Episode 13: Motor Skills Over Belts - The Blueprint Behind Masterclass

Joel Ellenbecker

CJ, thanks again for your time and conversation today. These, honestly, these are one of my favorite parts of what we do, just like get into talk about all the things that are going on in the world of Krav Maga and I learn a lot from them. So I'm glad to be here.

CJ Kirk

Yeah, me too. I love doing this.

Joel Ellenbecker

So I wanted to tee up a conversation around masterclass and Krav Maga masterclass. So one of the first times that I came down to Houston, I mean, you had been telling me that you were doing this, and then I got to see it in action. I was still healing up for my ACL surgery, but my wife took a masterclass.

And I just think there's, I think it's really interesting. I think there's a lot of valuable stuff there to talk about.

CJ Kirk

Yeah, I love masterclass. And I think there's a group of students, a portion, a segment, a percentage of students in every school that would be interested in something like masterclass. So I'd encourage people to look into that.

Joel Ellenbecker

So what got you started on wanting to create a masterclass or, you know, like, I guess, what is it even?

CJ Kirk

Yeah, so masterclass is a supplemental class that a portion of my students go through for an additional charge that teaches Krav Maga, not based on the specific levels, but based on the application of motor skills. I'll give you an example. If you are doing inside defense to right straight punch, once that motor skill is sufficiently intact and ready for straight stab, you go right into the straight stab.

So you think of the motor skills in Krav Maga as building blocks. That's a system-first architecture, which is the only way to really develop a self-defense system. And because of that architecture, we can look at those building blocks and where they're used throughout the system, and then bring them all to bear in sort of one sub-curriculum.

So we work through the curriculum based on motor skill, and we show the students how an inside defense to right straight punch develops into a defense to a straight stab, for instance.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah, I think what I love about that is on my own personal Krav Maga journey, it was very level based, level one, level two, all the way through. And I even picked up some habits in level one with inside defense of reaching out a little bit too far with my hand or scooping down a little bit that once I got to straight stab and nice stuff became a problem and I had to fix and unlearn it. So I really liked the idea.

And I think that's how the system was designed, right? Of these motor skills or these initiating movements or these fundamental Krav Maga essential movements that fit together that can carry you through the entire system. So when do students start looking at doing a master class?

CJ Kirk

That's a great question. I like your description of master class. So like I said, it was a supplement.

So students still go through the levels in the curriculum. And usually after level two or three is when we will recruit those that are interested for a master class. So they have a grounding and experience in Krav Maga.

But what I found, and I'll answer an earlier question, what I found in my years of teaching is that when students try to optimize, for instance, inside defense like you were describing, they tend to reach too much. They tend to kind of screw the drill, essentially. And in doing that, they learn a method of inside defense that is wildly suboptimal for straight stab defense.

And what we want to do is expose them to the idea that this motor skill shows up in many places in the system and it should be utilized so that it is optimally effective in all of those various instances where the motor skills deploy. And it became such an issue for me as students grew into straight stab defense that I realized we need to open the eyes of our students around the cost of the mistake they're making within the any one drill and explain that the motor skill is going to be reused so that they can't, for instance, reach too far and redirect a right straight punch super early because there's no wall if they do that for straight stab.

So that really was the origin. It was obviously, that's where the origin of most things are is we see that there's an issue or a problem we want to address. And that was then extrapolated into why don't I just teach Krav Maga based on motor skills and not the traditional levels.

But to be clear, students go through both curriculum.

Joel Ellenbecker

Okay. So after level two or level three is when it makes sense for them to join a masterclass and they continue on their level journey and then they add this on as an extra, almost like deeper learning opportunity. One thing that was popping up for me when you were talking about optimizing one defense, as I was just thinking about how the telephone game of teacher to teacher to teacher to teacher can get a little bit lost in translation and then also how analogies can get blown out of proportion.

So I did full contact kickboxing for a while. I did a couple of sanctioned fights and then I started Krav Maga after that. And I remember when I was learning inside defense, somebody was telling me the analogy of you have to shave their arm hair off.

And I don't know if I was interpreting it wrong or if it was said wrong to me or whatever, or suboptimally, but that had me develop this habit of like, I literally was using my hand like a razor or a blade and I would move it out and down the arm to shave off the arm hair. And the reason I said the whole kickboxing thing is because that felt so wrong to me from the fight experience that I had had. The parries were a little bit more to the side, but it just like it extrapolated and then kept going beyond that.

So I don't know. I just think it's interesting, the analogies and the trying to optimize how it can lead us down a whole different path. And then all of a sudden we're not really even doing Krav Maga anymore.

