How do we desensitize our students to contact?

[sgtmac_46]

Just a minor point of clarification: in randori you don't put on arm bars and wrist locks at full power. If a lock is executed properly and at full power, the elbow snaps. So do wrists and fingers (which snap like a twig).

Randori relies on the person being subjected to the lock admitting that the lock is set, and tapping out accordingly without the lock being applied full power. Only then can you spar using locks while preventing permanent injury.
If you do put on locks full power, you'll end up injuring sparring partners regularly.

No clarification needed. The person putting the hold on puts it on in randori as he would in a real world application, it is up to the person being submitted to tap out before he is injured. All techniques are done at real speed, full power.....you just stop when the other guy has had enough.

Randori IS full contact sparring.

 

[Bruno@MT]

No it isn't. because if you put on an arm bar or wrist lock at full speed AND full power, then the joint snaps instantly. There wouldn't be any time to tap out. To prevent injury the loser would have to tap out before there even is a lock.
So the attacker puts the lock on at full speed, but stops before the breaking point -> no full power. Otherwise they leave behind a trail of permanently injured sparring partners.

If you still think different, we have to agree to disagree.

 

[sgtmac_46]

No it isn't. because if you put on an arm bar or wrist lock at full speed AND full power, then the joint snaps instantly. There wouldn't be any time to tap out. To prevent injury the loser would have to tap out before there even is a lock.
So the attacker puts the lock on at full speed, but stops before the breaking point -> no full power. Otherwise they leave behind a trail of permanently injured sparring partners.

If you still think different, we have to agree to disagree.

If that were true, every submission in MMA would result in broken arm, elbow, leg or knee.....let me check....NOPE! Generally the only time someone gets their arm broken or elbow broken even in MMA fights is if they refuse to submit.

Perhaps you're confusing putting a submission on a cooperating training partner, versus attempting one FULL power against an uncooperative fully resisting training partner.......again, illustrating the confusion about full contact sparring. This isn't one person playing uke and the other person playing tori, in that kind of designated attack/receiver scenario one would get injured.....that that's not sparring or randori where there is no designated attacker or receiver, where both are jockeying for a position of advantage.

The assumption you're making is that ATTEMPTING to put the armbar on full power (as I said) is the same as slapping it on full power, against an unresisting partner (uke)....and that illustrates the difference between applying techniques against a cooperative partner and an uncooperative one....and that makes my point PERFECTLY CLEAR!

Anyone who spars in grappling full power and full contact knows that you attempt to put your technique on at full power, and your opponent resists it at full power. He isn't dummying for you, letting you slap it on him to full extension, because that's not how it works in the real world. If you slip a submission in, you've worked it in under his radar....and if he's at the level of proficiency he should be for such sparring, he KNOWS a moment before complete lockout that the technique is sunk in deep and he's not getting out and he taps. The key to avoiding injury is awareness of those moments, NOT in half-measure technique demonstration.

This is a prime example of why folks NEED to spar full contact if they expect to separate theory from reality......so they don't get THEORY confused with REALITY! It's the same reason many non-contact folks think that their techniques are TOO deadly to spar with.



Here, here's quite a few chokes, armbars and other assorted submissions at full speed.....with nary a broken limb or fatality in sight.

 

[Bruno@MT]

Anyone who spars in grappling full power and full contact knows that you attempt to put your technique on at full power, and your opponent resists it at full power. This is a prime example of why folks NEED to spar full contact if they expect to separate theory from reality......so they don't get THEORY confused with REALITY! It's the same reason many non-contact folks think that their techniques are TOO deadly to spar with.

If you manage to put on a lock under the radar before the opponent has the time to react, he is screwed.

How many times do you have an official fight? say 1 hundred times.
But you spar a lot more. So even if the odds are low, it's still going to happen. Let's take Bas Rutten as an example. If you look at Bas's fights, you will find instances where he seriously injured his opponent. He had 40 ish MMA type fights, resulting in a couple of nasty injuries for his opponents. Among the coupld of fights I saw, there was 1 shin broken because of a leg lock, and 1 broken liver.

So if he sparred like that against his sparring partner a hundred times, he would have gone through at least 5 sparring partners.

Also, MMA rules forbid small joint locks. With knees and elbows your argument has merit, on the assumption that you have the time to resist. But on small joints like fingers, it is no longer true. If I manage to grab hold of a finger, I can break it, and no amount of resisting is going to help.

