Systema Training Blog - stevewildash.com

NEW SYSTEMA CONCEPTS DVD! - MINDSET

2012-01-26T13:56:00.001Z

Shows simple, practical methods to access survival mind-set and how to bring that mind-set into your work
Shipping next week, available at pre-order price here

To the last breath…

2012-01-22T12:16:00.001Z

One of my greatest fears is having my breath taken away, suffocation or perhaps drowning. The thought of dying in this way is a pretty big fear of mine and facing up to it and working though it is a big challenge; to be able to fight to survive knowing that you have to find a way out, to get that breath that your body craves, coping with panic and other emotions, to keep a clear head under this sort of pressure is really worth visiting, as Rob said taking your self somewhere like this highlights how much of a survival instinct you have, strong enough to keep going? or will you lay down and die? Interesting thought isn't it.

This week we continued the breath work theme, but first a knife work warm up which lasted for about fifteen minutes or so, which was a decent amount of time to have a play, and enough time to learn more about movement, passing the knife back and forth between you and your partner, stripping the knife and other disarms… a great start, I think its very important to have access to this free time experimentation, these extended periods give you the right sort of practice time you need.

Recapping on last weeks breath work was a good way to get us in the right mind set for work to come later in the session. Running and holding breath drills and using exercise to normalise your breathing was first, followed by more pair work, using sit ups, press ups, leg raises and squats as a means to challenge ourselves; standing, sitting or laying side by side, no quantity of sets or reps given, both partners set off in the exercise together, one holds their breath while the other breathes normally, when the breath holder can't hold his breath any longer he starts burst breathing until normalised, all the while continuing with the exercise, at this point of burst breathing his partner then takes over the breath holding until he can't hold any longer, then burst breathes, repeating for a few changes then change exercise.

Rob stressed that at any point during any of the breath holding drills you could stop if you felt that your blood pressure was up too much, as safety for everyone was priority. The next drill was similar to the floor breath holding drills, but this time standing, with a partner again, both hold their breaths at the same time and stand without doing anything, the first one to suck in air and start to burst breathe was the signal for his partner to start striking him as a penalty, using the strikes to help normalised his own breathing... One thing that was observed during this drill was the introduction of unwanted tension through incorrect breathing, especially when holding the breath, too much tension held by tensing upper chest and shoulders, instead of breathing in and out lower down in the abdomen and lower chest. The tension I was holding by breathing this way was a problem, as it affected the duration I was able to hold my breath.. it was very poor indeed.. Andy my partner pointed this out, which later prompted the question to Rob. Seeing Andy last longer for this drill and issue me the punches time after time, was an indicator of how I was doing…there was something clearly wrong here… Once Rob explained the breathing with out tension, it was a lot clearer.

The next section of the lesson was all about not being able to have the choice of when you were able to breathe and for how long.. Rob used Mark and myself to demonstrate this. I had no idea what was going to happen.. I knelt on the floor as instructed, as did Mark.. he knelt by my side, Rob said when I was ready to take an in breath Mark was going to then place his hand over my nose and mouth; when I could hold no longer I was to tap Marks arm and he would let me take a breath... This time I wanted to take on-board the tension thing from the previous drill, so as Mark applied his hand after my in breath, I went into a sort of meditative state trying to be totally relaxed with eyes closed... This time I was able to hold my breath for at least double if not three times as long before I tapped Marks arm, but you guessed it, Rob Must have given Mark the nod to keep his hand there taking me beyond that point where I wanted to give up… realising what was up I continued, forcing a deeper relaxation if that makes sense, as the gag reflex to breathe had to be suppressed.. I had a few more seconds to continue before tapping again, but Mark still held his hand in place, a few more seconds passed before I physically moved Marks hand from my face so I could take that breath, even though I did this I still think I had a bit more in me to continue, it must have been the bodies automatic response to survive making me yank Marks hand away.. once again interesting work, proving even I can push myself further when the easy option is removed, decision made for me to carry on...

The next progression was to work in pairs and then onto threes and fours.. first in pairs, partner one standing the other behind him, again hand over nose and mouth, eyes open, but this time when you felt the need to breathe this was your queue to work against the man behind you, doing what ever you needed to do to escape and then finish....
From here I was working in a group of four with Mark, John and Gareth, a similar drill, one standing being held from behind having their breath taken away, eyes open, the other two stood in front, as soon as the person holding his breath need to breathe, the gripping hand was removed and this was the queue for the two men in front to attack the man who was trying to recover his breath, he had to then either escape or work against the two attackers.. it was surprising how effective you could be even though you where still in recovery mode... From here the next drill was pretty much the same, but while you where being held and holding your breath from behind, one guy in front with focus mitts, he was digging jabs into the breath holders body at the same time.. when the breath holder needed to breathe again, the arm was removed, he then had to move forward and attack the focus mitts at full tilt, driving the pad holder back...

If given enough time to prepare, it would seem that you can cope with breath deprivation for extended periods, but if other factors are introduced it becomes much harder, even something as simple as laughter can change things.. my breath was being held and someone then cracked a funny, this caused me to hold back a laugh, but in doing so I lost more breath in the process. Distractions, pressure, and fear, certainly don't help you in drills like these, over coming all mental and physical obstacles is a tough ask, but necessary when placed in a difficult situation where you have to survive.

In the circle at the end of the lesson, it was clear that everyone had taken something from the various drills, I'm not sure if my own fears have been totally put to bed, but certainly realised my own short comings with breath control and know if left up to me I might give up too easily, but when forced to survive I like everyone else in the group operate differently, and the willingness to endure more and more through the bodies desire to live and breathe is visible; this sense of survival seems to be an ingrained automatic response for most people, its as though you don't have a choice in the matter the body decides for you... It will fight “to the last breath”.

Steve

S-t-r-e-t-c-h your

2012-01-15T17:01:00.000Z

One of the more significant changes in how I use breath work in my training was the idea of stretching your breath. I think I’ve only just started to appreciate how useful this way of breathing really is.. its probably only since the summer of last year that I started to really put it into practice. I particularly like it because its a very easy way of allowing you to make simple exercises like press up’s, sit up’s and squats more challenging. Its funny that as a result of this type of breath work I'm much more aware of holding my breath when I concentrate on every day tasks, when very focused on doing something perhaps a little bit precise, I suddenly realise I’m holding my breath, which then forces me to breathe again…

Part 1/ Yesterday Rob showed a few new drills that sort of related to this idea of stretching your breath, by using extended breath holding. As a part of our warm up the class started to jog run around the training hall, starting off with some square breathing, timing the breath to strides, in for 4 hold for 2 out for 4 hold for 2 etc.. from there we continued to jog run with normal breathing around the hall, then Rob said on the command, breathe in and hold your breath as long as you can while continuing to run.. when you can’t hold your breath any longer drop to the floor an recover with breathing, then straight up again into running and breath holding. Next drill same again, but instead breathing all the way out then hold for as long as you can, when you need to breath hit the floor to recover and up again running as soon as you can.. Continuing again with this drill but using press ups to recover, breathing in on the down press and out on the up press until recovered or breathing vice versa, then up and running once more and repeat. Next from a static press up, hold your breath as long as possible, when you need to breathe again start doing press ups with breathing to recover, which did somehow speed up recovery... then reverse this do press ups while holding your breath, then hold a static press up at the top end and burst breathe to recover. The next simple drill was working with a partner, both striking at each others body, not too deep, heavy enough to work the body, both holding their breaths while doing this.. the first one that needed to recover stood still hands by their sides, his partner could then recover as well, but he continued to strike at his partner as he breathed, but turning up the volume a bit as Rob put it... This was a great way to get us all warmed up for what was to come in the next section of the class..

