Unified Weapons Master Armor

[GeneChing]

If any of you get the chance to don a UWM suit, we'd love to hear about it here.

The high-tech armour set to revolutionise martial arts: Suit lets fighters use weapons while built-in sensors measure 'injury' to an unprotected body
(http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2567944/New-high-tech-body-armour-featuring-built-sensors-measure-extent-injury-set-revolutionise-martial-arts.html)
Body armour calculates and represents the actual damage that would have occurred to an unprotected competitor
Unified Weapons Master will run competitions later this year with martial artists to wear armour
Armour developed by team, including engineer who worked on Lord of the Rings and Hobbit films

By Donna Sawyer

PUBLISHED: 21:58 EST, 25 February 2014 | UPDATED: 07:02 EST, 26 February 2014

A newly developed body armour, complete with built-in sensors that can measure the damage a hit would cause to the unprotected body, is set to revolutionise the sport of mixed martial arts.

The high-tech armour, has been designed by Unified Weapons Master, not only to protect but also to register the real force behind each strike.

A team of engineers from Chiron Global spent four years developing the Iron Man-like armour, which is designed to be flexible enough to fight in and uses built-in sensors to calculate and display the damage a weapon hit would have done to an unprotected body.

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/02/26/article-2567944-1BD58BAB00000578-311_634x424.jpg
Armed combat: Fighters wear 'intelligent' armour that shields them and calculates the damage a strike would cause to a body that was unprotected

The research team based in Sydney, Australia, includes a former armor developer, who worked on the Lord Of The Rings and Hobbit films.

Unified Weapons Master, is set to run competitions later this year with bouts featuring world-class martial artists engaging in combat with weapons.

'UWM’s vision is to create a large-scale sport and entertainment experience where martial artists can compete against each other with real weapons, with an objective measure of who would have won in a real combat situation,' UWM CEO David Pysden says.

'This is something that has not been possible since the days of the Gladiator,' said David Pysden, UWM CEO and experienced martial artist.

'We believe this new sport has the potential to generate similar levels of interest as mixed martial arts by unifying the weapons-based martial arts community.'
UWM - Unified Weapons Master - New martial arts armour


www.youtube.com/watch?v=M68WtF88w6A

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/02/26/article-2567944-1BD58E8000000578-536_634x544.jpg
Fighting it out: Opponents engage in combat wearing armour that has been designed to withstand high-impact strikes from martial arts weapons

'UWM will take a wide variety of ancient arts from around the world and bring them together for the first time ever, using modern technology,' Pysden said.

UWM Chairman, Justin Forsell says he was inspired to develop UWM because he wanted to re-ignite interest in hidden weapons arts, many of which he says are at risk of being lost forever.

'UWM is the creation of a new global combat sport that combines thousands of years of history with cutting-edge technology to create a unique martial arts experience,' Forsell says.

'The arts that UWM will showcase have been passed down from Master to student for generations and are closely linked to the national cultures, histories and identities of these countries.'

'Our vision is to bring these ancient weapons arts to the global stage.'

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/02/26/article-2567944-1BD58BB300000578-660_634x933.jpg
Suit up: The UWM armour features technology that objectively measures the specific location and force of strikes to a competitor¿s suit of armour

So far, the armour has been tested by a number of well-known martial arts experts including World Muay Thai Champion known as 'The Arch Angel' Sone Vannathy.

Vannathy says the armour allows competitors to hit their opponent without cauing major injuries.

'Going up against a competitor wearing the armour, I can strike them to the best of my ability without fear of causing serious injury,' he says.

'The experience is unlike any other, but it still feels good to hit.'

A spokeswoman for Unified Weapons Master says the armour and software are fully working prototypes and the company is currently working to raise additional capital to produce production versions of the suits.

She says the armour isn't for sale yet, however the company intends to produce a training version for purchase. A release date for the product has not been set.

