the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

Dmitri wrote:I'm an older guy rolling with younger and mostly bigger/stronger folks, so I pretty much have to work around pressure vectors. (Plus, 20 years of tai chi also embedded the same ideas into my body...)

There's also the fact of working within a certain framework, so there are things not allowed. So how does the grappling change if you introduce other forms of resistance?

Working within confines of a framework is a given in any training/MA scenario, even in Systema . So I'm not sure what you mean here by "other forms of resistance"

Yep. having just turned 60 I can relate to that... and I think that is one good thing to come out of TCC training.

To an extent, yes. I mean, there is usually a purpose to any drill, so a framework will reflect that. And the framework can relate to many things - speed, levels of contact, specific moves only, etc. But where you have stylistic or similar restrictions, how do you learn to work against someone not bound by those restrictions? If you want to, that is. I guess plenty of people in anything art are just happy doing what they are doing.

When not working from a style base, there are no restrictions, other than safety concerns, of course. But in either case, the challenge is always how to make training as "real" as possible without the risk of serious damage. I'm always interested to see how people approach this, as there always has to be a level of compromise somewhere.
For me, the ultimate aim is to be as "free" as possible in terms of actions or response, which feeds back into the principle approach.

RobP3 wrote:For me, the ultimate aim is to be as "free" as possible in terms of actions or response, which feeds back into the principle approach.

Agreed. Sounds good. It has long been my observation that such freedom of physical action and response is usually prevented by mental and emotional resistance, which in turn generates physical resistance.

How can any fighter of any style automatically and spontaneously manifest the foundation principles and basic body methods of their art freely and effectively in their techniques while constantly trying to consciously orchestrate a preconceived strategy and fight plan, which they may or may not be able to pull off?

It is virtually impossible to effectively go with the flow of live combat while simultaneously holding on to mental and physical resistance.

GrahamB wrote:Isn't this original clip by Rob simply pointing out that you don't want to work directly against resistance, but rather find a way to work around it, because it's usually the best way to go?

It's not rocket science, but I must be missing something, because a lot of people seem to have some sort of problem with that.

ok, maybe Graham.

but I thought he meant the other "resistance" ie. what most of us mean as "sparring" or alive training against someone who reacts counteractively in real time.

is that "resistence" or better stated "connection" or hardness.. we can all get behind soft overcoming hard - I think that's what you are getting at. Flowing around stuff and so on.

I'm sorry but from the intro i thought he was talking about resistance as in alive work or sparring.

Going to the video that was brought up showing the duck under - normally we should see control/moving the arm/protecting against the arm to get under and behind Safely - Something...
what was shown was vulnerable. the arms should be positioned better and doing more through the movement. deflecting from it (what's missing) isn't the answer. You need to train how you're going to fight (more or less). Otherwise you will get 'habit creep'...

bending from the knees rather than waist is also sound movement principle and technique.

frankly whether it's a talk through of some other principle; poor technique is still poor..

Principle based movement should include sound technique rather than flaunt it.
Perhaps this identifies a valid criticism of this kind of 'flow training'? (if I can call it that?), or if it's not training then demonstration.

to play devils advocate.

cloudz wrote:

GrahamB wrote:Isn't this original clip by Rob simply pointing out that you don't want to work directly against resistance, but rather find a way to work around it, because it's usually the best way to go?

It's not rocket science, but I must be missing something, because a lot of people seem to have some sort of problem with that.

ok, maybe Graham.
but I thought he meant the other "resistance" ie. what most of us mean as "sparring" or alive training against someone who reacts counteractively in real time.
is that "resistence" or better stated "connection" or hardness.. we can all get behind soft overcoming hard - I think that's what you are getting at. Flowing around stuff and so on. I'm sorry but from the intro i thought he was talking about resistance as in alive work or sparring.

So what you thought I was talking about was not what I was talking about. Again, stage one, in the context of the old "technique test," working against direct tension.
Establishing the principle of working around it as one option. As I say in the clip, you then have to work this against movement, against intent, and then work it into your sparring and testing, refining it each time.

