Sincerity

I have been writing already about the need to discern why are you learning/studying martial arts. But that question does not apply just to the students...If you are teaching martial arts, you have to ask yourself - "Why am I doing this"? What is at all about for you?

See, the thing is, unlike the motives to learn, not every motive to teach is legitimate. And I don't mind people making money from it. No, that is perfectly OK with me, as long as the teacher/instructor is honest about his offer and treats his clientele with due respect. Also, the fact that one may not be charging at all for their instruction does not make them worthy of the teacher title.

My guess is I am not alone in being sick of the types who are looking for some self-aggrandizing experience from teaching, harassing and humiliating their students in the process, all under the excuse of "instilling discipline" or something along those lines. Of course, discipline in itself is not a bad thing, but as long as it is conducive to the better learning and more efficient training process. If, on the other hand, it is a pretense for setting up some sort of unnecessary hierarchy with the sole purpose of blowing the instructor's ego out of proportion and nipping any healthy critical approach and inquisitiveness among the students in the bud... Well, sorry for putting it out bluntly, but then your an asshole and have no business teaching people.

Really? Or is there something more to it...

So what then is the central tenet that "makes it or breaks it" in my opinion? Well, like the title of the post says, it is all about sincerity! And by that I mean the approach to imparting the knowledge on your students.I have been blessed in my martial arts "career" to cross paths and learn from several great teachers, and they all had one thing in common - sincerely doing everything they could to make the student understand and truly learn what they were trying to teach.

Naturally, not all of them have the same teaching methodologies (if they have one in the first place) or philosophy of what they are doing, but they for each and every one of them student comes first! I have seen time and time again Alex Kostic of Homo Ludens Systema inspire awe in people by the way he moves, by the things he says and their eyes going bright for the new insight and another piece of the puzzle finally  falling into place. I have been astonished by Astig Lameco founder, guro Roger Agbulos' ability to captivate the students by the sheer joy of teaching and lighting the fire of desire to train hard and smart, to look for what works and put it all to test. I have been flabbergasted by Mikhail Grudev's managing to overcome the impending linguistic barriers and go out of his way to help the students get the point and have fun while working hard. I have had the privilege of undergoing some intensive training under Jogo do Pau's Luis Preto and admire his keen eye and uncanny capacity to immediately adapt the drill or the exercise to elicit the desired response in the student and make difficult things easier to comprehend.

Quite true

Another high point was seeing master Jon Escudero of LSAI putting his students in the spotlight when demonstrating his system, thus at the same time portraying the effectiveness of the style and his own effectiveness as a teacher. And then there is Steve Maxwell's leading by example and teaching you how to teach yourself; and Daniel Lamac of Koredas eskrima giving it all out without reserve; and Dave Gould of Lameco; Kevin Secours of Combat Systema; Bruno Cancho; Dima Hakimov, and...so on. 

Yes, a good curriculum is helpful, excellent methodology is most welcome. And yet, if you are not teaching for the sake of your students, with no heart in it, but with another agenda that actually has nothing to do with actual teaching...well, do yourself and the world a favor and just leave it.

Desired "product"

First, sorry for the long hiatus. Don't know if I'm going to be able and do this as often as I would like in the mid-term future, so you better cherish what you get :-)

As you know, if you have been tracking my last few posts, that is, one of my constant inquires that permeates all other aspect of training is the search for the ways to improve the training process and methodology. However, thing cannot be really improved if one has no idea of what the desired outcome is, so let me address this issue here.

Quite often, when discussing the training systems in combat arts, it is taken more or less for granted that the criteria for success is the effective and efficient application of the said system in pressure testing and ultimately a real life altercation. While there is nothing wrong essentially with such view, there seems to be an omission in the sense that the focus is somehow shifted, i.e. what is often forgotten is that the effectiveness of a system is always demonstrated (expressed, if you so prefer) by its practitioner. So with that in mind, whet would be the essential qualities you would like to develop in your trainees? Bear in mind, I am not asking about the character and physical traits you like to see in the potential students when the come for the first time - no, what do you hope to achieve with them after they undergo some training with you?

