Skill set - expectations?

[drop bear]

Recently, at my school, some black belts were 'choreographing' a fight for their promotion ceremony. There were (2) 3rd Dans and (1) 4th Dan and they were being promoted to 4th and 5th, respectively. While practicing, one of them took a pretty hard punch to the jaw. What surprised me is that the one who got punched didn't even attempt to block or evade it, so I asked why and the response was that there was confusion among the 3 of them and he wasn't expecting the punch at that time.

While I know rank standards are all over the place, but I really expected an experienced martial artist to be able to defend themselves against an unexpected strike, even if they were working out a planned 'dance'. Isn't that part of self-defense, protecting yourself from the unexpected? Am I wrong in thinking he should have been able to block or evade rather than taking that punch? Opinions?

Ok. Your concept of self defence is kind of fundamentally incorrect.

And it isn't uncommon to be wrong in this way.

Fighting is in general going to be too fast for you to react to. So what fighters do is put time and effort in to creating positions and circumstances that either slow the fighting down. Or limit the options the other fighter has.

So when you learn. He does this thing. And I do that thing. You are not really learning a realistic solution to that problem.

I have mentioned this before with drills. That you can be slick as anything if you know what is coming. But when you have a choice you suddenly fail.

 

[Taiji Rebel]

Ok. Your concept of self defence is kind of fundamentally incorrect.

And it isn't uncommon to be wrong in this way.

Fighting is in general going to be too fast for you to react to. So what fighters do is put time and effort in to creating positions and circumstances that either slow the fighting down. Or limit the options the other fighter has.

So when you learn. He does this thing. And I do that thing. You are not really learning a realistic solution to that problem.

I have mentioned this before with drills. That you can be slick as anything if you know what is coming. But when you have a choice you suddenly fail.

Everyone has a plan till they get punched in the mouth - Mike Tyson

Attack is the secret of defense; defense is the planning of an attack - Sun Tzu

 

[windwalker099]

"The combat tactics advocated here do not depend on any set stance or position to achieve results. They are based on what the smallest man can do to the largest, using the element of surprise when possible, with ruthless disregard for the opponent."

"In the homespun philosophy of David Harum"

“Do unto others as they would do unto you, But do it first.”

"Kill or get Killed"

A book written by "By Lieutenant Colonel Rex Applegate"

Might help provide another perspective in training, written long ago, much of it still relevant to today.
Rather then try to make sense of "violence" might be better, not to be a victim of it.

"Practice must be intensive enough to render the mechanics of each technique automatic. There is seldom
time to stop and think when the pressure of combat is on.

Being able to throw a man is much different from knowing how."

One might ask, despite all the training outlined in the article why didn't the author's "training" respond
as "trained"

 

[Wing Woo Gar]

Ok. Your concept of self defence is kind of fundamentally incorrect.

And it isn't uncommon to be wrong in this way.

Fighting is in general going to be too fast for you to react to. So what fighters do is put time and effort in to creating positions and circumstances that either slow the fighting down. Or limit the options the other fighter has.

So when you learn. He does this thing. And I do that thing. You are not really learning a realistic solution to that problem.

I have mentioned this before with drills. That you can be slick as anything if you know what is coming. But when you have a choice you suddenly fail.

This is demonstrated whenever somebody gets the gloves on for the first time. They stand up too tall, they drop their guard, they mouth breathe, they flail and cross themselves up. In short, they can better put to use the no contact part of training once they have had a couple full speed, full contact fights. Once the student has realistic experiences and expectations, much of the fluff can be disposed of and they can start to work on their personal shortcomings and strengths to develop their own playbook. I feel like this is really fundamental training for people who want to be able to use it. Some people just want the training for exercise and hobby, I have no problem with that, so long as they don’t get into fantasy land about their ability to actually fight.