Kung Fu vs MMA

drop bear

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I thought I just expressed how the concept of winning fits into my view of self-defense training. In competition, I have no real consequence to losing, unless I put myself into a competition where I could seriously expect to get injured in a loss (which is anathema to my views on self-protection). So, in a BJJ competition, for instance, I'd be trying to win, but would have no real concern if I lose. I'd be doing it for the fun of competition, like when I played sports. When I am working on self-defense, I have a different view of the outcome.

So as an example of mindset training. We have a 15 minute gauntlet drill where we quit simply torture the guy. At the end of that 15 minutes he has to escape from mount. Now that drill does not end untill he is standing. Simple as that. He can leave untill he has succeeded in his objective.

the mother of all drills.
 

Steve

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I don't know, Gerry. It's all there. I've tried to explain it several different ways over the years. If you really would like to understand, let me know. If you think you understand and are just telling me you think I'm wrong, I don't have the energy any more. You win. :)
 

Gerry Seymour

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I think the existence of a referee matters as well. The referee is the safety backup that will protect you if you are injured to the point where you can't continue. In a self-defense situation both physical and non-physical, there is no guarantee that someone will step in when things get to be too much. For example, the girl who was beaten to death in a school bathroom by other teenage girls. No Ref, No one jumped in to stop the attack. So her attackers continued even when she lost consciousness.

There are things that I will risk when sparring but wouldn't risk in a self-defense situation. If I had to physically fight back then I know that my attacks will be more intense and brutal. Sports fighting can be brutal but the brutality is limited by the rules. In a self-defense situation anything goes including shooting someone or stabbing someone. There is no rule set or law that will prevent someone from shooting me or stabbing. The only thing the law does is set up the grounds for which someone will be punished. If I get shot or beat to death then the laws don't mean squat to me because I would be dead.

When it comes self-defense, everything becomes non-sporting or should become non-sporting, and more about self-preservation.
I agree. My point was that a referee doesn't create a meaningful difference (to me, in my goals) between sparring and competition. The ref is there to ensure rules are followed (and to count points, in some formats). That can be handled by the combatants while sparring.

If I'm sparring for a sport win (as I would for competition), I'll try openings I they're purposely leaving to see what happens, just to see their reaction. From a self-defense approach, that's a desperation move. I can't say I won't do it, but I'd have to feel really endangered in that moment to try what looks like an invitation. Invitations of that nature are only likely to come from reasonably skilled fighters, and accepting the invitation isn't a high-percentage move.
 

Gerry Seymour

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So you are training for self defence. You get a bit tired or hurty and you give up.

What happens?

Submission from knee on belly?
In training, what happens is the same that happens in everyone's training. We're all human, and that doesn't change just because I train for SD. But we fight on as best we can in the moment (including doing what we can to safely train when injured), and acknowledge the consequences of that situation if it were outside the dojo. If we could all heal immediately, the best approach would be to make every mistake very costly. That's impractical both for everyday purposes (we all have lives to lead) and self-defense purposes (getting injured a lot doesn't make someone more able to defend themselves).
 

Gerry Seymour

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I don't know, Gerry. It's all there. I've tried to explain it several different ways over the years. If you really would like to understand, let me know. If you think you understand and are just telling me you think I'm wrong, I don't have the energy any more. You win. :)
I really don't understand, Steve. That's what I've been trying to say. It seems arbitrary to me, and that's out of character for you, so I don't think I understand. I don't see where there's a meaningful difference between sparring and competition, assuming similar intensity and ruleset. I talked about this with my wife yesterday, and something Drop Bear said gave me pause. He commented that he got tapped out in training, and there would have been more consequences if it were competition. I don't see that, at all. But then, to me, competition is about competing, not about winning. When I played sports, I wanted to win because that was more fun. But I'd rather lose than not play, because playing was fun, win or lose. And I played the same way in scrimmage as I did in games. Maybe that's why I didn't play soccer in college, though I was probably good enough. It was just fun for me, and that wasn't enough drive for me to put in that time.
 

