Combative system vs Martial arts

[tony dear]

Definately. He is, for me, the top guy around now that Geoff Thompson has, as you say, taken a different direction.

He is superb and his hero was /is Kelly Mcann

 

[tony dear]

I've seen the Combatives For Street Survival DVDs, and read the accompanying book at one point. All pretty mundane combatives stuff, except for the defense. The defensive work is some of the best i've seen from the combatives world. He's one of the only guys who seems to address the issue of closing the gap on someone who isn't catapulting himself into you with every attack, or starting at close range (i.e. a brawl.)

Now, the bad part. In one of his DVDs, he demonstrates using a chin jab to counter-attack while you're bent over, covering your head, having your skull smashed to smithereens by a nonstop flurry of punches... It's not the worst response in the world, but it's not a strategy i'd like to stake my health and wellbeing on. Would you?

I take issue to it because his OWN SYSTEM has a better response to this situation.



This is a logical fallacy.
Martial Arts AND Combatives are something you learn WITH your training partners, then do TO someone in the real world. Sport applications are meaningless if your purpose for training is self defense or personal development.

I agree..sport is sport....combatives doesnt really use blocks..why wait?

 

[tony dear]

sport is sport..martial arts is martial arts....self defence is self defence...... you would never go to a Spanish class to learn French ..even though there IS alot of crossover......lol

 

[tony dear]

...a martial art.
Combatives is a term people use to disassociate themselves from martial arts, but you're still martial artists whether you like it or not. Much in the same way, i'm an athlete, regardless of my reasons for training.

I love the term MARTIAL ART....just dont like when some schools say...learn the art of aikido or whatever then it says....oh it can ALSO be used as an effective form of self defence.....so Id go to an istructor who focusses on real world style attacks. Thats all.

 

[drop bear]

totally disagree..check out KELLY mC cann sir.

Who has he fought?

Anyway I checked out a video and the difference between martial arts and combatives is training with intensity and resistance.

Who knew all this time I was doing Combatives.

Not me in this clip.

 

[Juany118]

To the OP. Other people have given good explanations but, perhaps, missed one thing. Usually Combative systems, especially Military and LE related have the specific career they were designed for front and center. Examples...

LE: Gracie Combatives and LOCKUP come immediately to mind. These involve striking and such but they are primarily use to set up take downs and restraint methods. The system will also teach techniques in the context of the potential incidents (are you alone or with other officers), fighting with gear on, weapon retention etc.

Military: the Rangers and other US Special Forces train (or trained, not sure today) in a system called SOCP. Due to the changing nature of Military operations this system has similarities to the LE systems but also adds a dimension. They do a lot of training on how you may be forced into hand to hand but techniques are taught with the intent of quickly disengaging to draw access a lethal force tool.

 

[hoshin1600]

To the OP. Other people have given good explanations but, perhaps, missed one thing. Usually Combative systems, especially Military and LE related have the specific career they were designed for front and center. Examples...

LE: Gracie Combatives and LOCKUP come immediately to mind. These involve striking and such but they are primarily use to set up take downs and restraint methods. The system will also teach techniques in the context of the potential incidents (are you alone or with other officers), fighting with gear on, weapon retention etc.

Military: the Rangers and other US Special Forces train (or trained, not sure today) in a system called SOCP. Due to the changing nature of Military operations this system has similarities to the LE systems but also adds a dimension. They do a lot of training on how you may be forced into hand to hand but techniques are taught with the intent of quickly disengaging to draw access a lethal force tool.

Thanks Juany118 for bring this up. I did not mention the differences, because combatives is also taught to civilians (like I do) Kelly McCann now teaches civilians as well. I assumed the OP was asking about civilian training.
LEO and military have special considerations that must be incorporated into their training. Like weapon retention.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

i did say that generalizations are usually not accurate. i understand that. but we all must admit things like scenario based training was never and is still not part of the official curriculum for many styles.


let me make a different point

so we are talking about a system to deal with violence.
with no belts, no gi, no ranking. no foreign language. its not boxing, not karate, judo, BJJ, TKD or kung fu. its not an asian martial art......what do you call it???

