How would you fight your younger/ more inexperienced self

[Headhunter]

So this is more towards the older guys here. But I thought this would be a fun topic. Most people will be better martial artists now than they were when they were younger due to more experience, so knowing what you know how how would you fight your younger self.

Me personally as my name here suggests i used to always headhunt mainly because I wanted the fights over quick before I could get badly hurt. But if I had to fight myself I'd keep my head tucked and have a high guard and move around using leg kicks and body kicks to take away the power from the punches and looks for the counter attack.

This is all just a bit of fun no need to take it to to seriously.

 

[marques]

My younger self was able to apply more stuff, quicker, better trained... But he had a fundamental weakness. I would just exploit that weakness. Essentially, it is my number 1 strategy. Sometimes I need to guess and check to know the opponent. My younger self, I already know...

 

[drop bear]

I would go easy on him because any injuries he gets then I have already had.

 

[Danny T]

Which younger self?
My teens into early 20s; I would exploit my younger self's emotional immaturity.
My mid 20s to 40s; I would still attempt to create an emotional response, stay at range using pot shots to frustrate into making a mistake that can be exploited.
My later 40s to date; I wouldn't want to fight. I would take a lot to make him angry enough to fight and with the toys (tools) he carries I'd shoot from several blocks away.

 

[elder999]

I started martial arts when I was 11. So, my 18 year old self?

That guy's been a black belt in 3 arts for almost as many years, is a competitive power lifter, the student of a famous vaudeville strongman, and is on his way to Japan for more training.
I'd shoot him.

My 28 year old self?

That guy has two kids, a wife, 14 months training in Japan, loads of seminars under his belt, and lots of tournament and full contact experience, as well as years of experience bouncing in bars.
I'd shoot him.

My 38 year old self?
That guy's been widowed. Dealt with all kinds of crap, but he's about 5 years into being a little nuts, and pissed off at the world.
I'd shoot him-before he shoots me....one in the chest and two in the head. Then I'd cut off his head, just to be sure, because he lived in a vengeful frame of mind 24/7.

My 42 year old self and onward?
That guy isn't going to fight anybody-he'll just shoot 'em. Best to leave him alone.

 

[drop bear]

Well i assumed younger self in my prime. I am going after the 5 year old version of me.

For the easy win.

Technically. Suplex followed up with a flying elbow. Then restomp the groin.

 

[JR 137]

21 year old JR tried too hard to make things happen. 41 year old JR lets things happen.

21 year old JR tried too hard to create openings. 41 year old JR sees those openings and tries to take advantage of them.

21 year old JR tried to be as fast as possible, and tried too many high risk things. 41 year old JR tries to be as efficient and conservative as possible.

21 year old JR would rush in and try to overwhelm 41 year old JR. 41 year old JR would wait for that and kick his supporting leg out from under him when he stupidly tried to roundhouse kick him in the head. 41 year old JR would slip and unload with a simple hard left and right to the body while 21 year old JR would try to pull of some sort of ridiculous combo that a 5'8 stocky guy has no business trying to do.

I trained alongside a bunch of guys my own age when I was in my 20s. This time around, I'm learning a lot from the old guys. Bringing the fight to them plays right into their hands. They'll let the fight come to them and make their opponent pay for it. They'll let you pressure them and throw a few well placed and timed hard shots that'll put you on the floor pretty quickly. 21 year old JR would've fell for it every time; 41 year old JR learned his lesson.

I love the old guys I train with. They keep it effectively and brutally simple. I try my best to be like them.

 

[JowGaWolf]

I would go easy on him because any injuries he gets then I have already had.

Sounds like a safe bet. lol

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

I'm pretty sure that I can use my head lock to tap out my young self. My young self's head lock is not strong enough to tap me out. For some MA ability, old is better than young.

 

[Tames D]

I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now.

 

[hoshin1600]

My younger self was as fast as lightning. He was able to round house kick guys in the head before they could flinch. He even wore a snake patch on the left calf to let you know what was coming. The hands were even quicker with not only fast twitch muscles but also a great timing ability. But...he only weighed 135 pounds, had a week base with not much stability to take strong hits.
Today's Hoshin is 180. Joints hurt to much, I wouldn't be able to avoid the fast hits but I'm solid now and learned to take hits from guys in the 230 pound range.
So I could probably turtle up a bit and razz him, asking him to let me know when your done. Then drop him like a wet bag of sand with a Thai round kick to the thigh of those tooth pick legs.

