Many self-protection trainers talk about using certain ‘entries’ for responding to assaults, but you don’t agree with this – can you expand on why?

I know and understand it’s common usage in the Martial Art community, but i never liked the word “entry” when referring to fighting. Because I learned English as a second language I am always looking for clear definitions on the information I transmit and an entry to me always implied a doorway and , last time I checked, doorways neither move or attack people. Doors do but not door ways I prefer the term Engagement (the military definition; to come into battle) Now in a criminal assault, depending on the preceding events or circumstances and our level of awareness, we either Engage our opponent(s) or we are Engaged by them.

Now before I go further on this idea I will discuss some human physiology. Barring any pathology, the largest percentage of motor related neurons in the human brain are dedicated to the arms and hands. This is why when somebody attacks us we dont karate kick the attacking arm or weapon instinctively. Next the human arm can perform two basic functions: it either bends or straightens at the elbow. I call these in FES extension and compression.

When one or more bad guys take action to engage us, I call that an assault. If the assault happens as a surprise to us, but we have some awareness of it, instincts kick in. Because we have so many neurons dedicated to hands and arms, our response will be with those limbs. AND because our arms can only extend or compress, we will meet said assault with one or the other motion. Now how do we know if extension or compression will occur? We dont. There are several factors that weigh in. Emotional factors like childhood bullying or beatings, physiological factors like the amount of natural muscular tension a person carries, event factors like the position of the arms at the time we are assaulted, and behavior factors like what movements we have practiced (does our training emphasize the practice of extension or compression? see this article http://functionaledge.blogspot.com/2012/01/pale-in-comparison.html)

Regardless of which motion initially saves our butts, what will really get us out of trouble when we are engaged first is how quickly we can reverse the tables and engage our opponent with our own weapons. This is were the FES doctrine of Survive, Reverse, Engage comes from.

Now back to the whole “entry” thing. If we decide we want to preemptively engage our adversary, or we see the attack coming with enough time to choose to Engage cognitively and counter actively (ie at the same time) {this is what I believe most people mean when they say entry}; then we can do so efficiently and effectively with either an extended or compressed arm. However we must do so dynamically. In other words, once we Engage we must quickly deploy our weapons to maximum effect. Most of the problems occur when folks use an “entry” and then expect some magical fairy to stop the attack. Remember the ultimate objective of the “entry”. When a bad guy assaults us we dont enter we CRASH through his door and then we have to do the most appropriate thing to resolve the confrontation IMMEDIATELY.

Could you speak for a moment how you believe the startle reflex or ‘flinch response’ impacts on training design and improving performance in assault survival?

A lot of this comes down to training methodology and doctrine. There are a ton of factors that weigh in determining whether any particular individual may or may not flinch.

Recognizing and acknowledging that we may flinch when these factors stack up against us is just a first step. We must understand all sides if the problem and address them in our training.

There are three fundamental stages of when our cognition may kick in during an ambush; anything that happens before this will be instinctive movement ( compression or extension ) so we must be familiar with both. The three stages are Retro-active (our cognitive process kicks in after the initial attack reaches completion and has either hit the intended target or collided against one of our arms in whichever position it happens to be in) Counter-Active (very common, our cognition kicks in some time after initiation of the attack but before it makes target or arm contact) and then Pro-Active ( cognitive skills kick in before the attack starts or very shortly after).

One important point is that our cognitive engagement skills should be in line with our instincts and better yet, should be improvements and enhancements on those instincts so that we may move quickly and smoothly from Survival to Reversal, and Engagement.

If the circumstances allow us to be Pro Active, we should know to use extension and or compression to Engage pre emptively. For example, extension could turn into a palm strike that leads to follow up maneuvers, compression can be turned into a direct elbow strike to sternum or face that sets up follow ups.

The same arm movements can be used in a dynamic manner in Counter-Active responses as Frames (to maintain enough space between you and a bad guy to continue to apply your ballistic strikes) or Prybars ( to Create that space when the opponents application of pressure puts your arms in disadvantageous positions)

In Retro Active circumstances we can use the position our arms are in as a launch pad for reversal and engagement.

In best case scenarios we would all love to be able to be Pro-Active, but in the real world we know this is impossible. Training Retro-Actively and Counter-Actively is just good sense, and we should be training these modalities the most, but include pro active training.

Again: practice with partners that are progressively resisting and applying pressure and impact but who move like emotionally charged street fighters first.

Only then should you approach the subject of skilled attackers. Also make sure that you set up your scenarios with realism. Your bad guy should have the same Cognitive engagement problems you face when he encounters your Instinctive or Cognitve response. (this is why people with zero training have survived all kinds of violent attacks)

In other words when a bad guy assaults, his mental model is envisioning a pattern of success, when that initial assault fails depending on the bad guy’s experience and state of mind, he may end up in a retro-active, or counter-active loop, and this provides opportunities for Reversal and Engagement for the intended victim.