Part 2/ The big pause…. This was something I mentioned in a post last week.. I think this phenomenon its more common than we think.. We all like to think we have good flow, but the reality is there’s a point for most of us where we stop working against our partner, either as a micro pause, or perhaps longer, or even stopping altogether. Rob was trying to encourage us to think about this and keep us moving during our work against our partners, as what you practise in training is probably how it will go for real... I for one am guilty of this, as I tend to think of my flow as a count, maybe influenced from the old days where it would be 1/ jab, 2/hook or cross, 3/upper cut 4/upper cut, then break away… an old habit I need to move away from. I noticed this in one of my partners yesterday, Mark is one of the strongest fighters I know and have no doubt in his abilities, but even so he too had this pausing.. he seemed to time the duration of his breath to his work, a flurry of punches or strikes and the breath stopped so did his work, all but briefly but still there, he takes the next inhale and gets himself moving again.. I think most of us have a variation of this sort of thing, which makes us less fluid and we continue to fight against the idea of flow motion.. a definite stumbling block to our advancement and understanding of this goal… So how do we figure out how to move beyond the pause, well Rob was saying perhaps try not to think how good or bad things might be going for you at that moment, don’t admire your successes or wallow in failures especially in mid-flow, just keep working until you don't have to.. This is a difficult mind set to get yourself into, to not think of success or failure but to just to do.. and keep doing what you’re doing… I sometimes wonder if we tie our timing of our work to our breathing too much, perhaps there’s a way of breathing that I don't know about yet that enables you to breathe continuously and allows continuous motion to take place, letting us continue regardless… Rob said we are going to spend a bit of time on breath work over the next few weeks.. it will be interesting to see how we all develop and whether the pause button isn't used as much, but the play button is… :)

Steve

The Road Ahead…

2012-01-08T13:35:00.000Z

Frustration, inadequacy, confusion, were a few of the emotions I felt throughout yesterdays session, the first Saturday of the new year… These emotions were highlighted during a section of the class where I was paired up with Rob P working on a specific close work drill, the idea in its self was quite simple, move away from the punch and continue to work against your partner, pretty easy you would think, but caused me one or two problems... I was having real trouble with my flow motion, a subject the class covered in some depth towards the latter half of last year. Feelings of awkwardness and a complete lack of flow were frustratingly obvious to me, but then grateful to Rob for confirming what I could already feel... Rob said it looked as though I was comfortable at one range, but as soon as the range closed to a range I should in fact feel more comfortable with, seemed very stop starty ( if that's a real phrase) I should in fact feel safer and more comfortable and able to cope better when in this close quarter range, but he said I should first try to slow things down and get the control and flow back first of all, as better flow was what I was looking for.. working a bit slower should actually start to make thinks a bit easier for me... The fact is, lots of years working at a fighting range where you felt you were just outside of trouble, somewhere where you can nip in and out to deliver shots with relative easy and still feel in control, safe and secure.. but this is all well and good, but enter into the uncomfort zone and my fundamental Systema basics seemed to escape me. On reflection it appears that I struggle soon after I’ve placed a couple of well aimed shots and there it is… a slight pause before I can continue, almost as though I need to evaluate damage done before I can progress any further.. this can be a real problem, as I found out when slow sparring with Rob, I would move, take a couple of shots only to leave space for Rob to move back into, stuff I’ve spoken about in previous blog posts.. I explained to Rob that as soon as I see the shot I take it, which he said was fine, but you must continue on.. perhaps my pre-emptive strikes seemed a little rushed, creating this pause because the flow had indeed stuck, not able to recognise or feel the next strike in the flow sequence.. Rob explained and demonstrated that once in and moving I should just keep moving, that way the flow motion doesn't get stuck and yes I felt the pressure from Rob when he was in the flow, which was difficult to deal with and overwhelming at times; as my movement tended to get stuck I was unable to free myself from the flurry of his striking I just couldn't react well at all.
I explained to Rob that unless I'm put under a fair bit of pressure my work against someone seems to be less effective, so I asked Rob to make it more pressured... Not sure whether my work was actually any better really, but the feeling that you get when you are actually up against a real threat one that can do damage to you is somewhat different, certainly drives you on and focuses your mind to think about mobility etc.. of course this may well be the totally wrong approach; I have been told so many times that thinking too much about any given situation will be problematic for me.. speaking to Matt after the session I said I thought that we had similar issues with over thinking things, even though there are a few years difference in training between us.. I said to him do you think we have problems like this because we are both from an engineering background? we tend to problem solve in a 2 + 2 = 4 type of way and if 5 is the result we will continue to analyse and pour over it for the solution, we expect that if we are presented with A and do B, C must be the outcome, and then and only then we can progress, but if D is the result we struggle to make sense of it and progress in our eyes is very slow, and considering that our willingness to learn is so great, find this slow progress unreasonable.. I think he knew what I was getting at and may possibly have something to do with how we approach things, but of course on the other hand it may well be total bollocks, it’s more than likely that we are just slow to grasp simple things :)

Gareth made an interesting point as we discussed further, as I understand it he tends to have no preconceived expectations of the lesson or how he’s feeling at the time will effect his training, he just takes it as it comes and if things don't work out too well it doesn't particularly matter, he also said that Chris W once spoke about how he felt prior to a class, he said he thought he might have a rusty lesson that day and that’s exactly what happened.. this does seems a reasonable way to look at things, I should really adopt his open attitude, but like most people who are still fairly new to Systema, think that everything looks pretty easy and that you should be competent in no time, but the reality is yes it does take hard work and effort, but still you really must not beat yourself up if things do go a little tits up from time to time, almost let the time you spend training wash over you and eventually stuff will stick and you will eventually get it… proving your expertise in something just isn't the ultimate goal here, its something less obvious, perhaps not unlike the harmony found in Aikido, not that I know much about that either, but you can see the connection somehow..

To be honest I felt that I've taken a little backwards step so far this year, I know its still early days, but do see that there are still a number of problems to resolve and know that I’ll still be analysing what I should be doing for a while yet, instead of going with the flow, what I need to do is slow things down and worry less.. My new years resolution is going to be encouraging close proximity, and try to free my mind and body of the comfort zone, the place I know where I can be most effective, instead I should be constantly challenging the uncomfort zone, working to be comfortable at varying ranges including the floor... I can see exactly what needs to be done, its just finding the way through to where i want to be.. perhaps this is the goal for this years training, to free myself of the notions of where I think I work best and explore the options of where I don't particularly do very well, areas where I still carry an element of fear, putting aside the desires to be something and somewhere where I’m clearly some way off from, the understanding of true flow motion is still somewhere down “the road ahead”….

Steve

Good to be back… :)

2012-01-06T15:21:00.000Z

Yes 2012 is here and the 5^th of January marked the start of training for 2012. It was good to see some of the old faces again after the couple of weeks break and good to see a new starter so early on in the new year. As it was the first session back for the Stevenage Training Group, Gareth decided to make it just a general session to get us back into the swing of things, as I think most of us were pretty lazy over the Christmas period and fitness levels were probably suffering more than we realised; I know I hadn’t done as much as I should have, but I guess its nice to recharge the batteries once in a while and slob out a bit. I am glad I didn't go too mad on the food and drink this year though, as over doing it always makes it so much harder to get going after the long break, the lack of regular exercise really does make the body sluggish and tired, not sharp at all. I was hoping that I wasn't going to find the lesson a struggle, but as luck would have it managed quite well which surprised me and afterwards felt re-energised once more..

Really looking forward to Saturdays class with Rob and the guy’s and as the first one’s outside for the Tempsford group should be great fun. The weather has been blowing gales for the last few days and thought it should make for an interesting weekend session, but today once more the British weather has surprised me, not a cloud in the blue sky and barely a chilled breeze to be felt, so the weekend looks in good shape, so can’t wait to get stuck in to this year’s Systema fun and frolic’s.

All the Best for 2012 you Systema blokes from around the World.....

