Don't Overlook "Competitive" Martial Arts

[wingchun100]

Anyone who thinks striking is flawed has never seen this video:

[video]http://youtu.be/(null)[/video]

lol.

My point is to demonstrate that grappling isn't a worthless art. Here is one scenario to which I refer:

[video=youtube_share;dclfBro8ews]http://youtu.be/dclfBro8ews[/video]

In both areas grappling knowledge was important. In the first it is obvious. The 2nd the guy needs to stay on his feet. That is why I love judo. You learn how to stay up. Not just how to take down.


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Just about every grappler I meet says striking arts are worthless LOL.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

Just about every grappler I meet says striking arts are worthless LOL.

I'm a BJJ practitioner. Neither I nor anyone in my gym would ever say that striking arts are useless. In fact, a high percentage of us also practice or have practiced striking arts.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

I've been saying for a very long time, that everything has something to offer. Personally, I'm not so traditional or stuck in the box with blinders on, that were I to attend a seminar in another art or train 1 on 1 with someone in another art, that I would certainly pick their brain and if there was something that I could 'steal' and add to my own bag of tricks, I'd certainly do it. That said, I've also said many times, that having a basic understanding of the ground, is also important. Yes, there are grappling applications in the stand up arts, ie: kata, but if you want to explore deeper, crosstraining is the way to go.

So, that said, I don't think that intentionally pulling guard and taking the person down, in the middle of a streetfight, is necessarily the smartest idea. However, there are things that can be done from the grappling arts that a) don't require the person to be on the ground, and b) having enough ground skill, so that you can get back up to your feet, rather than looking for that submission, is also key.

IMO, it's natural that people will tend to fall back on their strong points. You'll fight like you train. We saw in the Fight Quest show, Doug and Jimmy, 2 guys who had MMA backgrounds, fall back, more than once, on that training. Now, that wasn't necessarily a bad thing, but in some cases it was. IMO, if you can transition the things that you'd do in the ring, to the street, you should be good to go.

For the record, I don't know that I've ever met a BJJ practitioner who would advocate pulling guard in a street fight. That's primarily a sport tactic. (I could come up with a scenario where pulling guard would be the least bad option, but it wouldn't be particularly likely.)

 

[James Kovacich]

Thank you SO MUCH for this post and these pics. I am so sick of people saying, "All striking arts are flawed. Learn grappling!" Even if the pictures here showed the guy on a smooth surface, that foot coming toward his head is proof that sometimes grappling can fail you.

The foot is raised on purpose.

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[drop bear]

For the record, I don't know that I've ever met a BJJ practitioner who would advocate pulling guard in a street fight. That's primarily a sport tactic. (I could come up with a scenario where pulling guard would be the least bad option, but it wouldn't be particularly likely.)

They don't butt flop in mma either. The rule of the day is win the scramble.

But you never know you might want to give your friends the opportunity to kick the other guys head in.

I have rolling guillotined someone in the street.

 

[drop bear]

That's why it's okay to have some training in a controlled environment. There is a learning curve.



Problem here is that, under duress, you revert directly to your training habits. Many people feel they have the ability to rise to the occasion but the harsh reality is that you will instead sink to the level of your training. Decades of law enforcement training and hundreds of years of martial arts training verify this as factual. Training somewhere safe all the time, like the two guys in your video dancing around with padded gloves, floor and walls, doesn't prepare you for a car jacking attempt. It doesn't prepare you for multiple attackers. Nor does it allow you to adapt to your surroundings (read improvised weapons, barriers, cover and concealment, escape and evasion etc) because it only has one surrounding...mats and pads.



Untrue, you're going to end up in the same controlled environment you started in. So is he.



Okay, let's examine this from the way I train to the way you train (based upon what you've written and the videos you've offered) using some examples;

• Doing some training in a parking lot. Gives the student some experience in what to do and just as importantly, what not to do. As an example, depending on the height of a nearby vehicle a student could drop and roll under a nearby vehicle to temporarily escape attack. What does this do for them? Well for one, if they have a firearm (most of my students carried) they have now created some distance between themselves and the attacker(s) to provide an opportunity to access the weapon. Or a cell phone to call for help. Perhaps they've narrowed access to themselves i.e. bad guy leans down to grab them and pull them out from under the car and is in a position to get an ancient Chinese secret move called a 'foot to the face'. By doing this, they broaden/add depth to their OODA loop by haven't had some experience with this environment.
• Inside an elevator. Teaches them to stand to the rear and to the side so that someone can't get behind them nor rush them directly from the outside when the door opens.
• Pulling up to a 'shop-n-rob' by parking to the side where you can clearly see inside the store. That way you're not walking into a robbery in progress.
• Inside a car. What is there for improvised weapons? How can the close confinement be used to your advantage? If exiting the car, can you draw a weapon and use it? How can you use your car (a big, heavy, sharp, hard object) to your advantage?
• ATM machine. Being aware of your surroundings. Looking for places of concealment or dark areas that may hide a bad guy. Having a plan for if someone approaches.
• Back to the parking lot. Can you see under your car as you approach? Do you glance in the back seat before you enter?

