One of many extra intriguing points of Ki Chuan Do (KCD) for inexperienced persons and out of doors observers is Grasp Perkins’ “Modified Native American Floor Combating.” Not solely have most individuals by no means seen or skilled genuine Native American martial arts (due to the dearth of practitioners alive at the moment and the even smaller quantity fascinated about sharing their abilities with the general public), however most martial artists and combative sport followers can not even conceive of an efficient technique of combating on the bottom that differs considerably from the grappling strategies (wrestling, jiu-jitsu, and so on.) so universally practiced at the moment. To even counsel {that a} very completely different technique could also be equally or much more efficient for actual violence instantly evokes skepticism, so conditioned are most individuals to think about “groundfighting” synonymous with “wrestling” or “grappling.”
Let’s take an analytical have a look at what KCD Modified Native American Groundfighting truly is, why it’s, and the way and why it differs from standard groundfighting (grappling) strategies.
DISENGAGEMENT vs. ENGAGEMENT
KCD groundfighting, not like grappling, emphasizes DISENGAGEMENT, moderately than ENGAGEMENT with the enemy. “Engagement” right here means the merging of two our bodies right into a single system of forces for greater than a break up second’s length. Put extra merely, standard grappling strategies emphasize engagement with the adversary in that the practitioner seeks to “tie up with” the adversary with a purpose to apply his strategies. The grounded grappler on the offensive seeks to reduce the gap between his physique and his opponent’s, therefore gaining most management over and consciousness of the entire opponent’s actions, maximizing alternatives to use connected joint locking/breaking and choking/strangling strategies.
Minimizing the area accessible to the opponent minimizes the opponent’s alternatives to strike the grappler (utilizing standard strikes, at the very least), and permits the grappler to make use of his full body weight and the energy of his core muscle tissues in opposition to the remoted weaker joints of the opponent, supplied the grappler has enough sensitivity, agility, endurance and information to make the strategies work in opposition to his opponent. Even when standard hanging strategies are built-in into grappling, as within the fashionable “floor and pound” technique of Combined Martial Arts competitions, the hanging is often carried out from prescribed positions of most engagement (e.g. punches from the Mount place or knee strikes from the Facet Management place) in order to keep up management over the opponent’s actions whereas creating simply sufficient area for the grappler to strike.
KCD groundfighting, alternatively, implores us to stay as disengaged as doable. Relatively than tying up with the enemy, a KCD practitioner strives to keep up his/her personal freedom of motion, moderately than committing his/her physique to merging with the actions of a single adversary. Contact with the enemy, moderately than being tight and fixed as in standard grappling, is fleeting and minimal, consisting primarily of kicks, strikes, slams, gouges, rips and fast wrenches. The precept of disengagement permits the KCD practitioner to make the most of a component comparatively unavailable to the standard grappler: MOBILITY.
GROUND MOBILITY
Whereas a very good grappler is cell relative to his opponent, in that he’s in a position to quickly climb throughout and across the opponent’s physique, the engaged facet of grappling prevents the grappler from being cell relative to the overall atmosphere. Whereas he’s connected to his opponent, working in the direction of the opponent’s defeat, the grappler shouldn’t be free to quickly transfer across the atmosphere he’s combating in.
The KCD practitioner, particularly as a result of he stays disengaged from the enemy (by skilled speedy, convulsive and yielding motion and sensitivity), is free to maneuver wherever s/he needs. Additional, speedy mobility throughout the bottom (primarily within the mode of rolling) is one thing that’s skilled continuously in KCD groundfighting coaching. This sort of coaching is notably absent from most standard grappling applications, just because it doesn’t match into the grappling paradigm of fixed engagement.
SPORT vs. COMBAT
The contrasts explored to date expose the first distinction between standard floor grappling and KCD groundfighting: Most fashionable grappling strategies are designed for a SPORT paradigm, whereas KCD groundfighting is meant for REAL COMBAT. Due to the at all times current chance of a number of attackers in actual fight, purposefully partaking with a single adversary on the bottom, thereby sacrificing mobility, is an especially dangerous technique. Whereas the story exists of a grounded grappler’s shopping for time in opposition to a number of attackers by manipulating his engaged opponent as a defend in opposition to the kicks and punches of the opposite attackers, that is hardly a dependable sufficient technique to rely on. A much better technique is the very same one a KCD practitioner would use on his/her toes: Stay MOBILE and disengaged with a purpose to stop the attackers from concentrating on you for efficient strikes and grapples whereas lashing out with highly effective, correct, full-body assaults in opposition to the closest attackers, whereas trying to create a window to flee the group.
