Run away in self defense

[jobo]

Do you honestly believe it is this easy? When was the last time you did this? When was the last time it was this easy for you?

well yes it can be/ really should be, if your dealing with average people, last time I did this was back at Christmas, where someone launched a big right hand at me, I ducked the punched and ended it as a fight in less than 5 seconds where he was in no position to defend himself and finished all to gather in another 10 second when I got bored of punching him

 

[Deleted member 39746]

well yes it can be/ really should be, if your dealing with average people, last time I did this was back at Christmas, where someone launched a big right hand at me, I ducked the punched and ended it as a fight in less than 5 seconds where he was in no position to defend himself and finished all to gather in another 10 second when I got bored of punching him

Slightly off topic, am i the only one who read that and thought "jesus christ, its Jason Bourne"?

 

[Deleted member 39746]

I broke this off of my joke to better filter responses, sorry for any inconvenience, i just thought it would turn out better.


i honestly think there should be some offical terminology difference between the martial arts which are focused on fighting, and then the ones for spiritual development and then further sport and actual fighting, but that is semi still here with one being known as a combat sport.

I think now days too many call themselves martial arts and don't do much which is martial other than a inspired dance, and thats comparable with military combative systems about drilling in aggression and the like on a terminology basis.

Also something else, if you aren't of good enough condition to run, how well would you do in fighting someone who can run you down? Surely they would have the fitness advantage which can make up for lack of technique to some degree especially if the disparity of fitness is great enough. At least situation pending. And then i dont know how common it is you find someone who can throw fisty cuffs at least semi effectively now days. MA and combat sport has taken off a bit but then there isnt as much fighting as their used to be for the most part. (at least in the countries most of us come from)

I more want peoples opinions on the latter as i think you are put in a drastically inferior position in most situations if you are fighting against someone who is fitter than you to the extent they could run you down. (granted if you have arthritis in one or both of your legs, i dont think somone needs to be THAT fit to outrun you)

 

[pdg]

i honestly think there should be some offical terminology difference between the martial arts

Is that so you've got something else to ignore because you don't agree with what gets decided?

 

[jobo]

Slightly off topic, am i the only one who read that and thought "jesus christ, its Jason Bourne"?

well not quite as good as that and not exactly a trained assassin.

but it's about what your exspectation are of your training, if your doing vigirous fitness training and have three years of ma behind you, your really should be putting people who do neither away in a few seconds. otherwise what's the point of what your doing if your toiling against someone distinctly average ?


the defining issue in this encounter, was despite him being taller, heavier and thirty years younger I was fully 50% stronger than he was, it was like fighting a child. if you can throw your own body weight around with ease, then throwing someone else about is well with in scope

bet that's the last time he picks a fight with a pensioner

 

[MetalBoar]

Once upon a time, I could have reliably outrun most anyone who wasn't an athlete. Since my knees have ended my distance running, and age has started making it harder to stay in shape, I'm not nearly as confident in my ability to escape by running. I'm more likely to stand and fight now, so I'm not gassed when the fighting starts.

Have your knees ended your long distance running or did your long distance running end your knees?

 

[oftheherd1]

Running isn't a good option for me. I can run to the nearest store but if the store is a mile away then I'm probably not going to run. All that will do is just tire me out and put me in a situation where I'm forced to fight, but now I have to fight while tired and out of breath. I would have just done better fighting fresh.

I actually teach my self-defense classes this very issue. Run or don't run. It's so easy to say "run away". There's no guarantee you'll be able to outrun your attacker. Everyone knows their own fitness level and can calculate their possibilities. People should have an escape route already in their mind, where are they going to run to, how are they going to avoid being captured by the attacker. Is running even a viable option. If running isn't an option then what is? For my own self-defense, I never assume that I can run away. The day that I'm attacked could be the day I'm in a cast or recovering from a back injury.