I don't think rank or lack thereof is a reasonable differentiator between what you're referring to and TMA. There are TMA that observe no rank, at all. The gi is just a handy, sturdy training outfit, and has little impact on the training, itself. I've trained with and without them, and find a few key differences that are adaptable, but they are smaller than the differences between shorts/tshirt and suit/tie. The foreign language, again, is not a key differentiator. I've worked with martial artists who used entirely English terms, and I didn't know what some of them were, so I had to learn some vocabulary. This is the same process I go through when I work with someone who uses Japanese, Korean, or Chinese terms.

The best differentiator, as I understand it, is a focus on intense, situational training for self-defense, with an abbreviated curriculum to keep people focused on getting to a point of effectiveness more quickly.

That last description can be used to describe the early curriculum within some TMA, as well. To me, "combatives" is just more vocabulary. It only means whatever it's agreed to mean within a given system. In Gracie JJ, it's their basic self-defense starter curriculum. In some schools, it's just a reference to self-defense. In some schools, it's meant to indicate that it's designed for LEO and the like. In other places, it seems to have no meaning, at all, as the stuff being taught appears to be for sport, only.

 

[Buka]

According to Quora -

"Set" has 464 definitions in the Oxford English Dictionary. "Run" runs a distant second, with 396. Rounding out the top ten are "go" with 368, "take" with 343, "stand" with 334, "get" with 289, "turn" with 288, "put" with 268, "fall" with 264, and "strike" with 250. But according to NPR, "run" has 645 definitions.

I think the word Karate and term Martial Arts have a boot-load of definitions as well.
Every single thing I have ever learned goes in the Karate I do and the Karate I teach, regardless of what art it originally came from. Who cares? I don't. My students certainly don't. I don't really know anyone who does. Do you?

 

[hoshin1600]

I don't think rank or lack thereof is a reasonable differentiator between what you're referring to and TMA. There are TMA that observe no rank, at all. The gi is just a handy, sturdy training outfit, and has little impact on the training, itself. I've trained with and without them, and find a few key differences that are adaptable, but they are smaller than the differences between shorts/tshirt and suit/tie. The foreign language, again, is not a key differentiator. I've worked with martial artists who used entirely English terms, and I didn't know what some of them were, so I had to learn some vocabulary. This is the same process I go through when I work with someone who uses Japanese, Korean, or Chinese terms.

The best differentiator, as I understand it, is a focus on intense, situational training for self-defense, with an abbreviated curriculum to keep people focused on getting to a point of effectiveness more quickly.

That last description can be used to describe the early curriculum within some TMA, as well. To me, "combatives" is just more vocabulary. It only means whatever it's agreed to mean within a given system. In Gracie JJ, it's their basic self-defense starter curriculum. In some schools, it's just a reference to self-defense. In some schools, it's meant to indicate that it's designed for LEO and the like. In other places, it seems to have no meaning, at all, as the stuff being taught appears to be for sport, only.

I dont disagree with what you say. My post you quoted was a response to the first few posts that inference that "a combatives system" was a scam of sorts not worth it's weight in salt. What I was getting from the first posts was that combatives was really just karate and should he called a martial art.
I went on a bit of a tangent but my point was that if you have a martial system without a gi or kata or Japanese terms and is not a recognized Japanese or okinawan style it shouldn't be called karate. Thus the American term combatives is a good description and should not be thought less of because of the name. Combatives is a martial art as much as karate is a form of combatives. ( meanning the are the same thing) The common usage however implies differences.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I dont disagree with what you say. My post you quoted was a response to the first few posts that inference that "a combatives system" was a scam of sorts not worth it's weight in salt. What I was getting from the first posts was that combatives was really just karate and should he called a martial art.
I went on a bit of a tangent but my point was that if you have a martial system without a gi or kata or Japanese terms and is not a recognized Japanese or okinawan style it shouldn't be called karate. Thus the American term combatives is a good description and should not be thought less of because of the name. Combatives is a martial art as much as karate is a form of combatives. ( meanning the are the same thing) The common usage however implies differences.

That is a valid point. I struggle with the term "martial art", myself. Because of my background, I actually typically use it to refer to TMAs that have a focus on defense. I often differentiate from "martial sports", but that's a false dichotomy, since there's a ton of overlap. I also tend to exclude modern martial arts and even some traditional Western arts until someone mentions them and reminds me about them. I have a concept of what a "system" is, and what "combatives" are, but no good distinction I could explain to someone. Because of the larger community that comes together here, I include combative systems in the world of "martial arts" now, because they are likely similar to where some TMA's started from.