And then when we get to these challenges or these high stakes straight stabs later on, our fundamentals are all over the place.

CJ Kirk

Yeah. And I've heard that before, peel the carrot or shave the arm. And the danger of using analogies is not in the analogy itself, but in the application of the analogy.

So I'm not averse to saying, shave the arm, but then someone would have to tell you that the arm is doing the movement across your fixed position of redirection, right? And if they don't tell you that, then your perspective around that analogy, because shaving is something you move the blade, right? So the analogy is an imperfect analogy.

And if they don't clarify, then you're building people for failure later. And again, that's what Masterclass is for.

Joel Ellenbecker

And through working with you a little bit, and I think because I'm athletic and I'm fast, I was doing it so subtly that maybe other people weren't catching it or seeing it. But then after we worked together, I was like, oh, it was like a light bulb. I was like, they are shaving their arm.

I'm putting the blade in place. I have that fixed position, like you said, and then their momentum and the arm coming forward, that's the actual thing. So thank you.

Now I'm better inside. A hundred percent.

CJ Kirk

Yeah. I think one of the things that we sometimes miss, and we develop into these insights because as an instructor that's been teaching Krav Maga for three months or six months, they don't have the experience with the students, nor do they have the vision for what's going to happen in a level they haven't completed yet. Does that mean they shouldn't teach?

Absolutely not. We need more people teaching Krav Maga, more people learning Krav Maga. However, I think we need people in the system that are also teaching like, hey, this analogy has been around for decades.

And I don't think it's been misinterpreted. There are very high-level people that came out of Krav Maga worldwide decades ago that are doing the same thing you're describing. They're shaving the arm.

And it's important that we have the right language in Krav Maga so that there's a shared understanding of what we're doing and why we're doing it. It's important that we have the chems and keds to a large extent to give people an understanding of what those building blocks really are. And in this case, I think it's important that the instructors that are brown belt or higher have a master class program that allows them to fully articulate, this is the motor skill, this is where it's going.

One of the things we do in our master classes, I say, look, if you go down to the hospital and you talk to people who've been stabbed, you go, oh gosh, what was it like to be stabbed? Most of them will tell you they didn't know they were being stabbed, okay? They didn't see the knife.

And when you're adrenalized, you feel like someone's just pounding on. And so, we take that reality and ask ourselves, well, does that mean then if the channel of attack between the straight stab and the right straight punch are similar enough in terms of line and level, should we do a redirection? And so, just to clarify, for straight stab, we do something called touch turn chop, right?

Should we touch turn on the right straight redirection? In other words, the turn is maybe enough to save you if you don't know it's a knife. Just redirecting the knife, if you think it's a punch, often puts the knife into your shoulder, right?

You've done a redirection and with a punch, it's the width of your head, so you're fine. But if your body defense is lagging in a straight stab defense, a lot of times, the knife will find your shoulder. But if you add a turn at all times and always for all reasons in that same channel of attack within, you know, a 12-inch vertical space or range, then you should be good whether you see the knife or not.

And so, we take the reality and we also say, but we introduce it like this, should we do this? Hey, should we do this? And the student's like, yeah, we got to do this, right?

So, they're driving some of their learning by virtue of thinking through not only how the motor skills fit, but what the danger is not only in the attack, but in recognizing attacks.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah, I love what you said about, you know, we need more Krav Maga instructors and we need more people learning Krav Maga, like Amy said, so that one may walk in peace. I was just having a conversation in class the other day that it's, you know, I think there's a lot of stuff out there on this, but it's like, if someone isn't capable of destruction or violence, they're not actually peaceful, they're just harmless.

CJ Kirk

It's true. There's a placard in the school. Let me see if I can get it right.

It says, only a warrior can be a pacifist. Everyone else must endure it.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah. And so, you know, I think the more people that are tapping into this, the safer that they're going to be, you know, also the myriad of other benefits, less stress and better shape, like all those things. And I also think you're a hundred percent right where it's like that beginner level instructor needs to continue moving through the ranks and getting a deeper, more vertical dive on the curriculum before they're ready to teach a masterclass.

And then you said Brownbelt, I think at that point, like it makes a lot of sense that it'll help even piece together the dots for an advanced instructor to go to that extra depth by being able to connect all the dots for themselves too. And I mean, I've learned so much, not only from teaching classes, but from private lessons and seminars. So I can see how that would be a big benefit to not only the students, but the instructors as well.

