Drak: Definitely agree on the individual instructor, as well as how much you put into the training, that shows the results. Later, also agree that I was too heated in my original response to LGod.
Synicism: Definitely agree on the mental training being important as well. I find that this also varies from school to school -- some schools assume that you'll pick it up naturally, while other schools try to cultivate it in their students.
deaded-beast: Definitely agree that the average attacker is not going to come at you with a spinning back kick followed by a seven-chop combination (so to speak).
So your notes on skill rather than style are great.
They might, however, come at you with a weapon. A good street-effective school will teach students how to handle club and knife attacks from a variety of forms, as well as gun attacks -- although the whole ranged aspect of a gun attack takes some of it out of your control. You sorta have to hope that you get a nice dumb gun attacker who gets within five feet of you, or that you can close the distance before they get their gun out and aimed.
Note: Some styles teach techniques against weapons, but only at higher ranks. This is fine and dandy and good and wonderful. I'm not saying that you should learn how to parry a knife on the first day of class. That's an example of "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing" just waiting to happen.
Gallo22 -- totally agree with you on the wise man staying silent where the fool speaks. Except that I spoke. Dang. So much for today's shot at enlightenment.
Tsyr: Agree on sparring teaching you to avoid certain strikes, and that being a bad thing. What I've found, though, is that I'd only rarely be using my street-lethal stuff against someone who came at me like the sparrer anyway. Most of my street-lethal stuff is against grabs and lunging punches -- you know, the kind of punch that an angry guy throws? Maybe it's a roundhouse, or maybe it's a straight punch, but it's got a ton of power behind it. Relatively few of my techniques are designed against jabs -- I've got enough that I won't be left out in the cold, but you don't get jabbed to death very often in the street.
There just aren't in general a lot of times when your sparring partner leaves himself open enough for you to break his arm, rake his groin, jab him in the eyes, snap his neck, and then break his nose.
About the only thing that I would definitely use on anyone who tried to "spar-attack" me on the street that I couldn't use on an actual sparring partner would be the good old fashioned kick to the knee. And my teachers make sure that we practice that a bunch, so that we don't forget about it if someone with a Tae Bo tape and an attitude decides to mug me through cardio-kickboxing.
-Tacky
Synicism: Definitely agree on the mental training being important as well. I find that this also varies from school to school -- some schools assume that you'll pick it up naturally, while other schools try to cultivate it in their students.
deaded-beast: Definitely agree that the average attacker is not going to come at you with a spinning back kick followed by a seven-chop combination (so to speak).
So your notes on skill rather than style are great.They might, however, come at you with a weapon. A good street-effective school will teach students how to handle club and knife attacks from a variety of forms, as well as gun attacks -- although the whole ranged aspect of a gun attack takes some of it out of your control. You sorta have to hope that you get a nice dumb gun attacker who gets within five feet of you, or that you can close the distance before they get their gun out and aimed.
Note: Some styles teach techniques against weapons, but only at higher ranks. This is fine and dandy and good and wonderful. I'm not saying that you should learn how to parry a knife on the first day of class. That's an example of "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing" just waiting to happen.
Gallo22 -- totally agree with you on the wise man staying silent where the fool speaks. Except that I spoke. Dang. So much for today's shot at enlightenment.
Tsyr: Agree on sparring teaching you to avoid certain strikes, and that being a bad thing. What I've found, though, is that I'd only rarely be using my street-lethal stuff against someone who came at me like the sparrer anyway. Most of my street-lethal stuff is against grabs and lunging punches -- you know, the kind of punch that an angry guy throws? Maybe it's a roundhouse, or maybe it's a straight punch, but it's got a ton of power behind it. Relatively few of my techniques are designed against jabs -- I've got enough that I won't be left out in the cold, but you don't get jabbed to death very often in the street.
There just aren't in general a lot of times when your sparring partner leaves himself open enough for you to break his arm, rake his groin, jab him in the eyes, snap his neck, and then break his nose.
About the only thing that I would definitely use on anyone who tried to "spar-attack" me on the street that I couldn't use on an actual sparring partner would be the good old fashioned kick to the knee. And my teachers make sure that we practice that a bunch, so that we don't forget about it if someone with a Tae Bo tape and an attitude decides to mug me through cardio-kickboxing.
-Tacky