I once knew of a guy who was threatened with robbery on a military base, against three assailants. He took off running. He pulled away from all but one attacker and realized he wasn't going to get away. With no warning he turned and hit his near attacker as hard as he could up the side of his head. With that threat removed he then continued running successfully away.

I don't know that I would script that in an SD class though.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

I once knew of a guy who was threatened with robbery on a military base, against three assailants. He took off running. He pulled away from all but one attacker and realized he wasn't going to get away. With no warning he turned and hit his near attacker as hard as he could up the side of his head. With that threat removed he then continued running successfully away.

I don't know that I would script that in an SD class though.

I've scripted almost exactly that in an sd class

 

[oftheherd1]

I've scripted almost exactly that in an sd class

I can expect you ran across some doubts, but we can know it worked for one guy. Anyone give you feedback that they used it and it got them out of a bad situation?

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

I can expect you ran across some doubts, but we can know it worked for one guy. Anyone give you feedback that they used it and it got them out of a bad situation?

I had not, and it is good to know that it worked.

For anyone interested, the drill that we did was 3 part though, and what you described was phase 2.

Essentially:

Phase 1: Aggressor "Aggresses". The student does whatever comes to mind which is appropriate to the aggression in question, to get enough space to run, then sprints until they reach the alleyway nearby (we would do this behind the school). The idea is that the alleyway would mimic a "street" with people on it.

Phase 2: Same start. But this time the aggressor chases (as appropriate). The student has to try to run away, and if he feels he can't reach the alleyway in time, at the time he makes that decision, stop and attack back until he either incapacitates aggressor, or makes enough space/head start that he feels he can make it.

Phase 3: Same as part 1/2, but here the other students will act as potential 'buddies' of the initial attacker, along the street, who may or may not react to the initial attack. Sometimes we'd even have someone hiding behind a staircase that jutted out to attack. The students lining around new in advance if they were going to participate or not, since realistically the attackers friends would know if they were friends of the attacker or not.

I hope it helped teach the right philosophy of escaping, the idea of running, and how to do so even if you're not a good runner.

With phase 3 though, most of the time (myself included), it did not turn out all that well.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

the right philosophy of escaping,

- A attacks a girl.
- B gets A into a head lock, and forces A to release the girl.
- A screams, "Please! Please don't kill me."
- B lets go his head lock. A runs away.

Will it be better that your can force your opponent to run away instead?

Sometime we may forget that we can put our opponents into SD mode instead.

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

- A attacks a girl.
- B gets A into a head lock, and forces A to release the girl.
- A screams, "Please! Please don't kill me."
- B lets go his head lock. A runs away.

Will it be better that your can force your opponent to run away instead?

Sometime we may forget that we can put our opponents into SD mode instead.

This drill is for the person being attacked, not the bystander.

 

[jobo]

I had not, and it is good to know that it worked.

For anyone interested, the drill that we did was 3 part though, and what you described was phase 2.

Essentially:

Phase 1: Aggressor "Aggresses". The student does whatever comes to mind which is appropriate to the aggression in question, to get enough space to run, then sprints until they reach the alleyway nearby (we would do this behind the school). The idea is that the alleyway would mimic a "street" with people on it.

Phase 2: Same start. But this time the aggressor chases (as appropriate). The student has to try to run away, and if he feels he can't reach the alleyway in time, at the time he makes that decision, stop and attack back until he either incapacitates aggressor, or makes enough space/head start that he feels he can make it.

Phase 3: Same as part 1/2, but here the other students will act as potential 'buddies' of the initial attacker, along the street, who may or may not react to the initial attack. Sometimes we'd even have someone hiding behind a staircase that jutted out to attack. The students lining around new in advance if they were going to participate or not, since realistically the attackers friends would know if they were friends of the attacker or not.

I hope it helped teach the right philosophy of escaping, the idea of running, and how to do so even if you're not a good runner.

With phase 3 though, most of the time (myself included), it did not turn out all that well.