CJ Kirk

It's a huge benefit. And there are a segment of students in every school who are interested in the additional training. And there are probably students who are interested, but maybe don't want to spend the money or can't for whatever reason.

And so, I would encourage instructors at the Brownbelt level or higher to consider a masterclass. It has to be taught by a senior instructor, obviously. The curriculum has to make sense, obviously.

The way that you promote and explain it has to be compelling and make sense. And I think that a bunch of great things happen when you do this. One, the students get the additional insight and training.

Two, the instructor really begins to hone his or her understanding of the system and the building blocks they're in. And the school has another revenue source. All those things are critically important.

We don't talk about a lot, but schools need to make money to stay open, to do what they do, which is invaluable. And so, a masterclass makes sense for anybody who has an instructor who's Brownbelt or higher, because nothing but good can come from it.

Joel Ellenbecker

And I'm kind of using my own experience here to learn. It's like, okay, great, I'm Brownbelt or higher, and now I want to run this masterclass. And you and I have had several conversations about it.

And I think by us having this deeper conversation, we can unpack some more. How do they even get it started? Where do they start?

What's the curriculum?

CJ Kirk

Yeah. So, I think what we need to do is we need to create a curriculum that allows people a jumpstart on this type of class. And a lot of the digital assets we're going to produce are going to be in the same format, which I think is helpful.

Because I think if people have the experience, seeing the system from this perspective is really, really powerful. It helps them to see the system as a system-first architecture, as opposed to like, oh, I do this and that, the other thing. And I don't even think people necessarily recognize that when they do plucking in level one, level two, that they're actually doing either the same type of pluck or leveraging the same set of principles, speed and leverage at 90 degrees, to make those plucks of use in their self-defense arsenal.

So, giving somebody this, it really turns on another light in another room in the mansion of Krav Maga. So, we should probably do that.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah. And definitely, if people are interested in something like that, just send us a message and reach out. And I think for me, and I know you've heard stuff like this before, it's like or you've said stuff like this before, I should say, EMEA gave us the framework, the foundations, these techniques, put the system together for us.

So, I think anybody who's a higher level black belt could probably figure out building this masterclass and it would just take them however long it's taken you, years and years and years to get to the point where it is. So, I think there's a lot of value in having a quick start or a breakdown of like, oh, here's I get it going.

CJ Kirk

Yeah. It took me a number of years to not so much to put the pieces together, but to decide where to start and how to teach it and in what order the curriculum should be taught. And like I said, you're building a base from level one, level two.

So, inside defense, 360, outside defense, make a lot of sense in terms of where to start. The other thing we do, is we talk about efficiency of movement. So, if you think of inside defense and people reaching too far, we have what we call the eight efficient defense drill.

And it's meant to show people that there are eight defenses that they can make in terms of airy cover in the front, cover in the back, defend the center line at the midsection, defend the liver and kidney on the right and left. And the eight efficient defense kind of is really as a drill. It's not really a defense, but it's really a drill.

And so, we'll stop people and say, okay, if you're making this defense freeze right here, okay, can you still make your eight efficient defense drill? Are you still four or five inches from every defense in the eight? And if they say no, then they go, okay, well, you've left your body too much.

And I don't want to go into this too much, but I think we've talked about this before. I don't think people fully understand that when you say, when I say, when people say, we're going to address the danger, that there is the primary danger, which is sometimes obvious. There's also a secondary and tertiary danger in almost every defense before you get to counterattack if you're going sequentially.

And people don't know that. And as a result, people reach too far, for instance. It's like, okay, what's your secondary danger?

Well, your secondary danger may be the danger you create in developing a defense that has unintended consequences because the defense is either done suboptimally or you're unaware of how the defense might be done and what other risks are associated with action, right? The ultimate risk is inaction, but there are risks associated with action, and you have to build those risks into the defense and teach it in a way that people understand. So not only do the motor skills matter, but the student's understanding of primary, secondary, and tertiary danger before you ever get to counterattack is, I think, paramount.

Joel Ellenbecker

Josh McCallen Yeah. And maybe an example of doing a defense suboptimally and then creating another danger is like headlock from behind where people pluck and maybe they don't get their head tucked quite enough and they start to lean over and then they just put themselves right into side headlock.

CJ Kirk

Yeah, that would be an example of a secondary danger that they created by a suboptimal execution of the defense, right? And we don't have time to go through all of it, but there's also secondary danger by virtue of making a block. What's the secondary danger?

I'm not saying that the defense isn't great. It's fantastic. What I'm saying is you have to be aware of the consequences of every action you take, at least in a reasonably self.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah. And so years of working on masterclass, figuring out where to start, bringing students through it, what are the results you're seeing now from the students who've gone through or are still in the masterclass?