EDIT:
Btw, I am definitely not part of the 'too deadly' crowd, but some things are too deadly to use in competition
what about eye gouging, biting, kicks to the groin, crusing the larynx, or elbows to the head or body, and all the other techniques that you'd use in a 'real' fight?
You can't have a competation (or spar) in a system that allows all this without ending up with lots of permanently injured people. I saw a cage fight under 'no rules' rules, and before the towel was in the ring, the thai fighter broke the boxer's knee, eyesocket, and the ribs in his back. It was a bloody affair, and the boxer's fighting career was over.

MMA rules have evolved to allow all out fighting and minimizing risk. But as e.g Bas has shown, you can still seriously damage teh person you are fighting with. So unless 5% of all sparring fights end with such injury, you are not sparring like you fight.

EDIT2:
As for not sparring / fighting. I sparred 2 times per week for 3,5 years (jiu-jitsu). And in all those years, I ended up hurting but not injuring my sparring partners. When I put on alock, I stopped at the point where it really hurt, but before doing real damage. That is controlled sparring. Full power, full speed, but with enough control to stop in time.
I could have broken those joints, but that would have changed only the realism of the outcome. Not of the fight itself.

 

[sgtmac_46]

If you manage to put on a lock under the radar before the opponent has the time to react, he is screwed.

That's why sparring isn't for everyone.....you should know what you're doing before you engage in it.

How many times do you have an official fight? say 1 hundred times.
But you spar a lot more. So even if the odds are low, it's still going to happen. If you look at Bas Rutten's fights (the only MMA fighter of which I've seen more than a couple of fights), you will find instances where he seriously injured his opponent. He had 40 ish MMA fights, resulting in a couple of nasty injuries for his opponents.

Those injuries are the result of trying not to be submitted....that desire not to submit is where the injuries come from. You don't want to submit, then they will put it on harder.

That happens in sparring, but it's almost always the fault of the person to who is on the receiving end of the technique resisting when they should have been tapping. Injury is a risk of full contact sparring.....if it were easy, everyone would do it.

So if he sparred like that against his sparring partner a hundred times, he would have gone through at least 5 sparring partners.

Again, those injuries almost always happen in competition NOT because someone is throwing the technique on harder, but because there is more incentive to attempt to slip the technique, rather than fight through it, resulting in folks refusing to tap in techniques that they would tap to when sparring.

The techniques ARE attempted at full power against a resisting opponent, exactly as I have said, who is attempting to do the same thing. But the difference in sparring is that there is little incentive to risk injury to avoid being submitted, so we tap soon enough to avoid injury.

Also, MMA rules forbid small joint locks. With knees and elbows your argument has merit, on the assumption that you have the time to resist.
But on small joints like fingers, it is no longer true. If I manage to grab hold of a giner, I can break it, and no amount of resisting is going to help.

Small joint locks are a bit of a switch of topics.....the topic we were discussing was the fact that in Judo and BJJ we randori at full power, not small joint locks versus large joint locks.

 

[Bruno@MT]

Small joint locks are a bit of a switch of topics.....the topic we were discussing was the fact that in Judo and BJJ we randori at full power, not small joint locks versus large joint locks.

Sort of. But not entirely.
To be honest, I have no idea if BJJ covers those techniques or not.

We had to learn small joint locks for grading. By requiring control, we could use those in randori, whereas it would not be possible with full contact sparring. And this way, we had more experience with those techniques than we would have if we'd have been restricted from using them because of the contact level.

The reason I pointed out sjl is that if you learn and spar a system that is broader, and not based on competition rules, there there will be some things that can't be fought full contact.

 

[sgtmac_46]

Sort of. But not entirely.
To be honest, I have no idea if BJJ covers those techniques or not.

We had to learn small joint locks for grading. By requiring control, we could use those in randori, whereas it would not be possible with full contact sparring. And this way, we had more experience with those techniques than we would have if we'd have been restricted from using them because of the contact level.

The reason I pointed out sjl is that if you learn and spar a system that is broader, and not based on competition rules, there there will be some things that can't be fought full contact.

It's true that there are some techniques you cannot practice in full contact sparring......eye gouges for example. But that's not an argument against full contact sparring.

The reality is if one COULD find a way to practice those techniques against a violently resisting opponent, that would be superior to how they are currently practiced. We are just restricted by practical limitations.

Specific techniques aside, not hitting and getting hit, choking and getting choked by another human being, who is pushing the situation as close to a real conflict as possible, puts one at a disadvantage if one's goal is to prepare for a real conflict.

Again, as I pointed out, it's like practicing full contact football......but never making full contact in practice.