So, what we are dealing with here is the matter of having an end goal in mind, and then diagnosing the particular needs in each student, aiming to reach the overarching goal. Without further ado, I will get to the point - if we are trying to prepare someone to deal with the ever changing demands of a combative equation, probably the most valuable quality to look for is adaptability. Yeah, some of you might point out (and rightfully so) that it would also be a valuable characteristic of a fighting system itself, but honestly, the two go hand in hand, and personally I believe it is more important to have/cultivate adaptability as a personal trait, and have the training methodology and system of tools and tactics support it.

It would be hard to say this more succinctly than my friend Jon Escudero of LSAI did, so I will simply quote him: "My goal is to let the system run silently in the background. The student does what he does because it supports his intent and goal, not because it is obligated by the system".

That said, we can now approach the issue of how to develop that attribute in a practitioner. I believe there are two closely related avenues to follow in pursuing the goal:
1. weaponizing the body;
2. dynamizing the structure

When it comes to the former, weaponizing the body (sorry, but the term was already out there, and I just could not come up with a better one), it would entail awakening the student's awareness of the potential of using various body parts to achieve certain effect in combat, plus working to maximize that potential.

No, not like that!

Naturally, various fighting systems have different takes on what are the worthy considerations in this regard and how far to go in developing any of those perceived assets. Possibly the prevailing problem here is that the schools of thought tend to revolve around the particular body parts and techniques per se, instead of looking at the bigger picture and identifying how some of any of those tools fit the individual person training in the system. Therefore, we end up having grappling systems, striking systems etc, while it may be more productive to think of grappling/striking options. 

Like pointed, whatever the arsenal it cannot be put to any effective use without some sort of delivery structure, and since we are discussing close combat, it means the biomechanical structure of an exponent. Again, the term "good/proper/correct structure" has become almost overused, and it resulted in the focus being on the trainee looked at in isolation...you know the "keep your head like this, your arms like that etc." approach. It then leads to having an image of THE correct structure in our head. But since our main concern is fighting another person (or more of them), they have to be taken into account. Without going into microscopic detail and countless examples, it suffices to say that one's structure (ideally) has to facilitate dealing with the force coming from the opposition as well as our own force production. See, it now looks more like a movie, not a still image!

To achieve that, our idea of structure should be of a dynamic and moving interrelation of all elements at hand, in any particular situation. It definitely should not be perceived as some "ideal" position... Namely, it most often actually means ideological, almost carved in stone, and how that helps adaptability?

What's in a method?

Huh, this was a longer hiatus that I thought it would…but, let me then use this post to tackle/some up with on of my earlier promises, i.e. discuss some of the features of what I would consider a good training methodology.

Basically, whatever the technical contents of your style/system, it can be approached in various ways during the training process, but essentially any of those approaches boils down to striving for one of two possible goals – effectiveness and efficiency. Please keep in mind that we are talking a continuum here, not an mutually exclusive either/or paradigm here.

What is considered effective (or functional) depends on the desired goal and outcome of your training, but if we limit ourselves here to the combative equation, it means disposing of the threat as quickly as possible, while keeping ourselves as unscathed as possible (and that may include the legal aftermath and other pertinent circumstances). From that perspective, this segment of one’s training focuses on the OTHER – in other words, a potential observer/witness should note what happened to the bad guy. You are training in order to fight them, not to be one, right?

Working on the other

Efficiency, on the other hand, has to do with the effects of the trainees’ actions on themselves, and may take any of the number of possible criteria into account (energy expenditure; time expenditure; exposure to the possibility of injury, be it self inflicted or courtesy of the opponent/enemy; etc). The bottom line, however, is that in this portion of one’s training the concern is with the SELF, and it has nothing to do with the meditation, spiritual uplifting and similar stuff. Again, from the perspective of the above mentioned observer, a high level of efficiency in the good guy makes his action look effortless. 

Working on the self

In some respects, the distinction of training for effectiveness and efficiency may resemble the dichotomy of self-preservation/self-perfection, that is popular in some circles. Actually, to a degree they do imply same things, but it is worth noting that the term self-preservation may be taken as synonymous with efficiency when relating to training in a manner that preserves one’s body from accumulated problems when training only for the effectiveness. So, we see that depending on the level of training we are analyzing, same terms could be applied to different things and vice versa.

Now, it is probably common sense that a well designed methodology should encompass both avenues in training (but funny how easy it is for may people to lose sight of that), and making sure they are supportive of each other. That said, in my experience the attempt to stress both facets at the same time does not seem to yield best results. Instead, the “pendulum” model is probably more appropriate – alternating the cycles of heavily emphasized effectiveness training with those of heavily emphasized efficiency approach. On top of that, when going back to the previous segment, it should be taken to the higher level in training.