Steve

2012’s around the corner…

2011-12-30T14:16:00.001Z

On a personal level 2011 has been a pretty good year for training, low on injuries and also pleased to say good health. This has enabled me to turn out fairly regularly and as a result feel some improvements have been made. There seems to have been so much ground covered in the past twelve months and everyone that takes part in Rob's classes and Gareth's training group seem to have gone up notch, I for one feel this is so, as the guys are pushing and making things more challenging for me at every session, which can only be a good thing for all of us... I think the guys know at Tempsford and at Stevenage that we are lucky to have knowledgeable and dedicated instructors to push us forward into a stronger position for the coming year, helping us to increase our understanding of the Systema principles and how to best apply them, not just as self defence, but in our everyday lives too…

Rob has put on some great courses this year and all of us appreciate his hard work and efforts to make each session enjoyable and interesting and has also brought together lots of like minded people in the process, to train along side each other in an open and friendly way, creating an environment for sharing both experience and expertise. The Leicester group that visit are a great asset for us and add ideas through their take on Systema, which certainly adds to the experience for me, and look forward very much to meeting up with them again in 2012.

Rob has hinted that as we've moved on a bit further in our understanding and raised our achievement bar to to speak, that next year will be equally as challenging for all of us, which is what we all need, more of the same.. and that's why we keep coming back….

Next year is certainly going to be more challenging for me as I push into my 50th year and 34th in the “Martial Arts”.. even so, these times are certainly the best so far, and grateful to all my training buddies for their support and encouragement when ever we get together, some of the nicest best blokes you’d ever meet…

So here's to a great 2012 and a Happy New Year to everyone...

Cheers and all the best.

Steve

Three for after Christmas… :)

2011-12-23T11:46:00.001Z

Crunchy Star..

Figure of eight sit up..

Moving push up from a fix point..

“Merry Christmas” and a “Happy New Year” especially to the Tempsford, Stevenage and Leicester Boys...
Thanks for a great years training…

Steve

Knife Practice… Most definitely for the over 18’s..

2011-12-22T19:19:00.001Z

Following on from my last blog post, I thought I’d experiment with some knife drawing practice at home. Some aspects of this have been covered in class this year.

Steve

DVD Review – Knife, Unconditional Mastery…

2011-12-14T20:18:00.000Z

A few days ago I received in the post a couple of DVD’s that I’d treated myself to, it’s almost Christmas and Sue my wife was looking for something to get me that wasn't socks or underpants, the usual dad stuff, exciting I know, but said I’d prefer to order up something else if she didn't mind, so I bought “Knife, Unconditional Mastery” by Vladimir Vasiliev and another title “Breath work and Combat” by Valentin Talanov. I wanted more info on knife work and breath work, so both seemed appropriate. As I write this I’ve only looked at Knife UM so far and thought I’d share my thoughts on it…
I have to say I was very pleased with this one, as there were drills I hadn’t seen before and also liked the thought provoking comment throughout from Vladimir Vasiliev. I’m the first one to be sceptical about DVD’s on weapons, especially edged ones, as they always seem over complicated as far as the drills go. The aim of this DVD was to show how to use the knife for the purposes of self defence, and how to overcome tension and fears within ourselves... Vladimir talks about five levels of fear when working with weapons and how fears restricts us, making us less mobile, and how breathing can help us overcome this fear and tension during knife work. The commentary throughout explains clearly the ideas behind the imagery shown on screen, you get a real sense of Vladimir Vasiliev’s perception of space and targeting, clean and precise. What I liked most was the no nonsense, non showy knife work, explaining the advantages of weapon concealment, using short controlling stabs, fast flowing circular cuts and working with and against multiple opponents, linking all these ideas together with free flowing ease.

It was clear that Vladimir was trying to show how the Systema view of knife work was a different one, in that when you use a knife it should be much the same as when you’re working without one, it was fundamentally the same work. This view is a commonly shared in my experience with other weapon arts, but the work shown in this DVD shows the link more clearly than most, the knife work just looked the same as when VV was without a knife and in some of the footage he works with and without the knife very smoothly and made everything look so in control, unrushed, with purpose.

The main thrust of this DVD was to show how short knife work can be very fast and fluid, and how the knife is a multi purpose tool not necessarily one designed just to kill, but by using the various parts of the knife it can be used as a persuader, a controller. By applying the flat of the blade, the cutting edge, tip, spine, or handle to lock, disarm, to strike, hitting nerve centres by poking and prodding, also showing effective take downs using the knife as a controlling tool. The emphasis was on using small cuts and thrusts rather than large ones that could leave you open to counter strike. So many things I hadn’t considered when using the knife as a control weapon or as a pre-emptive weapon; using pin point accuracy at speed, using different parts of the knife to do different things, working through all levels from standing to floor, flowing from level to level, being unarmed to armed, looking when to draw the blade and start working, some important lessons learned from watching this DVD; things like how you must be familiar with the concealment of your knife around the body, and knowing how your knife feels and how to comfortably draw it cleanly from wherever its located without obstructions, to be able to work left and right handed, knowing it’s shape and how to change grip is very important, just to be able to have your knife out and ready when you need it... Seeing Vladimir Work is like watching a cat with a mouse, playing with his training partners, the easy in which he deals with them was quite an eye opener, seeing how he continually uses different parts of the knife for different effect, insights in dealing with multiple attacks, he seems as though he’s looking at them as if they were one problem to solve. This is quite a different approach to other Systems that I’ve seen, but do wonder whether It’s really a one man System so to speak, can anyone really replicate or equal Vladimir’s standard of skill? although I doubt this, I for one need people like Vladimir to aspire to, giving you something to aim for, to help raise your own game to a higher level…..

I know there are many systems of knife work out there that are equally as skilful, but you could argue more complex to learn, where as the Systema approach to knife work seems to be less complicated. The methods shown on this DVD do make sense to me and show that I must rely on my own sensitivity's and explorations to work things out, nothing is prearranged in life... The drills are designed to cover both physical and psychological work and show that knives are very versatile indeed, lots of multi applications can be explored. Vladimir points out that you should be under no illusions how dangerous the knife can be and that it is almost certain that you will get cut in any knife fight. Although we can be better prepared none of us are infallible, so all we can do is train to stay more relaxed, more mobile and hopefully we’ll able to deal with things as well as Vladimir does :)

Steve

Running Time Approx. 2 Hours

Class Training Winter 2011…

2011-12-06T18:13:00.001Z

Ground work revisited…

2011-12-03T19:02:00.001Z

Saturday Class..

It’s been a while since we’ve had a serious look at working from the ground and it was good to spend the full two hours on the floor. It took a while to become acclimatised again, but after about half an hour the softness seemed to return and everyone was rolling and moving well. One thing I do accept is that Systema isn't a master of all, but does help me to have an understanding of lots of different things and one of these areas is working on the ground. There’s no way in this world I could ever compete with a trained wrestler or someone who trains for the ground full time, but over the last few years I’ve spent more time working on the ground than I ever had in any other Martial Art that I’ve studied. Working on the ground was viewed as somewhere that you just didn’t want to go and most instructors either didn't expect to ever go there, or it was because they just didn't know what to do when they got there…
Getting comfortable with working at all levels, progressing from standing to the floor is I feel one of Systema’s strengths, in that where ever you find yourself similar work is possible, as the drills translate well to any position, often starting from the most disadvantaged position, the whole body engages in the task.
The drills in yesterday mornings session flowed in a nice progression, from rolling, moving around on the floor, to joint locking and manipulation of limbs, working them into holds and non technical locks.. then escaping from locks, drills to develop movement with another person, to kicks while on the ground, but what was nice there wasn't really a clearly defined line between each section, the line was blurred enough to make the session feel as though it was one long drill…. The section I found most beneficial was from kicks and stomps while laying out on the ground. Various drills to deal with this, and I knew we were only going to cover half of what we could, but again time as usual was against us .