Boxers are such good punchers, and so good under pressure, because they spar and learn how to take a punch. Punching a boxer doesn't cause him to lose his mind like it does most folks, because he's been punched, many, many, many times. He learns how to deal with it, he learns that what didn't knock him unconscious doesn't stop him.

My issue isn't the techniques of many arts......but can many of it's practioners perform those techniques after getting punched in the head.........or as Mike Tyson used to say....'EVERYONE HAS A PLAN UNTIL THEY GET PUNCHED IN THE NOSE!'

 

[Skpotamus]

Again, those injuries almost always happen in competition NOT because someone is throwing the technique on harder, but because there is more incentive to attempt to slip the technique, rather than fight through it, resulting in folks refusing to tap in techniques that they would tap to when sparring.

The techniques ARE attempted at full power against a resisting opponent, exactly as I have said, who is attempting to do the same thing. But the difference in sparring is that there is little incentive to risk injury to avoid being submitted, so we tap soon enough to avoid injury.
quote]

That's just not true. People go into the control position for submissions quickly, but then they pretty much stop increasing force, and apply it much more slowly to not injure people (at least, most people do). When you go into pretty much any joint lock full speed, you can dislocate the joint or break it before the other person even feels the tension in the joint. Believe me, I've been on the receiving end of a rookie during an armbar drill who popped his hips into the juji-gatame instead of locking it in and applying pressure slowly. He just popped my elbow out of socket beforeI even felt tension on it. This was after I'd been grappling for about 4 years, I knew when to tap and when I was stuck, it was the only injury I've ever gotten in grappling btw.

Look at a few of Ken Shamrocks pancrase matches, he normally locked in a submission hold, then applied torque to it slowly to not injure his opponents. Then watch his Leon Djik fight (djik had said some disparaging comments about shamrock). He got a heel hook and wrenched it as hard and fast as he could, snapping Djik's leg before he even had time to scream, much less tap.

A King of the cage match a few years ago had a nasty heel hook in it as well. A blue haired BJJ student slapped on a heel hook standing, fell back and broke the leg on the way down. His opponent had no time to tap.

These are two examples of someone refusing to tap and getting their arm broken because of it (most common method of injury)

Here is the vid of shamrock snapping Dijk's leg - notice that he wrenched it as hard as he could as soon as it was under his arm

Here is the video of Kazushi Sakuraba breaking Renzo Gracies arm - note that it broke on the way down, giving Renzo no chance to tap- the arm break occurs around 4:09

Here is Rhadi Ferguson breaking an arm in judo, he locks on the sub and breaks it as the guy taps immediately from the armbar. occurs at the very end of the video

Someone in a dojo snapping a guys arm with a lock, occurs at 1:16 the guy wrenches the kimura around until it snaps, not giving the other guy any chance to tap.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8NblJ8d3wk&feature=related

A grappling tourny with a standing kimura arm break at 4:05, no time to tap either

 

[Bruno@MT]

That's just not true. People go into the control position for submissions quickly, but then they pretty much stop increasing force, and apply it much more slowly to not injure people (at least, most people do). When you go into pretty much any joint lock full speed, you can dislocate the joint or break it before the other person even feels the tension in the joint.

<lots of examples removed>

Thanks for providing the vids (and your personal story) and proving my point. This is exactly what I was trying to explain.

 

[just2kicku]

in our art of Kajukenbo, we do practice locks and throws. But I think the point is, that there is point where you can't go all out. When we practice techniques, I want to see hard contact. When we spar and you go for a groin kick, we want to hear the sound of the cup. Yes sometimes people cry, but they keep coming back.

It does no good to break something on one of the students, the only thing that desensitizes them to are the MA's. Punching, kicking, blocking and take downs are done at full speed and hard contact.

If you're gonna train to fight, you've got to be hit and give blows HARD. I tell the students if they get hit, when it's their turn, it's payback.

 

[Bruno@MT]

If you're gonna train to fight, you've got to be hit and give blows HARD. I tell the students if they get hit, when it's their turn, it's payback.

I'd change that to
If you're gonna train to be a fighter, you've got to be hit and give blows HARD.

Punching an kicking were medium contact where I trained jiu-jitsu. Throwing, take down, wrestling was all hard, but with enough control not to break.

In those 3,5 years, I learned how to fight. I readily admit to being less prepared to face an experienced fighter than you, and I was definitely not a hardened fighter like you. But I was infinitely more prepared for a confrontation than someone who spent 3,5 years on the couch.

So it is not a black and white scale. It is, however, imporant to be honest about this to yourself about where you are on the scale.