Gerry Seymour

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So as an example of mindset training. We have a 15 minute gauntlet drill where we quit simply torture the guy. At the end of that 15 minutes he has to escape from mount. Now that drill does not end untill he is standing. Simple as that. He can leave untill he has succeeded in his objective.

the mother of all drills.
I like that, DB. I don't have enough people to do a drill like that right now, but I'm adding the concept to my arsenal for advanced student training. It has a more direct purpose for MMA competition training (because you're more likely to need that amount of stamina), but the mindset part of it applies both places (keep fighting even when you feel like you can't) and is - if anything - even more important in SD. Thanks for sharing that.

We do have some similar stuff built into our training. For instance, in qualifying for my BB, I had to take 120+ attacks, with no significant rest. For brown belt, it was 80+. (The "+" is for when someone doesn't give a good enough attack - we get to do that one again. Yippee!) I remember on my brown belt test seriously considering taking the last few from my knees, because my legs were rubber (asthma attack during the test, and not being efficient). While I was thinking that (between attacks), I heard a student say, "Last card, Sensei." Music to my ears.
 

drop bear

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I like that, DB. I don't have enough people to do a drill like that right now, but I'm adding the concept to my arsenal for advanced student training. It has a more direct purpose for MMA competition training (because you're more likely to need that amount of stamina), but the mindset part of it applies both places (keep fighting even when you feel like you can't) and is - if anything - even more important in SD. Thanks for sharing that.

We do have some similar stuff built into our training. For instance, in qualifying for my BB, I had to take 120+ attacks, with no significant rest. For brown belt, it was 80+. (The "+" is for when someone doesn't give a good enough attack - we get to do that one again. Yippee!) I remember on my brown belt test seriously considering taking the last few from my knees, because my legs were rubber (asthma attack during the test, and not being efficient). While I was thinking that (between attacks), I heard a student say, "Last card, Sensei." Music to my ears.

We play around with simpler variations.

And yeah the idea gets thrown around in different forms. There was that guy who had to do wooden dummy for 4 hours or something. Same deal. Trains mental toughness.

Just saying we dont loose is bloody pointless. I have seen plenty of guys have their good intentions break down really fast when put under pressure. You have to create that through adversity.
 

JowGaWolf

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In training, what happens is the same that happens in everyone's training. We're all human, and that doesn't change just because I train for SD. But we fight on as best we can in the moment (including doing what we can to safely train when injured), and acknowledge the consequences of that situation if it were outside the dojo. If we could all heal immediately, the best approach would be to make every mistake very costly. That's impractical both for everyday purposes (we all have lives to lead) and self-defense purposes (getting injured a lot doesn't make someone more able to defend themselves).
I had this same conversation yesterday and said the same thing. The other instructor told me that our sparring was a waste of time for self-defense purposes. He asked how many times have I had broken nose or broken bones. He said that occurs in a real fight and if it's not happening in sparring then we aren't actually fighting.

I looked at him like he was nuts. If I fought with that intensity then no one would come to class because every they go against me, I would be beating the crap of him. The logic was crazy. He had this idea to put on full head gear with a cage and to punch at each other's face as hard as possible and it's up to the other guy to get out of the way. I had to inform him about the dangers of head trauma caused by being repeated hit in the head. For some reason he thinks he can handle a powerful punch or a powerful kick that has the same power and intensity of an attack that someone would do in fighting.

Like you stated "getting injured a lot doesn't make someone more able to defend themselves." I think it's actually counter productive because a person would spend more time healing than learning. Some would be permanent crippled which would then reduce their ability to actually defend themselves.
 

clfsean

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My guess is that in your system your punches are more exaggerated then what is done in Jow Ga Kung Fu. I trained with some Lama Pai students last month and we have the similar punches but they exaggerate their punches more than Jow Ga Students do. For example the Pao Choy punch is like a really long upper cut. for Jow Ga stops at my face level. The same type of punch for Lama Pai extends well above the head as you can see in the video below.

