Sparring without instructor

[SimonM]

Some of my best memories are of throwing down at the park. No instructor, just wraps, gloves, mouthpiece, cup and a whole lot of bloody noses. Peer review was always an important factor. Everyone had diff backgrounds and everyone pitched in. I enjoyed sparring at the gym, but it was never as fun as those summer days outside.

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[Syn7]

Actually, one thing was more fun than that. When I was like 16, we had a small group of us who enjoyed certain hallucinogens. I lived close to a driving range that was well lit at night. We would go box on the putting green. It was so much fun. A non level, irregular shaped, but soft area to throw down. Good times. Nothing like getting swung on while tweeking on an 1/8th of shrooms.

[-N-]

Three golden rules

1 rules: 10 to 30 second contact and break or --That is if you can not hit the other in close range in 10 second, disengage. You cannot throw the other in 30 second contact, disengage etc.

2 safety: no elbow, no knee, no groin, no temple strike etc

3 end points. thrown down 3 times (shuai jiao). reach face 3 times, reach chest 3 times (point sparring) etc

Communicate well beforehand

then spar away.

10 to 30 seconds isn't much time, you want to work so you can push your cardio a bit, I think anywhere from 90 seconds to 5 minutes, depending on the conditioning level.

I disagree with all these three golden rules.

[...]

Also you should push your endurance in sparring practice.

Depends on what you are trying to develop.

Are you sparring for conditioning and endurance? Or are you sparring for ability to end the fight decisively?

I have students do both. Continuous sparring for conditioning.

Then "3 second death match" for explosive aggression to end the fight quickly and cleanly.

In the "kill or be killed" context, 10-30 seconds can be too long. Originally, I gave students only 5 seconds to take out the other guy, and even that was too long and allowed for hesitation. 3 seconds worked out about right.

The result from combination of continuous sparring and also 3 second time limit worked pretty well, and it showed when they went to spar people outside of our group.

[SimonM]

Depends on what you are trying to develop.

Are you sparring for conditioning and endurance? Or are you sparring for ability to end the fight decisively?

I have students do both. Continuous sparring for conditioning.

Then "3 second death match" for explosive aggression to end the fight quickly and cleanly.

In the "kill or be killed" context, 10-30 seconds can be too long. Originally, I gave students only 5 seconds to take out the other guy, and even that was too long and allowed for hesitation. 3 seconds worked out about right.

The result from combination of continuous sparring and also 3 second time limit worked pretty well, and it showed when they went to spar people outside of our group.

Unless you're fighting with weapons the truth is that you're not going to be ending a fight in three seconds. If there's such a gross difference in skill level and size that you can, with bare hands, take somebody down with, well, with one punch basically, you probably shouldn't be fighting them to begin with.

Either you are fighting in the ring, in which case shame on you for going after people who can't stand a chance against you.
Or you're fighting for real in which case, if the person you are facing is at all sane / sober you can probably intimidate them into backing down without throwing one punch. Or you're fighting for real against a nutcase or somebody who is blind falling down drunk in which case you should probably be restraining them rather than beating them down - and a restraint of an irrational attacker isn't precisely something you train with three second burst drills.

OTOH, if you're training with weapons this is a different story - but sparring generally means fist-fighting more than knife fighting.

[SPJ]

If you really want to spar without a third person watching over you.

may be list the rules and post it on the wall.

Read them first and communicate well.

Spar away.

As pointed out, in the heat of the melee,

it is hard to disengage or stop without a third person present to intervene.

[-N-]

Unless you're fighting with weapons the truth is that you're not going to be ending a fight in three seconds. If there's such a gross difference in skill level and size that you can, with bare hands, take somebody down with, well, with one punch basically, you probably shouldn't be fighting them to begin with.

TCMA puts skill in third place behind strength and guts. Guts, strength, skill.

This training develops the aggressive intent for instantaneous all out attack.

The ideal would be to end the fight. That may not be possible, but you still have advantage over someone that did not train this.

Also, you can get in a lot more than just one punch in 3 seconds.

One of my students went to Air Force Academy. He was the smallest cadet and got put up against the biggest guy for pugil stick matches. He took him out in less than 3 seconds.

Another student liked to go to open mat sparring. He went up against blackbelts, boxers, and MMA guys, some that outweighed him by up to 80lbs. He had them consistently on the run from his attacks.

[SimonM]

TCMA puts skill in third place behind strength and guts. Guts, strength, skill.

This training develops the aggressive intent for instantaneous all out attack.

The ideal would be to end the fight. That may not be possible, but you still have advantage over someone that did not train this.

Also, you can get in a lot more than just one punch in 3 seconds.

One of my students went to Air Force Academy. He was the smallest cadet and got put up against the biggest guy for pugil stick matches. He took him out in less than 3 seconds.

Another student liked to go to open mat sparring. He went up against blackbelts, boxers, and MMA guys, some that outweighed him by up to 80lbs. He had them consistently on the run from his attacks.

All I'm saying is that if your training assumes you WILL end a fight in 3 seconds (by micro-burst sparring matches) then you will find yourself at a disadvantage when you fail to end a fight in 3 seconds. And if you aren't trying to crack some guy's head open with a baton that's more likely than not.

