How Do You Train For A Street Fight

[SevenStar]

My answer is awareness of surroundings.

For instance, my walk to and from the parking garage at work is where alot of bums and hoodrats hang out. As I am walking I take notice of anyone who could be a potential attacker (my basis is anyone who is in close enough in proximity, not by the way they look). I take into account the spacing around me, natural resources that can be used as a weapon, number of people together, how long it takes me to pull out my blade and flip the lever (it's an "assisted" opener knife) to see if it's an option. I also look at how a person is walking towards me and the look in their eyes. I then start looking at size, build, and what the best first target/strike I would use if necessary. It's similair to how a quarterback (American Football) makes his reads as he drops back to pass. I also look around for the transit and other police as well, if I have the option to run, which is preferable.

Most martial artists train to fight. But as for actually training for a street fight, I don't know that there is really a physical way to do so. Sure you can mess around with training knives and plastic bottles, but mental training in possible real situations is very beneficial to keep from getting ambushed by surprise.

bingo. ewallace has kicked the correct in the balls and subdued it.

[SevenStar]

walk around in a white robe, with a white hood covering your head. Unless you live in a place with all caucasins you will most likely get some training.

that won't get you into fights, it will get you shot and castrated...

[YuanZhideDiZhen]

that won't get you into fights, it will get you shot and castrated...

Ah! wise observation Hook Clawed Grasshopper! perfect practice makes perfect master. always train against methods better than your own to improve your technique. fighting against multiple attackers with knives and guns very good for all around survival skills. good training see if iron shirt qiqong practice propperly. otherwise very foolish.

[Mr Punch]

I thought Losttrak's suggestion to train balls and eyes was about training to grow a pair (get aggressive) and your perception/observation...? No?!

If he was talking about nuts strikes, twists and kicks and eye gouges and pokes or whatever, then it's a daft thing to say. You need the position to get any of those attacks in, and the position in a streetfight is gonna have to be through keeping your (read/assume 'well-trained, live'... ) MA principles (and of course, associated techs) in the midst of the fear, adrenalin and the thick of everything flying, and through the aggression.

I then start looking at size, build, and what the best first target/strike I would use if necessary.

Good post ewallace, but I would add to this. I don't personally think about where to strike, because picking specific targets is begging to be lost in the initial adrenaline dump... strikes to most chosen targets are gonna come under fine motor skills, and they're gonna get lost in the first few seconds, and then furthermore you're gonna be panicking about a back up.

Target visualization has worked for me only twice, both times for the throat and both times when I had the benefit of at least partial surprise (both times splitting up fights).

Thinking combos and different zones is in my experience more useful. So rather than thinking, 'this guy's big, I'll kick him in the knee', thinking more like, 'this guy's big on top, but he has scrawny legs, so I'll work a high low combo' to get his big arms on the defensive while you sweep/low kick etc. Keep it general.

To illustrate, one time the guy I was against was an animal, a real animal, and he was with his friends. My old man was containing him (my old man's huge, but this guy was berserk) and his friends and my bro were just getting to pitch in. The guy broke away from my old man, and I went for a kick in the side of the knee (I was wearing big boots), and it just bounced off... this guy was already drunk and not feeling anything... I then lost a couple of vital seconds (at least it felt like that, could have been less), giving him the initiative. The rest was pretty messy.

Apart from thinking in general zones, I've also found through long experience living in rough areas, drinking in rough places (in my younger days ), on the door etc that I automatically check out not how big people are, but if they have any distinctive characteristics like a limp, however slight, or other bodily imbalances.

Sounds a bit crazy maybe, but especially if you've practised a grappling art (maybe especially a touchy-feely one like aiki?) you get to read imbalances in people's bodies. Dunno, but maybe it's because in aiki there are a lot of older people, and people with progressive or repetitive injuries, and we were always taught to have respect for the people you train with, so I'm used to spotting people's weaknesses a mile off. Maybe it's just me.

I have been right many many times though on this one, and I do believe that it's something you can train yourself to do. It also impresses chicks no end if you can tell them where they're uptight etc...

I don't know how useful this may be in a fight, but I did accurately read a potential kungfu teacher's weaknesses once and easily took advantage of him in chi sao (in the nicest possible way of course) so maybe it's transferable.

[Mr Punch]

BTW, most of the grief in smaller countries (than the States) and cities seems to come from closer and more unpreventable sources nowadays. Eg, in Japan, and in the UK recently I've been reading more and more about random nutters stabbing people on the Tube or just walking behind someone in the street.

No amount of awareness will prevent you from one of these attacks. Unless you (a) walk around like a highly-strung basket case, or (b) really cultivate the mushin (no-mind) aspects of traditional zen (chan) meditation. I think this no-mindedness can really improve your response time and even go so far as a little development of some 'sixth sense' kind of thing. I've no scientific basis for this belief, and I don't believe it's particularly provable/disprovable.

On the other hand, the little Systema I've practised and the whole lot I've seen and been shown would seem like a good art for street fighting. There's no stance for a start. I mean really, no stance. And literally a little under half of every lesson is getting punched, kicked, hit with sticks and chains, rolling around on the floor avoiding people dropping real sharp knives on you and other such whacky fun and games. The other half is doing those things to other people!

