Full Contact Fighting

[Chad W. Getz]

Hey all, good that the forum is back up. I've got a question, anyone here just go in the back yard with macho mask on and just have a go at it? How often do you do it? How long have you been doing it?

[Tony10]

Check out the Dog Bros. and their clan--they love doing this kind of thing.

[Underdog]

Hey Chad, glad to hear ya bro!

Ok, actually it was done in a garage, not on the backyard; we didn't have the right protective equipment and we are all very NOVICES with the sticks, so we decided to CHEAT big time and use padded sticks and some protection that we do use for Vale Tudo sparring.

Actually what Hit me was that is a completely different game from empty hand sparring; basically we go against each other with no form; real sloppy and only with cavemans and sometimes abanicos, you need VERY fast reflexes and a whole new appreciation of distance, the tip of the stick can hit you from quite far! In the heat of the sparring session we kinda reverted back to what we had praticed most; at one point I completely forgot the stick and went for a double leg that missed completely 'cause of the distance. I was nailed hard on the back of the head.
Also you need to move the knee outta range REAL QUICK we all received multiple hits there. All in all an enlight experience; fun as hell and highly addictive.

As I expected; nothing fancy worked in sparring; and after a point, having a good cardiovascular conditioning was the deciding factor.

We are very new to this, but DAMN, IT'S FUN!

[Chad W. Getz]

Empty Hand

Underdog, stickfighting at a novice level is the purest. You are totally free of the classical mess. So remember that and don't become entangled. The goal in stickfighting is to hit hard and fast and not get hit. Oh yeah, you might want to work on that close BTW.

Tony10, I'm a little familiar with the Dog Brothers, but actually was aiming the question towards empty hand. Not full sparring in the classroom setting, but more like "Fight Club" type of scene. I thought about going no gear like that for a second, but decided I'd rather go into work with bruises on my arms than my face, so we're doing it with the macho mask and NHB type gloves. Maybe we'll take the mask off later down the road, huh.

[Underdog]

I haven't understood, that's the reply.

When I did my advanced student course in ruas vale tudo EVERYTHING was done full contact and without protection save a cup and a mouthpiece. I understand that this is a method to accellerate the learning curve tremendously; but it has its price. I returned home with cracked ribs, a swollen knee that took two months to heal and a full blue suit 'cause of bruises.

Was it worth it? I think yes. For me there is no better method to understand MENTAL attributes; back when we first see the UFCs we was wondering why fighters that on demo were technically perfect once inside the cage seemed...well..sloppy, cautious.

The same for The world vale tudo competitions. At the time we speculated that the level of partecipant was very low.
Now I understand that if you spar full contact and NHB, you didn't dare to do thing that at others level you routinely did. One wrong move and you are done.

Back when I started to teach a small groups of friend the basics of Ruas vale tudo, I made clear that in order to be admitted to training we all must did a round of sparring, full contact and NHB. We can done wathever protection we would. It was an enlightening experience. Real combat it's not made of techniques, but attributes. The small guy 16o soaking wet throwed a big guy by force of fear, and the biggest guy was actually the least dangerous. All fights went to the ground exept mine, just because I continued to throw fast jabs and retreat (I were experimenting if I can keep the distance by virtue of my long reach). A the time. one year ago, we were possesed and every friday night we had a sparring session NHB, but it was cause of too much injuries and the students plummeted and disappeared. Now we do sparring full contact with a cage mask and harbinger's gloves, but we do elbows and knees only 50% Otherwise it's more the time healing than training.

For me that's no other mode of training.

[Chad W. Getz]

Empty Hand

Underdog, my Italian friend. Glad to be conversing with you again. Do you guys always just work out NHB style now? Did you guys ever isolate just boxing, or grappling, etc. By the way, when are you making it to Hawaii? Did you guys have any formal training with sticks?

