- Joined
- Jun 9, 2006
- Messages
- 3,692
- Reaction score
- 176
...........and only now( only NOW) do my legs not scream with pain.
First thing i learned was just how far my fitness has discombibblebobbled---just the warm ups kicked my *** and I finished the class on sheer force of will alone.
This is far and away a different ( and far and away a BETTER) martial art than any I've previously come in contact with. How much of this is due to the fact that at least half if not more of my previous schools could be properly referred to as "McDojos" I don't know but it MUST have influenced this.
Of particular interest to me was the manner in which the takedowns I was shown were performed.
I must wander a bit in order to make my point:
You see, much has been made in recent years of people coming under criticism for claiming that this or that technique is "too deadly" to be trained full speed or used in sparring. In most cases this is considered a "cop-out" by our more overtestosterated brethren in the martial arts community. But with that being said, for the most part I would often find myself in agreement with them on this particular point, since up until this class my only reference point of such assertions of "deadliness" were made in context of strikes practiced solely against air in a "McDojo" environment( for those of you not familiar with the term, "McDojo" is a phrase used by both mixed martial artists as well as true traditional martial artists to refer to the average store front "franchise" school establishment with extreme scorn and derision for their slickly-packaged, "fast-food" style training geared less toward serious students and more towards children, soccer moms and soft middle class people who don't like to get hit. In such an environment the training is usually severely lacking in quality of technical depth( i.e. a lot of form or movement practiced with no idea why it is practiced or to what purpose), the promise of "self discipline" appears to send the message to soccer moms that a martial arts school, at some point, became synonymous with a babysitting service. This is not to say kids don't benefit, but it does change the whole tone, and so adult material( i.e. techniques or issues relating to deadly force, weaponry or true self defense) cannot be taught "as is" with children in attendance, and there is an implied guarantee that you will recieve your "black belt" or equivalent rank simply because you paid for it, irrespective of whether or not you can step on the mat and defend it.)
Getting back to topic, the takedowns I was taught that first class were practiced at quarter speed only because they actually *DID* have to be.
You see, most forms of Silat, still being relatively secretive/rare/new in this country, as such have had no "sporting" application or any other attempted yuppification tried with them, and thus remain true martial arts, "martial" meaning warlike, of or pertaining to Mars, Roman god of war.
As such, takedowns in Silat are functionally different from takedowns in, say, modern Judo, Aikido, Sambo or many modern forms of Jujutsu, or equivalent styles.
They aren't designed like those in styles like those listed, where in many cases someone can throw you or take you down at full speed with full intention and the person can simply breakfall or roll out of it.
Silat takedowns, or at least the ones I was shown so far, are all predicated on the premise that come time for you to take them down, you've locked a limb/joint/what have you at such a short, sharp angle that there *IS* no functional "breakfall"-- you just *break*, then you *fall*.:xtrmshock
The class was all adults, and so we dealt with adult material( I had *never* before this night been in a school where on my very first night one combination we practiced terminated( ha ha) in a neck snap and a takedown--which again, for blatantly obvious reasons, cannot be safely trained at full speed).
Which adult material led me to be grateful that all the adults there were in fact adults--no ego, no sexism, no anything. No one tried to be "better" or try to get cute going a little faster with the neck or joint-sensitive maneuvers--for all that the class was relaxed and we joked companionably with each other we all understood where the limits were.
There was no ego based on rank, in fact in each of the 3 styles taught there( Wing Chun, Kali, Silat) there are no formal ranks at all. You either have learned something in the curriculum or you haven't.
This was also the first time I have ever done any work related to a form, and then as we worked through a form the teacher was able to explain EXACTLY to me what the purpose of this movement was, and then showed us a self defense application with it, and who understood the DIFFERENCE between the way one moves in a form and the way one moves defensively.
In fact I'm now almost totally convinced that the whole argument between MMA/TMA is misunderstood--what MMAists are actually critical of are not true TMA but McDojos. ( true TMAs are pissed at them too because they directly give them their current bad rep).
And then the last 10 minutes of the class.We went over a different substyle of Silat called Harimau (":tiger").
I have given a new name to pain, and that name is spelled H-A-R-I-M-A-U.
Apparently this substyle came about in Sumatra, in areas where the ground was sloped, uneven and always wet.And so an upright stance with just two feet is less than ideal.
Picture poor out of shape Andy doing all of these stances, strikes, rolls and takedown sort of things all the while with his *** no more than a foot or so off the ground.
I shouldda brought my other legs.
They hurt too much to comfortably bend my knees for the whole next day. I hadn't felt so good in years.
