how to measure your success as a fighter

[gunbeatskroty]

How do you measure if you are a successful street fighter or not? I've been told by a kung fu teacher that I would be flattened by a few of his students (they are all larger than me) in a boxing match.

The problem is their technique is shoddy, and almost non existent. According to this guy they would charge at me and wouldn't stop! To me this sounds unrelenting, and hard to beat, but maybe this guy is just being an arsehole (I stopped going to his class long back).

Your question is hard to answer because you're not clear as to what kind of competition fights you've been in. Points sparring or full contact, timed rounds to knock the other guy out? And how many?

In general, someone trained and experienced fighting in the ring or cage, even once or twice, should be much more capable than the average turd on the streets. Because what leads to these 1-2 or two cage fights, is a lot of dedicated training...not just hitting pads, bags, cardio & strength training, etc...but most important, sparring, which can be from light to full sparring for KO's. This is what separates real fighters from the kata-fighters.

Noobs and toughguys comes into our gym all the time. Some of them want to spar. No problem on the BJJ side, but with standup, they need to show some skills as it's more damaging when they get hit in the face (as they're potential fee paying students). It's pretty easy to pick them apart and make them miss. They gas and get frustrated. Many of them go crazy, throwing full haymakers, one after another. No big deal, usually I can just stop them cold & bloody their noses with just jabs, footwork & defense.

Some Karate Masters told me that if I was able to jab in a streetfight, then I wasn't really in "real" danger. He's obviously not a fighter.

Like this video. This guy is decent, although nothing special. Maybe a mid level amateur fighter. This is one of our exercises, but against other trained fighters and not some slob from the street.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSX0PCQXiO4

[mawali]

That's half the battle right there!
The base is cardio and some stamina and the rest is a lot 'easier' relatively speaking.

[crazychang]

Yeah I thought one method to beat someone bigger than you might be to move around them quickly. Supposedly according to my old instructor some fighters will snap later on in the rounds when you are worn out, which means they can throw a dangerous ko punch with full aggression. I guess he's referring to something along the lines of what you see in the movie Rocky (not really a good example) where he becomes indomitable and beats the opponent blind. Its a movie but its the only example I've seen.

I shouldn't try to boast because I'm nothing special (but alot of people aren't that great at fighting!) but he was saying added aggression is the key to success.

He was more or less saying that anger mixed with some skill is the hardest to beat. It makes some sense if you can direct in a controlled way, but this doesn't sound like the shaolin mindset.

[crazychang]

Sorry in answer to your question my experience has been restricted to full contact karate (not heaps of full contact sparring but a bit). The scenario is a boxing style fight. It's very hard to grapple with people bigger than you when you don't train in that aspect of fighting, so I wouldn't make the claim that I can beat bigger people in a wrestle.

[gunbeatskroty]

He was more or less saying that anger mixed with some skill is the hardest to beat. It makes some sense if you can direct in a controlled way, but this doesn't sound like the shaolin mindset.

Personally, I think your old instructor is not a credible nor experienced fighter. When fighting in the ring or sparring hard, getting crazy is usually a waste of energy when going against someone of the same skill level.

Now maybe 2 untrained or low skilled fighters in a street brawl, that may work....say, both go into beast mode and just throw wild haymakers for 30 seconds until either both gasses out or someone gets a KO. But an experienced fighter should easily pick apart dum-dums who throws rapid wild punches. Just a stiff jab stops all of that crap right away.

[crazychang]

I just picked up the latest copy of Blitz magazine (an australian martial arts magazine) and noticed there was an article that addresses this topic to an extent. It covers the physiological responses the mind and body goes through when a random assault occurs, and breaks the two typical responses into two main categories. One is fear which leads to either freeze, fright, faint or flight. The other main category is anger which leads to fight. The article states there is a third category which is neither fear nor anger, but rather a neutral state where one can either choose to fight or not fight. The problem with the neutral state according to the article, is the avoidance of the benefits that come from entering a survival mode: increased speed, strength, endurance, and pain tolerance etc.

I guess my old instructor is saying that a lot of fighters go into this more instinctive, survival mode where there is more power, aggression and speed due to the physiological processes that occur within the body, which can be dangerous becasue they can KO someone. But like you said its probably short winded, uncontrolled and without direction.

Its interesting though because the article to an extent favors anger over the typical martial arts mind because of the extra power.

[sanjuro_ronin]

I have had far more "street fights" than I care to remember.
From just scrapping as a "kid", to the years as a bouncer to real life situations in the military.
I have also had quite a bit of fights in full contact sport MA.
My toughest physically have always been in the ring.
Fighting a trained fighter is always tougher than fighting some "wannbe".
The toughest mentally were as a bouncer, typically when weapons were involved and there was more than one guy.

[gunbeatskroty]

I just picked up the latest copy of Blitz magazine (an australian martial arts magazine)

I guess my old instructor is saying that a lot of fighters go into this more instinctive, survival mode where there is more power, aggression and speed due to the physiological processes that occur within the body, which can be dangerous becasue they can KO someone. But like you said its probably short winded, uncontrolled and without direction.

Its interesting though because the article to an extent favors anger over the typical martial arts mind because of the extra power.

I used to do this when I was new to fighting. Get all angry because someone just popped me in the face or something...so I go crazy, then gassing out. Some would sucker me into going crazy, while they just cover up. Once I gas, they'd attack, and now my defenses, footwork, counters, etc., are crap now. Then there also fear when someone that I know is much better than me and have always beaten me.

As I got better and sparring hard for full knockouts often, I realize that I do the best when staying calm and relaxed in both situations. In the 2nd, I still lose and get whooped by the better fighters, but I still do better in general (ie. take less damage, not get knocked down or out, etc.). There's still fear and anger to some degree though.

[gunbeatskroty]

I have had far more "street fights" than I care to remember. From just scrapping as a "kid", to the years as a bouncer to real life situations in the military. I have also had quite a bit of fights in full contact sport MA.
My toughest physically have always been in the ring.
Fighting a trained fighter is always tougher than fighting some "wannbe".
The toughest mentally were as a bouncer, typically when weapons were involved and there was more than one guy.

See, this guy knows what he's talking about.

I like what you said about ring fights vs. your bouncer job. It's so true about fighting equally trained opponents in the ring being the toughest, physically. I used to bounce too, and usually I would say to myself....I'm pretty sure I can take the average idiot on the street who's usually untrained that steps up, but do I really want to risk getting stabbed in the back today or sometimes next week....rather handling this peacefully and professionally?

And for me with firefights, usually there's no fear as we're all pulling the trigger and blasting away. But when rounds comes real close and you can feel its impact and/or ****zing nearby, that's when I start to fear getting shot. Then of course, once you're shot...it's almost like tapping out.