Something like this 

Sure, there is always the question of the duration of each block/cycle, but I am afraid nobody can give you an exact response… Some answers are just best found on your own, pay attention to what you do and what kind of results do you achieve. Do not be afraid to try new things, tweak old ones, discard those that are unproductive (but be realistic and not jump to conclusions).

Remember, any kind of training is a process, not a product, so handle it accordingly! 

Beyond speed

A while ago I wrote about the importance of speed and the role of fast work in training. While in some martial arts and sports this approach to training is taken for granted, in some others it is still a new and uncharted territory, or even a big no-no.

In order to avoid rehashing, I’ll skip right to the main point of this post… Going for, or even getting to, full speed and full contact training does not finalize our path. Simply, the speed in and of itself is by no means be all end all purpose in training. That is, of course, if your are not training solely for competition.

Well then, what is the “missing ingredient”? With regards to the technical development, being able to operate at full speed is actually pretty much the final destination. However, we all know (or at least should be aware) that the technical proficiency is not the entire picture. There is another dimension that affects combative performance to a high degree…

What if he feeds you full speed attacks?

Emotional content. Hmmm, yeah, everybody knows about the importance of mental preparation, what’s the big deal? Please note I did not say “mental”, but used the word “emotional” instead! And that was intentional, since those are different things, albeit closely related.

Without going into detail, the emotional component would include the tactical reasoning, strategically thinking, awareness/alertness of one’s surrounding etc. Another important aspect would be the proper intent in training, which gets us closer to the subject of the article, but still not the same thing.

All of the above, mental aspect do not necessarily have a direct cause and effect kind of impact on the relation between the two adversaries. For example, one fighter being smart and tactical, or highly aware, does not necessarily stir a reciprocal response in the rival. That is, not in any evolutionary kind of manner.

How about one of them?

Emotional content, on the other hand, is hardwired into humankind to cause some kind of emotional response in the other. Probably the price of being a social animal. In practice, it means that if the attacker is intent, deceptive, motivated…strong and fast, but all the while being cool and “poker faced”, the defender will have problems in dealing with the external stimuli and input. But, replace the “cool and calculated” portion with a “mad, foaming at the mouth, grimaced face” attacker, and you have an entirely different paradigm of defense operation, as all those stimuli and input will unavoidably beget the response in internal aspects to deal with as well. 

I guess the difference could be illustrated as full contact sparring session vs. one those adrenal scenario types of work.

Take a look at the short video I made at one of sessions with my own group.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jR_VNg2m3lQ

The guy who was defending my attack was chosen for being around for a while (read, knows what thinks to strive for or avoid), and being naturally pretty calm and non-prone to panicking.

In the first part, I was working at an elevated speed, but in a relaxed and unattached manner. In the second (sorry for the brevity, the “cameraman” did not press rec button on time), the speed level was pretty much the same, but I added facial expressions and “sound effects”… Do you see the difference in the defender’s performance? He had no idea what was coming up the second time around, so pay attention to his posture, degree of tension at the shoulders and movement pattern. See how he leans back, stiff in the upper body and retreats almost on the straight line?

I guess it points to further work to be done… 

Which ride to take?

Earlier I already have written about the place of acurriculum, mostly in RMA, but in this post I’d like to elaborate on what, in my hobble opinion, should be the contents of work in a martial art group/club.

The longer I train, the more I am convinced that all good schools, regardless of the system they teach, have one important thing in common – training methodology taking precedence over technical curriculum. “Why is that?” you may ask. Well, there a plenty reason, but let’s address a few of them, one at the time.

Who's got better argument?

First of all, in its nature the training methodology is a sort of a process, as is the act of continual training itself, while the curriculum is more of a set of “things”. Probably the main implication of this difference is that the methodology is directed outwards, moving things, i.e. concerned about the result of the process. The curriculum, on the other hand, tends to be more about keeping things in place, or looking to achieve stability.