Images from Cutting Edge DVD shown below.

Working against the person as apart of the kick and stomp process when dealing with the kick was of main concern, moving the kick to create weakness in structure, then apply the take down. How I found best do deal with this was not to get ahead of yourself and not to work faster than the kicker and certainly not to panic; meaning timing was the important thing here and for me to understand this, I visualised both hands and both feet as one integrated machine, a set of coordinated tools to deal with the kick or stomp. By using any one of the four limbs to pick up the opponents attack leg early, then to pass across to one of the other hands or legs, then to move the foot away from your body, literally stretching them out beyond a point where they could stabilise themselves, both legs in an uncomfortable position and some distance apart. From here it definitely gets easier, as working against them to make a take down takes very little effort; once you've taken them down, continue to move into a dominant position, taking them into a hold or simply to stand up to be safe..
This was a great drill for building confidence, as there's no where for you to fall as you're already down as far as you can go, letting the floor be your support so you can just concentrate on what you need to do to protect yourself. I found it important to remember not to remain static and lay in one position to defend, but to keep moving as if you were working up on your feet...

I dug out one of my old Cutting Edge DVD’s when I got home and everything was pretty much covered on there. I’ve started looking again at the DVD’s I’ve collected over the last few years and now that I’m a bit father down the road with this stuff, the content makes a lot more sense to me, I'm finding that the DVD’s are a good source of reference, but will never completely replace the guidance of a good Systema instructor or working with real people for that matter…

Steve

Worlds apart….

2011-12-02T13:21:00.001Z

I was early for the Tuesday class this week, and had a bit of time to kill, so I went over to watch the Karate class that was in session in the main hall, one of many Martial Arts classes held in the sports centre. The class was a senior one, about eight to ten Black Belts running through what seemed like Kihon Ippon Kumite (basic one-step sparring), arranged in a circle, one guy in the middle of the others, each taking it in turn to step in and launch punches and kicks in a prearranged sequence at him, the guy responded with a series of counters. Watching these guys conjured up mixed emotions in me, half of me reminiscing about earlier times when I too would have run through similar drills on a regular basis. I cant deny that I had very good times back then, but as they continued to train the other half of me started to be a bit critical of not only of the standard of their Karate, which, yes might be a bit unfair seeing as I’d been away from it for quite sometime now, but I found myself spotting things like poor posture, excess tension, lack of correct breathing and what looked like an element fear amongst some members of the group. Now I wasn’t about to pick holes in their training as they were clearly enjoying themselves, but even so, I could see there were a few egos within the group, which I also found interesting. I was also drawn to the lack of physical contact being made, which for their level of grade found strange, but looking back perhaps I would have accepted it as the norm a few years ago, control was everything, not sure if it should mean no contact though… I was trying to picture myself once again wearing the Karate Gi and had to admit to myself I would find it awkward to wear one now, having spent so much time training in what you might label as casual clothing. One of the Black belts that had been training in the hall decided to leave early and as he pasted me said “you here to train, you should go in and give it a go, its great fun”.. I had to smile to myself as I said “no that’s ok”... The Karate guys had started Kata now, and I thought about the luxury they had of using the big hall to train in and how much space they enjoyed compared to our small squash court...

It wasn’t long before the others turned up and we all started chatting as we moved through to the squash courts to start our session. As we entered the court we discovered it was full of stacked chairs and large tables, I thought to my self this could be a bit tight in here tonight, as there were nine guys and about 40% of the court was full up with furniture. After a bit of messing about to find another area to train in, we decided to stay put in the court… I think we all preferred to do this. Never to look a gift horse in the mouth, an opportunity had arisen.. “the use of the chairs”… Without a word of complaint and lead by Gareth, we all started working on a variety of drills incorporating the chairs, using different methods of rolling from chairs, to using chairs as weapons, working against knives in a seated position, as well as standing, pressure work one on one, free play against the knife using the chairs as a part of our work to disarm; it seemed as though the number of drills you could come up with were endless, if only given the time.. everyone had a great session, I know I did. After a breathing section to calm ourselves and get the heart rate down, and after the circle at the end, I started thinking a bit more about the Karate class and the Systema class as I walked back to my car, thinking about how very different both classes were.. one class was very orderly, clinical and tidy, the other a rag tag of all sorts getting stuck in to what amounted to an impromptu improvised session, one class training without contact, very serious without a hint of laughter, the other quite physical with unrestricted laughter, humour and with smiles all round, even so, working just as hard as the other group…. I would imagine that if you asked the other group how they liked their training, I expect they would have said it was great, as we would have, but you kinda wonder how it would go down if both groups were taken out of their respective environments, and placed somewhere else, which group would adapt the best….? the training environment for us that night had completely changed and without warning, and we just slipped straight into good productive work, would the other group have accepted the change in training conditions so readily?….. I’ll leave that one hanging out there for you to ponder, as I did on the way home...

Steve

The Straight and Very Narrow…

2011-11-29T19:00:00.001Z

Having tunnel vision in a threatening situation is somewhere I've definitely been on a few occasions, total focus on the target in front of me, totally ignoring my surroundings, the bigger picture of my situation. I can also remember many years ago coming up against a Wing Chun senior at a multi Style seminar and remember how he came straight down the middle, again with a lot of focus, and was very formidable and quite difficult to deal with. I look back to that situation and realise that the style of Karate I was practicing at the time was very linear and knew no other way but what I knew then on how to deal with it, deciding to play him at his own game and take him head on, like two steam trains colliding, the stronger and the faster was always going to win this sparring bout, and yes I was over whelmed.. eventually by superior skill and someone powering down the middle. Holding the line and defending your position by going forward and straight down the line without too much regard for the outcome was quite normal, and was common between fighters back then, It was one of those situations that If I’d know then what I know now, it may well have been a different story, but its easy to speculate in hind sight, just some alternative thinking was all that was needed. It wasn't until venturing into weapons training a few years later that movement and in particular the change of angles, the lines of attack and defence were explored, that gave me a better understanding of space and targeting in different ways and working off the line. Systema’s approach to movement has built on my understanding of space and working from a difficult position as a starting point, as well as keeping all options open and to be able to improvise if things go wrong, which they often do. To rely on technique totally for what you see as the solution to a problem may need a rethink if you’re smart, as a practiced set of movements for a practiced defence against practiced attack drills is fine, until you come up against something that doesn't quite fit the experience gained by drilling technique in a certain way, sometimes other considerations have to come into play, like size, strength, clothing, terrain, multiples, the dark, weapons, confined space, the list goes on.. any one of these can easily throw you if you don't learn to expect the unexpected, as Rob says we cant train for something that we cant possibly prepare for, so we train as best we can to embrace uncertainty.. Today I realise and understand that while straight line fighting has it's place, it also has many limitations and weaknesses... Using space is one thing that improved my peripheral vision and awareness before and during any confrontation.. Using the straight line head on approach might be the way of coping with inner fears and in certain circumstances may be successful, just by sucking it up and getting stuck in may help you, but any pause to weigh things up may let fear take the upper hand and the moment lost to be effective, but by using movement to enable assessment is a valuable tool and may make the difference in your response... Keeping a level head, dealing with threats as just something to deal with, using detached emotion, keeping things clinical and keeping aware of the bigger picture, takes something special, not all of us are capable of this level of cool... Indeed most of us will fall back to what we know well in order to defend ourselves, this may well be the “Straight and Narrow path" of A to B from another Martial Art that you first learnt, or possibly something learned that feels very comfortable, like an old sweater that you just cant let go of, thinking you might just wear it one day.. so for me it's important to make my Systema the thing I know well, and the thing I fall back to for security and not my linear past...

Cheers

Steve

Sensitive to your Senses..

