Are you a surly old man?

[Royce]

Are you a surly old man?

Some years ago, on a cold February morning, I was enjoying a cup of coffee in a neighborhood diner with my friend Jack. Jack was a Kung Fu instructor and
was talking about how mean spirited life on the street can be. His studio was in a rough, blue collar neighborhood. During the course of our conversation, he mentioned that he had some older guys enrolled in his classes.

As he explained it, he was giving these older fellows a dose of reality. He said that a lot of them had been tough guys in their younger days, but now they were old and soft. He couldn’t do anything about their age, but he sure intended to make them hard again.
He was talking about guys whose ages ranged anywhere from 48 to 80. The oldest guy in the class was, in fact, 80.

It would be an understatement to say that Jack was a “hardcore” fellow.
He encouraged the younger guys to “rough up” the older guys. As he put it, a lot of the “old roosters” talked a good game, but they usually “gassed” after a couple of minutes of sparing and were slow to get back to their feet if they were taken to “ground.”

It was Jack’s mission to change all of that.

Jack showed them no mercy! As he put it, “A mugger won’t cut you a ‘hus’ because you are old! They don’t give out grandpa badges!”

Although most people who knew him felt that Jack was insensitive, he had the best interests of his students at heart. Actually, he was very insensitive!

Jack strongly encouraged the oldsters to work with weapons, and during his classes he drove the old boys very hard. He felt he was doing them a favor by being very tough, and I had to agree. If an old coot managed to graduate from Jack’s weapons class, he was, in every sense, a dangerous old man! Jack said that he never want to hear that a dirtbag bested one of his students.

Although Jack was an extremely hard man, he had a real affection for his students regardless of their ages.

Anyway, I think Jack was spot on with his training philosophy, and I encourage all of you elder statesmen out there in cyber space to brutally evaluate your fighting capabilities. If you can’t fight effectively with your bare hands, you had better not go barehanded.

Do find yourself a young guy to train with. Push yourself. Most importantly, learn what you need to do to win! If you want to be a surly old man, you had better also be a dangerous old man!

[tom]

Reality is good. Athletic fitness is good. It sounds as though Jack doesn't want any of his students to lose in a self defense situation. There is a disconnect, though, when their self defense capability is judged so much by their athletic fitness.

but they usually “gassed” after a couple of minutes of sparing

Unless the major goal was athletic fitness, using a couple of minutes of sparring to judge self defense is tournament, movie fantasy. Don't judge those old guys with two minutes. Tell the young guys that they have only fifteen seconds to dominate. Tell the old guys they have fifteen seconds to survive. Then see if the young ones are so cocky. Yes, they may dominate some, but nothing compared to the sports sparring they are apparently doing.

Even fifteen seconds is too long, but let's go with that.

Who is that big bearded guy in Larry's DVD? Let's see him dance around for two minutes. If he'd cooperate, I'd be laughing at him after two minutes. But, he'd probably just haul off and whup me in the first ten seconds and then go have a beer. With my wallet. So much for gassing him. (I'm only using him for his age and size - don't know the guy at all)

Be clear of the difference between health fitness, athletic fitness, contests, and self defense.

Tom

[reg]

tom,good points and nice post.

[Royce]

Tom

You are right to point out that there’s an important difference between fitness contests and self defense. I have no argument there. It’s been asserted that encounters in the street are usually over in a very short period of time, and that is true.

So I am not putting a total endorsement on the way Jack approached matters. He really loved the old “boot camp” approach. And he did have folks do some jogging in the gym. That wasn’t popular. Personally, I would never have my students jogging. In my view, Jack put too much emphasis on “cardio” work.

I also suspect that Jack wanted to crank up the pain level a bit.


On the other hand, he did more good things than bad.


And I think we need to expand our definition of fitness to include the ability to bring forth great muscle power for a short duration. Older people are usually deficient in both muscular power and cardiovascular endurance. These are two good reasons for teaching the older guys to use weapons.

At some point in their lives, most people will be unable, at least temporarily, to mount a credible unarmed defense. That may occur for a number of reasons. A person may be unfit, injured, ill or too old in a biological sense. Although an individual may be relatively young from a chronological point of view, a person can be very old biologically. Some folks are old by the time they are in their mid forties.

Admittedly, it doesn’t take a huge amount of power to strike with an impact weapon and even less to strike with a blade. But when you are strong and fit, you have more options. There are times when you might want to run. Some people are far better to do that than are others.
For example, how fast can an older guy run? He may not be able beat a caterpillar in a 40 yard dash.

A law-abiding citizen might not choose to employ his weapon even when it is at hand. Lots of unfortunate things can happen when one is in an unsavory social situation.

It’s all well and good to predicate one’s self-defense plane on the idea that an encounter will last only fifteen seconds. In fact, I lend considerable credence to that idea. But nothing is certain. And I’m well aware of that.