CJ Kirk

Josh McCallen There's two elements of masterclass. The first one is the group that goes through the motor skill-based application of masterclass that we're describing. There's another subset of people that will go through something that we call reclamation, which is doing the coaching and the mental slash head work to be able to confront the idea that what you're doing is preparing for supervillain attack.

How do you want to perform when you get there? Really, what are your fears? What are you fighting for?

What is your personal ethos? If you have a sharpened spear or blade, when will you use it? When won't you use it?

How does that relate to your ethos? So it's really doing a lot of the mental and emotional preparation and even some intuitive preparation, situational intelligence that people miss in their preparation. So in those courses, the classes are hour and a half.

The first half an hour is really a group coaching session with sort of, for lack of a better word, homework. And then we actually train, right? Both of those are popular, but if someone was going to do a motor skill-based masterclass, they might charge $75 to $150 more per month than they do currently.

If they add the coaching element, it can be substantially more. I think the last time we did a coaching element, which has been a minute, we were at almost $800 a month. And those are people who are very keen to sharpen both sides of their blade and to ensure that they understand the skill.

They understand where it fits in the system, how it's utilized, but they also do a lot of preparation work around, what am I going to do this and why? Which only serves to really powerfully prepare them for the day.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah, that's incredible. And I mean, it seems like there's a lot of upside for the school and the instructor. And then we've talked about it on the podcast before, but you have one of the most successful cadres of instructors.

Is that also a breeding ground for instructors for you? Like obviously the students are signing up and doing this $800 a month program. What makes it so valuable or what results do they see afterwards?

CJ Kirk

Yeah. I just realized I didn't answer your results question. So yeah.

And there are a section or a portion that come from masterclass.

Joel Ellenbecker

Hey CJ, I lost you for a second. Let's start over. It like froze right at the, when you're like, oh, I didn't realize I answered your question.

Yeah. So I need to answer that question fully. A lot of our instructors actually come from the regular Krav Maga curriculum.

And I think there's reasons for that. And there are a few that come from the masterclass. I think masterclass has, will be populated primarily more by people who are more established, who are in a place in their life where they really want to understand this and they're willing and able to not only engage in it, but pay for it.

So one of the things I didn't say earlier is my masterclass is open to all my instructors. So if they're good standing, they can come in at any time and train. So they're getting, even if you're a level one instructor, right?

As long as you're teaching your classes, doing your thing. So they get the benefit of that. So in one way or another, masterclass really impacts the way we develop our instructors and the way we initially find our instructors.

But I will tell you this, I remember the first group that came through masterclass, which was probably seven or eight years ago, was doing the test at the end, right? And I had some eye level black belts come in and watch, and they were blown away because these people were essentially green belts in the system. And I remember the first group that came through masterclass, which was seven or eight years ago, was doing the test at the end, right?

And I had some eye level black belts come in and watch, and they were blown away because these people were blown away because these people were essentially green belts in the system.

CJ Kirk

But they were doing a straight stab defense, 360 defense with a knife, outside defense with a knife. They were doing hanging defenses around the body. They were doing longer defenses.

They were doing, you know, really nice, efficient, structured, speed, power, and balance, oriented striking. And they told me they were blown away. They're like, they look like brown belts.

And they did. I was so impressed with them and the work that they did. It makes a difference.

It makes a difference for your students to not only understand the movement they're making in the moment to address whatever danger is in context for that day in class, but also to understand it's going to be reused many times. It makes a difference. They invest heavily in making that motor skill work for all those defenses, for all those, you know, sets of danger.

It's just fantastic, truly fantastic.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah, that's amazing. I mean, I've been, like I said, I went to that master class and I don't know what level any of the students were that were in the class and they all looked really sharp. They looked like some of the, you know, highest level students at my school and they might've been lower ranked even.

CJ Kirk

Yeah. Most of them are, are orange or green belt. I think we have, there's some that are prepping now for blue belt, but that's the majority of them.

Joel Ellenbecker

That's awesome. Yeah. So when you first launched the master class, did you just like put it out to your student base or did you handpick and select, I'm sure if we make a course we'll dive even deeper, but what I'm just curious as to like, how did you get, how'd you get people to want to do it?

CJ Kirk

Well, we, we didn't necessarily invite anybody. Um, but we had some prerequisites and to have prerequisites, you have to have enough faith in the instructor cadre at your school to know that if someone shows up as an orange belt or a green belt, that, that they're sufficiently trained, um, so that they have a motor skill that you can help them to refine. Um, other than that, we did a lot of discussion around, um, the time it would take to commit, what it would take.