Inside the gym you can chit-chat about some of these things but it isn't the same as actually being in that environment and doing it. Somethings can be recreated in a gym...but are they? Do the lights get turned down from time to time? They should be since most attacks are in dim light conditions. How about tossing some water on the mats. Setting up some chairs or mats to simulate something. It isn't a substitute for actually being in a specific environment but it's better than what 99.9% of schools do now.



Precisely, so provide the student with the opportunity to see these opportunities in different environments. It ingrains certain reactions/responses/observations.



Only if you train in an environment that allows for it.

Yeah but the sport training is training to problem solve on the fly. So resorting to training is fine because you are just auto piloting basic concepts while thinking of creative solutions. Otherwise you have to sort through millions of processes until you find the one that matches your environment.

Falling on a hard surface is no different to falling on a soft one technique wise. There is no mat concrete break fall or roll variation.

It just sucks more to fall on concrete. I think most people know that without having to be led through the process.



Training on real environments like parking lots becomes a trade off. If I train on concrete I either have to dial down the pace and the resistance or restrict the skill set. If I am aiming for reality I have already shot myself in the foot a bit because I have to reduce the reality to train in the environment.

So I am not sure why I would bother that much with it in the first place.

But a gym is the real world. There is often no getting around that. There are other people occupying space things to avoid mats that get slippery and so on.

Now as far as awareness and other specific skill sets. They are completely bolt onable. Mma does this anyway. Anybody who cross trains is doing this. The advantage is I can go to a sports instructor who specialises in his skill set and not have to rely on their ability to teach awareness. I can go to an expert in that and train that. Then go to an rsbder and learn use of dirty tricks. Go to a weapons expert and learn that.

I am not going to expect a martial arts school to teach me to shoot or drive defensibly I would not expect my defensive driving instructor to teach me to box.

 

[drop bear]

I'm not sure why you think you need to fall fifty or sixty times on concrete to learn a technique properly. You can learn techniques on mats. If you need to fall fifty or sixty times I might suggest you are a slow learner. Once even, to prove you can do it, should be all you need.
:asian:

Either there is a difference or there isn't. If there is a difference you have to drill it. If there is no difference stay on the mat and save yourself the injuries.

If all it takes to turn mma into rsbd is one break fall on concrete then you are not going to have much of a street sport argument.

 

[RTKDCMB]

Just about every grappler I meet says striking arts are worthless LOL.

You need to get out more.

 

[drop bear]

You need to get out more.

There is an element of that. But the common movement is against it.

Royce is still anti striking. His reasoning?

Because the street.
http://m.mixedmartialarts.com/mma-news/438995/Rener-Royce-is-right-about-BJJ-only-and-wrong/

 

[wingchun100]

I'm a BJJ practitioner. Neither I nor anyone in my gym would ever say that striking arts are useless. In fact, a high percentage of us also practice or have practiced striking arts.

Well congrats. You are the first grappler I have met who said otherwise. Then again I read somewhere that one of the Gracies (can't remember which one) is good friends with Sam Kwok and is an admirer of wing chun. I didn't think of that until just now LOL.

 

[wingchun100]

You need to get out more.

Sadly, this isn't far from the truth.

 

[MJS]

For the record, I don't know that I've ever met a BJJ practitioner who would advocate pulling guard in a street fight. That's primarily a sport tactic. (I could come up with a scenario where pulling guard would be the least bad option, but it wouldn't be particularly likely.)

Probably not, but I think you know what I meant. Perhaps that was a bad choice of words. Intentionally doing something when there are other options. As I said in my post, a lot of the time, we fall back on what tends to be our bread and butter, even if it's not the best thing at that moment, ie: fight like you train.

 

[MJS]

There is an element of that. But the common movement is against it.

Royce is still anti striking. His reasoning?

Because the street.
http://m.mixedmartialarts.com/mma-news/438995/Rener-Royce-is-right-about-BJJ-only-and-wrong/

And that line of thinking made him get his *** handed to him. IMO, his line of thinking is no different than the same people some MMA guys talk bad about...you know, the extreme traditional guys, who don't want to follow the advice of the MMA guys, who believe in cross training. Hell, if you look at some of the Gracie guys, like Renzo and Ralph, they do a lot of striking. They don't seem anti striking. I wonder what they feel about their relative.

But, to each their own, I suppose.

 

[stonewall1350]

Just about every grappler I meet says striking arts are worthless LOL.

Not me I believe very much in knowing how to hit someone. I am not a big fan of formal striking, even though I trained in both. I am a huge fan of defensive striking, throat punching and groin kicks and all that jazz. If you can do that you can really level someone if you get the chance.

