude, speed, entry angle factors). Tier 2 is hitting while shielding - the extended 'hikite' hand going for the head and shielding on one side while the other arm covers the other side. Tier 3 is missing that head shot and having to follow through with a secondary tactic such as the elbow of the non hikite hand absorbing the impact of the forward momentum of the aggressor's body or striking in and then continuing as necessary with a Shuto Uke, Age Uke or Gedan Barai according to relevant positions. Tier 4 therefore is the failure of all those with the aggressor going in with momentum with another attack before Tier 3 has landed according to relevant positions with another punch, grabbing, clinching, tackling etc.

Hope you like it.

All the best.

John

JWT
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In this next video I start working more with my host Sifu Jay Cooper. Jay is an incredibly talented guy and also brings to the table a wealth of unique experience from the overlapping (but different) field of law enforcement having been an LEO both in England and in Canada. The drills I'm working here are predominantly taken for my applications for Heian Sandan / Pinan Sandan from my Pinan Flow System series of books.

All the best
 

John

JWT
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Details!

Iain Abernethy
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So much really good stuff in this thread John! Thanks for sharing!

JWT
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Iain Abernethy wrote:
So much really good stuff in this thread John! Thanks for sharing!

Thanks Iain. I've made 16 of these so far and I think we may end up with 20 in the series. I have to say the JKD students at the host venue of Esteem Martial Arts were great. They picked up the fluidity of the cascade failure approach right away - never intending to fail but always having a trained redundancy in place and a familiarity through drilling with the different variables.

Iain Abernethy
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JWT wrote:
Thanks Iain. I've made 16 of these so far and I think we may end up with 20 in the series.

Awesome! I look forward to seeing them!

JWT wrote:
They picked up the fluidity of the cascade failure approach right away - never intending to fail but always having a trained redundancy in place and a familiarity through drilling with the different variables.

I really like that way of structuring learning. It fits with the traditional ikken hissatsu (一拳必殺) concept (“one blow is decisive” or "one blow kills") while also acknowledging the need to flow on to the next “one blow” without any hesitation should the desired effect not be achieved.

To me, we always want to have the intent of ending the confrontation in any given instant (“Him, down, now!” as Marc MacYoung would phrase it), but many traditional karateka misinterpret that to mean “only hit them once”; which is not the idea at all!

The other trap that karateka sometimes fall into is getting seduced by “flow”. Long flow drills – while they can be useful when understood as just one part of a wider training matrix – can give the illusion of skill. Buy which I mean that they look good and feel nice to do; but compliant flow drills are miles away from actual application in the ever-changing, chaotic world of actual conflict.

In application “flow” is not something we want. We ideally want them dropped with the first shot i.e. no flow at all. The phrase I use to communicate this idea is that “Flow is the management of failure”. If a given method fails (despite our resolute intent to end the situation in that instant) then we maintain the initiative and advantage by flowing onto the very next instant (where we also intend to decisively end it).

Your phase “failure cascade” is one that I really like and I feel captures this idea really well. It’s also something I believe we see encapsulated in many kata sequences.

All the best,

Iain

JWT
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Iain Abernethy wrote:

I really like that way of structuring learning. It fits with the traditional ikken hissatsu (一拳必殺) concept (“one blow is decisive” or "one blow kills") while also acknowledging the need to flow on to the next “one blow” without any hesitation should the desired effect not be achieved.

To me, we always want to have the intent of ending the confrontation in any given instant (“Him, down, now!” as Marc MacYoung would phrase it), but many traditional karateka misinterpret that to mean “only hit them once”; which is not the idea at all!

Definitely. Follow throughs need to be trained because 'no plan survives contact with the enemy' and we need to be prepared for failure. But of course the aim is always to shut down the other person or persons as quickly as possible and only continue to use force as necessary.  In this series of drills I'm looking at failures that result in the other person continuously trying to land a punch, driving forward into a barge or tackle or clinch. Because I decided to include some of my Heian Sandan material from the Pinan Flow System books I've also gone into a control dynamic in a number of these videos. I've had some keyboarders elsewhere comment that 'that hold will never control a fully resisting person' and I think they've missed the context: it's not for a fully resisting person - it's for a stunned person or a person that is responding to pain who has had most of the fight taken out of them - they pose enough threat to control, not enough threat to warrant continued striking. If they were still fully resisting you could not 'safely' control them as a one person uncuffed restraint, and certainly not without some risk of positional asphyxiation. The one person control is always going to be a ying and yang approach - you strike to control and control to strike - you cannot stand up one on one control a fully resistant person that is ignoring pain - hence I have a number of different redundancy striking and reachieving control options from the position showed. I never 'intend' to do them all - I want the threat ended as fast as possible. 

