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phantom
05-16-2001, 05:30 PM
Jerry Peterson teaches this style in Arizona, I think. May magazines seem to give high praise to the effectiveness of this art. But is it really worth looking into? Thank you for any insight that youcould give me regarding this topic.

rogue
05-16-2001, 05:50 PM
What magazines?

Adventure is just a romantic name for trouble. It sounds swell when you write about it, but it's hell when you meet it face to face in a dark and lonely place.
Louis L'Amour

Watchman
05-16-2001, 06:59 PM
They did a write-up on it in Soldier of Fortune a while back. I'll have to dig the issue out of my archives.

dwid
05-16-2001, 08:18 PM
A lot of people on the main kung-fu forum and the reality fighting forum diss scars pretty hard. I don't have a lot of personal knowledge about it, but my bagua instructor, who has an incredible applied understanding of various styles of kung-fu , has gone to two levels of scars training, and swears by the stuff he learned there. It's not what you'd call competition-fighting oriented. It's just really simple ways to overwhelm an opponent with sheer aggressiveness - at least from what my instructor has shown me. He also said that Jerry Petersen is not a large man, but is a really scary guy. Anyone my instructor would describe this way deserves my respect if nothing else.

_________________________________________
The way of the samurai is in desperateness. Ten men or more cannot kill such a man. Common sense will not accomplish great things. Simply become insane and desperate. - Hagakure

Knifefighter
05-16-2001, 09:39 PM
I talked to one of the competitors before he fought in a Pancrase cage match this last weekend. He said he had studied SCARS and done some wrestling. I watched his match closely as I was curious to see what techniques he used. From what I could see, the only things he was able to use came from wrestling. He ended up losing to a not very skilled opponent.

GinSueDog
05-16-2001, 11:52 PM
I have had the misfortune of buying some SCARS videos about two years ago out of curiosity. It was the biggest waste of money IMHO. One of the reasons magazines like Men's Health or Details gives SCARS good reviews is simply from the fact that the writers have no idea what they are actually talking about. As for Black belt, why would Black belt or any other martial arts magazine give a bad review of the SCARS system when SCARS pours so much money into them every month on ads. SCARS was never used by the SEALs, it was used during BUDS training in the early 80's and has since been dropped. Jerry Peterson is just milking it for all it's worth. He went from a nobody to growing a goatee and wearing black turtle necks, it's all marketing and hype.-ED

Watchman
05-17-2001, 12:08 AM
I was waiting for someone who actually bought the tapes to post, as I never could get my curiosity level high enough to open my wallet.

For a long time it seems Jerry P. charged outrageous sums for his material to make it seem like there was a bunch of high level stuff in it. I'll have to dig out that SoF article because it relates how much he was charging for his seminars, and I remember it being an outrageous amount.

Oh, and how many times can I say "outrageous" in the same paragraph? Sheesh.

GinSueDog
05-17-2001, 12:34 AM
Watchman,
There is actually a funny story behind those SCARS tapes I brought. At the time, maybe two years to three years ago I was still into JKD big time and was commuting to Torrance to train with Richard Bustillo while also training with some local PFS guys. Well a friend of mine who I would car pool with routinely up to Richard's school read the whole Details magazine article on the SCARS system couldn't stop talking about it one day and was trying to convince me to pay the five thousand dollars with him and fly to Arizona and train with Jerry Patterson. Well, I read the article and was more then a little interested and curious too boot, but spending five thousand dollars for a couple of days I thought was a bit much. The thought of becoming a registered lethal weapon did sound good. So I decided to buy the SCARS tape to actually see what it was all about. Well when the tapes actually arrived and I saw what SCARS really was, I almost broke a rib laughing so hard. I ended up giving the tapes to my friend that I was car pooling with. He was so disappointed by what he saw, I think he in turn gave them to someone else later on. Needless to say neither of us when on that trip. All I know is that those tapes saved me and my buddy a whole lot of money. It also taught me an important lesson, that there are no easy answers or tricks, just a whole lot of sweat :D-ED

"The grappling arts imply most fights end up on the ground...take them there. The striking arts imply all fights start standing up...keep them there. The mixed martial arts imply any fight can go anywhere...be ready and able to go everywhere."-a mix martial artist

Watchman
05-17-2001, 05:59 AM
Absolutely right. The SoF article had Jerry P. going on about his "secret scientific mathematical formula" that he wouldn't divulge to anyone, and made you an invincible fighter. :rolleyes: Which I guess is better than saying it was his "chi" that made him invincible.