Um, and, and people seem to be, um, energized by that. Like for, for a masterclass, it's a 36 month commitment. And in those 36 months at the end, um, they're eligible to test for brown belt.

And a lot of people love the idea of getting sort of the inside look at this sort of mid range goal of, of really upping their game enough to test for Bravo and they, you, you, the tests are fantastic, but they really are. So remote internally, um, think about all the benefits you're going to offer. Um, you know, getting the inside look at the system.

And what I tell people is imagine the system is like floating around you and you're looking at it from the outside. We're going to walk you into the middle. Unless you see it from the inside.

And the way we're going to do that is through the motor skill, motor skill development and understanding. So that's one example of, of, um, how people sort of visualize that.

Joel Ellenbecker

That's great. And are they, are they training, you know, it's a supplemental class, so they're doing their regular training. And then are they adding this on one or two times a week or what is the recommendation there?

CJ Kirk

Yeah, we usually have two or three classes a week and we ask people to attend at least two classes a week. Nice. That's a great question.

Um, you don't want to, uh, bog someone down in terms of the instructor group, uh, with the class and it's, it's better to have a single instructor teach the course so that there's a level of consistency in how everything's delivered, it's not, it's not, you know, it's not a rule, it's not written anywhere, but it's better to have it that way. So two to three times a week is plenty. That's great.

I would also say, you know, I taught a sheepdog course this weekend and people were asking about, you know, how, how do we shoot the pistol? And I have this, you know, this form of grip, rip rock, press, press, press fire. And I teach what it means and why we do each of the steps and how we do each of the steps.

And then I connect it back to grab my guy. I'm like, why are we snapping? Uh, or why are we, uh, smacking and racking a certain way?

It's because if you get caught in the middle of that, someone's close to you, which is, you know, virtually all the time in a, when you're exchanging gunfire, um, and they're, they're pressing you, um, if you smack and rack a certain way, you're going to be, you know, you're not going to be able to strike with your weapon. You're not going to be able to respond properly. And so I was talking to them about why we do things that to some people feel suboptimal.

It was like, because the thing you're doing isn't the only thing you may need to do. The thing you're doing may turn into something else. And so it's a system first architecture, obviously inspired by Krav Maga, fits with Krav Maga.

And so we had this long discussion, Joel, and I say this to my kids, everything's a test, everything is training and everything worthwhile is a system, right? So this is a system and this system can bolt onto your Krav Maga training. If it can, it's worthless.

And I tried to get everybody to see that if you, and I even said, um, I think it's Archilochus and the Greek that said, um, you don't arise to the level of your expectations, you fall to the level of your training. And I said, it's not your training. You fall to the level of your systems, right?

And training is a part of your system. Right. And I tried to get everybody to understand that the quality of your system is what determines your outcome.

And masterclass is another way to show students the Krav Maga system in a way that has all these powerful, um, incentives to perform in, uh, within the system in a way that it was designed.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah, I think that's, that's amazing. And, um, I don't, I don't know. I think it would be interesting to, um, you know, speak with people who are a little bit closer to EMI and might've known, but I can kind of imagine that as Krav Maga was first developed, I don't, I don't know that it was, you know, very specifically, like you have to do this, this, and this it's like, it was designed, you know, partly for like the IDF as well.

And they, they don't have the kind of training that normal civilians might do now where it's like, you know, three, four or five times a week, whatever people are doing, it's like they had to learn it quick and be able to, um, utilize it. So walking into the middle of the system and seeing all of the pieces, I think gives a bigger, fuller understanding of what it is and how to use it.

CJ Kirk

It does. And I think the thing that's missing for most people is that powerful incentive to not to beat the drill, but to operate within the auspices of the motor skill and to not, um, you know, shrink or expand the motor skill to look cool in the drill. And that's, I mean, that's one of the biggest keys to, to seeing the system, you know, from the inside out.

Joel Ellenbecker

Well, I think there's a lot of different versions of beating the drill, but just for my own understanding, you know, like I see this in all sorts of different places in the system, but like, let's say we're working in choke from the front with a push and the person is just leaning like forward, almost into the choke so that their shoulders never go back over, over their hips, it's like they're not allowing themselves to be off balance or out of position when they would actually need to utilize the technique, like that's one way of it. But what are, what are other ways or what were you referencing when you mean beat the drill?

