Inosanto Silat

[sikal]

the only thing close is i look away when i do hubud.
ill try it for sure, My buddy who does CDT does that, it a part of his training.
They have the offical CDT Blindfold!! haha.. $40..
anyways. What are the goALS you are working for?

Yup. Blindfolded hubud is a good place to start. But you can work virtually anything blindfolded. The goals are basically to develop awareness and senstivity (primarily tactile but also audio). By taking your eyes out of the game, you force your other senses to work harder.

This has all sorts of potential benefits - like if you're fighting in limited lighting conditions. But even beyond that, if you can rely on your tactile awareness when you're touching someone then that means you can be looking for potential exits, potential weapons, potential threats and generally keeping an eye on the rest of the situation. It can help overcome tunnel vision (both the physical and mental kind).

Mike

[SuperToe]

silat

what are some things your focused on right now?

[sikal]

what are some things your focused on right now?

I'm rounding out my ground game right now. I've got a fair understanding of the ground but not a lot of mat time rolling with other people. If I hit the ground in a fight, I go straight into Harimau - at least until I can get back to my feet. I've hooked up with a guy, though, who's a brown belt in BJJ under Pedro Sauer. I teach him Sikal and then I go train in his BJJ class

On the more esoteric side, I'm focused on improving my teaching methods. I keep forgetting that other people aren't wired like me - I tend to thrive in a chaotic learning environment where I see something new every day and can then go and practice it and get my reps in private then come back for fine-tuning in class. Most people aren't wired like that. They expect and need to see the same material over and over from class to class and get their reps that way. So I keep having to remind myself of that fact and keep myself from wandering off topic in class It's rough but, as a teacher, I want to do the best that I can for my students and, I'm finding, that's what it takes for most people.

Mike

[SuperToe]

silat

oh yeah. Teaching. Do you find people have a hard time learning the silat??
at the school where i train, When I show them something its very hard for some to learn. Lots of guys are either boxers or grapplers and even hapkido based.

But they love learning the "weird stuff" as they say! haha..

[sikal]

oh yeah. Teaching. Do you find people have a hard time learning the silat??
at the school where i train, When I show them something its very hard for some to learn. Lots of guys are either boxers or grapplers and even hapkido based.

But they love learning the "weird stuff" as they say! haha..

Yes. I think a lot of peopl ehave a hard time learning Silat. Not because it's particularly difficult but because it requires a certain attention to detail in training to ingrain the subtleties that really make it effective. In short, it's not immediately gratifying for most people so they get frustrated with it and, some, give up completely.

And if people aren't getting any depth - i.e.: all they're getting is some techniques here and there - then they sometimes get the impression that it doesn't work in general simply because they haven't taken the time to actually develop it and ingrain the subtleties so they can't make it work. But it has to do with them and not the material itself.

Mike

[SuperToe]

slat

I wished we had more of a silat class... but i take what i can get.ahah.
i like the way you think.
but with those few techinques we have a high rep base..

[sikal]

I wished we had more of a silat class... but i take what i can get.ahah.
i like the way you think.
but with those few techinques we have a high rep base..

That's the only way to develop and ingrain the subtleties required to use those techniques. I was specifically referring to people who, for instance, go to a Silat seminar and pick up a few techniques. Then they go back and try to test them (without any development) and decide that, "This Silat junk doesn't work."

Of course, all of this can be said of most any MA but I, personally, have found it to be more obvious in Silat than in other arts I've trained. And it depends on the specific Silat system you're talking about, too, as to how much subtlety is required to make it work.

But a lot of stuff I've been exposed to over the years can be kind of forced to work by applying more brute strength (of course, this means that technique will only work until you find someone stronger than you). But a lot of the Silat I've seen doesn't really allow it to be muscled through very well. Once the principles are ingrained then mass and energy can be added to make it more devastating but, often, without the foundation in the details it won't work even if muscle is applied to try to force it.

The flip side to that is that when everything is done properly, very little muscular exertion is required to get the desired effect.

One of the hardest things I find in teaching Silat (and something I had trouble with when learning) was not to try to muscle things. People get frustrated and start trying to muscle through it. Then, after quite a few tries, everything clicks but they're still muscling - consequently, their partner ends up getting plowed because only a fraction of the force used was actually required when everything was done properly.