Now I'm really going to have to dig through my boxes to find that article. The 5 grand for a two-day seminar sounds about right. I'm glad you saved yourself the pain.

MaFuYee
05-17-2001, 05:19 PM
hey!
i didn't think that the tapes were too bad.
actually, i thought they would be very good for someone with little to no MA background.

it just looked like some watered down kung fu to me. - which is not so terrible.

also, i liked the methods they used to train, and i like that whole autonomics thing; even though i realise that it's not 100%. - still, it is good to keep in mind.

i don't know which version of the tapes you saw. - (if you saw the 2 tape version, that was real basic... there is also more advanced versions. - i bought the 8 tape one, which also covers weapons, including guns. - the gun stuff was much better than some of the other crap out there.)

scars, is definitely not the be all, end of of styles, but, i thought it was decent enough, for someone who chooses to go that route.

*it still requires hundreds of hours of practice to achieve any sort of skill level. (which could explain the wrestler... you can't just watch it, and then go out and beat up black belts, like he claims.)

* also, keep in mind, that the material is geared towards fighting against unskilled opponents.
and for that end, i thought the tapes were decent.

"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic music."
- Kristian Wilson, Nintendo, Inc, 1989

MaFuYee
05-17-2001, 05:24 PM
* i should also add;

-his marketing claims are ridiculous.
-he may have been lying through his teeth about the whole navy seals thing.
-tai chi is better. ;)

"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic music."
- Kristian Wilson, Nintendo, Inc, 1989

Grappling-Insanity
05-28-2001, 03:32 AM
Its just a scam, dont waste your $$$.

CrazyDan
05-28-2001, 05:38 AM
I heard SCARS was similar to Kung Fu San Soo
take a look at this Q & A with Master Bill Hulsey
-
I have noticed that Jerry Petersons SCARS system is very similar to San Soo in many ways. Is SCARS and San Soo one in the same? LS, Chicago, IL

Bill Hulsey answers: I promoted Jerry Peterson, founder of the SCARS system, to black belt in San Soo right here in Bellflower, Ca. He is also a personal friend of mine. He went on to recieve his masters degree from Jimmy H. Woo. That is why similarities exist. Whenever Kung Fu San Soo is changed or modified it can no longer be called Kung Fu San Soo.
-

Watchman
05-28-2001, 09:09 PM
LOL. Give it a name. :rolleyes:

CrazyDan
05-28-2001, 11:07 PM
Today I e-mailed Bill Hulsey with some of my questions and included about that "Mathmatical formula to make one an invincible fighter" and if it sounded familiar to anything he had been taught in Kung Fu San Soo, ill post up his answer as soon as he mails me back.

unclaimed effort
06-02-2001, 03:48 AM
the person who created SCARS is simply doing too much. You can find an art as effective as people say without having to go through a so called complete coverage of fighting skills that martial arts don't. isn't that what combined martial artists do??? :)

If two tigers fight, the result will be one injured tiger.

Stillness in stillness is not real stillness. Stillness in motion is real stillness.

Stranger
06-03-2001, 02:46 PM
I have never seen SCARS, but Mr. Peterson is a morally bankrupt person IMO.

"Luminous beings are we."

CrazyDan
06-03-2001, 11:25 PM
"I have never heard of any math formula
that would make you invincible and am very doubtful of any such thing, but
hell, who knows."