But if someone is a better striker than me, which there is a good chance they will be, I like to try to tie them up and trip them.


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[Tony Dismukes]

There is an element of that. But the common movement is against it.

Royce is still anti striking. His reasoning?

Because the street.
http://m.mixedmartialarts.com/mma-news/438995/Rener-Royce-is-right-about-BJJ-only-and-wrong/

I don't think that's exactly Royce being against striking. It's about him advocating for BJJ as a pure art in itself (which does include some striking BTW) rather than blending it with other arts such as wrestling or boxing. I don't really agree with his purist stance, but it's not really the same as saying "grapplers are better than strikers, so nyaah!"

 

[Tony Dismukes]

I'm a BJJ practitioner. Neither I nor anyone in my gym would ever say that striking arts are useless. In fact, a high percentage of us also practice or have practiced striking arts.

Well congrats. You are the first grappler I have met who said otherwise. Then again I read somewhere that one of the Gracies (can't remember which one) is good friends with Sam Kwok and is an admirer of wing chun. I didn't think of that until just now LOL.

Out of curiosity, what sort of grapplers have you been hanging around with who are so universally deriding striking? At my gym, almost all of the senior BJJ students/instructors have at least some striking experience. Probably a majority have black belt or black belt equivalent rank in some striking system. The previous gym I attended was the same. The non-BJJ jujutsu school (a Danzan-Ryu splinter group) I attended before that included striking as an important part of the curriculum. None of the jujutsu or judo instructors I have ever trained with (that's a fair number) have ever voiced anything like the opinion that striking is useless, at least not in my presence. I'm curious about the background of these grapplers you've met who don't have any respect for the striking arts.

 

[wingchun100]

Out of curiosity, what sort of grapplers have you been hanging around with who are so universally deriding striking? At my gym, almost all of the senior BJJ students/instructors have at least some striking experience. Probably a majority have black belt or black belt equivalent rank in some striking system. The previous gym I attended was the same. The non-BJJ jujutsu school (a Danzan-Ryu splinter group) I attended before that included striking as an important part of the curriculum. None of the jujutsu or judo instructors I have ever trained with (that's a fair number) have ever voiced anything like the opinion that striking is useless, at least not in my presence. I'm curious about the background of these grapplers you've met who don't have any respect for the striking arts.

Just like there are religious fanatics, there are also martial arts fanatics. One of my friends practices BJJ, and he said he went with it because most fighters who win UFC-type tournaments are grapplers. His exact words: "I knew what system to go with...the proven one!"

I said, "Proven in a ring where there are rules that keep strikers from doing certain moves? Okay, cool."

Didn't change his mind one bit.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

Just like there are religious fanatics, there are also martial arts fanatics. One of my friends practices BJJ, and he said he went with it because most fighters who win UFC-type tournaments are grapplers. His exact words: "I knew what system to go with...the proven one!"

I said, "Proven in a ring where there are rules that keep strikers from doing certain moves? Okay, cool."

Didn't change his mind one bit.

Your friend apparently hasn't kept up with modern MMA. He must have stopped watching the UFC in the 90's.

These days every UFC fighter is at least proficient in BJJ AND wrestling AND boxing AND Muay Thai AND possibly some other stuff. Many fights never go to the ground. Of those that do, many come back to the feet. Just as many fights are won with striking as with grappling. Just as many fights are won by fighters who prefer striking as by fighters who prefer grappling.

Don't argue with your friend. Just invite him over to watch a UFC pay-per-view.

 

[wingchun100]

Your friend apparently hasn't kept up with modern MMA. He must have stopped watching the UFC in the 90's.

These days every UFC fighter is at least proficient in BJJ AND wrestling AND boxing AND Muay Thai AND possibly some other stuff. Many fights never go to the ground. Of those that do, many come back to the feet. Just as many fights are won with striking as with grappling. Just as many fights are won by fighters who prefer striking as by fighters who prefer grappling.

Don't argue with your friend. Just invite him over to watch a UFC pay-per-view.

Oh, I don't argue with him. I made that one point and, when I realized nothing would make him see the flip side of the coin, I let him go on his merry way.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

Oh, I don't argue with him. I made that one point and, when I realized nothing would make him see the flip side of the coin, I let him go on his merry way.

I think that watching some top-notch MMA strikers in action might do more to persuade him than the "UFC rules favor grapplers by limiting strikers" argument. For one thing, he might be aware that the Gracies won plenty of matches in Brazil where those rules weren't in place - no prohibitions against groin strikes, throat strikes, eye pokes, head butts, elbows to the spine, kicking downed opponents, and so on. For another, he might be aware that modern MMA has just as many rules that favor the striker over the grappler. On the other hand, seeing a superior BJJ practitioner get knocked out by someone who isn't as skilled of a grappler should be a wake-up call for someone locked into a "my style is always the best" mindset.