Secondly, the proper methodology strives to facilitate learning, but the curriculum is focused on facilitating teaching. Now, this may sound as a mere difference in wording, but it is actually very important! Namely, if you are a martial arts instructor (an honest and passionate one), your chief focus should be the benefit of your students, or their command of the knowledge and skills you are trying to impart. In other words, that they are able to learn to their maximum capacity, and also as quickly and thoroughly as possible. In opposition to that would be your own comfort, i.e. not having think too much about how to run each individual class – heck, it’s so much easier to just run things by numbers and tick them off the list!

Next, a methodology is usually assessed in qualitative terms, as good or bad/effective or ineffective; while a curriculum gravitates to being evaluated in quantitative terms – large or small, expansive or streamlined etc. Sure, it could sound as mixing apples and oranges, but it entails one more distinction I’ll touch upon…

Finally, the two different emphases we are debating here often (please note – I said “often”, not “without exception”) end up having different goal. On one hand, developing a methodology is an attempt at developing certain objective (tangible) level of performance in the trainee (think wrestling, boxing, MMA...)

It seems to be working!

On the other, in way too many schools the curriculum is in place for the sake of developing certain desired appearance in the practitioner (think kata/forms in most traditional styles). Stemming from that is the occurrence of good coaches/instructors modeling the methodology after their athletes/trainees (having them understand what they do), and lazy ones modeling their students to suit the curriculum (imitate what they see). 

It seems...aesthetically pleasing(?)

Naturally, it is possible to have both the curriculum and methodology of teaching it, the two are not entirely exclusive, my point here is which side of the continuum one should be stressing in their training.

That is it for now. In the future, I will be addressing some of the feats of a good training methodology and the attributes it develops in the trainees. 

Speed - diagnostic and curative!

Among the people who train in martial arts/fighting methods with at least declarative goal of being able to "practically use it", the occasional or regular inclusion some of pressure testing is not a new thing. In most cases, it entails moving fast, i.e. faster than in normal training. When these scenarios and/or kid of drills is done, the main thing to look for is identifying the problems, more specifically, the things (techniques, tactics) that do not work in full speed. This diagnostic aspect of speed training is by now more or less widely accepted, and in good training groups followed by getting back to the "drawing board" and drilling to fix the problems.

However, I've been wondering lately, what happens when the battery of those speed tests is repeated in continuation for a while, without getting back to refinement immediately? And sometimes, it means simply doing more than a single round/scenario...

In search for an answer, I experimented a bit with my group of trainees (although, in all honesty, the amount of training and the size of the sample were by no means exhaustive). And guess what? Some aspects of training could be improved by doing the fast training alone!

This kind of methodology seems to have particularly beneficial effects with certain type of trainees, in this case the guys in their mid-teens whose overall coordination may be suffering as the result of growth spurts or similar challenges. For that kind of population, this sort of "task oriented drills" tends to be much better suiting  that the training that focuses on the mechanics of moves, i.e. motor actions themselves. In other words, my limited experience seems to corroborate the approach professed by Luis Preto (take a look at my posts relating to his work).

OK, let me give you concrete examples. After a period of screening, I introduced knives and related work to the guys in my group. Now, the thing is that while working on one's empty handed skills, and especially AGAINST empty handed attackers, some people have the proclivity of believing it is a good strategy to take a punch or two in exchange for a better/more powerful one (or more). That in turn leads to inadvertent neglect of the footwork and general movement skills. Well, the introduction of knives (even trainers) tends to address that issue rather quickly.

I put each and every one of the boys through 6-8 consecutive rounds of knife sparring/dueling. I know, it had nothing to do with "street savvy" skills, but more with certain technical elements. Not to mention that is fun to do :-) (I am kicking myself repeatedly for not having filmed the session).

Being that they do not need to use much power when striking with a knife, it naturally laid emphasis on the speed and efficiency of the movement. And here goes - one of the guys found out during the first round that his long arms and legs did provide the ability to cover a lot of space relatively quickly at slower tempos, but at full speed it represented major challenge to his balance and mobility, in the sense of changing directions daftly enough. In the second round, we saw him less but more deliberately. In the third, he started moving more again, but with shorter gait and better focus. By the fourth round, he was already pretty solid on his feet and could focus on the actions of his upper body and tactical considerations.