[Chad W. Getz]

Empty Hand

Diseredato, il mio amico italiano. Felice di conversare ancora con voi. Tipi sempre giusti ora risolvete lo stile di NHB? Li ha fatti mai boxing giusto dell' isolato dei tipi, o attaccare, ecc. A proposito, quando state facendolo in Hawai? Tipi avete de addestramento convenzionale con i bastoni?

Underdog, my Italian friend. Glad to be conversing with you again. Do you guys always just work out NHB style now? Did you guys ever isolate just boxing, or grappling, etc. By the way, when are you making it to Hawaii? Did you guys have any formal training with sticks?

BTW, how's my Italian?

[Evilution]

I teach a small MMA class and that's pretty much what we do. We do drills to isolate certain areas of combat to make sure the people can handle going all out but most of the class consists of going in the backyard (garage if it's raining) with the macho gear on and going at it. Back in the day we did mostly stick sparring with no protective equipment other than light padding on the sticks. For the past year or so we've been doing empty hand though, and I think it's a great way to learn. Put two guys in the ring (cage,backyard) and let em find out what works. I believe it was the Dog Brothers who's motto is higher conciousness through harder contact, and if you want to really learn to fight, that's the way to do it.

[Tony10]

So Chad:

What do you find, doing these just-about-no-protection bouts?

Is it like somebody said above regarding stickfighting: you pretty much forget everything and go "caveman"? Or do you find that the techniques you've picked up do make sense? Or does it always end up going to the ground (my guess).

In other words, are you able to keep that sort of martial artist's poise, or does it inevitably turn into a brawl?

Just curious.

[Underdog]

LOL AT THE ITALIAN TRANSLATION!

Sparring NHB with or without padding is what separe us from "martial arts" we forgot the artistic element (in the true meaning of the term: aestetich) and concentrate ourselves on the real fundamentals of combat: ATTRIBUTES.

When I spar at the academy (not in my half ass gym) I'm terrorized by the others guys, I see them only once a month and everytime there's someone new, so the fights are pretty much of two types: either VERY cautious, as when I met this guy from sambo weighting at 290 lbs, or sloppy and brutal as the fight that I did for belt exam. Most of the times when the spar is serious is kinda brawl, if the partecipant did their part they let the rage come out and this mess technique alot. It's a whole world apart, it's mistique it's highly addictive.

When you fight you have no time to think, to speculate, to dissect, to analize, to ponder to be sad or happy. You live in simple world of action and reaction, it's enlightning, for a brief moment you are immersed in the true meaning of "aliveness", it's like being immersed in fresh water, suddenly everything is speeded up ten thousand times and finally....

You are free from thinking...
Just moving, hitting, moving, hurting everywhere...

Damn, everything outside seems so boring...

[Tony10]

Do you find that the more experience you gain, the more it "slows down" for you, in that you can suppress the emotional part and almost act on auto-pilot?

In other words, fear and emotion begin to disappear and you look at it from a more objective--if that's even possible--view, even while you're doing it?

[Underdog]

Yes, it does. I gained a valuable training lesson from my days in competitive action pistol shooting; to succed in this sport you must have a highly analitical approach, if you throw into you training all the incognities of the equation, you have to much to worry about and you rely only on your primal instict to survive the game. You must dissect the game and then put one piece of the puzzle at a time. Translated to NHB training this translated in conditioned sparring; i.e. a sparring where you purposefully put only one thing at a time. If I train a response to a jab-cross combination, I spar full contact with my partner feeding me only that. I have only this to worry about and can develop a sound counter: what's is different from traditional styles is that I don't know the WHEN and WHERE of my opponent, that's put aliveness in training. Also knowing that if you did something wrong you have to pay for it helps alot. With free sparring you gain SITUATIONAL CONFIDENCE. Your reptile brain recognize that you have done it before and depending on how hard you go at it eventually you relax more.

Fear it's only the natural response to an UNKNOW situation; when you train realistically there will be very little difference between that and the real thing.