Can you speak for a moment about “Compound Assaults” and the problem with traditional one-step or single-assault modalities of training?

The truth is that bad guys do not just throw one attack and then stop attacking, unless you are very fortunate and knock them out on the first strike . Bad guys dont throw “combinations” as conventionally known either. Bad guys either deliver impact (punching and striking), apply pressure (pulling grabbing tackling), and they repeat and combine the process, in a DYNAMIC fashion, until they are successful or they are stopped. For example Asocial Predatory assaulters that initiate with a punch, will continually deliver dominant arm, looping punches, in machine gun like fashion, until their victim is out, their dominant arm becomes ineffective due to injury or entanglement, or they are disconnected from consciousness by their intended victim. The same happens when the Asocial Predator initiates with some type of pressure attack. On occasion an Asocial predator will switch from an Impact to a pressure attack or vice versa, when they encounter resistance from their victims. This type of Dynamic pressure, impact, and stress are why I moved on from the previous system that I taught for 10 years or more and then followed my own direction. This problem as I have described it is one of the key issues which the Functional Edge System Drills prepare the trainees for using a training drill evolution method that we call ‘Survival-Reversal-Engagement Waves’.

Can you please explain the differences as you see them between Self Protection, Martial Art and Combat Sport, and the modality needed for effective training in Self Protection?

I practice and teach Self Protection, Martial Art and Combat Sport and they all have qualities that enhance the others, but I truly believe that training ONLY against “skilled” opponents will be detrimental. If we ONLY train against “skilled” opponents then the answer is a resounding NO it will not be totally effective for self-protection. Its like saying if I only train in Soccer I will get really good at ping pong. This is the reason we all have either heard or witnessed for ourselves the infamous story of the “black belt, wrestler, mma champ, boxer, etc that got his ass kicked in a bar fight.

Simply put when you train symmetrically, that is sparring , rolling with a partner that is using the same art and skill set that you are, even when he is fully resisting, you are only indirectly preparing for a street assault, just like playing all that soccer will give you a lot of stamina and endurance that will transfer to the ping pong game. I have just seen too many well trained people fall apart when attacked on the street. If you train symmetrically often make sure you implement a healthy dose of asymmetrical scenario training in your regimen.

SO you are saying that Self-Protection training should not focus on skills for dealing with the “Skilled Opponent”?

I have a problem with the phrase “skilled opponent” This is the mythical unicorn of street fighters! Basically it is mostly used to either over complicate our lives or to sell the need to train in a particular system. It is a psychological trap we can easily fall into and get diverted into creating all kinds of false solutions to a non existing problem. On on side, At best, we create an opponent that has “skills” in order to justify some (almost always more complex or cool looking) tactic that we come up with.

At worst, we end up creating an opponent that has the superpowers of superman, is the size of Sasquatch, and has batman’s fighting skills. None of these are productive for street scenarios. I am going to break down how we categorize our potential attackers in the FES in descending order of probability and then follow up with an exercise we conduct in our certification courses, and you will see why I call the “skilled” attacker a unicorn.

SOCIAL Violence opponent, we are more likely to encounter some form of social opponent: domestic abuser, school bully, guy at bar trying to establish dominance etc. Than we are to encounter an ASOCIAL opponent: a resource or process predator, robber, kidnapper, serial rapist or psycho killer.

Under these two main categories of SOCIAL and ASOCIAL OPPONENTS again in the order of likelihood of encountering them, we have three sub categories: INEXPERIENCED, EXPERIENCED, and TRAINED.

An INEXPERIENCED SOCIAL opponent would be, for example, a domestic abuser in his first real relationship, or the local young wannabe at the bar trying to pick his first fight. An INEXPERIENCED ASOCIAL opponent would be a guy on his first armed robbery, or a psycho during his first kill. You can infer from these definitions what an EXPERIENCED SOCIAL and EXPERIENCED ASOCIAL opponents would be.

The odds that our attacker will be EXPERIENCED or INEXPERIENCED are about the same however, odds are much smaller that we will face a TRAINED SOCIAL or TRAINED ASOCIAL opponent.

I further divide TRAINED into two categories: SKILLED and PRACTICED (also know as fetishist) a TRAINED SKILLED opponents is one who has a combative background [boxing,mma, karate, whatever] and happens to be committing SOCIAL or ASOCIAL VIOLENCE. For example, a boxer that rapes his girlfriend, or a judo guy that decides to turn to a life of crime. A TRAINED PRACTICED opponent is the one that actually learns or modifies a skill set to achieve his SOCIAL OR ASOCIAL violence goals. Someone who practices and researches how to best stab a victim for either quicker or more painful death, or how to best distract a person before attacking etc.