CJ Kirk

Well, we talked about inside defense earlier, right? Where we overextend, we know the punch is coming down the middle. Uh, so we know we can sneak closer to the center line.

We can extend our defense further than it should be extended to start the redirection sooner. So there are a number of ways that students will, will formulate their defense around a drill. And that's disastrous.

You never form a defense around a drill. A drill isn't, it should be an application of the skill. So, and the drills meant to show you where you need to shore up your skillset, right, where the defense needs to be stored up.

So a lot of people bring, um, sort of almost, um, a sense that they, that they want to do well and they, and so either implicitly or explicitly, they are manipulating the drill. I'm not even saying, you know, if it's implicit, maybe they don't know. And great instructors have to explain it.

And they have to show them what the consequences are of building muscle memory or myelination around a motor skill that cannot be reused successfully.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah. I love that. And it makes me think, um, you know, when people are, you know, maybe leaning forward or reaching out too far to make that inside defense, um, and, you know, cheating the drill and doing that, they're robbing themselves of the ability to, to create a structure.

Like you were talking about before, where it's like, if I actually allow myself to fail because my technique wasn't up to snuff, then that can start a process or a structure of, oh, I messed up there. Okay. Well now, what do I do with that mistake?

Well, here's what I do next. And here's what I do next. And then that fits into that structure and allows the growth.

CJ Kirk

Yeah. If you were doing inside defense for me and you're reaching too far and you're making too much of a head defense, what's too much, well, when you put the preponderance of your weight in your left foot so that your counterattack is delayed until you can put the weight back in your right foot and burst in. Right.

Okay. So we talk about that. I see.

Okay. If you extend this far, your, your wall's gone, you made your redirection, but what happens if there's a knife? Is the redirection sufficient?

Does, because the knife comes in from the right side and it, as it extends, it goes left and it falls. So what happens now? Is your motor skills still sufficient?

What if you didn't see the knife? What happens? People would think, oh, okay, well, let's run through it.

Let's look at it. Well, I see it now. Okay.

Now, if you're, if your counterattack to a right straight punch is, um, delayed because of, you know, you moved your head too much, right? You made a head defense and in doing so you, you put 70% of the weight in your left foot. You now cannot drive off your right foot.

Is that catastrophic? Maybe not if they're punching at you, but someone is stabbing you. They're going to retract that knife because they're not going to, they're not going to throw a left hook next.

They're going to retract the knife. They're going to attack again with the same hand. They're going to want to do it quickly.

So now what happens now? You have to shift your weight to enter, but the knife's been retracted. You've lost a knife.

You're still in the channel of attack. You can't move yet. What happens now?

And so just walking the student through that, showing him where the motor skill is going to be utilized and helping them to see the ramifications of beating the drill by moving their head too far, by shifting the weight too much, by reaching out too far. It's like you're training for catastrophic failure and straight stab, is that what you want?

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah. And we need, and we need that feedback. We need to feel like what happens when it goes, when it goes South or it goes wrong so we can make the adjustments in our technique and our training and in our, in our processes.

CJ Kirk

Yeah, I, one of the things I'm just thinking here is, you know, I, I just said, is that what you want? That's one of the questions we ask a lot. And I found that years and decades ago.

And I was training somebody, it was an instructor group and the particular guy was, kept doing the same thing over and I kept telling him, no, we need to do it this way. And he, he stopped. He looked at me and said, what do you want from me?

And what came out of my mouth was just sort of intuitive. I was like, what do you want for yourself? How do you want this to go?

And so when you say that to a student, they have to take inventory around. Yeah. What do I really want to happen?

Do I want this defense right now or this interaction to go well, or do I want to learn this so I can be safer? And a lot of times, you know, putting it back on the student saying, what do you want for yourself is the most powerful way to get them to move forward.

Joel Ellenbecker

Wow. Yeah, that's incredible. I think even, you know, all my time and experience as an instructor, it can be, it can be really easy to fall into like, well, this is how we do it.

This is how I need you to do, or this is what I like to do or all this sort of thing, and it's like, well, ultimately what, what, what are they here for? What do they want? And if they want to learn to protect themselves in the most optimal, efficient way, well then, yeah, then this is, this is the way it is.

CJ Kirk

A hundred percent. I would also say about masterclass that we do have students that come in and they do have limitations, right? I have a trick shoulder for instance.

And so having an instructor that can help them modify within the framework of the motor skill itself is really critical. And people are, I think, um, emboldened by the idea that, that they can in their own physical state, um, still do the defense and still see that motor skill and that defense within the entire system. So look, I don't want to sugarcoat it.