Aggression in a fight is a good thing; but aggression doesn't necessarily (and shouldn't ever) come at the expense of endurance. Another old fighting chestnut: it's not how much punishment you dish out. It's how much punishment you can take and remain standing.

[-N-]

All I'm saying is that if your training assumes you WILL end a fight in 3 seconds (by micro-burst sparring matches) then you will find yourself at a disadvantage when you fail to end a fight in 3 seconds. And if you aren't trying to crack some guy's head open with a baton that's more likely than not.

Aggression in a fight is a good thing; but aggression doesn't necessarily (and shouldn't ever) come at the expense of endurance. Another old fighting chestnut: it's not how much punishment you dish out. It's how much punishment you can take and remain standing.

Agreed.

Which is why I recommend doing continuous sparring as well as multiple 3 second matches.

For the 3 second matches, have the students do 20 or 30 in a row, one right after the other. It is more intense than continuous sparring. Do it like interval training.

This is also a good way to train mental toughness.

[David Jamieson]

If your TCMA teacher doesn't teach sparring, you will need to form your own sparring group and accumulate sparring experience yourself. Many people may say that sparring without instructor may develop bad habit such as

- close your eyes when punch,
- always move in a straight line,
- afriend to try new moves,
- ...

but IMO, the worse habit is not spar at all.

What's your opinion on this?

We had an evening sparring group back when I trained formally. It was no big deal. It's just sparring and yeah, sometimes guys got a little hurt.
After that happens, THEN we'd ask sifu for advice.
Later, sparring with others just became a matter of fact thing.

New learners tend to fight instead of spar and they also tend to carry a lot of ego.
That can be ironed out with repetition.

[Faux Newbie]

I generally follow the approach that, if I don't know someone enough that I don't know that I trust them to spar reasonably, then I don't spar them. There are so many boxers, bjj guys, taiji guys, etc. out there, that there's no reason I should feel any need to train with the douchiest of them, I'll opt for the coolest.

Sparring is about testing what I've entrained, imo, not the time to start entraining. And finding what else needs to be entrained. Not about testing whether I can defend myself. I train to make a tech effective before the sparring stage, I don't try to enter the sparring stage unsure on what the effect of the technique is, that's asking for trouble.

That said, if I choose training partners wisely, a moderator is not always important.

As for the other question, about habits, particular people will make sure to develop good habits, sloppy people won't, with or without a teacher. Good students can ask someone whose knowledge they respect, "I sparred the other day, while no teacher was around, and kept having this occur, what are your thoughts," and they learn, or they do their own research or thought on it. If someone needs a teacher to notice they get uppercutted a lot, they aren't sparring to learn, they aren't paying any attention, and until they do, sparring without someone to guide them is almost pointless, imo.

[YouKnowWho]

sparring without someone to guide them is almost pointless, imo.

Sparring is skill "testing" and not skill "developing". You don't learn in sparring. If you don't train hip throw, there is no way that you will be able to use your hip throw successfully in sparring.

[Faux Newbie]

Sparring is skill "testing" and not skill "developing". You don't learn in sparring. If you don't train hip throw, there is no way that you will be able to use your hip throw successfully in sparring.

Oh, I agree. My point was, if they don't even know what is contributing to them succeeding or failing the skill testing, then they've risked injury for nothing. And many people don't. It's only useful skills testing if someone is keeping track of the results and basing their training from there on what they noticed, and then testing that training to make sure that they really understood what it was that occurred in sparring in the first place.

If the person who keeps track and tests things is the student, then, assuming they choose to spar with people who aren't psychos, then I don't see why they cannot gain from sparring, even if a teacher is not present.

If a person does not pay attention to the results, then they still need someone to watch and tell them, "you aren't watching your opponent", or "you just stood there, move", etc.

The first person can solve those problems by observation. The second needs an outside motivator.

i.e. you learn from sparring, not while you spar, if you are aware of what happened while you sparred. If someone is sparring to be a better fighter, they have to do this. Otherwise, they are perhaps sparring for other reasons, but will not gain as much from sparring.

[SimonM]

You don't learn in sparring.

I beg to differ.

If you don't train hip throw, there is no way that you will be able to use your hip throw successfully in sparring.

You don't learn everything from sparring but you won't finish learning the hip throw until you ditch the compliant drills.

[Faux Newbie]

I beg to differ.

You don't learn everything from sparring but you won't finish learning the hip throw until you ditch the compliant drills.

I agree with YKW's basic point. You don't change up your game during full sparring against equals too much, and therefore have a very limited window to learn WHILE sparring, but much to learn from post session.

[YouKnowWho]

I beg to differ.

You don't learn everything from sparring but you won't finish learning the hip throw until you ditch the compliant drills.

If you define "learning" as "developing" + "testing", then I agree with you there.

You may learn what mistake that you have made in sparring but you may not learn how to fix it. For example, if you just move back from your opponent's punches, you may never learn how to move yourself to be outside of your opponent's striking path. Where will you be able to learn that? In your class of course.