Young hoodlums frequently prowl in groups. One may find oneself in a pushing and punching situation and it isn’t uncommon to find oneself being jostled by three or more people. As distasteful as it might be, such a situation doesn’t justify employing a deadly counterattack.

However, things can quickly change. It’s quite common for weapons to be introduced when one side is getting the worst of a situation. It only makes sense to prepare for as many contingencies as possible.

So where does that leave us? I guess an instructor needs to push a student as hard as possible in order to get him out of his comfort zone—to press him to improve. But the instructor must be careful not push a student to the point where he quits. It can be a tricky situation for an instructor.

[tom]

I also suspect that Jack wanted to crank up the pain level a bit. . . . . But the instructor must be careful not push a student to the point where he quits. It can be a tricky situation for an instructor.

That's what got me about your description. Jack seems to take pride in toughness. I like tough, but . . . risk losing a student by sicing the young guys on them, by emphasizing jogging? Well, if they ain't tough enough and can't take it, we ain't gonna teach no sissies to defend themselves! Defending oneself is too important to waste on the untough. :silly:

I'm sure Jack is a good guy. I'm making some assumptions and committing a little unnecessary sarcasm just from the little description I got.

I know the type. When I was young I was more the type than I'd like to admit. :disapointed: JKA all the way. We were tough. (we were ig'nant and dumb)

How do we get the flinchy, out-of-shape, shy person to the point of having a better chance of taking care of themselves in the world. That makes me think the answer is teaching awareness most of all. If the student can learn that (which includes the awareness of what it feels like to be in a fight and in panic) without being overwhelmed and never coming back to class, it would be a good thing.

Other subject:

You brought up group bullying. Good point. A case of where awareness is most important - don't be there, try to see it coming, don't be shy about turning around and walking quickly away or across the street when you see a group in the distance.

Tom

[MikeNY]

Wow surly old man there must be classes where I can learn that :act-up:

Sounds like Jack has thier best interest in mind. I'd teach it differntly, first fitness and bring them up to level then later the combat training. Weapons are the great equalizer in life a doddering old man with a stiletto that stabs you makes life a bad place for young thugs.

Life is not always fair, I once saw a exhibition with two men using wooden tanto daggers tapped up, fencing masks and protective gear. A mid to late 60's Siclian Fencing Master verses a mid to late 20's Special Forces Knife Instructor. It was a slaughter and unfair match; lucky for the young Special Forces guy he was wearing protection, and he might have been hurt anyway. Now the Fencing Master was fit and expert; he was from Sicily and might have actually used a knife in real life; but the dagger technique was his and he ruled in that arena. Might have been a differnt result using hand to hand. With the knife he was like a sewing machine just stabbing away. Each time they started he overwhelmed the young man immediatly. It was a stunning presentation skill over youth and skill won.

I've read a few times that if you sent modern Special Forces guys back in time to old New Orleans during the heyday of the Bowie knife and they chanced to fight the real deal, they'd end up dead in seconds. The Bowie knife fencer's used saber technique and attended the Salle de Arm fencing Schools for training. I believe that statement.

[Royce]

Mike,

Tell us more about the method that the Special Forces guy tried to use.

[Royce]

Tom,

Jack’s middle name should have been “Swagger.” That was what Jack was all about. He liked to mix it up, and while I don’t suggest that the picked fights, he was, certainly, pleased at the prospect of participating in one. Just for the fun of it, I participated in a few of his classes and, let me assure you, they were tough!

His method certainly wasn’t for everyone. Jack like to demonstrate his punches on people. He was always whacking his students on the arms or chests—just to let them “feel the power.” Of course, he always did this in a good natured way.

Jack had an auto shop that was linked to his martial arts studio. He lived in an upstairs apartment with a girl many years his junior. She was a total “pot head.” And she spent a lot of her day “stoned”—as they say in the vernacular. I guess her voluptuous good looks helped make up for her lack of conversation.

Although well spoken, Jack was very close to being illiterate. Fortunately for him, he had an assistant who could read and do the books. Don’t take what I’m saying as proof that Jack was some sort of dummy. He was far from that. He had great street smarts; he was exceptionally shrewd.

And I will say this for him. When he saw that a student was giving it his all but still failing, Jack would spend an inordinate amount of time working to bring out the best to bring that student up to speed. In those cases, all the bullying ceased and he went to great lengths to avoid embarrassing the slow students. Usually he would work out personally with a student having problems. He seemed to relish doing such remedial work.

So Jack had both strong and weak points. Overall he was a guy you could trust and relay upon. In my opinion, that counts for a lot.

[tom]

He sounds like a good guy. I have some best friends just like that. I've chosen those types to learn from. They have the instinct and craziness that mellow me doesn't. I started when I was young and dumb. If it were now, I might not bother with them. I would have missed a lot.