I'm not big on complex scenario training, I really dont think it adds anything, humans are hard wired to run from danger, they really dont need to be trained to do so. and your running them in to false confidence

this is also dependent on the " street" they reach being safe once they get there and it almost certainly wont be, if they have chased you that far there not going to be put off by a few people, who almost certainly wont intervene.an awful lot of attacks happen on busy areas. and on CCTV, that may make it easier to find them or may not, but it doesn't help at the time. you need to reach the street and then run some more to be safe

if your going to have running as an escape strategy, then you need to practise running, not once in a while with a half hearted chaser. but on an ongoing basis.

experience has shown me, that unless they are really upset with you, they wont chase you very far, if they havent caught you inat most 100 yards or so, they will give it up or an awful lot sooner if your accelerating away from them at a good rate.

running and failing to escape can make the situation a lot worse as they have your,back ,they are likely to trip you as you run so you end up on the ground and if your gassed out no oxygen to then try and defend your self. plus the chase reflex may make them more intent on hurting you than they were at the beginning, they now have adrenalin cursing round their systems

the phylosiphy that you can make running effective for people who cant run faster than their attacker is deeply flawed, you are always going to get a 2 second head start, whilst they react to you leggings it.if you cant turn that into an unreachable distance or a genuine safe place in the next five seconds then your going to be caught even istreet do reach the street in that time frame.

my approach to this has been to practise dashing, particularly the crucial first 40 yards or so and then just in case they are fast and persistent to run flat out for 5 minutes if that doesn't shake them they they got me, OR I tinstructed my young niece to avoid capture whilst playing tag, by never running in a straight line and using her light weight and low centre of gravity to keep turning me so I could never use my straight line advantage to catch her, that to needs basic running ability agility and practise and a good bit of room to work, but is a good strategy if you do have a straight line disadvantage

 

[Monkey Turned Wolf]

I'm not big on complex scenario training, I really dont think it adds anything, humans are hard wired to run from danger, they really dont need to be trained to do so. and your running them in to false confidence

this is also dependent on the " street" they reach being safe once they get there and it almost certainly wont be, if they have chased you that far there not going to be put off by a few people, who almost certainly wont intervene.an awful lot of attacks happen on busy areas. and on CCTV, that may make it easier to find them or may not, but it doesn't help at the time. you need to reach the street and then run some more to be safe

if your going to have running as an escape strategy, then you need to practise running, not once in a while with a half hearted chaser. but on an ongoing basis.

experience has shown me, that unless they are really upset with you, they wont chase you very far, if they havent caught you inat most 100 yards or so, they will give it up or an awful lot sooner if your accelerating away from them at a good rate.

running and failing to escape can make the situation a lot worse as they have your,back ,they are likely to trip you as you run so you end up on the ground and if your gassed out no oxygen to then try and defend your self. plus the chase reflex may make them more intent on hurting you than they were at the beginning, they now have adrenalin cursing round their systems

the phylosiphy that you can make running effective for people who cant run faster than their attacker is deeply flawed, you are always going to get a 2 second head start, whilst they react to you leggings it.if you cant turn that into an unreachable distance or a genuine safe place in the next five seconds then your going to be caught even istreet do reach the street in that time frame.

my approach to this has been to practise dashing, particularly the crucial first 40 yards or so and then just in case they are fast and persistent to run flat out for 5 minutes if that doesn't shake them they they got me, OR I tinstructed my young niece to avoid capture whilst playing tag, by never running in a straight line and using her light weight and low centre of gravity to keep turning me so I could never use my straight line advantage to catch her, that to needs basic running ability agility and practise and a good bit of room to work, but is a good strategy if you do have a straight line disadvantage

I initially wasn't going to respond to this, because I know it's pointless to argue with you, but you made so many wrong assumptions in there that I feel compelled to.

