Sunday With Blackthorn - A Basic Combat Judo Course Part 6 by Mark Tripp

Combatives Part 6

B A L A N C E!!!!!!

There in lies the problem with pointless debates about my dad can beat your dad; or worse, the deadly error in selecting combative material.

65 basic throws in Kodokan Judo; but only 10 score Ippon on a regular basis in Shiai.

I have seen dozens of sweeps from the Guard in class; yet in the last several years perhaps TWO have been pulled off in NHB matches. You may notice Royce hasn't swept someone out of his guard for some time now...

NOW FOCUS CAUSE THIS IS CRITICAL..

When you take something out; what ever is left will expand to fill the space.

READ THAT AGAIN!!!

When you take something out; what ever is left will expand to fill the space!!!

If you do not have balance in your technique selection you are going to have a system with LOTS of "stuff" that while "possible" to pull of, is NOT "probable" to pull off.

Modern Judo; now a throwing art; has dozens of throws that are just plain wrong to throw someone with. Take Hiza Guruma. Lets do a simple physics test...

You have a 6 foot telephone pole that weighs about 300 pounds. You want to knock it over. You are going to place a bar to block the poll then push it over the bar. The question is; where to you put the bar to block the pole?

In the middle? As in O guruma? Try it! 25% of the distance from the floor as in Hiza Guruma? Try it!
Obviously you want to put the bar as close to the bottom as posible to make your job of tipping over that pole the easiest! So clearly Sasae tsuri komi ashi (block the ankle) is VASTLY more effective than O guruma (block the waist) or Hiza Guruma (block the knee). So why waste our time with the others? MASTER the one that works best!

We need to spend our time mastering the things that are most likely to work for us. I can make similar points about ground fighting too.


Why the problem in the first place?

Remember I spoke about driving paying people out the door? How many people will pay you to take a year to master O soto gari? Can YOU perform O soto gari to all eight directions of movement? Gets boring as you struggle with it!

How many people want to drill the "reflexive responce" necessary to do these techniques under stress and against a resisting opponent?

Hell, I have lost dozens of students because when I hold a Small Circle/LeBell grabbling class they bitch about how much it hurts!!!!

ANY system that has ignored balance, is subject to this problem. I don't care what it is.

Now in terms of sport that simply means you don't get a medal...

But in terms of Combatives it means you don't get to go home....

We will now spend time looking at HOW we select techniques for Combative programs; and how to teach them!