Reality, no place for traditional drills

[stoli]

Well let's just state the f***in obvious here before we go on.

TRADITIONAL ONE AND TWO STEP DRILLS HAVE NO PLACE IN ANY REALITY BASED TRAINING.

Any one who's been in a real situation will tell you that. Yes you can train drills for reality but they cannot be structured, the real situations aren't structured so drills cannot be. Best advice I can give is take what happened in the situations you've been in and react differently to them, adapt your initial reactions to see if you can find a method of dealing with the situation that works for you. There are lots of methods for de-escalating situations before you fight, pushing the attacker away and keeping your hands raised is good, ready to take the moth**fu**ers eyes out if he decides to keep coming.

Anyway there's the answer to the original post, but remember that some styles have drills in their system which aren't pre-arranged and can help with skills like sensitivity!!

[dezhen2001]

so you just answered your own post?:confused:

there are many different ways of training for the same thing.... Partner drills teach you about timing, body movement, footwork, distance, feeling/reading movement and energy and a whole host of other things. They help you understand principles which can apply to many different things.

Also, many are not static (in fact most), but they help develop attributes which imo are more important than any technique that you know (distance, timing, awarness, a calm head etc.). If you don't have these, then how can you apply techniques?

Also, i've been in a few 'real' situations and the attitude that i have developed through training in TMA is the thing that has saved me from getting stabbed and really beat up... so i guess it depends on the person and their teacher :)

i would disagree that 'pushing the attacker away' is a good method of de-escalating a fight. that's an aggressive movement. There are many other ways to do this... take a step back for example.

I guess a lot depends on how you train, your attitude and the actual sitation that you are in :)

david

[stoli]

OK, first of all one and two step drills do have a place in training, I don't disagree with that but not in reality based training, these drills are pre-arranged. Your 'opponent' steps back then attacks with a pre set strike. This might teach a beginner a few very simple things but timing, a calm head etc etc ??? I disagree, you know what's going to happen, if you've been training for more than a few months then you should move beyond set drills, you're kinda comparing painting by numbers to a Monet in my eyes, sorry. Also you need to understand de-escalation, it isn't necessarily a passive thing, learning to control your opponent is vital and the push will give you distance and, often will make your attacker think twice about hitting you, which is the aim.

[dezhen2001]

Stoli: i was just answering your original post... you said :-

"TRADITIONAL ONE AND TWO STEP DRILLS HAVE NO PLACE IN ANY REALITY BASED TRAINING."

and i said there are many types of drills. Yes, many start of with a pre-arranged sequence. what does that teach you (think more than just the block and counter). It teaches you how to deal with a certain type of movement (straight punch for example), and how to apply a principle against them (such as moving offline and covering). This principle can then be used against many different movements that use the same kind of energy (jab, cross, frint kick etc.)

But, many drills also are not as fixed as that. In Fact, that is just something you usually learn as a beginner. Maybe they start off with a fixed technique, or a combination... than they change in to a free defence or whatever. An old style i used to do basically had a set 1st attck, any counter, then the attacker also countered so you get in to kinda 'free sparring' as the defence is not set. Also think about a boxer working on the pads, what does that teach him? Practising his jab or hook etc. that's a drill too. getting the pad wearer to hook so you bob under etc. same thing. still training awarness and distance etc. so that you can maximise whatever you do. Working in the ring with a partner attacking and you just defending is also a type of drill... all develop different skills which add to the whole. I think trying to defend against someone who is constantly attacking you will teach you how to stay calm :)

Also think about something like sticking hands or pushing hands training. they are partner drills but are not fixed and teach a heck of a lot about distance and sensitivity. Also how to get in to the right place at the right time, stay calm and relaxed posture, footwork etc.

i didn't say de-escalation had to be passive. All i said was that pushing someone away if they're up in your face tends to be regarded as an aggressive thing (saying as they are already het up about something). Again, this is just from my own experience. How about moving back, or to the side, it creates distance as well...?

:)
david

[JWTAYLOR]

Traditional drills have NO place in reality training?

Yes, they do.

Traditional 1 and 2 step drills, when actually DRILLED over and over and over again can develope an automatic reaction.