That is precisely what the KCD a number of attacker technique consists of: fixed, unpredictable motion (within the mode of speedy, stomping steps whereas standing, and rolling when on the bottom); speedy, highly effective, full-body hanging in any respect angles (dropping strikes and kicks whereas standing, and dropping kicks [primarily], physique slams and strikes on the bottom); and trying to escape the mass assault (breaking out of the group to run away whereas standing, and creating area to stand up after which run when on the bottom).
PROVEN IN WORLD WAR II
If this groundfighting technique sounds novel or unproven, observe these excerpts from the guide Kill or Get Killed by Lt. Col. Rex Applegate, one of many best works on shut fight of the World Conflict II period:
“Keep away from, if in any respect doable, going to the bottom together with your adversary. . . . One injunction you need to heed: As soon as going to the bottom, by no means cease transferring. Begin rolling and attempt to get again in your toes as rapidly as doable. If you cannot stand up and might’t roll, pivot in your hips and shoulders so you may face your opponent and block together with your toes any try to shut with you.
Keep in mind, it’s not essential to go to the bottom as soon as YOU have positioned your opponent there. You possibly can end him off together with your toes. Your enemy can do likewise in case you stay motionless on the bottom and keep inside vary.”
(p. 15–emphasis included in unique)
“When on the bottom, subjected to assault from a standing opponent, the person can use his toes to forestall the adversary from closing in or administering a coup de grace.” (p. 16-17)
“On the first alternative he ought to attempt to regain his toes.”
(p. 20)
Regardless of being an professional in sportive strategies of floor grappling, Lt. Col. Applegate, like John Perkins, understood that below actual fight circumstances, the place a number of adversaries could have boots and different weapons absolutely able to ending issues instantly if provided a very good (stationary) goal, a) mendacity on the bottom is usually a nasty place to be, and b) when on the bottom, the sportive technique of engagement should be deserted for considered one of disengagement and mobility.
THE STRATEGY MUST MATCH THE GOAL
The grappling method of full engagement with a single adversary with a purpose to apply pins, joint locks and chokes is ideally suited to permitting a grappler to convincingly and demonstrably management and dominate a single opponent with out severely injuring him. This is the reason grappling is such an ideal technique for sport competitors, the place the item is to exhibit one athlete’s superiority over one other whereas preserving each athletes to carry out one other day.
In distinction, the KCD method of disengagement, with contact restricted primarily to the impacts of highly effective, full-body kicks, physique slams, strikes, wrenches, rips and gouges, shouldn’t be very properly suited to pinning an opponent in place or forcing him to confess defeat earlier than critical injury is finished. What it IS fitted to, nevertheless, is sustaining the KCD practitioner’s freedom of motion and mobility, permitting him/her to maneuver sufficiently to forestall a deadly pile-on or boot celebration from a number of attackers and create area to face up, whereas dealing out disabling and presumably deadly injury to the attackers.
THE WEAPON FACTOR
One other distinction between KCD groundfighting and standard grappling that illustrates their respective foci (fight vs. sport) is how the palms are utilized in every. In standard grappling, the palms are used virtually continuously to carry and management the opponent, and in addition at occasions to stability on and push off of the bottom or strike the opponent. In KCD groundfighting, nevertheless, the palms are virtually by no means used in opposition to the bottom or to carry the enemy, and are used solely secondarily for momentary hanging, gouging and ripping. Throughout coaching, the KCD practitioner is admonished to maintain his/her palms as free and unencumbered as doable. It’s because KCD acknowledges the truth that in actual fight, hand-held weapons are sometimes an element within the end result. Due to this fact, KCD groundfighting is designed to combine seamlessly with weapons use. That is inherent within the artwork’s Native American roots, when a practitioner would have been anticipated to have tomahawks and/or looking knives in his palms whereas combating in shut fight, on the bottom or in any other case. The trendy KCD practitioner could as a substitute have in his/her palms a carry knife, a cane, or a weapon of alternative which may be picked up from the bottom (e.g. a brick, a bottle, or grime to throw within the enemies’ eyes). Groundfighting with weapons, in addition to choosing up weapons from the bottom within the midst of a combat, are incessantly practiced points of KCD coaching.
SENSITIVITY AND DESTRUCTION vs. CONTROL AND SUBMISSION
To sum up what we have coated up to now:
- Sportive grappling SEEKS the bottom with a purpose to acquire CONTROL over a single opponent with a purpose to make him SUBMIT to the grappler’s will.
- KCD AVOIDS the bottom as a result of risks of being on the bottom in an actual fight state of affairs (versus in a sporting match). Nevertheless, if compelled to the bottom, the KCD practitioner makes use of DISENGAGEMENT (by sensitivity), MOBILITY and MAXIMUM, IMMEDIATE DESTRUCTION OF THE ENEMY (together with use of WEAPONS if accessible), identical to whereas standing up, with a purpose to decrease the hazard whereas on the bottom and rise up as rapidly as doable.