You have to be, um, you have to be someone who understands the system to teach a masterclass. Um, but if you're paying attention and, you know, if we, I think a Brownbelt above could follow the blueprint. Um, if we took the time to make one, but there's what you're giving the students is substantial, lots of benefits.

Joel Ellenbecker

And does a masterclass feel like a normal problem? Like for me, it's like a normal problem. Our class has this like undulation of tempo and timing and effort and energy.

It's like a burst of, you know, aggressive adrenaline. And then it's like a calmed down period of like absorbing and learning and then a burst again. And I think sometimes even just in normal.

Prof classes, we miss out on the ability to slow down, like the touch turn chop, when I worked that with you, it was like just a lot of, you know, slow, smooth, smooth, as fast. Right. It's like a lot of the reps of just having that motion.

So as masterclass like that, where it's like a lot of slow reps, or is it a mixture of like a regular problem? I got class.

CJ Kirk

That's a great question, Joel. Um, there's a rhythm to the class, a masterclass that's, that's different from a more, um, regular carbon class. If that's the term we want to use.

And we look at it almost like a workout with the students. And so what we do is we say this, we want to myelinate, you know, muscle memory. We want to myelinate this skill.

So what I want you to do is we're going to train, you know, inside defense. We're going to train the redirection, the touch and the turn, or maybe just the touch to start with. And we're going to do that.

Um, until I check you off, you're checked out. You have the skill now, once you have the skill, you're going to do that skill a number of times, right? And so in the class, if everyone's been checked off or checked out of, let's say inside defense to write straight punch and the motor skill we're focused on as a redirection, they know what the initiating movement is.

They know what the physical cues are. Then we'll say, okay, today I want you to confirm it. Okay.

It looks good. Everybody's got it. Okay.

There's a and B A's we're going to work out. We're gonna do 10 sets of 10. Everybody gets a hundred reps on this the same way.

So the masterclass allows people to, to understand that the format is, um, to capture sufficiently the motor skill and then to get the reps to myelinated. So it is a more thoughtful, methodical March than it is a sort of an up and down rhythm. And at the end of that process, when it looks really, really good, we'll have like these mini tests where the energy is high and the tempo is very, very high and I like that, um, temple for people to learn myelination.

And, and I, you know, I borrowed that from the book, the talent code. If you haven't read that book, anybody out there, make sure you read it. But you're, that's a great question.

The rhythm is different masterclass for sure.

Joel Ellenbecker

That's cool. And we've mentioned it before the chems and the kids, the Krav Maga central movements, Krav Maga center drills. Would you, would you classify like the touch turn chop as a Krav Maga central drill?

Or is that still like just part of the technique?

CJ Kirk

Yeah. The, the touch and the turn really are an essential movement and the chop could be considered as well. A drill would be, you know, having 10 people line up and utilizing touch turn shop, the skillset, the motor skill, um, to just isolate that skill over and over and over again.

And we've all done that, right? And one of the telltale signs that things are going wrong, not wrong when there's really suboptimal is in that drill of people don't want to run at the person anymore because their arm is really hurting. That means the person's going straight to a turning motion, which, which bangs bone on bone.

So there's not a redirection that, um, is diagonal and orientation is just left to right. And that's not a good idea because if you go left to right, you're early or late and you, you miss it all together. So that's the problem.

I got a central movement is say the touch turn chop. The drill is how do we express that skill and isolate it?

Joel Ellenbecker

Cool. Yeah. Cause I think that, um, I did a lot of teaching karate before I started teaching Krav and, you know, we would see something off with a kick or something, and then we might be in the middle of a high energy drill or some partner work or something like that.

And it's like, we would stop that student and like kind of pull them off to the side and be like, Hey, do this. I think Kelly calls them training methods, but it also could be called a drill, but in Kravitz have these high, high intensity drills and it's not that it's different from that it's like, here's a training method or here's. Something that you can work like the touch turn chop or, you know, picking up your knee and pivoting your leg or something like that, that'll help you with whatever technique you're working on.

And I think, I think sometimes those can just get overlooked in a Krav class, maybe with more junior instructors where it's like, if you see something that somebody is stuck on or their myelination is off, or you're not getting, having a little trick or training method or something that they can do to fix that piece of it.

CJ Kirk

Yeah. We, we file that under remediation, right? So the Krav Maga essential movement is a movement like, like touch turn chop, which is redirection and, and control.

Um, the, um, drill is the, you know, people running out and isolating that skill and then the remediation is, Oh, well, you know, there was a, there was an issue we identified. And here's an action you can take to address that issue.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah. I like that. Yeah.