For instance, when I was a kid we used to drill outward block, punch, upward block, punch, lower block, punch, block punch, block punch, block punch for ever. By the time I was 18 years old I had done this thousands of times. Probably tens of thousands of times.

When someone attacked me and tried to stab me, I blocked and punched. He cut my arm, but the punch put him down and I ran. The drill went EXACTLY like it was supposed to. I didn't have to think. I saw a movement comming at me, (I didn't recognize a knife, no time) and I executed the movements that I had drilled.

A simple, 2 step drill saved my life.

Now let's take a ring sport, like boxing. Many gyms teach that when someone throws a jab to immediately throw out a hook over the jab. The way they train this is that someone throws a jab, and the other guy throws the hook. They do that drill until it's automatic, jab = hook. When the figther steps into the ring and someone throws a jab, out comes the hook. It's automatic.

The problem with your argument is this statement


adapt your initial reactions

Impossible. That's your initial reaction. You can't adapt it. It's already happened. There isn't time to THINK about what you are going to do when you are attacked. There is only time to, as you put it, react. Traditional drills help you react in an appropriate manner. After that, you can adapt away.

BTW, there is no such thing as an unstructured drill. It's an oxymoron. If it's a drill, it's structured.

JWT

[dezhen2001]

good post JWT, i didn't notice that when i first read it :)

david

[scotty1]

Sorry Stoli your thinking is flawed.

Pushing a potential aggressor is not a good way to de-escalate a situation. If someone is in your face and you push them, unless they're scared of you (in which case they wouldn't BE in your face) then that's just going to tell them that you want to get physical.

And JWT has just demonstrated why traditional drills are useful for building reflex.

[Dark Knight]

Drills are an important part of training. Just as much as sparring, sensitivity drills, bag work...

All of these are part of your training. By repeating them you will develop habits and reactions when the time come. Timing and fluidity are important in fighting, these drills are the foundation of them, later in your training you want to make them more difficult and realistic, but without them being drilled in time after time, they will not be natural.

[dnc101]

I study American Kenpo, and we (as most people know) don't use one steps. However, I work out with a bunch of TKD nuts, and I recently started going thru their one steps and applying our principles to them. I've got to tell you that there's gold in those drills- you just have to dig for it. Try this approach:

1: The movements are broken up for training/ learning purposes. But instead of block then punch, do both at the same time when possible. Some of the more advanced drills do this. But part of being an advanced belt is to do the lower belt stuff at your advanced level.

2: Look at what different attacks the move can be used against, as well as the possibility of using it as an opening attack. The moves are taught as options. It's up to you to apply them to specific situations.

3: Try the moves with your fighting stance. I havn't seen many people try to fight from a front stance. Most TKDers use a stance somewhere between a Hapkido stance and our neutral bow. What I'm finding in this exercise is that the one steps work even better from my neutral bow/ their fighting stance, and the principles directly transfer. For example, useing a stance change to a forward bow instead of a front stance- both add power and enhance stability, but the neutral bow/ TKD fighting stance leaves you more maneuverable.

4: Change up the order of strikes, alter the targets or strikes, and play with a few what if's. What if's have a tendency to happen, and they make your drills a little more interesting. Have some fun with it.

5: After you've dissected the one step, work it up to street force with the actual attacks you think it would work for. You'll soon find out if you were right. You may have to rethink it at this time, or maybe just tweek things a bit- angles, foot positioning, timeing- fine tuning.

6: Use some common sense. Some of the one steps are just meant to work on basics. The best example I can think of is where a punch is blocked with a kick. Some of those TKDistas are pretty good kickers, but no one (that I've seen anyhow) blocks punches with front snap kicks. My read on those one steps is that they teach accurate kicks, and moveing into the next strike (usually another kick) with ballance and power. And my sparring experiences with these guys attests to the fact that it works.

For me this is all just an interesting digression, although I'm getting a lot out of it. But if your style uses one steps then I'd recomend this approach as necessary to truly learning and using your art. Like anything, what you get out of the martial arts is directly related to what you put in to your training.

[omegapoint]

Originally posted by guohuen
No drills=no plan= no form= no stability= no balance=losing. = NO DOUBT!