They often turn out to be their own worst enemy.

Tom

[MikeNY]

Mike,

Tell us more about the method that the Special Forces guy tried to use.


The Special Forces guy was trying to use standard Special Forces knife fighting techniques. I tend to belive that item that I once read; that is if you sent back Special forces types to Old New Orleans they be killed in second in a Bowie knife fight. Here is a quote

" So, the sharpened back clip, combined with the bowie knife's size, makes the American bowie knife, in trained hands, the most deadly fighting knife ever conceived by man. Bowie knives were actually outlawed for carry in the Southern states in the mid 1800's (I believe by about 1860, not sure though) because they could cause so much damage so quickly. Actually, it was really the New Orleans "gentlemen" who employed them in combat that were so deadly.

How deadly were they? Bill Bagwell, noted bowie knife maker (maker of the "Hell's Belle" bowie) and "Soldier of Fortune" (SOF) Magazine columnist, has written in the past that if you had a time machine, and you were to drop a modern day military Special Operator (i.e. Delta Force operator, Navy DevGroup operator, British SAS operator, doesn’t matter) back in time to New Orleans in the 1830’s to 1850's, and he were unlucky enough to get himself involved in a knife fight with a bowie knife practitioner, said operator would most likely be killed (butchered, actually) in seconds. That’s seconds, not minutes. " here is the article I got that in http://www.defensereview.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=519

The article talks about some Delta Force Operatives were trained to use the bowie knife properly. "Actually, some U.S. Army Special Forces operators (most likely Delta Force operators) might now have at least some chance (or perhaps even a decent chance) at survival in that time machine scenario, since some of them have reportedly been trained in bowie knife-fighting techniques at least once in the last few years. So, at least some of them now have a base knowledge of the deadly back-cut and other bowie knife fighting tactics and techniques. DefRev isn't sure which specific U.S. Army Special Forces units were trained in this discipline. However, it's our understanding that whichever unit it was, they were trained at Ft. Bragg. Bill Bagwell was, to our understanding, their instructor. "

[Royce]

Thanks for the great response, Mike.

I think a lot of the stuff written about knife training in the service is bogus.

Let me explain. A lot of writers suggest that unarmed combat, bayonet fighting and knife fighting is a big deal—that a considerable amount of time and effort is spent teaching soldiers, sailors and airmen sophisticated ways of attacking with bladed weapons.

Well……………..it wasn’t true when I was in the service. There was some introductory stuff—very, very basic information—but that was the extent of it.

Many years ago, one of my friends in the Army Special Forces was discussing the knife fighting techniques he learned in training. Essentially, he was taught to hold the blade in an ice pick grip, with the edge out.

He then said that he was taught that if a situation arose where one were facing an assailant armed with a knife, one should utilize an underhand throwing technique in order to throw one’s blade at the attacker. After throwing the blade at the attacker, one should run.

I am quite serious, Mike. That is the way the story was related to me. And my friend was not kidding. That’s a pretty dumb sounding strategy, isn’t it? And it is certainly in sharp contrast to what our people were taught in WWII. Throwing a knife is normally a very bad move. How many can reliably hit a target when throwing a knife. If you miss, your opponent is unharmed and you are without a knife.

I have to conclude that the so called training he got was pretty close to worthless. And that leads me to believe that anyone with some real solid training, such as what you describe being taught at the old time arms academies, would have an overwhelming advantage over someone like my friend.

I learned basic knife work when I was with the Marines, then I took it further while training with Marines who held after hours classes on base. Such training was like a club activity. Yes, it was fine training and it was rigorous,. But it was unofficial. And the number of people following such a regimen were miniscule in number.

Modern military units are concerned with firearms. And my friend spend a huge amount of time on the rifle range. But blade work simply isn’t a priority. The situation was no different with either the Marines or Navy.

I have been told that a variety of special training seminars are offered to so-called “special operations” units. From what I can determine, there are transient programs that certain folks with friends in the military hierarchy get to teach for a fee. Apparently, Bagwell had some hand in such a seminar.

[MikeNY]

Royce great post and well thought out. Accurate too, I don't believe most Special Forces get much knife training as they did in WWII. Throwing a knife is instant self disarmament, and turning your back to run a good way to open up vital targets for a stabbing; wow frightening. I suspect anyone that was fighting any fencing Master would be in a world of trouble with bladed weapons.

I agree any modern man sent back in time wouldn't survive more than seconds when faced with a skilled, trained Bowie knife user that was trained in Old New Orleans. Practice is the secret for everything and hours and years spent training always pay off in the end.

I am sure the Military brass see training men with knives as a waste of time in modern warfare. I bet they even have an analysis of the probably and how many men will get killed as a result of poor training. Cost flow analysis and Accounting that will get some guys killed.