2011-11-19T13:32:00.001Z

We all take our senses for granted and trying to imagine what it would be like to have any one of them taken away would I imagine be very hard to deal with indeed, and every day life would inevitably become a whole new ball game. Rob made an interesting point in today's class, he said there was a misconception that if one of your senses were take away the others then become enhanced somehow, but this isn't really the case, your remaining senses stay exactly same, all that happens is that you now focus more closely on the remaining ones, you just have one less feeding you information that needs processing..
This week was outside again, although a lot colder it wasn't going to take very long to warm up the bodies internal core temperature.. it was to be a session using blind folds and the second half of the class was almost totally in the dark. Working in two groups, one wearing blindfolds and the other just working as spotters for the blindfoldees... For a good half an hour or more, a variety of fast paced drills were worked at bettween the pair, from jog running around the field, slow and at speed, the sighted guy acting as the guide, using sounds, verbal instructions or physical contact to take them around the circuit; directional finder work, calling to your blindfolded partner from a distance, using only three signals in total to show the way back to you.., then only using one name call, this was somewhat harder for you to make the right decision then go.. psychological mind play, holding a stressed position e.g. press up and exposed to a range of noises, pokes and prods, blades and other unusual items that lay around the field; exercising in pairs, sill one person sighted one not, push ups, sit ups and squats shoulder to shoulder, running again and then dropping into a sprawl, straight into press up’s until instructed to get up and run again... onto sensitivity drills with arm contact only, then introducing knife play and disarms, again one sighted one not.., take downs without warning straight to the ground and in the dark, onto free play one sighted one not, escape from grabs and holds, partnered with another blindfolded guy and made to stand up grapple.. everything in this section of the session was about expecting the unexpected... After a good while the groups exchanged roles and off we went again. Taking your vision away does exactly what Rob talked about at he beginning of the session, deprived of one sense you soon forget about being sightless and begin to excepted your situation and just get on with the drills, focusing on the instructions given.. your remaining senses soon take over and this is where your focus lay. During the sensitivity drills while blind folded my touch seemed to be softer and yes felt more sensitive to my partner, using touch to locate, that also helped my positioning, good positioning seemed to be highlighted as important all of a sudden, trying to feel my way behind my partner and filling the gaps left open by him. During some of the drills where you felt a little bit isolated, I found that as soon as you were able to touch another person it was as though you were safe again, and started to then work against them for security, the touch to their body enabling you to follow the path back to the rest of their body to work on things familiar to you. Chris made an interesting observation that if he was making body contact with someone else while either he or his partner was subjected to stuff, it only appeared to feel half as bad, Rob said that’s why in interrogation you were almost certainly isolated from others and Chris agreed that a shared experience seemed a lot easier to deal with… It was quite surprising how quickly you do acclimatise yourself to your own situation, relying on sounds and touch to get you back to somewhere that felt safe and normal, even so there was always a slight eminent of fear present, fear of the unknown, waiting for the unexpected, the uncertainty of what might be coming your way in the next second or two..
Being in the second blindfolded group you were automatically thinking of what you had just done to the other group, almost creating mild anxiety in yourself created by your previous actions, now half expecting / anticipating the heavy strike to the abs without any warning, the first group where spared this luxury, having been caught cold suffered a bit more discomfort but less stress than we did...
Overall it was an interesting experience and asked Rob in the circle at the end if we could take a look at other sensory deprivation, as it could create even more interesting work, especially if two or more senses were taken away from you at the same time…

Steve

Deconstruct…

2011-11-18T16:00:00.000Z

Construct - To put together the constituent parts of (something) in their proper place and order; to build; to form; to make.

Deconstruct - To break down into components; dismantle.

It’s funny how we spend all of our time in the Martial Arts busy “Constructing” our Body, Mind and Spirit only to break it down in others. The succession of dedicated instructors have made you what you are.. they slowly built and formed the best fighter they could from the abilities you had and instilled in you that the skills you have learned from them were to be used only to protect you, your friends and family. The “Construction” of yourself though training ultimately means the “Deconstruction” of someone else in combat..
Causing damage to someone else can be a problem in the psychological sense, a real barrier to overcome in order to get on in your Systema or in what ever other MA training you follow. Assisting someone to overcome their fears is as equally as tough for you as their partner, mentally preparing yourself to deal with strikes and blows as this means of letting them “Deconstruct” you, this can be a barrier to progression too.. Deconstruction of your opponent was the the theme of Robs last seminar for 2011 and proved to be one of the best so far.

End of year seminar 2011

Yes another year is almost up and I have to wonder where the time has gone.The last Systema seminar of 2011 and like all the others a great session and flew quickly by. Rob wanted to look at how to “Deconstruct” someone through drills designed to be a bit more direct and robust, definitely not a softly softly session. The first thing Rob said was that we were to get a knife and keep it with us at all times during the next four hours, so that's what we did. Carrying a knife in one hand while exercising and while performing drills seemed strange at first, but as time went on I felt more comfortable with it and I started to feel more at home; changing the knife from hand to hand and using different grips too felt ok.
After about two hours and because some of the drills changed, mainly due the fact that we were drawing the blade while falling, meant I had to place it back in its scabbard for safety. Being able to Handle the knife and feel comfortable around it is very important and this extra time for me was well spent, familiarising myself for this lengthy period I found very useful.

Rob wanted to look at the component parts of the body this time and how to take away the fight in someone by attacking the bodies, bone, muscular and nervous systems. The first couple of hours were taken up by breaking down the body into specific target areas, and as time was against us and with so much to get through, only a few areas were looked at, the feet, knees, solar plexus, neck and head, keeping to the central core of the body. Working in pairs each section was taken in turn, looking at ways to strike targets from a static position as well as moving around each other, and then the same working in groups. We explored types of strikes that could be used, target areas and the accuracy needed to effect the person structurally and observe the effects that were created, depth of strikes was also explored. It’s always hard to create exact realism in training, as you and your partners wellbeing is always the first priority, so it was down to each person to give permission to allow the other to make heavier strikes to the body, making it challenging but not damaging. Blind folds, knife work and group work were all looked at individually and then combined and brought together in free flow work, all fitted together very naturally..

Rob said at the end of the session that the work shown by everyone meant the bar was now raised, and a marker set for next year’s training. Everyone was now at a good standard, so next year we can get a bit more combative in our training.. I for one look forward to this and feel ready for more pressured work, I think I now have a reasonable handle on the basics and want to feel more challenged, pushing these “almost” 50 year old bones to their limit.. :)
It’s easy to see that Systema is not designed to fit a sporting profile but one of self protection and healing, making the body strong and fit for purpose, ultimately flexible enough to handle most situations, a set of principles that when applied in the correct way gets the job done, perhaps not always in the most aesthetically pleasing or a stylish way, but in a matter of fact way that leaves you in no doubt of its effectiveness, that it has subtleties that an ever increasing number of people think are worth a look at; you can clearly see this as its ideas are slowly being absorbed into mainstream thinking.

In the circle at the end of the session John said there was an almost family feeling within the group now, and he went on to say that ”it was like seeing your relatives at Christmas” I really understood what he meant by this; having everyone there together training especially when the boys from Leicester are down always has a good feeling about it and making a strong connection between us through the training we do.. Rob pointed out that no matter what Systema group you train with there is always a similar feeling; I have to say that’s why training with this group for me is so special, instructors and students have a mutual respect for one another which is very clear to see.

Steve

Sensitivity Training…

2011-11-18T10:20:00.001Z

Giving Support…

2011-11-08T09:32:00.001Z

Sometimes in life you need to forget about yourself and concentrate on helping others to get on, and the bi-product of this is quite often you are able to learn more about yourself in the process.. With Systema I think sometimes you need to be able to work on things for extended periods to make the connections between ideas and the subtle meanings behind the drills and how you need best apply them; so for this reason and to keep my own ego in check, it's important for me to sometimes let my partner get on with the drill for as long as they need to; sometimes its best to forget yourself and be content to be a sort of crash test dummy for a little while… Even though you have given yourself to your partner in order for them to explore their understanding of the Systema drills, it’s still possible for you to explore allsorts of things about yourself at the same time.. as last Saturday’s session showed me.

