Sport Fighting & Self Defense

[jks9199]

There is another aspect to sport fighting which I think is often overlooked.

When you roll (everyone knows I'm a BJJ guy right?) with someone who trains like you do, they know many of the techniques you are going to use, and they know how to defend against them. In consequence, you are forced to train different ways of setting techniques up and applying them, because if you just go for it against a person that is not only resisting but knows what you are trying to do, chances are you are going to fail. That type of experience just makes your techniques that much stronger when you go against someone that doesn't necessarily know how to defend against your techniques.

For example, if a Judoka gets really good at performing throws against other judokas, I like his chances of being able to throw me if we meet on the street.

That, and I think that sport fighting goes a long way in removing some of the nerves that are involved in a real fight. And I think that nerves are a lot more important than many people realise.

Not always...

It can also set up the "you attacked me the wrong way" situation. Lots of the knife and tappy-tap stick work out there is a good example; they're training tricks and tactics that will only work against each other, and are overly complicated for a "real" situation. Or the student gets so tied up trying to trick and pull off techniques against people who know what's coming or work on particular motions or habits that they aren't practicing solid principles.

 

[Flying Crane]

I think that there is a certain amount of common ground that can be found in sport fighting and self-defense training. They are not the same thing and they require a different mindset and different approach to training. But there is some common ground and they don't have to be 100% mutually exclusive of each other.

 

[searcher]

I was just thinking about what I got the most out of "knockdown" kaarte events, which are a sport event and I think it is, getting hit hard and not freaking out. Think about it, the purpose the other guy has is to knock you out. I know it is not to kill you, but they still want to inflict harm on you and you are having to deal with that. At the very least, you are going to be able to better control your adrenal dump.

 

[Rich Parsons]

i see a fair amout of self-defense oriented martial artists on this forum who speak disparingingly of sport fighting arts. this is a shame, because i think that while you can be adequately prepared for most SD situations without participating in sport fighting, sport fighting can be a valuable training aid.

I have stated before, it is not the art but the person.

let's examine boxing for instance, a sport i enjoy. while training this sport, i've landed hundreds, maybe thousands of jabs on fully uncooperative opponents. i've landed them on smaller faster people, & bigger stronger people. i've landed jabs moving forward, backwards, & circling. i don't have a perfect jab, but i know what it takes to put my fist in someone's face with enough force to make them pause.

This is good training. It is your experience. But is this common with the standard grapplers? I know I have heard from some who complain that they go to class and start out on the ground. This is technique isloation, and is good training but they complain that they do not train the stand up enough.

So, I guess this would be school and individual dependant,

once you can do this, an eye gouge isn't a difficult adaptation to make. instead of making a fist right before impact, you fan out your fingers & keep them fairly relaxed so that they slide into the eye sockets. you simply take the timing & technical skill you developed in a combat sport, slightly modify it, & you have a perfectly viable self defense technique. most sport striking techniques can be similarly modified. instead of push kicking in the torso, target the groin. instead of throwing a hook to the head, aim for the side of the neck, etc.

Jarrod, I agree it is a natrual transition. But is you never train it then you will not be good at it. The big thing I hear from the grapplers is that others who do not train the proper escapes from the ground they will not get out. The same is true for the eye gouge. I have known some who will cringe at the idea or even placing a thump over the person's closed eye, so they can push very lightly just to see the alignment. Others will not spend the time to strike bags or fruit or what have you.

As to the groin target this could happen by accident so it is a good idea. But I know people who have trained so long in wrestling or ground rolling that they will not take the illegal shots.

now let's take a look at grappling. obviously, the ground is not the ideal place to be in most self-defense situations. nevertheless, to paraphrase a famous saying, grappling happens. watch any boxing match, & count how many times the ref splits up the boxers from clinching. it's the most natural reaction in the world to take a punch, & grab the guy who hit you so he can't immediately hit you agian. from the clinch it can be a short trip to the ground, especially if the ground is icy, or there are obstacles to trip over, whatever. once your there, you should know how to get up. failing that, you should now how to win.

I agree it is natural to tie up. And it can happen you end up there for environmental conditions. The problem I have is the wrestlers and others that want to take it to the ground first thing.