Typically, KCD groundfighting makes use of the identical technique as KCD stand-up combating: Use SENSITIVITY and the DISENGAGEMENT PRINCIPLE to as rapidly as doable DESTROY THE ENEMY whereas sustaining a agency ROOT NO ONE CAN FIND (by balanced MOBILITY), looseness, and physique unity.
The key variations that require further coaching are using completely different ROOTING POINTS on the ground–hips, again, shoulders, and so on.–as opposed to simply the toes whereas standing up, and the elevated availability of TOOLS, in that each legs could also be used concurrently from the bottom and in methods completely different from when standing up. Seeing because the legs (particularly with sturdy boots on them) are by far the extra highly effective limbs of the physique, it is smart to benefit from their elevated usability on the bottom by further coaching. Therefore, the primary foci of solo coaching for KCD groundfighting ought to be the event of BALANCE on and transition between the assorted rooting factors accessible on the bottom, and the event of the musculature and coordination vital to make use of all of the accessible instruments in all doable methods . . . and, in fact, the event of the flexibility to stand up off the bottom from any place as rapidly as doable!
GROUND AVOIDANCE
Though this text primarily addresses how the KCD practitioner fights whereas on the bottom, as a result of the prevention of going to the bottom is such an essential think about actual fight, we’ll handle it briefly right here.
There are not any particular “anti-grappling” or “counter-takedown” strategies in KCD. One downside with such strategies can be that by the point one realizes their necessity in a combat (i.e. when one acknowledges the takedown try), it’s often too late to use them! As a substitute, the fundamental ideas of KCD, if skilled diligently, will often stop the circumstances that usually end in fighters’ going to the bottom in opposition to their will. Particularly:
1. BALANCE: The “hyper-balance” that could be a results of KCD coaching makes it much less possible {that a} KCD practitioner will lose his/her footing and fall to the bottom, whatever the trigger.
2. SENSITIVITY and the DISENGAGEMENT PRINCIPLE: The skilled KCD attribute of exterior tactile sensitivity together with its software in keeping with the disengagement precept (whereby the practitioner strives to stay as disengaged with the enemy as doable whereas remaining engaged sufficient to trigger damage–to “stick however not get caught”) can stop a grappler from attaining a powerful clinch with the KCD practitioner, because the KCD practitioner’s physique at all times appears to “squirt” out of tried grips and holds whereas hanging into important areas and disrupting the grappler’s stability from surprising angles. This negates a typical grappling takedown technique: to first tie up the opponent in a standing clinch with a purpose to suppress his strikes and acquire management over his stability, after which to take him down from there.
3. DROPPING ENERGY (“absorbing the overtravel”) and the SPHERE OF INFLUENCE: KCD practitioners’ use of dropping vitality to “take in the overtravel” of strikes (as Grasp Perkins has defined in Publication #18) in addition to maintaining strikes inside the sphere of affect (to forestall “reaching” with strikes) implies that KCD practitioners are unlikely to overcommit to strikes. Making the most of a striker’s overcommitment to his strikes is the primary means whereby an skilled grappler can shoot in for a profitable takedown from exterior of contact distance. If he can not power the opponent to overcommit to long-distance hanging assaults, it turns into very troublesome for a grappler to realize a clear takedown with out first attaining a controlling clinch (addressed above in level #2). Moreover, dropping vitality (together with BODY UNITY) permits very highly effective strikes from very shut vary, which might additional frustrate a grappler’s efforts to soundly shut distance.
4. LOOSENESS: The KCD practitioner’s skilled looseness makes it very troublesome for a grappler to manage the KCD practitioner’s physique, even when a grip is achieved. For instance, in opposition to an untrained individual, a grappler can power the entire physique off-balance just by manipulating one arm, because the untrained individual naturally tenses up in opposition to the grappler’s grip. Nevertheless, many a grappler has grabbed a KCD practitioner’s arm solely to appreciate that “he is bought nothing,” because the KCD practitioner’s looseness permits him/her to maneuver the remainder of his/her physique decisively unbiased of the managed arm to retain stability and assault the grappler. The significance of this mixture of Looseness and Sensitivity can’t be over-emphasized. It’s the emodiment of all the inner rules talked about in KCD. The practitioner learns to maneuver his physique as if his attacker’s pores and skin is pink sizzling and scalding but he should nonetheless really feel the place he’s and the place he is going; this utterly modifications the mindset from power and management to the touch, evasion and destruction. The picture is, as we wish to say, considered one of carrying a sizzling potato in your palms throughout a room with out dropping it. It is too sizzling to carry however too essential to let go.
Typically, coaching the KCD rules will permit the KCD practitioner to take care of a grappler as with every different fighter. Particular consideration is given to points of contact move and fight software notably germane to grappling (e.g. feeling the extent change, discovering and indexing on the pinnacle, physique unity and dropping to cease momentum, shut vary destruction, destroying the grappler whereas being taken down, and so on.)