[Mr Punch]

walk around in a white robe, with a white hood covering your head.

that won't get you into fights, it will get you shot and castrated...

Those poor Benedictines!!!

[Shaolinlueb]

learn the super chi blast. and how to surround yourself with fire. cause no one likes to touch fire.

[BIGG S-MANTIS]

U Cant Train For A Street Fight. Being In The Streets Is Your Training, Because U Already Know What To Expect From The Idiots That Like To Start The Fight. Scouts Model "be Prepared"

[Odin of Wei]

been kicked in the balls in a fight before - I didn't feel it until the fight was done. I know a few others who have had the same experience. For that reason, I don't stress striking there as part of a self defense program.

My health teacher told me that if you get hit there hard enough you could go into shock.

[redofthenorth]

I agree with sevenstar I belive the best way is to stay awarte of surondings use perefreial vision " Moon Eye". And there is nothing wrong with running or geting away from the fight you will still wake up in the morning a man or woman , the only thang that would be hurt is your ego and that heals in time. A great man named Mushashi once said " If you draw your sword you will die" this is a posibility in a street fight so decide if a name caling match or ego fight is worth yours or there life. Only fight when you have to and if you must use the "Lung Fu Gin Shin" (Power of tiger spirit of the dragon).

[g0pher]

How do you train for a street fight?
Regardless of style, mindset and physical ability,
HOW DO YOU TRAIN FOR IT

You practice kung fu like you have no tomorrow. You could spar, but what are the odds of you getting into a fight with a guy on the street who has done Muay Thai or Karate for 15 years?

Just practice your moves and they eventually become instinct. With enough practice, when someone punches you, you react anon by going into a cross stance so the punch misses, or you run through a sticky hand drill with precision. And that is just a mildly experience student. When you get good, you just start punching the limbs of your attacker away. But of course this depends on your attitude. You have the killer instinct or you don't.

[Mr Punch]

When you get good, you just start punching the limbs of your attacker away.

You've never been in a street/bar fight have you?

But of course this depends on your attitude. You have the killer instinct or you don't.

And this is a different thing to what you just mentioned. You were talking about fine motor skills of punching small moving targets away, and now you're talking about the hindbrain instincts. Very different.

To get to the fine motor skills in a fight, assuming it can be done, you need an extremely well-disciplined brain to give you the objectivity, the calmness (maybe even describable as cold-blooded) which is where the monklike aspects would have to come in.

The killer instinct you speak of is what exactly? Basic survival instinct is fight/flight. It is not a killer instinct, it is a hit and/or run away instinct. Killer instinct is also cold-blooded, the instinct of a hunter. Hunting animals know their prey is just that, weaker and defenseless, and they (the hunters) can't think strategically because they are just operating on instinct, on patterns of behaviour.

Of course, humans were/are part-hunter. So assuming your survival instinct is fight/flight, at some point in any fight your attacker may become the weaker, your instinct may tell you to kill him. Our capacity to override this is what makes us human.

The only killer instinct you could therefore have is not innate, but learned. And that of a hunter in humans against other humans would be sociopathic/psychopathic.

[Mannie]

Well done Matt.
Your advice is sound and in accordance with my experience of 12 years doorwork.
Key points to remember:
1. Most street encounters start of verbally - if this is not handled properly then physical encounter is next.
2. The attacker most of the time has the upper hand - he/she chooses the time/place/method of attack (most martial systems teach self defence and not self preservation - self defence requires the attacker to strike first - wrong/wrong/wrong)
3. Most attacks are medium to close range assaults - this is most often a king hit
4. 100% of street assaults start standing up

- Aggression over Aesthetics
- Simplicity over Complexity

[bodhitree]

find someone smaller and weaker than you

[Vasquez]

You've never been in a street/bar fight have you?And this is a different thing to what you just mentioned. You were talking about fine motor skills of punching small moving targets away, and now you're talking about the hindbrain instincts. Very different.

To get to the fine motor skills in a fight, assuming it can be done, you need an extremely well-disciplined brain to give you the objectivity, the calmness (maybe even describable as cold-blooded) which is where the monklike aspects would have to come in.

The killer instinct you speak of is what exactly? Basic survival instinct is fight/flight. It is not a killer instinct, it is a hit and/or run away instinct. Killer instinct is also cold-blooded, the instinct of a hunter. Hunting animals know their prey is just that, weaker and defenseless, and they (the hunters) can't think strategically because they are just operating on instinct, on patterns of behaviour.

Of course, humans were/are part-hunter. So assuming your survival instinct is fight/flight, at some point in any fight your attacker may become the weaker, your instinct may tell you to kill him. Our capacity to override this is what makes us human.

The only killer instinct you could therefore have is not innate, but learned. And that of a hunter in humans against other humans would be sociopathic/psychopathic.

LOL if you think animals don't have to learn to hunt. Lions have to learn strategy as well as how to kill a prey. LOL at what you said.