Now that I have defined how I break down the opponents, here is the order of relevance of what you are likely to face: 1st You are more likely to face SOCIAL THAN ASOCIAL violence. 2nd within each category you are SLIGHTLY more likely to face an INEXPERIENCED than an EXPERIENCED opponent, but chances are very minimal that you will face TRAINED SKILLED and EVEN LESS SO A TRAINED PRACTICED Opponent.

The good news is that the all the following categories of a opponents: SOCIAL and ASOCIAL, INEXPERIENCED, EXPERIENCED AND TRAINED SKILLED, will almost always attack based from an emotional place based on fear or anger which means they always default to the basic predatory attack modes that i described before. Continuous application of pressure and impact, until they achieve their goals or they are stopped, in the form of repeated dominant armed punches and grabs and tackles. In other words we dont have to train any differently for any of them.

The problem lies when we face the infamous unicorn, which would fall in the category of SOCIAL or ASOCIAL TRAINED PRACTICED opponent. The infamous stalker in the night, the assassin that practices his skills specifically to defeat us. WHAT ARE THE ODDS?

Can you please explain the exercise that you go through on your certification courses?

Here is the exercise. This is actually part of an interactive lecture I do at all my courses when the question of the “skilled Opponent” comes up. Since I am from the US, I use american statistics for the discussion. During the first part I stack the odds heavily in the favor of the victim encountering the Unicorn (A TRAINED PRACTICED opponent)(Feel free to find and use statistics from your countries but they will likely reflect very similar numbers) Here We go! Put on your “Math Hats”. The actual population of the US is around 315,000,000 so, to make the math easier to handle and stack the odds in favor of us meeting the bad guy, I will make this population 500,000,000 and they will all be males of the typical criminal age.

Of this population: what percentage do you think participates in any martial art or combat training? Lets call it 10%, which leaves us with about 50,000,000 people. Out of that number how many actually practice the more combative arts like wresltling, mma, muay thay, boxing etc. Lets call that another 10% which leave us with 5,000,000, Now how many of those actually practice long enough that they could actually bring those skills to use under heavy stress? Lets go with 10% (see where this is going ) this is 500,000. Out of that number how many of them have criminal anti social tendencies? Lets say mmm…10%! which is 50,000.

Out of those how many are violent criminals that practice those skills to further their needs? yup 10% which leaves us 5,000 guys that are Capable Trained Practiced evil doers that can use their skills to do bad things. Now, all 5,000 of them in this fictional America I created have a meeting and decide to divide themselves equally among all 50 states, so there is 100 of them in each state, they further decide to magically never sleep or eat and not ever get caught or imprisoned: What are the odds at any given time of them attacking one of the 10,000,000 people in any of my equally divided fictional states? If I did my real math in this fictional scenario correctly its about 1 in 100,000. BUT REMEMBER this is FICTIONALLY STACKED IN FAVOR of the encounter, so now for some real numbers and I will let you guys do your math. the chances of running into Mr Unicorn dwindle quickly when we use real numbers. Population of US as said before is about 315,000,000, about half of that female, and about half again children. So approximately 75,000,000 males of potential criminal age in the US.

Now track all the other questions above, and instead of 10%, use the real percentage which is around 1% {now part of your brain will fight this because we trained martial artists live and socialize and interact constantly with other martial artists, giving us the illusion that there are a lot more trained people out there than their really is} the truth is we are a very rare breed. Once you do the real math and realize that bad guys do have to eat and sleep, and tend to gather in specific places and select victim that meet certain requirements, and so on. You come to the stark realization that when you hear the pounding of hooves, it will probably be horses, less likely zebras ( unless you are in the Serengeti or the wrong are of a zoo) and almost never a Unicorn.

Train for what is likely the majority of the time and, only if you have extra time, delve into the less likely scenarios. By the way the odds using the real numbers are probably less than 1 in a million

Aren’t more people watching MMA, and aren’t more people doing ‘some training’ during their life in some kind of MMA-related martial arts practice? Isn’t there evidence of cops now being assaulted with MMA-type attacks unlike those previously seen?

Again look to my definitions and breakdown of skilled or trained guys. Just because a guy practices MMA, it doesnt mean that you will be attacked with MMA. This is a myth perpetuated by imagined, fictional problems. The Confirmation Bias usually happens like this.

A cop either trains a little bit or has a friend that trains a little bit in mma, or watches the UFC. They get a call where there it is commonly known fighters gather. An altercation ensues and voila! every bad guy knows MMA. The truth is if you watch a video of said altercation, what you will see is the mma guys executing the same haymakers and sloppy tackles etc that the untrained guys use. Because they will be emotional (fear or anger based) attacks. In the hundreds of real life incidents I have been in involving both trained and untrained, bad guys and good guys and in the thousands of hours of cctv and dashcam fight footage I have researched, no one has produced a verifiable account or shown me a video where this trained bad guy actually used his Trained martail arts to ASSAULT a police officer.