 

[sgtmac_46]

Again, those injuries almost always happen in competition NOT because someone is throwing the technique on harder, but because there is more incentive to attempt to slip the technique, rather than fight through it, resulting in folks refusing to tap in techniques that they would tap to when sparring.

The techniques ARE attempted at full power against a resisting opponent, exactly as I have said, who is attempting to do the same thing. But the difference in sparring is that there is little incentive to risk injury to avoid being submitted, so we tap soon enough to avoid injury.
quote]

That's just not true. People go into the control position for submissions quickly, but then they pretty much stop increasing force, and apply it much more slowly to not injure people (at least, most people do). When you go into pretty much any joint lock full speed, you can dislocate the joint or break it before the other person even feels the tension in the joint. Believe me, I've been on the receiving end of a rookie during an armbar drill who popped his hips into the juji-gatame instead of locking it in and applying pressure slowly. He just popped my elbow out of socket beforeI even felt tension on it. This was after I'd been grappling for about 4 years, I knew when to tap and when I was stuck, it was the only injury I've ever gotten in grappling btw.

Look at a few of Ken Shamrocks pancrase matches, he normally locked in a submission hold, then applied torque to it slowly to not injure his opponents. Then watch his Leon Djik fight (djik had said some disparaging comments about shamrock). He got a heel hook and wrenched it as hard and fast as he could, snapping Djik's leg before he even had time to scream, much less tap.

A King of the cage match a few years ago had a nasty heel hook in it as well. A blue haired BJJ student slapped on a heel hook standing, fell back and broke the leg on the way down. His opponent had no time to tap.

These are two examples of someone refusing to tap and getting their arm broken because of it (most common method of injury)

Here is the vid of shamrock snapping Dijk's leg - notice that he wrenched it as hard as he could as soon as it was under his arm

Here is the video of Kazushi Sakuraba breaking Renzo Gracies arm - note that it broke on the way down, giving Renzo no chance to tap- the arm break occurs around 4:09

Here is Rhadi Ferguson breaking an arm in judo, he locks on the sub and breaks it as the guy taps immediately from the armbar. occurs at the very end of the video

Someone in a dojo snapping a guys arm with a lock, occurs at 1:16 the guy wrenches the kimura around until it snaps, not giving the other guy any chance to tap.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8NblJ8d3wk&feature=related

A grappling tourny with a standing kimura arm break at 4:05, no time to tap either

You still miss the point entirely. Most folks who don't spar full contact miss the point, because they envision (based on how they train) that they are going to slap a technique on a REAL opponent like they do a submissive cooperating uke.......and that's why those who don't spar are operating on a false set of assumptions.

What about 'the vast majority of such injuries are the result of someone refusing to tap' isn't clear? Did I say that it NEVER happened that someone threw on a hold, and someone was injured? MOST CERTAINLY NOT! That is why some folks stick to table tennis. But the vast majority of such injuries, as I said, are the result of attempting to avoid tapping.

The ARGUMENT is about the fact that Judoka, and BJJ practioners spar at full speed, full contact. Bruno wanted to argue that we don't. The fact is we do. You can split hairs with him if you like.

 

[sgtmac_46]

It is, however, imporant to be honest about this to yourself about where you are on the scale.

Which is the point i've been trying to make the entire time, while we've been splitting hairs.

 

[AoCAdam]

What an awesome and well thought out post! I think that so many people go out of their way to avoid contact that they have a mental block against it. When I did Muay Thai in high school my coach would slowly increase our contact by light sparring drills until we became comfortable with getting hit. He had to convince myself and many of the students that we would not get seriously injured or die by getting a jab in the face or kicked in the leg. It hurt for a little while but my fellow students and me included got "conditioned" to the point we were no longer scared of getting hit. Which allowed us to do full sparring which is so much fun.

 

[Twin Fist]

hmmm

all those vids?

well, what to say.....

well, for one thing this thread has strayed off topic pretty badly

 

[AJPerry]

Great thread Thesemindz

I think you stated the transition from light cntact to heavy in great steps.

My art is very contact heavy and we do find new students are nervous about starting when they come along and watch the higher belts in general training.

Kids are so much easier as they can be taught to lose any fears they have very quickly.

We started the kids off with simple contact games and when we got them through to full sparring they love it, whether they are standing up or getting taken to the ground they are having a great time and fighting hard. I have released a book of games for Instructors that teach kids, the link is below if anyone is looking for more ideas to add to their lessons.

Adults are actually harder because of the years of fear or the inflated ego. I think your steps for adults are excellent. Any art that lacks contact also lacks reality.