'The first production versions will be used for our UWM competitions, where we intend to have the best weapons based fighters from around the world compete to determine the first Unified Weapons Master,' she says.

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/02/26/article-2567944-1BD58E7700000578-102_634x424.jpg
Head protection: High-tech helmet worn during battle to protect competitor and register damage caused by hits until a fighter is virtually knocked out or killed

The UWM armour features technology that objectively measures the specific location and force of strikes to a competitor’s suit of armour.

Using medical research, including fracture profiling, software calculates and represents the actual damage that would have occurred to an unprotected competitor.

It then processes a result, similar to a video game, but based on real, full-contact martial arts weapons combat, all in real-time.

The armour has been designed to withstand high-impact strikes from real,but blunt, martial arts weapons.

Damage caused by hits accumulates until a competitor is virtually ‘knocked out’ or ‘killed’, with a strike or a series of strikes of sufficient force to render an unprotected competitor incapacitated.

Competitors can have multiple ‘lives’, just like in a video game, in order to prolong the duration of the bouts.

The winner can also be determined based on a points system using impact data from the fight.

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2014/02/26/article-2567944-1BD58BB700000578-860_634x442.jpg
Prototype trial: Martial arts expert and World Muay Thai Champion Sone Vannathy tests out the armour

[Raipizo]

If any of you get the chance to don a UWM suit, we'd love to hear about it here.

That looks awesome, kinda like a storm trooper.

[ShaolinDan]

That's pretty cool...very storm trooper indeed...maybe they plan to market them to the Jedi schools? :)

[SteveLau]

Very good indeed. One design shortcoming of the armor that I want to mention is the eye google. Its size needs to be larger in order to give the student maximum vision area. Two of the main beloved features of this armor is the good protection provided and the score meter.


Regards,

KC
Hong Kong

[sanjuro_ronin]

I guess the only problem would the the little fact that weapons fighting is not won by "points".

[GeneChing]

The realz swards only win by decapitation. Until that armor can measure decapitations, any training that comes from it won't work on the street.

:rolleyes:

[Faux Newbie]

I wouldn't want to pay for the points meters, could care less.

The armor, maybe. I'm not sure I like the eye protection.

But, if my beloved uncle was killed by criminal scum intent on making the streets a sewer of filth and depravity, I would don it, rising from the sewers, and the iniquitous and inebriate ingrates of inbred impiety would curse the birth of The Silverfish!

Granted, it would suck to fight crime in a suit that periodically announces "Point! To Vermin Scum."

[RenDaHai]

It would be interesting to see how the sensors work,

Blades work by slicing (drawing along the surface) not by hacking, often a very soft slice could be more damaging than a hack. Hacks are likely to destroy a weapon, especially against other weapons or shields or armour.

[Faux Newbie]

It would be interesting to see how the sensors work,

Blades work by slicing (drawing along the surface) not by hacking, often a very soft slice could be more damaging than a hack. Hacks are likely to destroy a weapon, especially against other weapons or shields or armour.

It's one the things that I used to be terrible about, and Katori Ryu and cutting meat for cooking helped solve, though now, I hate seeing people do the same thing I used to do.

For cuts, it's cutting meat, the slide, and the leverage behind it, makes the cut. That's one of the reasons that I doubt the thing could score in a way that doesn't favor the hack over the cut, but it's all fun, I'd play with it.

Weapons training is always about unfortunate compromises with reality. Even the Dog Brothers videos, and I respect the Dog Brothers highly for the limit they are willing to go to in training, show something entirely different than you see in riot footage where night sticks are involved. Anything close enough with weapons of sufficient weight to call it effectively similar to real fighting is crippling, imo.

[Syn7]

They should make the eye holes a strip so it looks more like a Cylon!