I am nearing 50 now and I have been around for every martial arts craze. If the “MMAi s Really Popular now so A lot of Bad Guys will use MMA now” unicorn was true, then in the ’60s suddenly we would have seen a sudden spike in karate attacks, in the 70s more kung fu and cops training in kung fu, in the 80s I would have been fighting ninjas, and in the 90s Jeet Kune Do, Muay Thai and BJJ bad guys. But I did not!

The point is we sometimes waste a lot of training time and energy and funds worrying about an enemy that we will not likely encounter and developing skills that only INDIRECTLY will help us with our real problems and then we are back to square one; we have all this skill and our opponent only brings forth raging dynamic pressure and impact, while our practice and conditioning tells our brains to look for “skill”.

SO you believe that training time needs to be prioritized and specialised for the outcome required of it?

I developed Functional Edge System so that we DONT waste time Chasing Uncorns and so that we and our Self-Protection students only train for what we and they are likely to face.

Prioritizing training is essential in any SD or for that matter a firearms shooting curriculum. For example I think a lot of pistol training time is wasted training at distances further than 7 yards. We know that most offcer and civilian self defense shootings will occur inside this distance, as a matter of fact 3-10 feet. Realistic shooting training then should focus on this and only when this skill is “mastered” should we entertain longer distance shooting. HOWEVER, most departments and units focus on target practice at 10-15-25 and even 50 yards and using sights at these ranges in their pistol shooting qualifications. Knowing the statistics and odds would helps us have better use of training time, we would focus on dynamic instinctive shooting at close range and a lot of force on force (simmunition training). That is why understanding statistics and odds is important. Use most of your time to prepare for likely reality, use critical thinking.

If i have a group of students, civilian, police or military, it would be irresponsible of me to start the lesson with “This is how you stop a jab cross, Shin kick to double leg, takedown, to cross body to mount and mounted triangle choke transition” Could this ever happen in a real fight? Of course its possible but how Likely is it. The fact is it is all in the ODDS when it comes to prioritizing training!

There is a video out there in the world of a boxer who atacks a police officer – many people commented that the police officer needed MMA skills to be able to counter the attack. Can you comment?

I have seen the incident you described. But here are the questions

A. did the boxer that assaulted the police officer use boxing or did he use a predatory assault pattern that, because he has a lot of experience in punching (from all the boxing), caused a lot of damage?

Did the officer in his report and investigation find out AFTER the fact the guy was a boxer therefor making the assumption that he was attacked WITH SKILLEDBOXING
Or

Did the officer have foreknowledge that the suspect was a boxer so the Pattern Recognition prt of his brain assumed he was being attacked with SKILLED BOXING?
and

If the protective strategies we teach are such that they are efficient and effective against an INEXPERIENCED, EXPERIENCED, TRAINED And PRACTICED opponent, then why bring up any differences at all?
To use my previous analogy. If I teach you how to lasso a horse, you can also use that rope and skill to lasso a zebra (less likely) or even a unicorn (nearly impossible) {i say nearly because unicorns are real, they are called rhinos and are nearly extinct and all you need to lasso them is a stronger rope and more leverage, in other words be really good at the things that help you lasso horses

Is MMA really a growing threat? For example right now in the USA because of media “awareness” you would think “mass shootings” are on the rise but really they are about the same as before tv and radio were around its just that our current culture of 24 hour news. You would be inclined to feel they are on the rise. but truly in some places they are less so.

I would have to see the following in order to believe that unicorns exist and that they are a problem: so bear with me…!

I would have to have seen said unicorn and touched it myself more than once in a situation where i could clearly be in control of my senses, other witnesses who were present would have to corroborate that I in fact saw and touched said unicorns, and I would have to under verifiable tests corroborating stories of other people with their own evidence and corroborating witnesses that they encountered their own unicorns.

To top it all off I would have to have the same real experiences witnesses, other people, and their witnesses and documentation that said unicorns behaved in a way identifiably and infinitely different than horses during all these encounters to justify me changing the way I teach and train others.

I’m not saying theses guys are delusional but definitely they are suffering of some level of conformation bias. I still train and I am in contact with officers, federal law enforcement officers and cops and I have still not seen evidence i.e. Video or documented Police reports that clearly state that the assaulter used trained and skilled MMA tactics in the incident.

But I have seen hundreds where trained MMA guys, Boxers and martial artists of all sorts just plain get angry or scared and use Predatory assault patterns against those they are attacking.

Other than using it as a marketing scheme I dont see a reason to try to sell a course to prepare cops or soldiers to fight against “MMA guys”. And if anyone did; with the minimal amount of training time allotted to officers, what makes anyone think that they will master specialized skills for this. Its just applying critical thinking to the problem.

The 9 Attitudes

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