I agree that people should train environment and also on the ground.

But, I have worked with Wrestling coaches that have done well in State and regional Comp before they were coaches. They just could not get over the conditioned training.

I had one young 19 year old who challenged my "fat ***". I got him in a rear naked while I was on the bottom and he was on top of me. He could not get over the idea of not putting his back on the ground. He came up screaming that the Turtle Technique I did to him was illegal. Others explained to him, that the agreement was to see who could pin or tap the other on the ground, No strikes, and no collegiate rules.

one prevelant concept that somewhat irritates me is the idea that grapplers are somehow magically prohibited from using eye gouges, biting, groin attacks, or what have you. on more than occassion i've been asked "what are you going to do when you go to mount somebody & they grab your groin?" well, i'd most likely bury my thumbs in their eyes. i'd grab a nearby improvised weapon & bash them unconsious. i would do whatever it took to prevent or stop their groin attack, & i certainly wouldn't expect them to let go just because i stood up in pain. i'd also hope like hell that i wasn't wearing my kilt!

I agree it is not a magical prohibition. But what stops the guy who is stand up from hitting at C2 when the guy goes for a single leg take down. What stops him from hitting so hard in the spin that they may not walk again? Nothing. It is all about training and what you expect.

Any sport be it stand up or ground or mix has rules for safety.

Even in self defense, not everyone is willing to bring the amount of damage it requires to stop or slow one. Those who have had actual conflict and have brought enough damage, to hospitalize, break, or even possible kill someone know that others who were seconds before ready to "Fight" you to the end, were really not ready to fight to the end. They could not and did not expect that level of damage and assault and agreession on them.

in short, a grappler has all the tools available to any other martial artist, along with the advantage of position & ground awareness. meaning, while attacking the eyes, groin, or throat, he won't overextend his arm, expose his neck, or make any of the other mistakes that can cost you a grappling match. or in this case, cost you the upperhand in a possibly life threatening encounter.

While I agree on the ground they have the advantage. But if they do nto practice the stand up and the other person is willing to break them and permanently damage them, they have the possible advantage. But even this beginner for the ground has been able to surprise Black Belts and other high ranks because they did not expect this stick jock to understand joint locks and take advantage of what they gave me. If they were not showing off it might have been different. In one case the guy was going to separate my skull from the spin in a "choke", so I stopped "Going Along" and took it to him. I countered and then demonstarted what he was doing to me, and what he should have been doing for the oxygen choke or for the blood choke. Of course he was tapping the whole time and I did not stop. As he did not stop when I tapped, and told me he would only stop when I was unconscious. So I felt no issues with ignoring his tap.

what's more, sport fighting also helps you to develop all sorts of attributes necessary to survive self defence scenarios: strength, conditioning, control during stress, calm during aggresive physical contact, & perhaps most importantly, determination. so if sport fighting is not your flavor, that is fine. i have many friends who cannot or do not participate in sport martial arts who i am confident could handle themselves when they had to. but to believe that sport fighting & self-defense skills are not complimentary is, in my opinion, a great mistake.

respectfully,

jf

I agree, to ignore would be a mistake. But to ignore the other end, or to have the superiority complex that ground fighters have the advantage all the time is just as big a mistake.

Skill sets can be inproved in lots of ways.

Conditioning can be improved lots of ways.

"That Guy" who is willing to do permanent harm to others also can be trained, but it also depends mostly upon what is inside the person. They have to decide what to do and to do it. Not hesitate. This is independant of the training method or the art or style.

 

[sgtmac_46]

There is another aspect to sport fighting which I think is often overlooked.

When you roll (everyone knows I'm a BJJ guy right?) with someone who trains like you do, they know many of the techniques you are going to use, and they know how to defend against them. In consequence, you are forced to train different ways of setting techniques up and applying them, because if you just go for it against a person that is not only resisting but knows what you are trying to do, chances are you are going to fail. That type of experience just makes your techniques that much stronger when you go against someone that doesn't necessarily know how to defend against your techniques.

For example, if a Judoka gets really good at performing throws against other judokas, I like his chances of being able to throw me if we meet on the street.

That, and I think that sport fighting goes a long way in removing some of the nerves that are involved in a real fight. And I think that nerves are a lot more important than many people realise.

I've seen that in the street as a Judoka and a BJJ practioner.....when you go hard against other Judoka and BJJ guys it's hard......but when I trip or throw a guy on the street and move to control him on the ground, even big strong guys, it's NEVER as hard as against other trained grapplers.....most folks, even in this day and age of MMA, are fish out of water once they hit the ground.

Likewise, i've had guys in the street try to push me, shove me and pull me down to the ground with them. Just the sense of balance and training in off-balancing the other guy in Judo means that every shove or push in the street by some drunk or druggie feels like some awkward half-assed thing, even from big guys. It would be difficult to replicate that in a purely RBSD environment.....that is the result of the kind of repetative sparring done in Judo and BJJ.

Conversely, I apply a RBSD mindset to my techniques when i'm on the street, and a sense of situational awareness you can't replicate in a purely sport oriented training. Take what's useful, leave the rest.

 

[sgtmac_46]

That's the key right there.

As Saint Cooper used to say when he was still amongst us, successful self defense is less a matter of skill than a matter of will.

Absolutely! As Napoleon said, the moral is to the physical as three is to one. Physical development of body and technique is crucial.....but even more crucial is the will!

 

[sgtmac_46]

Not always...

It can also set up the "you attacked me the wrong way" situation. Lots of the knife and tappy-tap stick work out there is a good example; they're training tricks and tactics that will only work against each other, and are overly complicated for a "real" situation. Or the student gets so tied up trying to trick and pull off techniques against people who know what's coming or work on particular motions or habits that they aren't practicing solid principles.

You're confusing drilling with hard sparring.....the 'tappy-tap stick work' is a prime example. Drills can be performed in such ways.....but sparring against a resistive combative opponent, as you find in Judo and BJJ can't.....nobody calls 'you attacked me the wrong way'.....someone just gets choked out or tapped.....and THAT is the crucible where technique is tested.

As per stick work, that's why the Dog Brothers have gone so far on......hard core sparring to filter out what works, instead of constantly just drilling. Sparring with as few rules as possible is a great filter of technique.

To make sparring work even BETTER one should chane up their sparring partners before too much familiarity sets in. Sparring against different styles even better. That's how we ended up with modern MMA in the first place.

 

[sgtmac_46]

I agree, to ignore would be a mistake. But to ignore the other end, or to have the superiority complex that ground fighters have the advantage all the time is just as big a mistake.

Skill sets can be inproved in lots of ways.

Conditioning can be improved lots of ways.

"That Guy" who is willing to do permanent harm to others also can be trained, but it also depends mostly upon what is inside the person. They have to decide what to do and to do it. Not hesitate. This is independant of the training method or the art or style.

I would say, in reality, that STAND UP fighters have a far greater advantage than they do in the ring, given the right mindset.

In the ring everyone knows there is a fight, and someone stands in the middle of the ring and tells them when to start. In the street, bar, etc.....it's much more about unpredictability and the element of surprise (mindset!).

It's generally easier to knock someone out in the street than it is in a ring. Boxers do it all the time in some bar or parking lot or another.....and they do it because, unlike in the ring, where the other guy knows that punches are coming, is moving with his hands up, etc.....in the street many guys carry themselves wrong and allow the punch to be set up for maximum advantage, EVEN if the other guy was initially the primary physical aggressor.

 

[Rich Parsons]

I would say, in reality, that STAND UP fighters have a far greater advantage than they do in the ring, given the right mindset.

In the ring everyone knows there is a fight, and someone stands in the middle of the ring and tells them when to start. In the street, bar, etc.....it's much more about unpredictability and the element of surprise (mindset!).

It's generally easier to knock someone out in the street than it is in a ring. Boxers do it all the time in some bar or parking lot or another.....and they do it because, unlike in the ring, where the other guy knows that punches are coming, is moving with his hands up, etc.....in the street many guys carry themselves wrong and allow the punch to be set up for maximum advantage, EVEN if the other guy was initially the primary physical aggressor.

SGT - SHHH!

Stand up would not have the advantage. That would make the Ground people upset. It has to be equal for both cases or one side will feel slighted.


Seriously, I agree. If you are aware of your surroundings and aware of situations as they develop then it would be an advantage. If a person was caught totally unaware and they were hit and knocked down then the ground person would be at the advantage. They would be in their positions of familiarity, and also the person they are up against would be off balance just being hit and taken to the ground.

 

[jarrod]

first of all rich, i didn't mean to give the impression that i was arguing about sport grappling. i maybe discussed it more because that's my favorite flavor of martial arts, but really i'm talking about any sport fighting. now pardon my HTML laziness, please see the bold below for my other comments:

I have stated before, it is not the art but the person.




This is good training. It is your experience. But is this common with the standard grapplers? I know I have heard from some who complain that they go to class and start out on the ground. This is technique isloation, and is good training but they complain that they do not train the stand up enough.

So, I guess this would be school and individual dependant,

honestly, i don't know what a standard grappler is. i'd say about half of my students cross train in boxing &/or kickboxing. at the jujitsu school where i am a student, we have former amateur & pro boxers, black belts from TKD & karate, military personel including special forces, cops etc. in my experience, people who like to tussle like to tussle, & will do it under a variety of rules.



Jarrod, I agree it is a natrual transition. But is you never train it then you will not be good at it. The big thing I hear from the grapplers is that others who do not train the proper escapes from the ground they will not get out. The same is true for the eye gouge. I have known some who will cringe at the idea or even placing a thump over the person's closed eye, so they can push very lightly just to see the alignment. Others will not spend the time to strike bags or fruit or what have you.

As to the groin target this could happen by accident so it is a good idea. But I know people who have trained so long in wrestling or ground rolling that they will not take the illegal shots.

personally speaking, i never roll with a cup on & neither do most of my students. as a result, we've gotten used to some accidental love taps to the cookies. a lot of grappling moves place some pressure on the groin, & while i'm not advocating iron crotch training, it does take the panic factor out. you're right that many grapplers won't go for it right away, but i've seen many that will once you do it to them. but once again, i'm not trying to get into a grappling vs. striking debate, but i would like to put to rest the notion that sport fighting & RBSD are polar opposites.


I agree it is natural to tie up. And it can happen you end up there for environmental conditions. The problem I have is the wrestlers and others that want to take it to the ground first thing.

I agree that people should train environment and also on the ground.

But, I have worked with Wrestling coaches that have done well in State and regional Comp before they were coaches. They just could not get over the conditioned training.

I had one young 19 year old who challenged my "fat ***". I got him in a rear naked while I was on the bottom and he was on top of me. He could not get over the idea of not putting his back on the ground. He came up screaming that the Turtle Technique I did to him was illegal. Others explained to him, that the agreement was to see who could pin or tap the other on the ground, No strikes, and no collegiate rules.

lol, good for you! once again, i'm not going for grappling vs. stand up. i train grappling more than striking because i enjoy it more, that's all. i agree that the ground is not the first place to go in SD.


I agree it is not a magical prohibition. But what stops the guy who is stand up from hitting at C2 when the guy goes for a single leg take down?

only a lack of timing from not having done it to a resisting target repeatedly. if the stand up guy can do it, awesome. shouldn't have single-legged in most SD situations anyway.

What stops him from hitting so hard in the spin that they may not walk again? Nothing. It is all about training and what you expect.

Any sport be it stand up or ground or mix has rules for safety.

Even in self defense, not everyone is willing to bring the amount of damage it requires to stop or slow one. Those who have had actual conflict and have brought enough damage, to hospitalize, break, or even possible kill someone know that others who were seconds before ready to "Fight" you to the end, were really not ready to fight to the end. They could not and did not expect that level of damage and assault and agreession on them.

i agree, it's all about INTENT. people are either willing to kill or maim or they aren't. & there are plenty of sport fighters who don't have that will. but that doesn't mean that sport fighting & intent to do harm are mutually exclusive.

While I agree on the ground they have the advantage. But if they do nto practice the stand up and the other person is willing to break them and permanently damage them, they have the possible advantage. But even this beginner for the ground has been able to surprise Black Belts and other high ranks because they did not expect this stick jock to understand joint locks and take advantage of what they gave me. If they were not showing off it might have been different. In one case the guy was going to separate my skull from the spin in a "choke", so I stopped "Going Along" and took it to him. I countered and then demonstarted what he was doing to me, and what he should have been doing for the oxygen choke or for the blood choke. Of course he was tapping the whole time and I did not stop. As he did not stop when I tapped, and told me he would only stop when I was unconscious. So I felt no issues with ignoring his tap.


jerk had it coming. unfortunately, i've met tools in the MA world from all quarters...strikers, grapplers, sport, keyboard warriors. sad thing is they seldom learn.


I agree, to ignore would be a mistake. But to ignore the other end, or to have the superiority complex that ground fighters have the advantage all the time is just as big a mistake.

i'm not advocating feelings of superiority from either end, i would just like folks to see the benefits of sport fighting. it's not superior, but training under a set of rules doesn't automatically handicap you. i don't throw people when i box, i don't kick people when i do judo, & don't hit people during jujitsu (unless we're working on that)...but i'm often aware of those opportunities. it doesn't take a lot to be aware of more deadly opportunities as well.

Skill sets can be inproved in lots of ways.

Conditioning can be improved lots of ways.

"That Guy" who is willing to do permanent harm to others also can be trained, but it also depends mostly upon what is inside the person. They have to decide what to do and to do it. Not hesitate. This is independant of the training method or the art or style.

absolutely!

jf

 

[jks9199]

You're confusing drilling with hard sparring.....the 'tappy-tap stick work' is a prime example. Drills can be performed in such ways.....but sparring against a resistive combative opponent, as you find in Judo and BJJ can't.....nobody calls 'you attacked me the wrong way'.....someone just gets choked out or tapped.....and THAT is the crucible where technique is tested.

As per stick work, that's why the Dog Brothers have gone so far on......hard core sparring to filter out what works, instead of constantly just drilling. Sparring with as few rules as possible is a great filter of technique.

To make sparring work even BETTER one should chane up their sparring partners before too much familiarity sets in. Sparring against different styles even better. That's how we ended up with modern MMA in the first place.

That's why I said "can lead to" not is.

I've known people who mistook point sparring tag for "real" hard sparring. I've known people who mistook fancy knife partner drills or controlled one-step sparring exercises with a partner who throws one punch, stops and gets "done to" for realistic training.

As I've said many times -- sparring is ONE way of practicing the learned techniques against a partner. But, unless you want to run out of playmates, you can't really go full force against a training partner. Sport style sparring is fun; it's a great chance to move and experiment against some resistance. Sport competitions are a fun way to find new playmates, and maybe develop some bragging rights. What even the hardest core sporting event isn't is a real fight. (If it is -- it's not sports. It's a fight to the death...)

 

[Kwan Jang]

I do believe that sport sparring is a valuable drill towards self defense training. MMA/NHB sparring is pretty much as close to real as you can get in a safe, controlled enviroment and can greatly benefit your self defense training IF you are physically fit enough and far enough along in your training base to benefit from it. However, there is quite a difference between sport sparring and self defense. Many previous posts have addressed this, so I am not going to rehash the good points that have already been made, but I will add one additional point of my own and share an experience I had a few years ago.

Sport fighting is a contest between two athletes who are (usually) fairly evenly matched under a specific set of rules trying to gain an athletic victory over the other along that rule set. Self defense is another matter as far as intent. It is trying to survive an encounter that was usually not of your choosing and the preferred objective is to "stun and run" in most cases. The only rule is that you survive by whatever means that are neccesary. Your opponents are not divided up by wright class, age, gender, ect. They often like to attack in numbers, by surprise and use weapons.

Sparring is a very valuable drill to help provide live training against resisting opponents, but there are numerous other drills that will aid with this as well. Adrenal stress drills and even pattern (esp. as partner drills)work and one steps can be good beginner and intermediate drills to aid with SD skills. There really can be a danger of sport specialization though. Often when you limit yourself to sparring under certain conditions and rule sets, there is a tendncy to no longer mentally or physically prepare for things outside of that context. It is far from a given that this will happen, but I believe that it is something that you must consciously make an effort to make sure that you don't fall into that trap.

Frank Shamrock used to train a couple of days a week at my instructor's school for several years. He also taught a MMA/NHB class for senior black belts right after the Monday morning staff meetings. One class I participated in was on applying ground fighting as it pertained to the street as opposed to the ring or cage. We were working on striking from inside an attacker's closed guard and Frank was going over different strikes to different targets to help you be able to post up and get to your feet again. One target he didn't mention was the groin, so I brought this up. "Oh, in the cage, we wear steel cups, so it really doesn't do much good to strike there", Frank replied. I reminded him that this class was specializing in groundfighting for the street and he said "in that case, it sounds like a good idea". (It's been a few years and I may be slightly off on the direct quotes, but our conversation was very much along these lines).

With a fighter as experienced and technically/strategically minded as Frank, there was still the tendency to overlook things outside of "the box" he normally trained in. In fairness to Frank, he did spend a good deal of that class working on techniques and strategies that were along the lines of "if taken to the ground, don't stay there...here's how to post back to your feet as safely and quickly as possible". It's just the way you train is the way you react. If you are an Olympic TKD guy and all your training has your hands down and you never train with them up guarding your jaw, then don't be surprised if you get KO'ed by a left hook on the street. OTOH, if you are a well trained fighter and are trained effectively in RBSD and MMA, there is no reason that you can't go out and also play at Olympic TKD sparring.

 

[Lightning Ram]

The danger comes when someone mistakes the environment of rules and "gentlemanly conduct" for reality. And that can happen in or out of competition.

Well said.

 

[sgtmac_46]

That's why I said "can lead to" not is.

I've known people who mistook point sparring tag for "real" hard sparring. I've known people who mistook fancy knife partner drills or controlled one-step sparring exercises with a partner who throws one punch, stops and gets "done to" for realistic training.

As I've said many times -- sparring is ONE way of practicing the learned techniques against a partner. But, unless you want to run out of playmates, you can't really go full force against a training partner. Sport style sparring is fun; it's a great chance to move and experiment against some resistance. Sport competitions are a fun way to find new playmates, and maybe develop some bragging rights. What even the hardest core sporting event isn't is a real fight. (If it is -- it's not sports. It's a fight to the death...)

I agree in principle that a street fight CAN be worse.....and one should prepare for the ultimate opponent......the reality, however, is that most folks you run in to in a ring are tougher than 99% of any opponent you'll encounter in the street......the only difference is the inclusion of weapons and the element of surprise (which is where awareness and mindset come in).

That's why fights involving professional boxers, just by way of example, in bars last mere seconds, and results in some non-boxer being rendered unconscious in the first punch or two.......even if they didn't throw the first punch. Boxers, and other full-contact sport fighters, are used to getting hit and getting hit hard, and are not deterred by a punch of two to the head or body. They have conditioned their mind to get hit, and more importantly, to instantly return devastating fire on the person that hit them.

Training the proper mindset is THE most important.....but training and conditioning the body is a close second.

Yeah, sport many combat fighters may not train a lot of eye gouges.....but when you've got the physical capability of rendering most human beings unconscious with a blow you've thrown LITERALLY thousands of times, I think you can survive without a good eye gouge. They have mastered the basics of punches and kicks through repetition and hard sparring, and coupled that mastery of basics with intense cardiovascular conditioning and strength training to bring them to the peak of physical conditioning.....and those basics, and physical conditioning, when the proper mindset for the street is applied, are MORE than enough......not that they can't be an even MORE formidable adversary by applying RBSD techniques, mindsets and drills.......but the full-contact combat sport fighter brings a devastating arsenal to bear as is.

 

[Zero]

Jarrod

I think what you write makes sense. What occured to me the moment I started reading your thread and your comments on adopting moves or modifying certain techniques of sport fighting to be effective in SD was that, many of these sport and competition styles originate and derive from styles initially 100% SD orientated. It just struck me as a point worth pondering in that we have ended up with many styles (such as judo from the original jujitsu) which are now heavily sport orientated and that we are now re-modifying them in part so that they resemble or are as effective, to a degree, as their original precursor style.

I have trained in a range of styles from pure sport to more SD orientated and I think (while it depends heavily on the instructors) all training and styles have something to offer in the real world and a SD instance. I do agree though that the ones specifically focusing on SD applications and training in those will hold you in better stead to deal with quickly escalating situations or street confrontations (as often it is the mental response that saves your *** as much as the physical reaction). However, so many of us, myself included, love the sporting styles as we love to compete in the ring, to challenge and prove ourselves on that level. Not many of us, I hope, (at least once some maturity has kicked in (that's hopefully just started to happen in my instance)) want to be continually proving ourselves in street brawls and winding un in the pen. Therefore boxing, judo, mma is all we got to focus on regarding that side of martial arts - personaly I don't want to be in a sanctioned fight were eye gouges are permitted.
Keep it real

 

[jarrod]

agreed; sport fighting is the safest & most legal way to test your abilities.

jf

 

[Brian King]

Sgtmac 46 wrote:

“That's why fights involving professional boxers, just by way of example, in bars last mere seconds, and results in some non-boxer being rendered unconscious in the first punch or two.......even if they didn't throw the first punch. Boxers, and other full-contact sport fighters, are used to getting hit and getting hit hard, and are not deterred by a punch of two to the head or body. They have conditioned their mind to get hit, and more importantly, to instantly return devastating fire on the person that hit them.”

I agree that they have conditioned their mind to get hit. But many have also conditioned their fists to make contact while taped, wrapped and conditioned their bodies to do the work while warmed up and stretched. Which is one reason we read about (and I have seen) pros who get into a scrap end up with broken hands. This can be a real danger if they would then need to go to weapons or if the fight was to last weeks or months rather than seconds or minutes in my opinion.

“Training the proper mindset is THE most important”

Agreed sir! Mental aspects are the most important in my opinion

Warmest Regards
Brian King

 

[jarrod]

Sgtmac 46 wrote:


I agree that they have conditioned their mind to get hit. But many have also conditioned their fists to make contact while taped, wrapped and conditioned their bodies to do the work while warmed up and stretched. Which is one reason we read about (and I have seen) pros who get into a scrap end up with broken hands. This can be a real danger if they would then need to go to weapons or if the fight was to last weeks or months rather than seconds or minutes in my opinion.



Agreed sir! Mental aspects are the most important in my opinion

Warmest Regards
Brian King

true, but i've also heard of & seen pro boxers & kickboxers break their hand on a guy & keep punching with it anyway because they were determined to win. it's just hard to beat the kind of toughness that can be developed in combat sports.

jf

 

[Steve]

Just to set the record straight, I noticed it being brought up that grapplers use a cup. While it's not uncommon in schools to train with a cup, many don't. Jarrod mentioned he doesn't. I don't, either.

Also, what I really want to mention is that many of the larger tournaments in the USA and Brazil do not technically allow a cup. CBJJ rules forbid use of any equipment that may artificially alter the outcome. So, if you are down at the Pan Ams or the Mundials getting your butt kicked and notice he's wearing a cup, you could technically have him disqualified.

 

[Brian King]

Jarrod wrote

“true, but i've also heard of & seen pro boxers & kickboxers break their hand on a guy & keep punching with it anyway because they were determined to win. it's just hard to beat the kind of toughness that can be developed in combat sports.”

There is no denying the truth of that Jarrod, toughness and adrenalin can make a broken hand negligible same with drugs and alcohol. I am merely pointing out that you can win the fight and lose the battle. Next time you break your hand take your pistol for instance and go compete in one of those all weekend shooting events, or put out that report due that the future of your employment depends on or finish and win the first fight but go again with the next opponent and the next and the next.

Not all fights, not all self defense ends with the knock out. For action professionals they may well have many fights over many days. Broken bones even a small one while out in the bush can make the deference in survival or death. When you have people depending on your carrying your weight either by being able to continue the fight or bringing in a weekly paycheck injury may make the deference no matter your profession.

Regards
Brian King