You can see the punch here. at :23

Compare it to the punch here at around :34

In Jow Ga kung fu we don't throw that punch higher than that for the very reason you speak of about being open. This is both in forms and in sparring. If your punches exaggerate like Lama Pai then we aren't talking about the same measure of exaggeration.

Ummm... nope.

We don't exaggerate. We have specific reasons for doing specific techniques a specific way. Not everything is what you see or are shown.
 

JowGaWolf

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Ummm... nope.

We don't exaggerate. We have specific reasons for doing specific techniques a specific way. Not everything is what you see or are shown.
This is my definition of exaggerate: "to enlarge or increase especially beyond the normal". Source: If a punching technique in training extends beyond what would be considered a the normal application of that technique in fighting, then the technique done in training would be considered by definition, as an enlargement of what is done in fighting.

A person can enlarge movement without overextending.
 

clfsean

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This is my definition of exaggerate: "to enlarge or increase especially beyond the normal". Source: If a punching technique in training extends beyond what would be considered a the normal application of that technique in fighting, then the technique done in training would be considered by definition, as an enlargement of what is done in fighting.

A person can enlarge movement without overextending.

Unless it's not. Then it's exactly as you see, but what's missing to the unfamiliar is content & use context.
 
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For a topic that people groaned about on page 1, this has turned out quite well :)
 

Gerry Seymour

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This is my definition of exaggerate: "to enlarge or increase especially beyond the normal". Source: If a punching technique in training extends beyond what would be considered a the normal application of that technique in fighting, then the technique done in training would be considered by definition, as an enlargement of what is done in fighting.

A person can enlarge movement without overextending.
When you say "normal", are you referring to that sort of "average across many styles"? In other words, what most of us are used to seeing?
 

JowGaWolf

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Just curious, not challenging: how would you define overextending?
Over extending breaks structure and greatly reduces benefit of the action. This is the definition I use for overextend: " to extend or expand beyond a safe or reasonable point" source. If my punch does this then I have put myself in an unsafe position in which my punch would have had no more power then a punch that I didn't overextend. Sometimes it makes the punch weaker because the structure required for the punch is broken.
 

JowGaWolf

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When you say "normal", are you referring to that sort of "average across many styles"? In other words, what most of us are used to seeing?
When I say "normal" I'm referring to the normal application of a technique in a fighting like sparring or actual fighting scenario. For example a boxer's uppercut. There is a maximum range of effectiveness and that would be the "normal range." for a boxer's upper. Take note of what happens when the uppercut goes beyond that "normal range." The structure, breaks, he is wide open.
 

drop bear

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I really don't understand, Steve. That's what I've been trying to say. It seems arbitrary to me, and that's out of character for you, so I don't think I understand. I don't see where there's a meaningful difference between sparring and competition, assuming similar intensity and ruleset. I talked about this with my wife yesterday, and something Drop Bear said gave me pause. He commented that he got tapped out in training, and there would have been more consequences if it were competition. I don't see that, at all. But then, to me, competition is about competing, not about winning. When I played sports, I wanted to win because that was more fun. But I'd rather lose than not play, because playing was fun, win or lose. And I played the same way in scrimmage as I did in games. Maybe that's why I didn't play soccer in college, though I was probably good enough. It was just fun for me, and that wasn't enough drive for me to put in that time.

But self defence is more about winning than competition. Because you are not there for fun. It becomes serious business.

Imagine I am in some sort of real fight, got a bit tired and let the other guy get that arm. Do that and I am going to have a bad day.
 

drop bear

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Unless it's not. Then it's exactly as you see, but what's missing to the unfamiliar is content & use context.

Exept being terribly mysterious is a cop out. And every one sees it.

We specifically do that punch in that manner because.............
 

Gerry Seymour

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But self defence is more about winning than competition. Because you are not there for fun. It becomes serious business.

Imagine I am in some sort of real fight, got a bit tired and let the other guy get that arm. Do that and I am going to have a bad day.
That's pretty much my point. I don't see competition as an end point. It's something that (under the right ruleset) could be fun. But I can't really see myself being overly concerned with winning. I'm more focused on the not-losing/winning when I consider self-defense, for exactly the reason you point out.
 

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