You could say I like the place.:supcool:
First thing i learned was just how far my fitness has discombibblebobbled---just the warm ups kicked my *** and I finished the class on sheer force of will alone.
This is far and away a different ( and far and away a BETTER) martial art than any I've previously come in contact with. How much of this is due to the fact that at least half if not more of my previous schools could be properly referred to as "McDojos" I don't know but it MUST have influenced this.
Of particular interest to me was the manner in which the takedowns I was shown were performed.
I must wander a bit in order to make my point:
You see, much has been made in recent years of people coming under criticism for claiming that this or that technique is "too deadly" to be trained full speed or used in sparring. In most cases this is considered a "cop-out" by our more overtestosterated brethren in the martial arts community. But with that being said, for the most part I would often find myself in agreement with them on this particular point, since up until this class my only reference point of such assertions of "deadliness" were made in context of strikes practiced solely against air in a "McDojo" environment( for those of you not familiar with the term, "McDojo" is a phrase used by both mixed martial artists as well as true traditional martial artists to refer to the average store front "franchise" school establishment with extreme scorn and derision for their slickly-packaged, "fast-food" style training geared less toward serious students and more towards children, soccer moms and soft middle class people who don't like to get hit. In such an environment the training is usually severely lacking in quality of technical depth( i.e. a lot of form or movement practiced with no idea why it is practiced or to what purpose), the promise of "self discipline" appears to send the message to soccer moms that a martial arts school, at some point, became synonymous with a babysitting service. This is not to say kids don't benefit, but it does change the whole tone, and so adult material( i.e. techniques or issues relating to deadly force, weaponry or true self defense) cannot be taught "as is" with children in attendance, and there is an implied guarantee that you will recieve your "black belt" or equivalent rank simply because you paid for it, irrespective of whether or not you can step on the mat and defend it.)
Getting back to topic, the takedowns I was taught that first class were practiced at quarter speed only because they actually *DID* have to be.
You see, most forms of Silat, still being relatively secretive/rare/new in this country, as such have had no "sporting" application or any other attempted yuppification tried with them, and thus remain true martial arts, "martial" meaning warlike, of or pertaining to Mars, Roman god of war.
As such, takedowns in Silat are functionally different from takedowns in, say, modern Judo, Aikido, Sambo or many modern forms of Jujutsu, or equivalent styles.
They aren't designed like those in styles like those listed, where in many cases someone can throw you or take you down at full speed with full intention and the person can simply breakfall or roll out of it.
Silat takedowns, or at least the ones I was shown so far, are all predicated on the premise that come time for you to take them down, you've locked a limb/joint/what have you at such a short, sharp angle that there *IS* no functional "breakfall"-- you just *break*, then you *fall*.:xtrmshock
The class was all adults, and so we dealt with adult material( I had *never* before this night been in a school where on my very first night one combination we practiced terminated( ha ha) in a neck snap and a takedown--which again, for blatantly obvious reasons, cannot be safely trained at full speed).
Which adult material led me to be grateful that all the adults there were in fact adults--no ego, no sexism, no anything. No one tried to be "better" or try to get cute going a little faster with the neck or joint-sensitive maneuvers--for all that the class was relaxed and we joked companionably with each other we all understood where the limits were.
There was no ego based on rank, in fact in each of the 3 styles taught there( Wing Chun, Kali, Silat) there are no formal ranks at all. You either have learned something in the curriculum or you haven't.
This was also the first time I have ever done any work related to a form, and then as we worked through a form the teacher was able to explain EXACTLY to me what the purpose of this movement was, and then showed us a self defense application with it, and who understood the DIFFERENCE between the way one moves in a form and the way one moves defensively.
In fact I'm now almost totally convinced that the whole argument between MMA/TMA is misunderstood--what MMAists are actually critical of are not true TMA but McDojos. ( true TMAs are pissed at them too because they directly give them their current bad rep).
And then the last 10 minutes of the class.We went over a different substyle of Silat called Harimau (":tiger").
I have given a new name to pain, and that name is spelled H-A-R-I-M-A-U.
Apparently this substyle came about in Sumatra, in areas where the ground was sloped, uneven and always wet.And so an upright stance with just two feet is less than ideal.
Picture poor out of shape Andy doing all of these stances, strikes, rolls and takedown sort of things all the while with his *** no more than a foot or so off the ground.
I shouldda brought my other legs.
They hurt too much to comfortably bend my knees for the whole next day. I hadn't felt so good in years.
You could say I like the place.:supcool:
