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Yeah I had my neices Christining last sunday, and as I am talking to alot of my brother-in-laws family who I don’t know , someone asked me what the Combative Edge bumper sticker was on my truck……Well I decided to start pulling out the fixed blade under my suit coat, the folder in my pocket, and the other folder under my belt in the back, I quickly realized that I was getting some strange looks, mostly from my sister who I think was about to throw up from the humiliation of her brother passing knives around the table to a bunch of bankers, and the PRIEST …very funny.
\”The problem with those defenses is the footwork, there is no getting out of that centerline of the attack.\”
As I see it, the \”problem\” with the FMA methodology is it assumes a state of readiness–KM’s approach does not.
Regarding the knife thing, the truth is, you can’t carry a knife everywhere, and you aren’t going to get a majority of your students to carry one, either.
The reality is, there may be \”better\” techniques out there, but they aren’t for the everyday person with two days a week to train.
I used to do private lessons in Balintawak Arnis, with Grandmaster Bobby Taboada. He’s the real deal, with the requisite stories and scars. We spent a lot of time on very intricate movements, and the \”play\” looked really cool, especially at advanced levels. However, I remember him once telling me, \”In real stick fight, it’s just ‘whack, whack’.\” That was my last private lesson (nothing against him, he’s a great martial artist, but…)
I should mention, my timing, hand speed, and eye-hand coordination were never better than when working with Taboada, so there certainly are benefits, as long as we understand the goals and keep things in perspective.
The assumption that most people have is that you need to have a knife on you to defend yourself in the FMA styles, when as you should know through Bobby Toboada the empty hands are very good as well.
And yes in a real stick fight it is just whack whack,….but must of the time they have protective gear on, an can take a whack whack, when in reality with no gear on and a strike across the bridge of the nose will be the only whack…
Lastly the biggest misconception that the FMA are a stick fighting art is untrue. The true FMA the sticks were used as just training tools for the blade. Then it grew into a sport which dilluted the art very much, and giving it the impression that its just stick fighting….Like the history channel show.
CE, I don’t disagree with anything you just said, but I don’t think it has much to do with the original direction of the thread. I respect FMAs for what they are, I just believe KM is a much better fit for most people with limited training time.
Take care.
Ryan I will agree however about the state of readiness you mentioned. But I think that Krav may put a little to much emphasis on getting attacked by suprise. Every altercation but one that I have been in, I knew it was going to happen, and could deal with it accordingly.
I should also mention that I am a bouncer and I am only about 180 lbs. There are alot of times where not having good footwork and proper balance and leverage when some 200+ guy is coming at you will be a big problem. Krav always deals with going straight in at an attacker when unfortunetly that can be a problem when there is a big size advantage.
I really don’t want to sound like I am bashing Krav because I truly do like it, and am usually defending it to people that have never done it, but because this was a krav compared to FMA, I have to give my opinion. There are things I like about Krav more than FMA also so keep that in mind. You know like the logo 😆
I agree 100% that krav is much better for people with a time schedule.
If you don’t have time to fully commit to training in the FMA it is almost pointless other than like Ryan said it will help with hand speed and timing.
Tuhon Gaje always says that it’s not the years, it’s the hours, and that is very true. You won’t get far in FMA with 1-2 classes a week, You need to put in hours of training.
\”But I think that Krav may put a little to much emphasis on getting attacked by suprise.\”
I agree with you here, to an extent. I don’t know that it’s \”too much\”, since that’s what KM is. KM is a self defense system, based on principles, that teaches students to deal with attacks. There is little to no emphasis on the pre-contact phase of things, but that’s not what KM purports to be. That said, I’ve never seen FMAs deal with pre-contact phases either.
I feel both are a bit lacking in this area, but I also feel it’s more likely that most of our students are more likely to find themselves dealing with a choke, bearhug, headlock, etc. than they are a \”duel\” type scenario.
Anyway, I appreciate the civil dialogue. All the best.
The other day I watched a CD that showed 4 different styles doing self defense against various attacks ranging from a punch, knife, gun, baseball bat, etc. One of the styles was FMA. The FMA looked very effective but also very comlplicated. It looked like it would take much longer to learn than Krav techniques.
One thing I did not like was that in almost every senerio, the FMA guy seemed to use multiple techniques to positon the attacking arm in various subdueing positions. And ultimately ended up taking the attacker to the ground. Now this FMA guy was very good and anyone that actually tried to attack him was in for a lot of pain or death. It’s just that his techniques seemed complicated.
I like the idea of some stick and knife fighting in advanced levels. You don’t have to be an expert in it, but to have some idea how to block a stick with another stick (or stick-like object) or how to use one sharp object against another may be useful in certain situations.
As for improvised weapons mentioned earlier, I think it could also be interesting to, on occasion, bring some more unconventional objects to class, such as a skateboard, chair, broken bottle and carefully stage attacks with them, just so one can get used to seeing different types of objects being used in an attack and learn to recognize which type of defense would be appropriate against them.
Most things swung at you would likely be similar to stick defense, yet if you have never seen a chair, a skateboard, a lamp or the like fly at you in training, there may just be a bit of hesitation in regards to how to defend against it. That bit of hesitation could cause problems, so maybe going over some improvised weapon attacks would be beneficial to do sometimes in class.
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GiantkillerI think for a system to have a good body of knife defenses, it really should have a good block of knife offense as well, otherwise you may end up training to defend against the lowest common denominator knife attacks. For instance, I was training with a friend of a friend who I believe did hapkido, and the concepts of a looping overhand thrust from a forehand grip, or a backhand thrust, or the tactics to shred up limbs with an edge in grip were totally foreign FMAs usually have quite a bit of offense, and it is very refined. I’m really not sure if this is the case with krav. I also like that most of the FMA people I’ve trained with like to have drums playing, but that’s just my preference.
Anyway, I’m a big fan of Atienza kali:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JvEbq-NkT4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_GVOpGs5ZI&mode=related&search=This one was especially interesting (combat archery?):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e46hizXDd0Technically silat, but I think that Felix Valencia and I believe he comes from FMA:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYfy3AM-lSQWell,
As a former student of the Latosa Escrima System I’d like to add my 2 cents. Latosa Escrima is certainly less traditional than most of the typical FMA schools. The one objection to most FMA schools is that they primarily train from a weapon to weapon standpoint. Very rarely does this happen in the streets. So then how effective can it be? Well it depends. I mean consider the realities of a stick to stick fight.
I can’t recall when I’ve seen a stick fight in the street! I know that many of the hand movements in FMA remain the same with our without sticks but the reality is that the sticks and knives are a huge part of the training. Unless you are walking around with these items, it is highly unlikely that you would use these skills.
Krav on the other hand simply teaches that with or without a weapon we can, will and must fight back! The reality here is simple any experienced stick fighter will not waste time with figure 8 strikes and fancy movements when facing an opponent who is unarmed. He, like most everyone will come right after the opponent. Thus the Krav defenses will be more than adequate.
\”Krav on the other hand simply teaches that with or without a weapon we can, will and must fight back!\”
In my experience this is true of FMA also.
We do alot of weapon against empty hand. One problem is that everyone refers to the FMA’s as \”FMA’s\” obviously including myself…..
Truth is that as most of the FMA’s are similar, they are not at all the same. So really it depends on where you get it from that will give you a better idea of what it’s all about. For an example in Pekiti you won’t find some of the ridiculous disarms that alot of styles have because they just don’t work.
I don’t think you would need to be an expert stick fighter in most SD situations, but knowledge of some simple blocks and counters (as taught in KM) may come in handy in some situations. Doesn’t always have to be an actual stick, maybe an attacker will pick up a stick-like object during a fight and you pick up another stick-like object to defend yourself. A candleholder perhaps, or a bottle, maybe a chair, if the fight takes place inside. Knowing a good block and counter in that situation could give you an edge.
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Giantkiller
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