I have been looking at exosuits over the last few years and they seem to be advancing pretty fast. Control is a problem. All the variables involved are too much for one to manage. When the neural interfaces become more advanced, we will have iron man type suits. Maybe not with the flying and all that, but most definitely strength and protection. Speed is an interesting part, but we have to keep in mind that there is a person inside there. We see this problem with aircraft. We can built aircraft that do amazing things, but the human body can only take so much. This is why fighter jet pilots, astronauts and the like have to be in peak physical condition.

[RenDaHai]

Weapons training is always about unfortunate compromises with reality. Even the Dog Brothers videos, and I respect the Dog Brothers highly for the limit they are willing to go to in training, show something entirely different than you see in riot footage where night sticks are involved. Anything close enough with weapons of sufficient weight to call it effectively similar to real fighting is crippling, imo.

Your right. I guess it would be a lot of fun anyway.

Its often impossible to imitate reality. When I spar, I try to dodge punches by the smallest possible margin, to give me a chance of counter attack. But in reality, i know from experience my instinct forces me to dodge a punch by a much wider margin. 2 feet instead of an inch. And most other fights I see people are the same. Because the stakes are so much higher, and there is no incentive to score points. You just can't imitate reality in training.

[Faux Newbie]

When I spar, I try to dodge punches by the smallest possible margin, to give me a chance of counter attack. But in reality, i know from experience my instinct forces me to dodge a punch by a much wider margin. 2 feet instead of an inch. And most other fights I see people are the same. Because the stakes are so much higher, and there is no incentive to score points. You just can't imitate reality in training.

It's funny that you mention that, I've been working on slips a lot the last few months, and watching a lot of fight clips looking at what happens.

One thing I've noticed often in the clips and my training is that, where one does something in the slip that loses full view of the opponent, the slips tend to get larger, and are less often followed up on. Where awareness of the opponent isn't lost, they tend to be able to slip closer.

The other thing is that, where the slip is forward or straight to the side, the slip almost always ends up to be by a larger margin. I've seen a number of clips, however, where the slip is slightly to the rear quarter, and because this means the strike has to go further to hit, it buys time, and the slip tends to be closer to the punch. One problem with slipping to the back quarter is avoiding actually falling back too far and losing the ability to counter. Regardless, in the real situation, it's not as likely to be as close as we'd like it!

[GeneChing]

My, my. What they can do with carbon-fiber (http://www.martialartsmart.com/32-160.html) nowadays...:cool:


Leave it to Australians to resurrect gladiator duels with carbon-fiber suits (http://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/unified-weapons-master-future-fighting/)
By Drew Prindle — July 5, 2014

http://icdn2.digitaltrends.com/image/gladius-and-shield-vs-krabi-970x0.jpg

Imagine for a moment what it’d be like if we resurrected gladiator fights in the modern day.

Not that American Gladiator, bodybuilders-shooting-tennis-balls-at-substitute-gym-teachers nonsense either. I’m talking proper Roman gladiator fights. Full contact, no-holds-barred, Russel-Crowe-style deathmatches broadcast on national TV.

Fat chance, right? The world we live in is much more civilized than the one the Romans inhabited, and that kind of brutality just isn’t considered a valid form of entertainment anymore. Nobody would stand for it.

But what if you took out the whole human slaughter part out of the equation? Imagine if you could toss two trained fighters into a ring, give them whatever weapons they want, and and let them go full-on Spartacus on each other without anyone getting seriously injured. With the death element removed, even the most die-hard pacifists would have to admit that it’d be pretty **** entertaining.

In a nutshell, that’s exactly what Australian startup Unified Weapons Master wants to do. The company’s founders are on a mission to bring back weapons-based fighting, and have spent the last few years developing a way for weapons-based martial artists to fight without eviscerating each other in the process.

“For us it’s about honoring, preserving, and reigniting interest in weapons-based martial arts — arts that have sort of slowly drifted off of people’s radar since the invention of gunpowder and projectile weapons,” explains UWM co-founder and CEO David Pysden. “Since then, there’s been no forum in which to see weapons-based marital arts practiced, and we want to change that.”