If you got from that post that

A: it's a complex scenario training, (running, and turning to attack if you can't escape, is far from complex)
B: I'm giving them false confidence (when you try to run and the person catches you each time they chase, that's telling you you need to work on your running more)
C: that the street almost certainly won't be safe (fyi it's probably about 30-40 yards, and by that point, like you stated, is when you either got free or when you realize you won't), D: this is suggesting that they should not practice running (if they are slow, it'll just reinforce that they should be running more),
E: I'm saying they should run every time (it's one option), or
F: that you should run if you're not fast (nowhere did I say that)

Then you clearly didn't read the post very well, or are imagining something entirely different than what happens.

 

[oftheherd1]

I'm not big on complex scenario training, I really dont think it adds anything, humans are hard wired to run from danger, they really dont need to be trained to do so. and your running them in to false confidence

this is also dependent on the " street" they reach being safe once they get there and it almost certainly wont be, if they have chased you that far there not going to be put off by a few people, who almost certainly wont intervene.an awful lot of attacks happen on busy areas. and on CCTV, that may make it easier to find them or may not, but it doesn't help at the time. you need to reach the street and then run some more to be safe

if your going to have running as an escape strategy, then you need to practise running, not once in a while with a half hearted chaser. but on an ongoing basis.

experience has shown me, that unless they are really upset with you, they wont chase you very far, if they havent caught you inat most 100 yards or so, they will give it up or an awful lot sooner if your accelerating away from them at a good rate.

running and failing to escape can make the situation a lot worse as they have your,back ,they are likely to trip you as you run so you end up on the ground and if your gassed out no oxygen to then try and defend your self. plus the chase reflex may make them more intent on hurting you than they were at the beginning, they now have adrenalin cursing round their systems

the phylosiphy that you can make running effective for people who cant run faster than their attacker is deeply flawed, you are always going to get a 2 second head start, whilst they react to you leggings it.if you cant turn that into an unreachable distance or a genuine safe place in the next five seconds then your going to be caught even istreet do reach the street in that time frame.

my approach to this has been to practise dashing, particularly the crucial first 40 yards or so and then just in case they are fast and persistent to run flat out for 5 minutes if that doesn't shake them they they got me, OR I tinstructed my young niece to avoid capture whilst playing tag, by never running in a straight line and using her light weight and low centre of gravity to keep turning me so I could never use my straight line advantage to catch her, that to needs basic running ability agility and practise and a good bit of room to work, but is a good strategy if you do have a straight line disadvantage

While there are some interesting points in your post, I think you missed that the things @kempodisciple was trying to teach his students were valid responses to real world possibilities. He wasn't covering everything nor was he telling them he had shown every possible danger and its response, simply some probable attacks and useful responses. Training of that sort may allow a student to keep his cool and have a useful response.

Turning on a single opponent amounts to a sucker punch and those are known to be effective much of the time. If there are multiple opponents each within striking distance of you, that is different. If you have been running and can't outrun them (which as you pointed out may well work) then your best bet is probably to suddenly turn and bring as strong an attack as possible against them until you can get them to retreat or again retreat yourself.

I will say I envy you your experience in having had so much personal conflict to draw from. I don't have that. But I do listen to those who have and evaluate them against my own abilities.

 

[jobo]

I initially wasn't going to respond to this, because I know it's pointless to argue with you, but you made so many wrong assumptions in there that I feel compelled to.

If you got from that post that

A: it's a complex scenario training, (running, and turning to attack if you can't escape, is far from complex)
B: I'm giving them false confidence (when you try to run and the person catches you each time they chase, that's telling you you need to work on your running more)
C: that the street almost certainly won't be safe (fyi it's probably about 30-40 yards, and by that point, like you stated, is when you either got free or when you realize you won't), D: this is suggesting that they should not practice running (if they are slow, it'll just reinforce that they should be running more),
E: I'm saying they should run every time (it's one option), or
F: that you should run if you're not fast (nowhere did I say that)

Then you clearly didn't read the post very well, or are imagining something entirely different than what happens.

why does it need to be an argument, rather than a debate or a discussion?