Fear of being manhandled can be a bit unpleasant sometimes and to keep yourself in this position for a while can be challenging as well.. to except blows to your body and face, to be continually taken down to the floor, then having to get up again, generally roughed up for a bit, then changing partners to start over again, keeping the pressure always on yourself... Although a bit wearing, I think this sort of thing is an important step in my own confidence building and facing up to fears, and by doing this constantly wears away at any of the ego that I still hold on to.
Sometimes though for no apparent reason I feel an overwhelming need to point out things to other people, is this an ego thing or a genuine gesture in supporting my fellow student?, this I can’t tell you, you would really have to ask them about that.., This sort of interference could either be taken in two ways either as “who the feck does he think he is pointing out the obvious to me, or more often I think taken as constructive criticism as it’s always intended, but sometimes its hard to tell how it’s been taken. When I spot something that is concerning others, I generally want to step back from aspects of the drill that we’re working on and let them work on the troubling bit as long as they need to, enabling them to get more proficient and happy with what they’re doing, and for some unknown reason I’m very happy to do this.. but as I said earlier, the fact I’ve stepped back doesn't mean I cant still learn something during the drill.. quite often my partner will say sorry Steve you didn’t get to have a go at that, but it really doesn't matter to me, as there will always be another time to try this stuff out, and not for getting you can learn just as much about the drill with your partner experimenting on you, as by doing it yourself, there is always two sides to a drill, what ever he’s practicing it still rubs off on you just by the shared experience. At the same time lots of other stuff is learned by you while being the punch bag guy, lots of falling, rolling, breathing, balancing, learning to be softer, you may well be getting a bit of a battering, but so is your ego too… becoming a little bit compliant to aid your partner works for both of you, and as this is all about sharing stuff, experiences, knowledge, fears and shedding ego’s, I’ve found that the benefits of drills always travel in both directions if allowed to do so…..

Steve

Feeling a little Tense are we…?

2011-10-29T15:46:00.001+01:00

Tense = 1. Stretched or stressed tightly; taut or rigid, 2. Under mental or emotional strain or producing mental or emotional strain.

I don't suppose this will be the last post on tension, as it crops up at practically every lesson and the last few weeks it seems as though we’ve spent a good while exploring all that tension has to offer, but I doubt it…
One thing John raised in the circle at the end of class last Saturday, was that the word tension may not correctly describe what goes on in the body when we talk about tension as Systema defines it, is there a word out there that better describes what we mean… Most people when asked, will describe tension as something created by stressful high pressured or perhaps very emotional conditions that cause muscular tension, often in the shoulders an neck resulting in headaches etc. When we talk about tension in Systema it really relates to body structure, the opposite being relaxation, although mental tension in psychological work will no doubt result in muscular tension of some kind too, but in this post I’m trying to describe tension when talking about working with the bodies structure.

The closest analogy that fits well with my own understanding is comparing it to a guitar, and the strings on it. For the guitar to function / operate correctly it needs to be held at the correct position and the player to be comfortable in their performance, each string needs to be tuned to carry the correct amount of tension in order to vibrate at the correct frequency, to give the sound that gels well with each of the other strings, giving the overall complete in tune sound quality that also compliments the guitars shaped body; so relating this to the human body as best I can, I see the limbs as the strings and the torso as the body of the guitar, the arms and legs are given tension or relaxation depending on what's required of them, once in tune so to speak, the torso or body then operates as one with the limbs, all in tune…

When facing an opponent and physical contact is made, using “Tension and Relaxation” in the right quantities can transform a problematic situation into one of a controlled situation, and by applying not only “Tension and Relaxation” in the right quantities but to the right locations, can be just as important, as the last few weeks have taught us. Through drills to make this easier to understand, I think most in class would say they now have a greater understanding of how “Tension and Relaxation” compliment each other and can either be used for advantage or disadvantage.

Below I try as best as I can to show one example of some of the drills we’ve been looking at.

1/To maintain good posture when pressure to the body is applied from two different directions.

Ordinarily if the torso was pushed in two apposing directions and held insufficient tension it would rotate and collapse to the floor, but if more tension than usual is held there a different result can be obtained. By trying to join the two points of contact in your mind, creates the required amount tension to make the torso unbendable, at the same time the right amount of complimentary relaxation should be held in the legs and arms, giving the option of motion to avoid collapse; if the legs and feet were also tense and routed to the floor collapse would be inevitable, by holding tension in one place and not another, posture can be maintained and the take down is less likely.

To define by name this constantly changing state of “Tension and Relaxation” is difficult, it’s like the body parts are continually re-tuning themselves to the situation it finds itself, a sort of auto-tune, creating the ideal amounts of “Tension and Relaxation” to operate at its optimum position. Someone who has a good understanding of this type of body control is very difficult to deal with.. when working with Gareth at the weekend, the drill was simply to take the other man down to the ground, using a sort of stand up grappling, this proved to be very difficult for me and could imagine being very frustrating to someone from outside the group of regulars. Tension through anxiety is totally different to what Systema practitioners are talking about here, its all about body control, but the real understanding of tension can only really be achieved by experimentation.. just doing it.. so what are you waiting for, get stuck in and get tense…

Steve

A fist full of Tension…

2011-10-22T16:26:00.001+01:00

Well this week’s Saturday class had the feel of a Seminar about it, not sure why, but maybe it was because Ed and a couple of his boys were down from Leicester and their presence always adds something to the session, easy going, friendly and great to work alongside. For the last few weeks we’ve been looking at various aspects of applying tension and relaxation to our work, and this week was to follow up on that by taking the fist as the subject, and how we needed to carry a certain amount of tension within it in order for it to be an effective tool and not crumble impact.
Some of the lesson was dedicated to holding objects in the hand, feeling the tension created by just holding something, at the same time holding structure in the arms, not as in muscular tension. Different items were held, knife, sticks, training guns, tennis balls, all used to create this localised tension in the hand when making a fist. After taking one of these items or two items one for each hand, we were asked to move around the floor, rolling etc while keeping the fist/s tense around the object/s but all the while keeping the rest of the body soft and relaxed; then with a partner moving around in a standing position, a kind of free play pushing the objects into each other, the partner rolling off the push, not unlike the standard pushing drill, still maintaining a firm grip on the object/s held.

After a while it was time for a few exercises and you guessed it press up’s where used to reinforce this feeling of tension in the fists, so multiple press up’s in a circle, four guys each doing a press up in turn while the others remained in a static position, keeping it all going until you’d been around the circle eight times, ending up having done 36 press up’s each, plus the static holding position in between... quite hard going and white blood drained fists all round..

After having done the exercises we used the hands in fists against each other, holding the arms out in a press up type of position with that heavy tense feeling still in the hands, then “one for one” punching and defending with the fists and arms only, in a soft parrying sort of way, just feeling the fists tension… then the same work in groups of three, striking and passing the punches around in a circle, in a sticky arm chain link sort of way... a great free flowing drill, one that demonstrated the relaxation required throughout the body culminating in tension held within a strong well formed fist.