UWM Lorica Gold and Lorica Red action“Our objective,” he says, “is to promote a new global combat sport with weapons. So the unified in Unified Weapons Master is about bringing all the different weapons arts from all around the world together in a single competition. There’s roughly 300 distinct martial arts practiced around the world, and of those styles, 96 of them are either entirely weapons-based, or have a significant amount of weapons-based training in their curriculum. What we want to do is bring all of those styles together in a competition, much like UFC did with mixed martial arts.”

http://icdn5.digitaltrends.com/image/uwm-lorica-gold-and-lorica-red-action-1000x1500.jpg

The only problem is that, barring all-out death matches, there’s really no way for weapons based martial artists to really test their skills. When you’re practicing with, say, a battle axe or a katana, you can’t actually follow through on the last shot because there’s a pretty good chance you’ll murder your opponent.

So how exactly do you facilitate a weapons fight without actually killing anybody? In a word: technology.

The suit

To make all of this possible and enable this sort of next-gen gladiator fighting, UWM’s founders have spent the past two years engineering a special suit called the Lorica — a name which literally translates to “body armor” in Latin. But don’t let the name fool you; this thing is much more than a series of hard plates designed for protection. The suit does do that, of course, but protection is just one part of the equation.

“The armor itself is made out of a sort of sandwich of high-performance materials.” Pysden tells us. “On the outside there’s some impact- and penetrative-resistant materials such as carbon fiber, and beneath that there’s a bunch of polycarbonate material and elastomeric foam, which is impact absorbent.”

If you check out some of the demo videos the company has put together, you can see for yourself what Pysden is talking about when he says “impact absorbent.” There’s footage of a guy getting repeatedly beaten over the head with a staff, and it doesn’t seem to faze him even the slightest bit.

http://icdn2.digitaltrends.com/image/twin-tomohawk-raised-cover-2.jpg

“We deliberately over-engineered the suits, for obvious reasons,” he says. “Our chairman and co-founder, Justin Forsell, has tested the suit himself, and we’ve done that with world-champion martial artists. So in other words, we’ve put the best people available up against guys in the suits and had them attack with traditional martial arts and weapons-based martial arts, and the suits have passed with flying colors. They are very, very well built.”

But under the hood is where things really start to get crazy.

Underneath all that carbon fiber and impact-resistant foam, the Lorica is outfitted with a dizzying array of sensors, all of which are designed to detect when a given part of the armor is struck. The suit uses a combination of piezoelectric shock/vibration sensors and accelerometers to measure not only where a fighter lands a hit on his opponent, but also the approximate severity of the blow. Amazingly, all of this data is collected by the suit in real time during a fight and beamed wirelessly to a special ringside computer system that keeps score.

The scoring system hasn’t been fully ironed out just yet, but according to Pysden, UWM’s custom-built software draws on medical research to calculate the damage that would’ve been inflicted on an unprotected body. Therefore, once the system is finished, it’ll presumably work a lot like an old-school arcade fighting game: Every time a fighter is dealt a blow, his or her health bar will drop by an amount commensurate to the severity and location of the hit. So in other words, when the first UWM fights kick off in 2015, they’ll probably look a lot like Mortal Kombat, but in real life.

http://icdn7.digitaltrends.com/image/helmet-fitting-silver-2-1500x1000.jpg
http://icdn9.digitaltrends.com/image/uwm-scoring-screens-1500x1000.jpg
http://icdn2.digitaltrends.com/image/staff-vs-twin-stick-3-2-1500x1000.jpg
http://icdn6.digitaltrends.com/image/tomohawk-buckler-vs-katana-2-1500x1000.jpg

But of course, you can’t have a proper live-action arcade-style weapons brawl if both fighters are lumbering, heavy-footed human armadillos. A good fight requires a certain measure of agility, so in addition to all the armor plating and sensor tech, UWM had to design the Lorica in such a way that it still allowed freedom of motion.