Iain Abernethy wrote:
The other trap that karateka sometimes fall into is getting seduced by “flow”. Long flow drills – while they can be useful when understood as just one part of a wider training matrix – can give the illusion of skill. Buy which I mean that they look good and feel nice to do; but compliant flow drills are miles away from actual application in the ever-changing, chaotic world of actual conflict.

Absolutely. The longest flow I teach is a big sequence from Heian Sandan / Pinan Sandan, but the aim is always to stop the other person with each move. I'm not fond of back and forth 'same move' flows which is why, once learned, the one I teach for Sandan has 'shift' elements for the Uke at every move so it really does become unpredictable.

Iain Abernethy wrote:
In application “flow” is not something we want. We ideally want them dropped with the first shot i.e. no flow at all. The phrase I use to communicate this idea is that “Flow is the management of failure”. If a given method fails (despite our resolute intent to end the situation in that instant) then we maintain the initiative and advantage by flowing onto the very next instant (where we also intend to decisively end it).

I like that idea. I tend to think of flow as seamless transition between techniques and ranges. The phrase 'be like water' springs to mind. 

Iain Abernethy wrote:
Your phase “failure cascade” is one that I really like and I feel captures this idea really well. It’s also something I believe we see encapsulated in many kata sequences.

Thanks. Absolutely agree that having redundancies for failure cascade is a key part of a lot of kata sequences. It's central to the way I approach my kata interpretation.

All the best,

John

JWT
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Here's the next one in the series.

JWT
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A short aside on 'that' question. :)

Dod
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John, looking at the first few videos I really like the use of the standard blocks (shuto, gedan and age uke) as cover and strike. Shown in a clear and consistent method, but adapting to the circumstances and size of the opponent.

Soto uke (outside to inside block) is different because the so-called blocking hand comes from the other side and there is no crossing or mawashi uke movement in front of the body. Despite this, I was reminded of this demonstration video which basically uses Soto uke for a similar initial cover with the left arm and, similar to yours but from the other side, an elbow to the chest and forearm to the neck. (There is then a natural take down follow-up with the help of hikite).

I thought it was good to point out different examples reinforcing similar principles.

JWT
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Hi Dod  

Yes I can see overlaps in the video, although there are some important differences. My use of the extended arm is not force against force as shown there (although that could be the fault of the uke throwing the punch), but deflecting impact while covering the head, so the more force behind the punch the more the other person is driven into the elbow of the other arm rather than a one-two dynamic. It may be shown this way because this is a casual walk through, talk through demonstration, but I'd also not use the open hand as a secondary head shield for reasons I explained in the warm up video at the start of the thread.  

Interesting srtuff as always though, definitely a valid approach, and always good to learn from watching another person's material.   

With regard to the Soto Ude Uke, which I haven't shown in this seminar, I embue that tactic with a different purpose and that in turn is also linked to its weighting and positioning in kata (compared to Shuto Uke, Age Uke, (morote) Uchi Uke and Age Uke). I tend to use the rearward arm movement as a stripping of a grip in a push/pull dynamic before a forearm/elbow/hammer strike.  

All the best  

John

JWT
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I talked for so long in this coaching element that I had to break it down into multiple videos to try and make it more digestible. These are the last two.

This next video is the last of this sequence before I shift to looking at punch to clinch failures. In this video I try to sum up the concept of failure cascade before setting the students to play with their attacks in a manner where the defender doesn't know how far the attacker will push - so the defender is always trying to shut it down as fast as possible while the attacjker is looking to exploit lots of gaps. All these individual elements form individual drills in my Pinan Flow System series of books, but the point is that skills are introduced as individual elements and then you train like this to link them until you can fklow seamlessly between tactics. Apologies for the nob jokes - I blame one of the trainees for bringing it up. :)

All the best

John

Dod
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John,

Thank you for those points. All well noted

Marc
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Thanks very much for sharing your stuff here, John.  

JWT
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Marc wrote:

Thanks very much for sharing your stuff here, John.  

Thanks Marc. I'm sorry for the late reply. I've been snowed under over the last month with voluntary work for a local charitable project and editing my new book.  

I hope to be able to go through the second phase 'punch to 'clinch' collapse footage soon and get some of those dropped on youtube as a Christmas present. :)

Marc
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JWT wrote:

I hope to be able to go through the second phase 'punch to 'clinch' collapse footage soon and get some of those dropped on youtube as a Christmas present. :)

I'm very much looking forward to that.

All the best

Marc

karate10
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This is marvelous. John Titchen's videos are very good and on video #14 and some others as well, I can see Pinan/Heian Shodan variations to avoid being taking down...Very good videos...Thanks for sharing JWT.

Gerald

JWT
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karate10 wrote:

This is marvelous. John Titchen's videos are very good and on video #14 and some others as well, I can see Pinan/Heian Shodan variations to avoid being taking down...Very good videos...Thanks for sharing JWT.

Gerald

Glad you like it!   

All the best  

John