Today I received some sad news by email about an old, old friend of mine.

Master Ray Terry announced that he is shutting down the Eskrima Digest, which, to my knowledge, is the oldest online forum for Filipino Martial Artists. After 15 years, its archives must be a gold mine of information, as I don’t think a day passed in the 4 or 5 years I subscribed that I did not receive something from them. Prior to that, I had students who received them and would bring me pages of their messages, or forward issues by email. And before that… one of my students, who was stationed at NSA (attended the Baltimore location of my school) would bring me his laptop to read the issues after class (this was around 1996, so you know I didn’t have any form of technology). The Eskrima Digest was where I actually saw the American  as well as the Philippine Filipino Martial Arts community start to mature, as in this place people interacted–who normally would not have had access to each other.  I have seen some Filipinos who looked down on American practitioners develop respect without throwing a single strike between them, other than a few harmless insults and flames across the list. I saw Americans who thought the Filipinos questioning Dan Inosanto’s version of FMA were jealous or just “pricks”, and eventually befriend some of these Filipinos. The Digest was a community, and people exchanged ideas, shared information, learned from each other, forged friendships–even sparred– by email.

Mr. Terry, you made a great thing. Your list helped me grow up as a martial artist, because I interacted with people I knew nothing about, and probably would have never gotten to know. I have had students who found me on your list. I’ve learned about other styles and Masters there. I’ve learned new ideas about what I can do to make my classes better. I’m sure there are thousands of us who can say the same thing. God bless you.

So, what next?

I have heard that the forums have been slow too. Martialtalk  and Defend.net  have not had the activity as in past years. Could it be that people are starting to train more? Or have they just found another place to interact? The benefit of the Eskrima Digest was that everything went straight to your email account and you could simply open messages whenever you wanted–even read them from your phone. Is it convenience? I don’t know.

But there is a magazine I have been receiving for a few years–an FMA magazine–by email. I have enjoyed the issues and I think many of you would too. It is the FMA Digest, published by Master Steven Dowd. For those unfamiliar with his name, Mr. Dowd is the author of the two books entitled Kuntaw:  Fist and Foot Fighting  (I am getting this from memory, because I actually haven’t even seen the books in about 20 years). It was written back in the 70s, I believe, and featured Master Lito Lanada’s system and forms. The last time I saw a copy, Master Billy Bryant showed me his, and had asked for me to take him to Virginia Beach to meet him. I learned the form in the book from Master Boggs Lao, and showed it to Billy (I can’t remember if there were all five forms in the book. Boggs had 5 versions of the form). Master Dowd is also a master of an Arnis style called Arnis Balite. He has been involved with the FMAs long before most people knew what FMAs were–even longer than many of you have been alive. He was a Black Belt in the arts when–as my son would call it–since the world was still in black and white. I’ll bet you a sweet potato pie, that this gentleman has a huge amount of FMA knowledge. His magazine is free, and it always features little-known about FMA styles and Masters. When you get over there to get your copy, make sure you tell them that thekuntawman sent ya.

So, anyway, where do we go from here? What can an FMA guy who wants to read about his art do? The martial arts magazines barely feature the FMAs, other than the occasional self-promoting jerk-offs who use the magazines to promote their new DVDs or give credibility to the new, “ancient” arts they just made. Anyone remember the Filipino Martial Arts magazines that Eliot Shearer produced? They were good, and I really crossed my fingers hoping it would grow to international levels, but personal problems kept him from moving the project forward. I suspect everyone was looking to take away but not put back in. It is like the parable of the pear tree (I’ll post more about it later), and to do something like this takes money and it is a time-consuming mission. Now, I hear that the Philippine-based Rapid Journal is now shutting down. They’ve been around forever too!

I’ll tell you what. Everyone should get behind the forms we have now–all the forums, the magazines, etc–and support them. That means FULL support:  time, energy, positive support as well as constructive criticism, attention (like spreading the word) and MONEY.  Because these things help you occupy your time, they entertain you, and they deserve something back from you.

And that’s all I need to say on that subject.

Thanks for visiting my blog. Please, spread the word!

“Ikken Hissatsu”

This is the Japanese term for “one punch kill”. It was ridiculed and discounted by men who can’t do it (look for my story about the fox and the grapes), because if you can’t beat em–many martial artists would say–mock em! 

There is a lot more to the one-punch kill than some guy training his reverse punch a thousand times a day. To be honest, that is actually a great way to train your martial arts (thousand reverse punches a day) because you would have such a great, powerful punch if you did. By contrast, the average professional boxer throws over 3,000 punches a day when he is in training, but then, that is his full-time job. For the martial artist who subscribes to this philosophy, a lot of attention is given to the application of the one punch–that is to land solidly and cleanly, regardless of what the opponent does–without any chance of counter or missing. This is why in competition karate, some formats end once the first point is landed: so that fighters do all they can to not get hit and do all they can to land that hit.

But can a single punch kill?  Of course it can. In my city alone (Sacramento, California), at least four people have died in one-punch fights. Some of these fights are justified (somewhat) in that the person who did the killing was actually defending himself. I have had three students since 2002 go to jail for injuring their attackers.  That’s right, someone attacked my students, and my students went to jail. Go figure. (Separate incidents)  There have been some good people pay the price for defending themselves, and some not-so-good people paid the price for poor judgment in failing to walk away from a fight. Take a look at this Google search, and you will find possibly hundreds of cases where a single punch killed someone. Involuntary manslaughter. Didn’t mean to kill them, but you certainly did something that ran the risk of killing someone.