“We had to solve a bunch of problems before we built the prototypes” Pysden explains. “People have been building armor for thousand of years, but what they’ve never had to do before is encase all of this technology in the armor and make it work. But more importantly, when the knights were fighting back in the medieval days, they weren’t throwing kicks to the head. They were generally on horses or on foot, and typically weren’t using marital arts as part of their combat. That’s the big difference here — we wanted to develop suits where you had the articulation and mobility to fight as you would in unarmed, unarmored combat, but to be able to do that with weapons.”

Round two

UWM has made some impressive progress in the past couple years, but building the suits was only half the battle. They’ve still got a long road ahead of them before fights begin. At present, the company has produced four working prototypes of the Lorica, so for now, the next step is finalizing the design and building production versions of the suit.

“We’re hoping to hold competitions by early next year, so we’ve still got some more work to do to build the production models of the suit and take the software up to world-class quality,” Psyden says. “But we’re close to finalizing our Series B round of funding, and once we do that we’ll have the resources we need to build out those production versions of the suit.”

After that, it’s game on. By the time the first suits roll off the assembly line next year, Psyden says UWM should already be holding the first rounds of competitions in Australia. The plan is to hold the first first few bouts as small, private events, and use them as a sort of beta-testing program to make sure everything runs properly and iron out any wrinkles in the scoring system.

“From there, we want to slowly build things out,” he says, “and get feedback from those guys on the build, the scoring system, and how it all works. Then we want to slowly improve that until it’s ready to launch on a larger scale. Eventually, we want to hold competitions in countries all around the world.”

“We’ve got the historical European martial artists chomping at the bit to take on the various Asian styles, and we can’t wait to see who comes out on top there. We’ll have knife-fighting champions, sword-fighting champions, staff fighters — all those different styles will be able to compete against each other for the first time. What we eventually think will happen is certain styles and certain weapons forms will actually come out on top, but we won’t know that for sure until we start competition.”

[boxerbilly]

COOL. Thanks Gene.

I met a guy maybe a decade ago while I was in a MA shop buying pads. He was carrying a Knight Helmet. He was looking for a more comfortable inner padding. We got to talking and I asked him whats it like being hit in that stuff. He said, try it on and Ill hit you with a staff. Oak staff they sold there. I said, okay. I felt nothing. Really, I heard a loud crack, he actually blew a chunk out of the staff about eh size of a quarter , he hit me so hard. It moved me a bit but again, I felt nothing. He said, in the armor. You need to knock the guy down and thrust something in between the openings. He said, you wont do it fighting on your feet. He has to go down. Unless you have a battle hammer. They puncture through. Swords don't. Flairs will if they are spiked. He said a smooth one will crush a helmet but they probably never used them in battle outside of the events.

Anyway, he was some renaissance guy. He said, we fight hard and it is fun but we seldom get hurt because of the gear.

[bawang]

mang i want one of these so bad

[curenado]

I'm sure they won't go over 15,000 apiece.... ;)

[GeneChing]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ur0QZWr7Yzg

:p

[sanjuro_ronin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ur0QZWr7Yzg

:p

I think I could probably punch that kid through a wall.

[sanjuro_ronin]

The problem with protective gear like this is that it gives not only a false sense of security but creates a false sense of reality.
You can NOT take multiple shots to the head with a stick and be ok ( as was stated a couple of posts back).
Taking a cut to the chest causes far more damage then the impact aspect of it.
Taking a blow to the wrist or forearm with a hard stick can fracture it and the person can NOT use that arm.
Taking a cut to the arm will sever the arm.
ETC, etc.

[GeneChing]

stormtrooper armor


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBQaLuqwtl8

[GeneChing]

Coming soon: Martial artists competing at full force in high-tech armor (http://www.techspot.com/news/61997-coming-soon-martial-artists-competing-full-force-high.html)
By Devin Kate Pope on September 3, 2015, 4:30 PM


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtUTDqXDes8

If you’ve ever wondered where to get body armor for full contact martial arts combat, wonder no more.