Steve

Breath Work…

2011-10-21T11:09:00.001+01:00

Tuesday Class

Gareth was taking the class tonight and took us through a lengthy warm up which focused on exercises and breath work combined. Breathing while exercising is usual, but this week we were going to experience a more challenging side to breath work and really extend the breath through the exercises. Breath work seems be one of those things that you sometimes pay little attention to unless directly linked to the drill you are looking at and I’m very guilty of this, sometimes putting my body through physical challenges of strength, psychological fear etc with out too much thought about working the breath as hard. If you let it, breath work can deliver equally challenging work that can also highlight physical and psychological fears we hold onto.. The breath work drills tend to feel as though the challenge is within yourself, a very internal thing, a fight against buried fears you hold on to. The fight for air is probably one of the most natural things the body craves and any shortfall in oxygen is soon picked up by the bodies systems, and this is more noticeable when the bodies hard at work. Fear from oxygen deprivation is one of my own fears and the thought of purposely depriving my self of it seems crazy at best, but like everything in Systema it has a purpose and is designed to make yourself stronger mentally, able to cope with the problematic events that can come our way daily and help us to continue to function under pressure, this is what Systema training gives you; placing yourself in very uncomfortable situations helps to face all sorts of fears and gives you the tools to calm yourself down and deal with the extraordinary, taking you a bit further away from the safe environments we’re all used to… taken out of your comfort zone occasionally doesn't do anyone any harm and we should all experience this from time to time.

Simple breath drills are an easy way to challenge yourself and thought I’d write a few down from last nights session, which if reading this and not a Systema practitioner you still might want to try.

The first exercise is carried out with a light jog, starting from one stride to each section, Breathe, Hold Breath, Breathe out, Hold breath, then back to the beginning. What we were trying to especially work on was to keep the breath as smooth as possible and not jerky while doing something physical, building up from one stride to the final eight strides per single breath. Its important that the duration of one breath equates to the amount of strides, so the example below shows the final eight strides with a timing of about one second per stride, the start of the breath starts at the first stride. I say one second per stride just to illustrate for timing purposes 1 second = one thousand and one approx.) but you may wish to carry out faster or slower the choice is yours.

Try this one just sitting while reading this blog post, work the timing to see how challenging it is.

The same drill shown in a slightly different format.

Note: Each section can be done for as long as you wish before progressing to the next level.

Next we looked at the standard exercises, Press up’s, Sit up’s, Squats and Leg Raises, applying similar breath work to them.

Press up variation No 1/ The diagram is self explanatory, but one press up = Down and Up. We worked up to a four set of press up’s, but you can go as far as you wish to push yourself; by the time I was doing four press up’s I was feeling slightly pressured, you can easily increase the number of press up’s or increase the sets, I guess it will be your own personal preference.

Core exercises: The next set of exercises were quite tough when the same breathing pattern as we did with the jog running was applied, again the idea was to tie one, two, three or four press up’s to the breath cycle of Breathe, Hold, Exhale, and Hold. To be done without a break between exercises / sets.

Enjoy

Steve

Movement for Defence…

2011-10-18T10:42:00.001+01:00

In last weekends Saturday lesson one of the things that Rob said that stuck in my mind is that Systema predominantly uses movement for defence unlike most other systems. When I look back pre Systema I can see what he meant, for my Karate anyhow, the main objective was yes to also move offline “sabaki” but this involved moving to another position or stance to initiate a simultaneous counter strike, which in itself was fine, but required a certain amount of thought to move to the offline space, select the appropriate kick, block or punch and then finish. As I said nothing wrong with this approach, but the lesson on Saturday was designed to show that any applied force to your body can initiate an almost instant counter response from another part of your body, taking away the need to think about what to do next, the body wants to take over and solve the problem in its own way.
We also looked at how this idea could also be applied to breaking structure in someone else and how to best spot / locate tension and work against it. To get to a point where movement can be used for defence you need to stop any planning of your next set of moves, achieving a state where you accept what comes at you and deal with it as presented. An understanding of tension and relaxation is really a prerequisite for movement as defence, as how you apply this to your body will effect how it responds to any threat against it, what outputs are generated in relation to the input received. So Rob spent quite a lot of time running through some drills on localising tension, to make us more aware of tension and relaxation in ourselves and others, using a partner to feel the differences when either were applied.
Working with your partner, one pushing the other, the one being pushed keeping the top half of their body relaxed, bottom half tense, then look to see how this effects your partners movement when pushed, not very mobile but able to deflect pushes, then change it around to having the top half tense bottom half relaxed, this showed more mobility in the guy being pushed, although their structure was still easily compromised through their tension; then to the whole body being tense, which was easy to work against, as your partner was so immobile they just fell over, then pushing against the whole body while relaxed, this proved to be the more difficult to deal with as your partner was able to move more freely.. the whole point of this was to see how the person being pushed could deal with the pushes in varying states of tension, the pusher needed to understand how to work different parts of the body that held tension and how best to work into the partners tension, to move it or strike it to effect the overall structure of the body, perhaps resulting in a take down. As for the person being pushed, it was an interesting experiment in applying tension and relaxation simultaneously. Separating tension / relaxation at the waist, above or below this line had its difficulties and was useful as a tool to understand body control, but if lets say an arm was grabbed and then the grabbed arm was made to be very tense and the remainder of the body was at the same time made to be very relaxed, the relaxed body is then free to move around the fixed point of the grab, this is a real advantage, as the tense arm in this example can be almost ignored as if given away, while the rest of the body is able to move around the restraint and free to work.

The more tense overall, the less effective you were in reacting to pushes which could also relate to punches, so to reinforce this we went into free play, empty handed and also with a knife and I for one certainly found that having looked at tension beforehand helped when it came to free play, staying relaxed became easier, my own thoughts and worries about what I should be doing were substantially diminished and it was only then it became just plain fun. Rob finished up the morning session by explaining that by defending space from a fixed posture, with hands up and in say a regular front facing stance, encouraged you to defend the small area of ground that you were standing on and stay rooted to it; so we had to realise this wasn't helping us to defend ourselves as effectively.. moving around without any sort of fixed anchor point, this gives us more options.. from the initial punch, push, kick grab against you, you should be able to remain flexible and act responsively.. there maybe of course some instances where you are backed up and have no choice but to stand your ground, but generally speaking these would be few and far between.

So “movement for defence” or “defence through movement” or “defending yourself with movement” amounts to the same thing, don't remaining static or this will stop or stall your breathing, tension will creep in creating fear, which eventually stops all movement; so by maintaining your relaxation, in turn helps with your breathing, keeps you mobile, then defence is possible.

Steve

CLASSWORK AUTUMN 2011…

2011-10-14T18:57:00.001+01:00

Disarms – The last line of defence…

2011-10-12T13:02:00.001+01:00

Ok just to clarify things first, I have never had to disarm anyone or been put in a position to almost have to, so my thoughts about disarms are just thoughts on the subject and the relevance to my training and the reality of what disarms are and how much better off are you if you know a little bit, or is a little bit of knowledge just as dangerous as not having any.

There are probably as many deferent types of disarms as there are weapons to disarm, each fighting system out there boasts their own variations of how best to take a lethal weapon off someone that’s either threatening to use it on you, or is in the process of using it on you. The common factor with disarms is that you really need to be at arms length to even have any sort of realistic chance of doing anything, beyond this distance I think the odds of success increase against you. Obviously edged weapons or firearms present a more significant risk than say stick or empty hand, although even against these weapons you may have a real problem to resolve.

I suppose where you live will also determine the amount of significant risk you might be exposed to, what country, whether inner city or out in the suburbs, your occupation, your social circle, these things will obviously determine the exposure to what you might come up against. In the US perhaps Gun and knife threats are more likely than say here in the UK, where knife crime is more prevalent than fire arms, although you might argue that inner city crime does increasingly involve more gun use these days and is perceived to be on the increase.

When I was young.. hmmmm sometime ago now, but I can remember that it was almost unheard of that a knife was used in a fight let alone a gun. I've never lived in a city, always lived out in small towns, so my own personal risk of exposure to anything was always going to be a lot less and day to day living had little to be concerned about. The most likely scenario today however, is that you will almost certainly come up against a knife as a minimum in most altercations, so some sort of close quarter defence training should be a priority in my view, who’s the best at teaching unarmed combat including knife and gun disarms is of course anyone's guess, the people with real life experience get my vote and yet the percentage of instructors with this real life experience must be quite small, as most Martial Arts instructors that I’ve come into contact with are quite law abiding and unlikely to ever get involved in unruly behaviour… well unless under extreme provocation that is. I suppose when under instruction in unarmed defence training you kind of have to imagine yourself doing what they’re showing you and be honest with yourself and say would this technique or idea, principle work, any doubts and you’re probably right to dismiss it.