INTENTIONALLY GOING TO THE GROUND: “EMERGENCY OFFLINING”
Whereas going to the bottom in an actual fight state of affairs ought to typically be averted, below sure circumstances, going to the bottom specifically methods could also be one of the best plan of action.
In KCD, deliberately going to the bottom could also be characterised as a type of “emergency offlining.” Getting offline from an attacker’s cost is a elementary idea in KCD. It’s often completed whereas standing by stepping to the facet (and ideally ahead) of an attacker with acceptable timing, positioning and follow-up. Nevertheless, typically the practitioner could not have the area or time to maneuver to the facet (e.g. in a confined space a number of attacker state of affairs), or should instantly get his/her important organs additional away from the attackers’ weapons (e.g. knives) than a sidestep within the given atmosphere would permit. If offlining can’t be completed to both facet, and if the KCD practitioner can not levitate, altering the angle could be completed in just one path: downwards. The KCD practitioner should go to the bottom.
The strategies by which the KCD practitioner goes to the bottom are very completely different from these utilized by most sport grapplers. Practically all of the strategies sport grapplers use to take a combat to the bottom (e.g. wrestling takedowns, judo throws) contain bringing their most significant areas (head, neck, chest) very near the opponent’s palms. This creates a serious downside in actual fight conditions that require going to the ground–situations during which one GOAL of the maneuver is to GAIN distance between the fighter’s important areas and the weapons of the enemy! The strategies utilized in KCD, based mostly on Native American takedown maneuvers, don’t endure from this downside. They contain dropping, diving, spinning and rolling to the bottom at angles that current the practitioner’s toes in the direction of the enemy, whereas transferring the higher physique away from the enemy’s weapons. The simultaneous takedowns are performed with the toes and legs and have a very good likelihood of severely damaging the enemy’s decrease physique (primarily breaking the knees). In addition they arrange the practitioner to make use of his/her legs on the bottom (once more maintaining the important areas of the higher physique away from the enemy’s weapons) to rapidly finish any subsequent groundfight.
TIPS FOR SURVIVAL
Listed here are some coaching tricks to take into account as you start your path to combative groundfighting experience:
1. STICK WITH THE PRINCIPLES: As a result of KCD groundfighting appears to be like completely different from KCD stand-up coaching, folks typically assume that the fundamental KCD rules of stability, sensitivity, looseness and physique unity don’t apply. NOTHING COULD BE FURTHER FROM THE TRUTH! Steadiness in any place on the bottom is what permits all of the “loopy” maneuvers to be efficient. Sensitivity (together with tactile and subcortical visible) is critical to information the practitioner’s actions throughout the bottom and into the enemy, even when the practitioner’s head could also be transferring and turning quickly to avoid hazard. With out looseness, the practitioner’s physique will rapidly be damaged in opposition to the bottom itself, particularly throughout the falling and diving maneuvers. Looseness mixed with sensitivity can be what permits the KCD fighter to not be dragged into an motionless grappling clinch. You have to study to maneuver your physique like a writhing mongoose or a furiously twisting, spitting alleycat. Would you wish to grapple a 160 pound alley cat? Attempt placing it in a headlock or a mount or a determine 4? In fact not, it will be madness: you’d by no means get a grip on its physique as you are being torn to shreds.
Lastly, physique unity is what makes the bottom kicking and rolling maneuvers so damaging to the enemy. The assaults come from the whipping and dropping (sure, even on the bottom!) of the entire physique, not simply the legs, permitting them to cleave by the enemies’ our bodies moderately than bouncing off harmlessly. The unique Native American combating strategies KCD groundfighting was distilled from have been characterised particularly by a free gracefulness and uninhibited use of the complete physique as a united weapon to destroy the enemy.
2. REMEMBER CONFINED SPACE: Keep in mind that if one of many doable causes to go to the bottom is to have the ability to get your important targets additional away from a weapon in confined area, you want to have the ability to do all of the maneuvers in a confined area! Don’t apply the entire diving and falling assaults solely by diving throughout the room into vast, ballistic arcs. You need to be capable of drop to the bottom inside your personal area and take out the legs of the individual proper subsequent to you. Going to the bottom like this begins out with a sensation much like dropping in your toes. Like a marionette that is had its strings reduce, your complete physique immediately goes limp and drops–only moderately than catching your self inside an inch, you let the drop go all the way in which to the bottom whereas spiraling or collapsing to land on the right angle to can help you take out the enemy as you fall. Whenever you do it correctly, you need to appear to your enemy to immediately disappear–only to reappear subsequent to his damaged legs, your boots in opposition to his neck and head.
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