 

[JP3]

My younger self was able to apply more stuff, quicker, better trained... But he had a fundamental weakness. I would just exploit that weakness. Essentially, it is my number 1 strategy. Sometimes I need to guess and check to know the opponent. My younger self, I already know...

Well, what is it?

Wait... I get it. No need to tell everyone your weakness, since we're all lying in wait to learn what each others' weaknesses are, I get you. Good strategery, right there!

 

[JP3]

Well i assumed younger self in my prime. I am going after the 5 year old version of me.

For the easy win.

Technically. Suplex followed up with a flying elbow. Then restomp the groin.

Dammit! You got me right int he middle of drinking my wife-supplied ketone supplement drink. Damn near shot out my nose all over my screen!

Do you realize how gross that is to clean up, while trying to do it quietly so I don't have to explain.... sheesh....

Re-stomp the groin. At 5, you didn't HAVE a groin. You were made of Play-Doh and dirt.

 

[JP3]

Let's see, I turn 50 next, so let's say John at almost 25....

Oh man... That guy was a bit frightening, actually. At 25... that' be right around 3d in TKD and 2d HKD and I'd be somewhere around my 2nd or 3rd full year of Muay Thai. I could still jump out of the gym, pick up cars and kick like a truck, but a fast truck. Especially with that short, dirty little rising inner-thigh kick. I'd been working on that high head guard hitting me in the ribs/belly was akin to punching an oak tree because of all the medicine ball work we did for abs. And, I'd been bouncing for 4 years by then, so had ha enough real-world nasty incidents to have lost the... ah... innoncence of youth as it comes to brawling.

So... I think I'd talk trash to me... and make damn sure I didn't give a big opening with my weight on it for that rising kick, that thing freakin' hurts bad. Sooner or later Old John would get the right combination of smack-talk to convince Young John to "just take this old man out" and there'd be a bomb. But, since I'm me, I can read the bomb, since, after all, I know which bombs "could" be coming....

And then there'd be a explosive motion, ripping throught he air towards Old John's leg, belly or head, doesn't matter.... and Old John is out of the way


... and on Young John's back, wrapping in a nice tight rear naked choke, whispering "Here is where you take a nap, dumba$$, since you've not done any grappling yet. When you wake up, go take Judo." And Old me would walk away, leaving Young me to lie there uhnconscious, peeing his... er... my, pants. A combination of nice guy and not-nice guy.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

As Elder999 mentioned above I would shoot him. (ie. my younger self) That guy was crazy...

Some people still feel that way.

 

[Jenna]

I would go easy on him because any injuries he gets then I have already had.

Unless you hit your younger self with such power you can only soooo vaguely remember even having the encounter with "mysterious handsome older guy" haha..

 

[hoshin1600]

i just want to point out that if you shoot yourself you will distrupt the time/ space continuum and your old self would slowly disappear. and as you punch and kick your younger self you also will feel the ramifications of these injuries that would have plagued you over the years. however the reverse is not true. the younger self could inflict all kinds of damage and even kill you with no consequences. however as it happened you would experience a sort of deja vu. since the younger self would remember the incident and the older self would recollect it as a memory as it happened.
bottom line you never want to meet yourself face to face during time travel.

 

[jobo]

basically I wouldn't, my 28 yo self would knock me over before I knew what was coming.

when I was 18 I had a fight with my dad, who was a noted hard man of these parts. As his much younger self, well as near to it as you can get with out cloning,he stood no chance , I was stronger and faster with better balance and co ordination
shortly after. That my sister knocked him over in a pushing match, it was just about then that he realised hisdays of knocking us about were over

 

[Jenna]

bottom line you never want to meet yourself face to face during time travel.

..if I learned any thing from Jean Claude Van Damme movie it be this haha

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I'll take Gerry at 30-ish, when I was training hardest. He was about to get his BB in NGA, after riding the slow boat. He was technically better than many people of higher rank (similar level of NGA experience, plus some natural talent in balance and movement, plus some previous experience in other arts), so he was overconfident, though he was quiet about it. He was closer to the Judo training than I am, but didn't actually understand it as well. He pulled when he didn't have to, relied on his arms more than he should have, and misapplied his weight. I'd probably take the easy route against him and slip in some aiki-influenced Judo. He'd probably be easy to get into a front leg sweep. He wasn't very patient at sparring, and was still a bit shy of getting hit, so he'd be easy to drive back with some steady pressure, then give him an opening to grab an arm, let him commit his arms and weight to it, then drop weight against him to set up the sweep.

I'm pretty sure that would be repeatable about 5 times in a row on him. He wasn't a fast adopter of new learning - he chewed on new stuff a while before integrating it - hence the slow march through the ranks.