I'm not dissing your scenario train, just most of them as being staged to the level they become completely unrealistic and the more complex they are the more contrived and unrealistic they become and at the point where you have multiple people some hidden who may or may not attack dependent on the script, it's certainly complex.

at real level if theres 4 people in a narrow alley way between you and safety you not getting out of there unless you have some very well developed rugby, american football ice hockey skills, any s scenario that ends with a successful escape with out such skills is not realistic at all. someone isn't trying hard enough to stop the escape. are you running scenarios that constantly fail to get you to safety or are they contrived and give a false level of confidence .? it has to be one or the other unless it's the New York Broncos your training.

what's really missing from this is why are they chasing you, it really really matters as to how much effort they are likely to put in. a minor flash point they wont chase you more than 10 yards as a token effort if at all, they will just call you a coward as you disappear from view. if you've spent the evening winding them up, chatting g up their girl friend or other really annoying them to the point they have decided to cause you physical harm, they they will really put some considerable effort in and as hurting you is there motivation, getting to a busy street wont put them off at all, if there still in range they will continue to chase you down, but if there not making any meaningful gain your your lead, they will stop after a 100 yards or so, probably unless they are really really annoyed

the whole turning and fighting thing, is a bit iffy, you cant actually run flat out and look over your shoulde, so you dont know how much of a lead you have, stopping if your getting away is stupid, stopping if there about to kick your legs away, takes really good timing or they will just collect you as you stop or run past you, which then puts them between you and escape

the real problem is a group of young men, running will provoke them to chase, even if most of them have no idea what they are chasing you for, and the chances are a some of them can actual run at at speed, they will hunt you down like a pack of wolves, turning and fighting is of little use if theres three or four of them in close contact. really if they are not actually chasing you, walking away is a lot better strategy, at least till you can turn a corner then legg it

 

[Gerry Seymour]

Have your knees ended your long distance running or did your long distance running end your knees?

Likely some of both. I did a LOT of distance running in high school. I really enjoyed it, and sometimes ran 10 miles a day, 4-5 times a week. But I've had knee issues of one sort or another since my mid-teens, so the running probably didn't help. I miss it.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

I once knew of a guy who was threatened with robbery on a military base, against three assailants. He took off running. He pulled away from all but one attacker and realized he wasn't going to get away. With no warning he turned and hit his near attacker as hard as he could up the side of his head. With that threat removed he then continued running successfully away.

I don't know that I would script that in an SD class though.

If you're pretty fast, that's not a bad strategy. It's likely to separate the attackers more effectively than basic footwork.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

With phase 3 though, most of the time (myself included), it did not turn out all that well.

I think that's a good sign. Too often multiple-attacker scenarios involve too much complicity from the assigned attackers, and create a false sense of competence. I'd rather see it go badly at a high percentage, so folks can start to assess what helped improve odds, and what didn't.

 

[Gerry Seymour]

While there are some interesting points in your post, I think you missed that the things @kempodisciple was trying to teach his students were valid responses to real world possibilities. He wasn't covering everything nor was he telling them he had shown every possible danger and its response, simply some probable attacks and useful responses. Training of that sort may allow a student to keep his cool and have a useful response.

Turning on a single opponent amounts to a sucker punch and those are known to be effective much of the time. If there are multiple opponents each within striking distance of you, that is different. If you have been running and can't outrun them (which as you pointed out may well work) then your best bet is probably to suddenly turn and bring as strong an attack as possible against them until you can get them to retreat or again retreat yourself.

I will say I envy you your experience in having had so much personal conflict to draw from. I don't have that. But I do listen to those who have and evaluate them against my own abilities.

Agreed. I see scenario training as a way of introducing more variables for folks to work with. Inside the dojo, there's rarely going to be space to actually experiment with running to see how it fails (failure mode, IMO, is the most important evaluation of most tactics and techniques).

Sometimes it's as simple as changing the surface (uneven grassy dirt, pavement, steps/curbs, etc.) to see how that changes the footing and movement. Sometimes it's creating some restrictions on one or both sides.