And I mean, I think sometimes those training methods can go too far one way and then people misinterpret the technique. But I think that's also because the framework of the Krav Maga essential movement isn't there for them. Um, you know, like this is just one we use in karate where it's like, if people's elbows were flaring out and they're hitting with their back knuckles, it's like we would put a magazine under their armpit and they would pinch the to help them keep their, their arm down.

Like, I don't think that that's going to mess your straight punch up too much, but there are some other training drills where it's like, or methods where it's like, we're isolating this thing. And then all of a sudden just gets, you know, turned into a whole different technique that that's not what we're trying to do.

CJ Kirk

Yeah. There's a prolific issue around misinterpreting drills as skill or technique or defense. Right.

And that's something instructors have to always keep their eye on. Even the, the idea of a magazine between the arm and the, the body. It's like, okay.

Um, fantastic idea for keeping the elbow pointed at the floor and for not flaring the elbow. Secondary question, are we creating a different set of movements with the muscles that we can't replicate with the punch because we're squeezing the magazine for instance, right? Yeah.

For me, the answer, the answer is actually no now, because when people's elbows, where I say, I want your shoulders and your arms relaxed, but you can pull your elbows in with your latissimus, right? Sure. But if you do a training drill, what we call remediation and the muscle sequence is different than the point is made, but the myelination is stopped.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah. Interesting.

CJ Kirk

So the level of depth and thinking you have to go in, that has to go into a masterclass is not insignificant. You had a great example because it's, it aligns in all ways, but there are also examples that do not align and the instructors have to be aware of those things.

Joel Ellenbecker

That's interesting. I mean, I think, um, just for myself, I learned a lot more about masterclass and, um, we've had a couple of requests of people who, um, are highly skilled, talented black belts who would like to, to incorporate, um, masterclass at their, at their school. So I think us creating a blueprint and, you know, having a step-by-step checklist of like, here's how you get it started.

Here's how you launch it. Here's how you facilitate. I think that would be really valuable.

And if, if anyone else thinks so, please reach out. We'll put you on our list.

CJ Kirk

Yeah, I think it's, I think it's terribly valuable. And again, the benefits, um, the instructor really grows by looking at the system, teaching the system this way, even if the instructor is not discovering at all, the fact that they have to teach it and apply it is still really super powerful. The students grow in a way that they probably didn't know they could.

And the school benefits, which means that the doors stay open and more people are in Krav Maga. So it's like this virtuous cycle that, um, masterclass brings to each Krav Maga school.

Joel Ellenbecker

I love that. Thank you for thinking of it and creating it and putting it out there. I think, uh, one thing that kind of pops into my head is like, when, you know, we have a podcast where you talk about your story and how you got into Krav Maga.

And you've often said, like, I didn't even really, I didn't even want to teach it. I just wanted to learn all of it. I just wanted to go deep on it.

And you even said it in this conversation where you're like, well, yeah, I just, I created this because it was a need and it was solved the problem. So I think it's, um, kind of a cool full circle moment where it's like, you created a program for the you that started Krav Maga.

CJ Kirk

Yeah, I essentially that's true. And, um, I'm sure people are doing different things based on their perspective and their, their needs in the school. Uh, but I would encourage people to think about a masterclass of some kind that, that really turbocharges learning and understanding, um, not only in the students, but in the instructor, the instructor cadre, just, we don't talk about this enough, if you're a Krav Maga student, um, you're doing something that, that isn't, you know, we don't have a right.

It's a privilege and maybe it sounds self-serving, but it's a privilege to go into a school and learn from someone who's dedicated years of training to teach you to navigate what might be the worst day of your life. And if that's there, if that's what they do for a living and they're a high level professional, uh, make sure they get paid, make sure they can keep It's, it's, it's fundamental to, um, to their being able to, to sort of meet their meat and exceed in the way that they make meaning in their lives. And the truth is this, this is, this is not Karate Kid.

This is not, you know, a little karate, you know, studio that you expect to pay $79. And these are super high level people that have been through the best training, uh, in terms of worldwide that you can get. Uh, to learn to save your life.

So make sure that the, you bring that perspective and if there's a master class and you're a student by all means, if it's within your budget, if you can, you know, not go out one, one night a week and have dinner and drinks with somebody, put that money towards masterclass, you'll be shocked at what you look like in the next 12 months.

Joel Ellenbecker

Yeah. Sounds like it's going to change their lives. Thanks again, CJ.

Great conversation. Always great.