So how far should we go and how much time training should we apply to this subject, well I guess as much as you can afford, as any edge will surly save you, even if the likelihood of ever using these skills are remote. I also feel as you get older the percentage risk also reduces, as lifestyle, responsibilities and outlook constantly change. Deciding that where you live or your occupation i.e Military, police, security requires special measures is personal choice, I suspect though will sway you towards extra training, as it would certainly be high on my agenda if my profession put me in harms way. But as it happens I’m an office worker and as such less than likely to face anything more threatening than a stapler or hot coffee, so any threat is more than likely going to be during my journey times (Road Rage) or in a social setting perhaps down the pub, so as you can see my situation is slightly different, quite safe compared to someone else who faces risk every day, either perhaps through poverty just trying to survive perhaps living on the streets, a police officer trying to protect others, a soldier on the front line doing his bit for Queen and country, Fire and Ambulance workers etc.. but as you know things tend to happen when you least expect it and from someone you least expected… these are the occasions that may occur for you and your family. I have no illusions that Knife and Gun defence can go horribly wrong and that any attempt to disarm someone who is pretty keen on doing you harm is going to take exceptional courage and balls; I would like to think that years of training would be an advantage, but the unseen weapon is the one that fears me most, the sly attack or the hidden / concealed blade that will reach its target before disarms are possible, a frightening thought.

Gun disarms are a new phenomenon in my training, meaning I haven't done much at all, perhaps one of the problems or reasons for this is that firearms are pretty difficult to get hold of or train with, unless of course your work enables this or you’re close to a certain fraternity that hand gun procurement is fairly straight forward.... So for the majority like me who want to practice any form of hand gun defence have only the rubber replicas or Air Soft pistols to work with.. They certainly have their limitations and a fair bit of imagination has to be employed in their use, as the difference between these options and the real thing is I suspect like using live and dull blades in knife work.. worlds apart. To understand gun disarms, I would think an element of understanding of how guns work and the fundamental differences between them, as this knowledge may have a bearing on how they are dealt with.. but perhaps the main criteria is to get them pointing away from you and others while your disarm is in progress, once the finger is away from the trigger you would hope things would start to come under control, but like all things cant be taken for granted, especially when up against someone who is keen to do you harm.

Rob is planning another seminar shortly, where Air Soft might be used and this will hopefully answer some of my questions and make things a little clearer, but I fear that ultimately the training we do will merely scratch the surface of facing real firearms, let alone disarming someone, but you have to put things into some sort of context and how you feel about the likelihood of high threat level events taking place in your neck of the woods and what you think is appropriate precautions.., for me though, in my small world, I think it safe to assume that I'm more likely to get run over by a bus or poke my eye out with a pencil than face this type of threat, but again who knows what's lurking out there.. So don't have nightmares. and do sleep well… :)

Steve

Massage…

2011-10-08T19:16:00.001+01:00

The act or art of treating the body by rubbing, kneading,patting, or the like, to stimulate circulation, increase suppleness and relieve tension.

One of the most rewarding experiences in Systema is the giving and receiving of massage, especially after a long training session and is an excellent way to free the body of any residual tension... a great way to bring the body back to normality, helping it to recover and able to face the rest of the day. Massage seems to have many qualities, one of which is fixing or perhaps more accurate, giving relief to injuries that may have been caused by training, but could have just as easily have been caused during an everyday task.

From my own personal experience, the only time I really came across massage or the care of your training partners outside of Systema was with my old Jujitsu club, where the Shihan would offer help with injuries and one or two of his students also had experience gained outside of the Martial Arts and would assist with a troublesome back or similar if asked, but even then it wasn't apart of the general class training. With Systema though, it seems to play an integral part of classwork and is just seen as more “stuff” to work with, a valuable and worthwhile provision of time to understand how the body works. By using hands, feet, or a combination of both; you are able to feel the structures of the body and how they fit together, interconnecting muscles, bone, tissue and fibres.. spotting tension gets easier by looking at your partners form laying in front of you, trying to locate by sight any obvious physical ailments or if directed start working on a specific area. Recently I’d been carrying an injury for a few months and was one of those niggling shoulder problems that never seems to go away; not painful but more of a dull ache. I asked Mark one of the guys at class to take a look and he was able to pin point the problem under my shoulder blade fairly quickly and within three short sessions the problem had gone away, I was really grateful to Mark for taking time to sort this out for me and can certainly feel the benefit every day now.

I'm of the view that anyone can get involved with massage and within a few goes can demonstrate enough skill to help anyone in class to relax. Giving massage teaches you a lot about helping others to recover and to energise them. Most in class would agree that the feeling you have after a half hour session is worth the lesson fee by itself.

Initially the massage can be uncomfortable, especially when someone walks up and down your legs and back. At first you will start to resist with a certain amount of tension, but eventually your body gives in and the muscles relax and that's the point where you start to feel the benefits. There are other ways to apply massage, with a stick, knife, elbows, knees for example, all have different levels of penetration into the muscle groups and have different effects, but all are available to help repair and relax the body, as relaxation is what most of us want to feel more often.

Steve

The path of least resistance…

2011-10-01T19:10:00.001+01:00

In close quarter work there isn't always a great deal of room to move, especially in stand up grappling. The last couple of Saturday sessions we've been working on evasion from grabs and thinking about finding space to move into. Finding the gaps and weakness in your opponents work, working out escape routes from chokes, arm grabs and body holds, all these things can seem a bit impossible to work against sometimes, but once you realise that the best solution is to accept your situation and not fight against strength, but to use it to advantage, not to work further into your opponents grasp, but keep relaxed and keep your head and try not to panic; then methodically search for the open space however small. Once found, any space can be enlarged to move through and then to move to an advantageous space to continue to work from. Try not to leave unoccupied space between you and your opponent otherwise they will soon move in to fill it, then you’re back to square one.

Making space is necessary to escape, that goes without saying, but still an important point Rob was keen to stress, any gaps left open would give your opponent his own room to work in, so we needed to make sure that once we had found a gap to work through to escape, to make sure we move back in close to fill any gaps left behind. Obviously we all know that the earlier you get out of any hold the better your chances, so a progressive set of drills was looked at to cover this, light contact and then complete controlling contact and then from before contact.

Drills to improve our sensitivity was first, light touches to be brushed away or to move away from, moving into fairly large free spaces. Next exploring ways to create space from tighter grabs.. this proved to be a little more difficult, different considerations had to be taken into account, protecting the airway or neck arteries in order to prolong consciousness when choked, I found creating a wedge with my own hands and arms up and around my own neck created some protection and in doing this provided a movable surface between the grabbers arms and my own neck, this made me a little bit slippery and enabled me to move the strangles off without too much trouble. Rob suggested that moving into free space was more preferable than engaging directly with your opponent and said that the use of the feet was also important, it was a way of creating openings, it was possible to move the whole of the grabbers body to affect his structure by foot movement, as his arms were pinned to you, by stretching out or moving your base, this took him with you creating gaps, this was better than just working to free the restrained area with hands only and using limited movement. By moving the feet first altered the structures of both you and your opponent, you creating space, he unable to maintain control and balance, also to maintain his grip. We found that the movement of the feet soon created gaping holes to work with and your partners loss of body contact soon followed, creating further problems for him to deal with. Your next objective was to either clear and move away to safety, or to close in to make body contact again, always moving to a better and more favourable position there by ensuring that you gain the upper hand.

Steve