Another member of the group a very tall and lanky fellow. My previous pointers about the need to bend/relax the knees were futile for the most part, but here again, the task at hand worked it out! In the first round he was almost like stuck in the mud or something, and even fell on his ass when trying to move back and keep the distance against a charging opponent, even without any physical contact. The second time through - lo and behold, his knees were bend and the entire movement much more springy! The third round even brought some sideways movement, albeit with lousy balance. However, that issue started self-correcting in the fourth round.

Yet another chap had had the inclination to avoid punches by bending from his waist, or use the same "tool" in order to reach the target that would move away from his own. That in turn did not carry over to well the message for the necessity of weight transfer and related issues. Once put through the multiple rounds of knife sparring - yes, the problems were first blatantly exposed, and then proceeded to "self healing" part. First, he noted that the leaning thing does not work against attacks to the legs or against fast combos, because the second or third blow would easily catch him. So, from almost non-existent he developed some workable footwork in a matter of minutes! Next, he saw the need to be able and go from moving forward to going back, or viceversa. It lead him to lowering his center a little and bringing the feet to act in a more coordinated fashion in transferring the weight for that direction change.

It does not end here, but you get the picture. All that said, though, the fast training is not some kind of panacea by any means. Namely, while certain mechanical/technical aspect did seem to be susceptible to getting fixed this way, not everything worked out so smoothly.

With regards to fighting strategy and tactics, training at high speed does function beautifully as a diagnostic tool, but I did not notice any actual short-term progress in either plugging the tactical holes in one's game or boosting the ability to take advantage of someone else's mistakes. Evidently, it is a different kind of cognitive process that requires a longer and continual work in striving to get better at this aspect of performance.

In conclusion, training at higher or full speed is not be all end all approach, but probably could be used more, not just as a diagnostic tool, but as a cure, too.

Alex Kostic - ever evolving!

First, sorry for the delay! I did not think it would take me this long to get to this installment…

So, as promised – a word or two about the highlights (for me) of the teaching that Alex Kostic presented during his annual “Training Above the Clouds” event, in June this year.

The main thing you need to know, especially if you have trained with Alex before but not recently, is that currently his focus is almost entirely on the mass fighting scenario in combat. The reasons are multi-fold and not my topic today, but this shift in Alex’s work lead to some interesting observations and conclusions/methods of training. Oh, and a cool new “label” for the whole approach – Wolf Pack Fighting.

Probably the technical chief aspect of fighting multiple adversaries (no tactical layers here! The entire thing is based more on the Russian cultural heritage, i.e. being in a circle of attackers and letting loose[1].) is the specific demand on one’s mode of movement and power generation. Specifically, it means that this kind of highly asymmetrical situation does not allow for the laser-focus approach to maximum technical efficiency and polishing. Instead, you have to move with authority and amplitude, nut not in an entirely haphazard manner.

When being attacked from all over the place and in full speed, there is simply no time to process the incoming information according to a typical OODA  protocol, so you have to act decisively and powerfully. And this is where the principle of individual frame full release comes into play! In short, it refers to making every move count and exude enough power to either knock one of the attackers out or hurt them enough to strike fear and hesitation in coming after you again. As you may have guessed, it does not work in slow motion…

The central mechanical element that makes it possible, and differing largely from most widespread RMA schools today, is the vertical component of all the striking and movement techniques. Namely, this is what will add both power to one’s hits and stability to their movement. That in turn requires loose articulation in the joints, even with short and explosive motions.

Now, while this kind of work may look crude and unpolished to an observer used to highly developed symmetrical combat systems, it dies not mean it is not technical. I took a close look at the people attending the camp, and everybody had to experience all those difficulties and confusion of facing the task of developing a new technical skill. Not to mention the phase of putting the individual moves/frames in succession and stringing them together…and then under pressure of being under the attack of a bunch of people around you!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBoLKmMMMKA

Speaking of possibly having tried Alex’s work before, the notion of the individual frame full release dovetails really nicely with his punctuated flow concept. The difference is, as I understand it, that the latter relates more to the outer perspective, i.e. how things look when seen from the side, while the former is the “inner description”, or how things feel when done properly.

Last, but not the least, aside from bringing confusion and puzzled experience when learning the moves, the result of doing them in the real time and with full release is a special feeling of exuberance and…well, release. Hard to argue with things you have developed and experienced on your own, even if through the process of guided discovery, as this camp may be described.

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[1] Heavily influenced by the traditional Russian martial school of Skobar, headed by Andrei Gruntovski of St. Petersburg.