Trying to get people to use as little muscle as possible in training is the hardest thing I find - that and getting people to just breathe and relax

Mike

[SuperToe]

silat

Very nice post.

Are you a forms guy or just using the appliction from it.
I know the juru's aren't very long or hard but still..

[sikal]

Very nice post.

Are you a forms guy or just using the appliction from it.
I know the juru's aren't very long or hard but still..

I practice quite a few jurus and a few longer forms (one from Cikalong and a few Kuntao Silat de Thouars forms).

But I'm always thinking in terms of applications and drawing applications from the forms. The forms are "Pencak" and the applications are "Silat" and, as the saying goes, "Without Pencak, there is no Silat and without Silat, there is no Pencak."

Mike

[SuperToe]

silat

I heard there is 110 forms in the uncle bill kuntao silat.. True?
How many you up to?

[sikal]

I heard there is 110 forms in the uncle bill kuntao silat.. True?
How many you up to?

LOL. Uncle knows a lot of forms - I'm not sure of the exact number but 110 is probably in the right neighborhood. But he doesn't require anyone to learn all of them. I'd guess (and that's all it is, I've never thought to ask) that most of his seniors have around 20.

Personally, I've got 3 that I practice regularly. I've seen another 10 or so but don't have them at all.

Mike

[SuperToe]

ohh

That make more sense. 110 forms is lot of memory work. 20 is a fare number. is he teaches more appiclition then the forms i guess. I have a hard time remembing the one i know. I learnt some just for fun. about 4. People say im weird but i like the traditional part of the martial arts also. Learning from the past.

[sikal]

That make more sense. 110 forms is lot of memory work. 20 is a fare number. is he teaches more appiclition then the forms i guess. I have a hard time remembing the one i know. I learnt some just for fun. about 4. People say im weird but i like the traditional part of the martial arts also. Learning from the past.

LOL. The way Uncle teaches is basically this:

He looks at his victim ... er, uke ... and says, "Hit me." If it's someone who doesn't know him, they'll usually throw a real slow punch and he'll say, "No, no. Hit me!" Sometimes he'll even let them hit him and then say, "Now really hit me."

Anyway, the guy swings and when Uncle is happy with it, he moves. There's a flurry of motion, usually some laughter from Uncle, and some oofs and ows from the slap monkey. Then Uncle looks at the rest of the class and says, "OK. Now you struggle with it."

If you ask to see it again, he'll do it again - but it's almost never the same thing he just did because he's responding in real time to the way the uke moves.

Then he'll come around and watch what you're doing and say, "Good! Now, try it this way." And he'll tweak what you're doing in this really small way that makes a huge world of difference when you try it. You go from struggling with it to wondering why your partner is laying on the floor.

It's an incredible experience

Mike

[SuperToe]

Silat

So he likes to show you once or twice then let you try it to see what you can do with it? Sounds interesting.

I like that more then someone showing you a tech for like 5 mins.
Have you trained with all the brothers? If so, Which one can flow the best. Ive heard that Paul is Scary when he does stuff, because the control and timing he has.

[sikal]

So he likes to show you once or twice then let you try it to see what you can do with it? Sounds interesting.

I like that more then someone showing you a tech for like 5 mins.
Have you trained with all the brothers? If so, Which one can flow the best. Ive heard that Paul is Scary when he does stuff, because the control and timing he has.

LOL. Most people find it very frustrating until they've been around him long enough that they start picking the stuff up quicker just through repetition of exposure.

I have only trained personally with Uncle Bill and Pak Vic. I've seen video footage of Paul and Maurice, though. They're all pretty awesome. As far as flow, though, I'd say that Paul's flow is the cleanest. Uncle, though, is mind boggling. He doesn't try to do anything. There's no apparent effort. He just moves and stuff happens. Paul, from what I've seen on video, though, is pretty amazing, too. He's barely moving at all but he's not getting hit - even when people are swinging full on to hit him hard - and the people attacking him hit the floor like bags dropped from the back of a moving truck.

Mike