An Australian company is on a mission to create a new combat sport pairing masters from different disciplines against each other, and they’ve built high tech armor for the occasion.

The armor from Unified Weapon Master (UWM) has layers of shock-absorbing materials, biometric sensors, a cooling system, and a helmet camera. That last feature is less about safety, and more about giving the audience a breathtaking view of the fight. Justin Forsell, one of the founders, says their vision is to facilitate “real fighting, real weapons, full force, very few rules, high levels of safety and with science judging the outcome.”

Forsell, along with fellow founders David Pysden and Samantha English, came up with the Lorica armor as their solution. And since they all have backgrounds in martial arts, they are highly motivated by the fighter’s safety.

http://www.techspot.com/images2/news/bigimage/2015/09/2015-09-03-image-6.png

How can a person be kept safe while fighting at full force? The armor provides real-time analytics during the fight about what type and level of damage the fighters are experiencing. The analytics are designed to show the stats as if it’s a HUD in a video game with a health bar that shows the force of each blow and how many lives the fighters has left.

All of this information will be streamed to the audience watching the fights online, alongside the live stream from the camera on the fighter’s helmet. To get any closer, audience members would have to actually suit up.

The Lorica project is on Indiegogo with the goal of raising $100,000 AUD (around $72,000 USD) and as the crowdfunding gig goes, they’re offering a ton of perks. Some of the benefits include Google Hangouts, tickets, weapons the supporter could use in the UWM arena, and at the high end of the offers, a custom suit of Lorica armor for a pledge of $1,000,000 AUD. They’ve reached 42% -- that’s almost $30,000 USD -- funded with 31 days left.

The next question is, how does a TechSpot writer get her hands on this armor for a review?

We actually have a policy here about not supporting crowdfunding projects (there are so many in the martial arts that it would be inundating if we did). However, I'm hoping this is an investment in the armor sample they will send to me. I haven't donned armor in over a decade. In fact, just last night I came across my bogu (http://www.martialartsmart.com/35-01.html) in storage and thought about passing that on.

[SteveLau]

Applause to the invention.



Regards,

KC
Hong Kong

[Neeros]

Competing in this would be a dream come true.

[GeneChing]

There's a vid if you follow the link.


Weaponised martial arts bouts pave way for new spectator sport (http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/78468512/Weaponised-martials-arts-bouts-pave-way-for-new-spectator-sport)
TOM PULLAR-STRECKER
Last updated 15:51, April 1 2016

A new high-tech combat sport was born in Wellington this week as six martials arts experts fought each other with blunted weapons.

There was plenty of sweat but no blood spilled.

That was thanks to the fact the fighters from Australia, Turkey and China were wearing "intelligent" carbon-fibre body armour equipped with an array of sensors to detect the location and power of hits.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/content/dam/images/1/a/p/w/u/1/image.related.StuffLandscapeSixteenByNine.620x349. 1apuow.png/1459479817780.jpg
Unified Weapons Master martial artist Jim Campbell, aka "Fierce", rests between battles in Wellington.
KEVIN STENT/FAIRFAX NZ

The Unified Weapons Master (UWM) sport is the brainchild of Porirua-born martial arts enthusiast Justin Forsell who hopes it will become a major spectator sport.

Forsell came up with the idea while training at the Buddhi Swan sword-fencing institute in Bangkok in 1998, after pondering how to preserve the ancient skills he saw there.

The first "underground" UWM tournament was filmed at the Avalon studios in Lower Hutt in front of a small audience and will be edited before the footage is released online to fans over the coming weeks.

Kung Fu fighter Martin Soderstrom, aka "the Wolf", said he and his fellow fighters had developed an amazing camaraderie on location in New Zealand.

