When you’re sparring, getting punched is frustrating, not to mention painful. On the street, getting punched can be far more devastating. The reason: Most street punches are thrown at unsuspecting targets. Have you seen any of the so-called “knockout game” videos on YouTube? If so, you’ve witnessed just how dangerous it can be to fully absorb a punch to the head when you don’t see it coming. The danger doesn’t come just from being knocked out; once you’re unconscious, even if

The July 7, 2015, edition of The Washington Post  described an incident in which a man on a moving train allegedly punched a passenger until he fell, then stabbed him repeatedly in the torso and arms until he died. As the crime unfolded, other passengers in the coach watched; not one intervened. The tendency to not get involved, dubbed the “bystander effect,” is becoming the norm these days, particularly in big cities where a sense of community doesn’t exist. Rather than help

Learn How to Deal With Them Now in the Dojo — or Use Your Techniques at Your Own Risk on the Street! I’d arrived early to meet a friend for dinner, but his class was still in session, so I watched from the viewing area. The students were practicing handgun defense under the tutelage of a senior student — which probably explained why it appeared so casual. I’m sure you’ve seen classes like that one, with mundane repetitions, comfortable surroundings and friendly pairings. You

Most combatives practitioners spend a lot of time learning to develop powerful strikes. It’s important to be efficient, to be able to exploit the momentary vulnerabilities your attacker presents and not waste them on half-assed or weak attempts at hitting and hurting. Unfortunately, what people don’t spend enough time on in their martial arts training is understanding the importance of movement, establishing range, and being harder to hit. Sure, the combatives mentality lends

Martial artists can learn a lot from people who have mastered different realms of combat because often the principles and tactics they use can be adapted to what we do. Case in point:  Oswald Boelcke. This German flying ace was one of the top innovators and instructors in the Axis air force during World War I. Among his many accomplishments, Boelcke chose a young Baron Manfred von Richthofen to become his pupil and coached him to an astonishing string of air victories. Von Ri

Before I get to the meat of today’s thought exercise for real-world fights, you’ll need to take a few inventories. For the first inventory, list at least a dozen “designated weapons,” or devices that are carried and used primarily for self-protection. I'll get you started:  firearm, folding knife, fixed-blade knife, Taser, pepper spray, tactical flashlight  — feel free to continue the list. Next, assume a complete absence of designated weapons and look to your environment for

It’s a sad fact that when we conduct combatives seminars, some attendees who have spent money and effort developing their martial arts...

The knife and its use as a defensive tool are always contentious topics — not only with respect to if and when you should use one but...

It’s become increasingly difficult to legally arm yourself for the purpose of self-defense. Laws vary greatly from state to state, and...

There was a time when the haymaker was the most advanced technique you were likely to encounter in a typical sidewalk scrap. Sadly, those...

It’s become an all too common sight on the nightly news: allegations of police officers using excessive force, which lead to furious...

The techniques you see in MMA are not new techniques. They’re just a blending of old martial arts techniques. In MMA, we’re just taking what works from a lot of different arts, then we make sure it does work. How? By experimenting. In MMA competition — outside of biting, eye gouges, and groin shots — everything else is pretty much fair game.

I haven’t seen Damon Gilbert’s martial arts resume, but it’s got to be among the most diverse in our world. He’s trained and competed...

Young people who grew up in the age of the internet will find it difficult to grasp just how hard it used to be to track down information about rare martial arts. Case in point: hisardut. I first heard about the Israeli self-defense system in 1990 while attending college on the East Coast. I was part of a small group of die-hards who kept their eyes and ears open for leads on events that featured styles that were new to us. A campus flyer indicated that a hisardut seminar wou

Let’s start with a definition. For the purposes of this column in giving tips for martial art teachers, the term “training scar” does not...

Mike Tyson is famous for saying, “Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Think what you want about the former heavyweight boxing champ, but there’s deep wisdom in his words. That wisdom happens to be the reason martial arts instructors so often remind their students about the necessity of having a backup plan. The logic applies whether you’re engaging in a friendly sparring session in the dojo or fighting full contact in the ring. Or battling for your life

Tom stepped in front of Jim and challenged him to a fistfight. In response, Jim did a kiai and stepped back into a stance. Tom lunged...

“If there’s one technique that’s more effective than anything else in a real fight, it’s punching.”

Fighting skill is one of the most unconventional abilities to quantify.

Kelly McCann’s Combatives Self-Defense, Real World Self-Defense course on Black Belt Drills is an opportunity you won’t want to miss!

Like most martial arts, karate originated as a system that was designed for hand-to-hand combat.

Anyone who’s been around the martial arts long enough no doubt has heard a certain boxing maxim: Make him miss and make him pay. That’s all well and good, but what if there was a way to just make him pay and immediately reverse the momentum of the fight? It just so happens that there is. The Filipino martial arts teach a strategy called “defanging the snake.” It has you literally attacking your opponent’s incoming limb before it can do any damage. While this fighting tactic c

Whether Systema can be classified as a traditional martial art is a matter of debate.

The Keysi Fighting Method (KFM) is a modern martial art that has garnered attention for its raw, street-smart approach to self-defense