Doc Stier wrote:

RobP3 wrote:For me, the ultimate aim is to be as "free" as possible in terms of actions or response, which feeds back into the principle approach.

Agreed. Sounds good. It has long been my observation that such freedom of physical action and response is usually prevented by mental and emotional resistance, which in turn generates physical resistance.
How can any fighter of any style automatically and spontaneously manifest the foundation principles and basic body methods of their art freely and effectively in their techniques while constantly trying to consciously orchestrate a preconceived strategy and fight plan, which they may or may not be able to pull off?
It is virtually impossible to effectively go with the flow of live combat while simultaneously holding on to mental and physical resistance.

Absolutely. The challenge, then, is building a progressive method of training the skills and attributes required to achieve that result, and setting up ways to test them at each stage. Pressure testing can come in many forms, some touching on that emotional resistance you mention.

RobP3 wrote:the challenge is always how to make training as "real" as possible without the risk of serious damage. I'm always interested to see how people approach this, as there always has to be a level of compromise somewhere.

Ah, I see. I used to worry about that a lot, but the focus on self-defense aspect of my training has, over the last few years, been almost completely replaced with the focus on not getting hurt (while still giving sparring partners something to work with); I'm just happy to be able to show up for regular classes and still be less out-of-breath than many of those aforementioned younger stronger guys.
Totally different priorities now

Dmitri wrote:

RobP3 wrote:the challenge is always how to make training as "real" as possible without the risk of serious damage. I'm always interested to see how people approach this, as there always has to be a level of compromise somewhere.

Ah, I see. I used to worry about that a lot, but the focus on self-defense aspect of my training has, over the last few years, been almost completely replaced with the focus on not getting hurt (while still giving sparring partners something to work with); I'm just happy to be able to show up for regular classes and still be less out-of-breath than many of those aforementioned younger stronger guys.
Totally different priorities now

Amen to that - the game now is... to stay in the game. But I cannot deny the huge boost it gives my fragile 50 year old ego to submit people 30 years younger with simply more knowledge and experience when they would beat me in just about any other physical test of endurance beyond trying to stay alive against me for 6 minutes at a time on a soft mat (with a certain rule set )

I've never been very interested in the 'self defence' side of martial arts though - I've always been more interested in the art of the art - like, how it works, what is the clever thing that it's doing. Trying to work out the magic trick. And I think I lose a bit of interest if I can figure it out.

So you guys got Marvin banned then. Just what this forum needs, less interaction.

liokault wrote:So you guys got Marvin banned then. Just what this forum needs, less interaction.

Quality of interaction is more valuable than sheer quantity of same. And so, I would love to see whatever measure of discernment that was used in marvin8's case also applied to others who spam post multiple totally unrelated images to numerous threads, generally just taking up space and adding nothing of substantial value to any discussion.

liokault wrote:So you guys got Marvin banned then. Just what this forum needs, less interaction.

What? Nothing to do with me. Though I stopped responding when he started repeating himself, plus saying he didn't train or teach.

Ian says it better than I could

https://youtu.be/qnR2I_1Tdr0

Why does Leo think Marvin is banned?

GrahamB wrote:Why does Leo think Marvin is banned?

Because if I tap your name, I see your profile. If I tap Robs name, I see his profile. If I tap Marvin’s name I see that the user doesn’t exist.

That and the PM he sent me about getting banned…

liokault wrote:

GrahamB wrote:Why does Leo think Marvin is banned?

Because if I tap your name, I see your profile. If I tap Robs name, I see his profile. If I tap Marvin’s name I see that the user doesn’t exist.

That and the PM he sent me about getting banned…

He PMd you although he is banned?

Maybe from another account, if he's not IP banned. Even then, there are ways around that, that are quite easy. I personally had the impression it was kinda hard to get his point sometimes. But it's not my place to judge.