"We all love the concept.

"The armour is only going to get better, the weapons more true to life, and the format more exciting to watch."

The armour fully protected the fighters "vital areas" but that did not mean no pain, Soderstrom said.

"You will feel a strong hits on the legs and arms much more."

Fellow fighter Jim Campbell, aka "Fierce", said the sensors which link to a medical database and are used to detect hits and "kills" seemed fair.

"Sometimes you put a hit in that you think should have been a scoring hit but it is hard to argue with science."

UWM investor and managing director Rick Walker said the main purpose of the Wellington bouts was to test its second-generation armour ahead of further fine-tuning that could allow live events in front of a large global audience.

"No-one has ever put two weapons martial arts fighters in a suit before and let them go at each other full tilt. What is happening in our test event is the first time that has happened anywhere.

"This is not 'UWM announcing itself to the world'", he said.

"What we want is for this to be a live event where people can come along and support their favourite fighters in the flesh. That's the goal."

The Sydney-based venture was also looking at additional opportunities for the technologies it had developed, which could also be used to train police officers and soldiers, Walker said.

"We have people around the world approach us about adapting our suits for a range of applications.

"Nobody has ever put sensor-force technology in a suit of armour before. There are a myriad of people trying to do that, including a range of militaries, but no-one [else] has been able to make it work."

- Stuff

[Lucas]

I want in that seems like a lot of fun

[GeneChing]

I forgot that we can't do cross-out text here. "IRON MAN" in the subtitle should be crossed out. :(

And the vid is embedded but it's like the one above.


NEW FULL-CONTACT SPORT WRAPS MARTIAL ARTS IN ELECTRONIC ARMOR (http://www.popsci.com/martial-arts-meets-iron-man-in-new-full-contact-sport)
IRON MAN CARBON FIBER MAN
By Sarah Fecht Posted Yesterday at 2:12pm

http://www.popsci.com/sites/popsci.com/files/styles/large_1x_/public/uwm.jpg?itok=9vlmrjsX&fc=50,50
Chiron Global
An underground test fight with high-tech armor

Watch out, UFC--a new kind of full-contact combat may be coming to television. The Australian company Chiron Global is developing a high-tech suit of armor that they think could revive interest in weapons-based martial arts.
Made of Kevlar and carbon fiber, among other things, Lorica armor is light enough to let athletes to move around, but strong enough to protect them from severe blows. Plus, it has 52 sensors embedded to measure the impact of each hit. The Economist suggests Lorica could portend a new kind of televised sport--a modernized, data-laden version of jousting, or an Iron Man-ified MMA.

You can watch some test fights in the video below. The sensors enable a Mortal Kombat-style health bar that adjusts based on where and how hard the player gets hit.

The sport, which the company is calling Unified Weapons Master (UWM), could come to America soon, writes the Economist:

A series of test fights using the system was staged in Wellington, New Zealand, in March. The first official fights, which are being branded as the Unified Weapons Master, will begin later this year in Australia, with competitions expanding to America in 2017.
And apparently several militaries are even interested in getting some of these suits for training purposes.
Lorica seems like it could be a useful training tool, though it has its limitations. Hand-to-hand fighting styles often target the joints, and this suit of armor, like others, is soft around the joints to allow for mobility. That rules those body parts out as targets. That's probably one reason why Chiron is focusing on stick and sword arts, which are more likely to go for the fleshy parts of the body.
Although the company is touting UWM as the most realistic way to practice your weapons skills, some sword schools frown upon the use of armor in practice. If you know that your opponents cannot hurt you, you're more likely to make reckless attacks that in reality would get you killed.
On the other hand, this could be a great way to put that old show Deadliest Warrior to the test and settle some age-old disputes.
Is it totally realistic? No. But would we watch it anyway? Heck yes.

[Vash]

I want to know what it takes to actually get into competition in this.

Would love to play with a trifa/tonfa or sai in this venue.