For example I don't like too much brazilian jiujitsu as it's taught here; it's a good BASIC preparation but when you add the strikes it revolves so much that very little of what you have trained remain; I prefer a more realistical approach. But bear in mind that self-defence is the primary motivation that led us to Vale Tudo.

[Chad W. Getz]

Tony, first off, my experience runs a little deeper with stickfighting that with empty hands. So, I'm still exploring my "vale tudo" if I can use the term here. I'm very fortunate to have a very good group to train with. They all realize that to get better at fighting you have to fight and they all face their fears very well, IMO.

I personally don't fight caveman style when I stickfight. I think the caveman style though is very effective if you have a good sense of distance and timeing, but someone that has proper strategy behind his techniques can mess up the caveman's gameplan.

The answer to your question about the techniques and fight slowing down, etc., in my opinion are as follows. When one first starts stickfighting, all there attention goes to their breathing and their fear. With that they don't have any attention to pay to all the other aspects. Slowly they start to pay attention to it, until it becomes natural. What I mean to say is that if you concentrate on putting in a power shot, you will probably telegraph it, because it is not mnatural. It's also like paying too much attention in one of the three balls that you are trying to juggle. People seem to pay attention to techniques, footwork, hitting with power, fear, not getting hit on the hand, etc., etc. Too many things to be thinking of in the midst of a stickfight. One would appear to be caught up in a classical mess by trying to do things. Now I've been stickfighting long enough to say that I don't pay attention to getting my hand hit, because it's a natural reaction to move it when the hit comes. I don't pay attention to my footwork too much because it's instinctive. The same for the power shots. I can put these in without thinking much about it or telegraphing it because I do it so much and I am able to do all the other things "subconciously". I see the same thing happening in the empty hand fighting that we're doing as well. You have to "instinctively" deal with a jab, kick, attempted take-down, etc. for you to pay attention to how you are setting up your opponent. One example is this strategic footwork that I was working on to set up my opponent. It worked very well in isolated jab/cross sparring, but in the real fight, I noticed it harder to do and my timing very off. The more I do it though, the better I get right.

Whether it stays with the martial arts poise or turns into a brawl depends on a few things. The first being what are your definition of the two terms. The other being the two fighters. When I fight, if I can present myself to be a powerful, respectable fighter from the beginnign, I get my respect and the person will either back off or come in right away. Either way, I maintain myself and if the move was effective then it will look nice on tape. Not all moves that look good are effective, but all moves that are effectively done are beautiful.

I also like the explanation that Underdog, il mio amico italiano, talks about. I do alot of meditating and I have found myself in a state of "zen" many times in the midst of the stickfight. When you are out there on the field with nothing but a fencing mask on, nothing else really matters while that rattan stick is buzzing past your face or knee. This brings up the question, can adrenaline have any effect on the concioussness and zen? Maybe another time and another post, ey?

[Edited by Chad W. Getz on 09-29-2000 at 04:43 AM]

[Tony10]

Good answers, you guys--thank you.

Chad, the reason I was asking was that I noticed in watching the Dog Bros. meets that I have on tape--and in some empty-hand examples, too--that you could instinctively pick out one of them fighting because they were so relaxed. Most of the guys, as you said, were going full-out--you can hear them breathing--and by the end of the bout they're gassed, even if they win.

On the other hand, the Dog Bros. guys were calm, collected and vicious as hell with their strikes. Even when one of them was matched with some huge guy who, in a previous match, just squashed his opponent.

Sounds a lot like what you described above with the whole Zen thing.

And that, in the end, is exactly the kind of attribute that I am striving for.

[Ryu (non-working password]

Underdog, had to say that I really loved the info in your posts. You're definately a knowledgable guy. Great stuff.
I have been too busy to put in some of the better training that I used to, and have been just ground and pounding the hell out of some wrestling dummies. I am hoping to start sparring again with some friends when I have the time. Do you get your cage masks, gear from any particular place?
Or just out of magazines, etc?

Thanks.

Ryu
(by the way, I did lose a few pounds and am down to like 175-180. Haven't tested my bench yet though