Knowing who, how, where, why in the moment

[Brad Souders]

I was just writing on an area imo that is not touched to often. And that is the mental tension in the heat of the beginning stages of a fight.

First we have who. Who is the person your starting with. Not so much the name of the person but, How tall is he? About what does he weigh? Who is with him?

Training we use for this: Obvisious everyone uses this training. You get this from training with your different training partners. This is also another reason i like to train at a couple different schools.

Second we have How. How is he approaching you? How are his friends reacting if he has any around? How is his stance left/right, hands high/low, body posture, etc....

Training method we use: One person stands in the middle of the mat in front of a line. Each classmate comes up to him and they start the "play". The classmate has already decided what he is going to do. Right before the "fight" begins the instructor stops the "play" and ask the person what he picks up from the opponent such as:

hands are high/moving around pretty well probably a boxer or good with hands,

Crouching over slightly at the knees ad is changing height levels probably a wrestler wanting the takedown

One hand behind his back: possible weapon attack etc...

Next we have where: Where is this conflict? Where are the nearest exits? Where is the best place not to end up? This situation should be take care of before anything should happen. I mean when you enter a place with a tough guy ego ala bars and such.

We uses this as training: We have a small hallway in our school. I'm talking probably about 4 ft across. One person goes to the back of the hall in the bathroom and closes the door behind them. While they are in there things are changed. Weapons such as chairs, ladders, trash cans, and anything else found about anywhere is there. There could also be any given amount of people in the hallway. Now the person then is told to leave the bathroom and is make there way out of the hallway trying not to cause any trouble. Sometimes the person will be aloud to leave with no altercation, others the opponents will start something and the persons job is not to "beat up" the opponent but to take him out and get out of the hallway.

Finally we have why: Why is this fight going to occur?

This is pretty simple and doesn't require much training. Just yourself this, Is my life in danger, Is my family in danger

If you answer yes to either question then the decsion is in your hands.

Just wondering what you guys do for this type of training?

[Ryu]

I go over full contact scenario drills all the time. Headgear and gloves on, one will encroach on another and go into any type of scenario. They MAY or MAY NOT throw a sucker punch. Some will just walk away.... it's up to the defender to figure out what's coming, IF something's coming, and either attack first, block the attack (whatever it may be... you don't know if it's a haymaker or a hidden knife attack, etc.)

Scenario training is priceless, and infinite in possibilities.
Sammy Franco and Richard Dimitri, and also people like Geoff Thompson, and Marc MacYoung deal almost exclusively with this type of street awareness training.

Ryu

[Brad Souders]

You may actually like this one for mma training Ryu. We start off clinched with just the regular three ouncers on. You can use and strike,sweep,throw,or takedown you want but you can NOT leave clinching range. I thought the first time we did all whatever this ****s going to be like everything else. HAHA!!! God i love feel

P.S. Obvisious no ko shots just enough to know you got hit ;)

[rogue]

No real scenario training in my school, but we did do it in JJJ. Now I'll practice what-if 's where ever I am. I also have a friend who is real good at real world tactics who helps teach me about awareness when we're just going about our business. I don't believe he was big on teaching scenario training at his school as he's never mentioned it on how he trained people.

The problem is mistaking a scenario for how it could go down outside the dojo. I think the awarenss elements you listed Brad are great but could be trained, maybe better, anywhere outside of the dojo. Just sitting in a bar or restaurant watching people interact is an education in itself. The above mentioned friend used to always comment if I picked a good table when we'd meet for lunch or drinks, or if I wasn't paying attention to who left and who came in the door, who went into the bathroom and did they come out, my normal stance, what is the person next to me wearing. Just a lot of little things that can't be simulated. No matter how hard we try to simulate the real world in our schools it's still an artificial environment, and just because we perform well within it doesn't mean we'll perform the same out in the world.:)