There is a saying, that it is better to be tried by 12 than to be carried by six. There’s a lot of wisdom in this, because the one time you fail to defend yourself adequately you may be the one who dies. Still, we should at least explore the importance of developing this concept into a skill in the event you need it. I am not advocating killing attackers; I am simply saying that we should develop the ability to take out an opponent (not necessarily fatally) with a single punch. The one who has this ability is one who can apply the right amount of damage for the situation he finds himself in when he needs it. Something to think about.

And develop the skill to take out your opponent with a single hit, and your survival skill in the street will be just that much better. If some untrained guy on the street can do it accidentally, a deliberate, trained fighter can do it as well.

So, the next question is, should you?  This is an issue I have with the lot of knife-pukes (and in the FMAs we have plenty). These are guys who are so afraid of fighting, they only prepare for one type of fight, and that is where they find ways to plunge a knife deep into their opponent… makes them feel safer.  As warriors, we do not go for the kill everytime a guy looks at us funny. And just as we need to discern whether we should fight or not, we must also determine if this fight is one where we will need to justify the level of damage we inflicted later. A real concern, because in the process of defending ourselves, there is a pervading possiblity that we will kill our opponent.

I will leave you to ponder this subject on that note, and we will revisit the one-punch kill some other day. Thank you for visiting my blog.

First of all… You betcha.

Secondly, let’s answer another question:  Are there martial arts styles that are neither superior nor inferior?

Yupper… That too, kiddo. Sort of.

Here’s the thing:  a martial art style is neither good nor bad, until something is proven. There are many martial artists out there that don’t want to know if their art is good or bad, so they never test it. You know the type… the kind of guy who says, “I don’t compete in tournaments because they aren’t realistic enough”, but also says, “NHB is not realistic because there are too many rules”, and “Use control when you spar; we’re all here to learn!”  It’s a good way to remain in a safe place–the safety of burying your head in the sand and staying in your familiar circle, hiding behind cliches and excuses.

This article is for those guys, the ones who say, “one loss doesn’t mean your skill is bad”, and “I lost the match, but won the fight”, and “maybe you beat me in a tournament but on the street I’d kill you”. These are the guys who like to swell up their chests and pad their resumes with friendly promotions (you know the kind, where your martial arts friends give you the next degree and the then next year YOU promote THEM to the next degree?) and easy seminar certifications. The same guys who swear that there are no such thing as a “good” fighting art, only “good fighters”? But at the same time, they will tell you that no matter how hard you train, you must train under a certified teacher to learn martial arts “properly” and you can’t create your own style if you’re not “experienced” enough. These are the “masters” who have, like, 10,000 posts on the martial arts forums who call you a troll if you disagree with them or speak your mind about who is legit and who isn’t, but when you have one-up on them in the argument, they say “to each his own… I’m going back into the training hall to train…”  Yeah, but you’ll end up with 20,000 posts within the next 12 months!

Train my ass.

I am one of those guys who live in the real world. I believe in reality, and I will speak my mind. The only time I won’t is when I really don’t want you to know the truth. So, you tell me that Moe-Can-Do Kalitukan style is a great empty hand fighting art from the Philippines, that was taught to you by your Lolo and comes from blade fighting… and guess what? Thekuntawman kept his mouth shut (rarely). Why? Because sometimes I have better things to do than to rescue another FMA sheep from the clutches of commercial McGuros, like go home and let my 8 year old paint my toenails.

But then there are times, when I think the little lamb needs a dose of reality. And this is where superior and inferior martial arts styles are not necessarily made, but defined. You see, most FMA people hang with other FMA people, and almost all of them think and act alike. They certainly train alike, so they tend to pat each other on the back, and tell the same bullshit stories. But in the open martial arts world–where the assholes hang out–people size you up, stare you down, and think to themselves:  I think I can take this guy… And poor McScrima student, can’t understand why I can’t have my way and he just have his. Can we all get along?  Why do some people have to try you out? Aren’t we all practicing the ancient Filipino martial tradition of Lapu Lapu? Leave your ego at the door and just train!  No, no. See, right there–where you said you did a tradition of the Filipino culture, mainly Filipino martial culture, this is a major part of our culture that you seem to have forgotten, pare. The Filipino arts came to be so, because one Master encountered another Master, and thought I can take this guy… then another Master encountered another Master, and he thought, I can take this guy… and so on. And each time a Master proved that he had the better fighting skills (or not), both men walked away with his art just a little bit better than it was before that fateful encounter. And this is the tradition of the Filipino Fighting Arts.

Now, the students of those Masters inherited their lessons learned, along with their curriculum. Then they encountered another guy who wanted to try them out. Then they passed those lessons–theirs as well as their teachers AND their curriculum–to their students, and as each generation failed to “get along”…. you got the Filipino martial arts. Not just that, but you got superior Filipino martial arts. How do I know those arts are superior? They proved it. Now prove that those arts aren’t superior.

But what of the so-called Master of yesterday’s generations who did not get out and prove themselves? Remember the saying, there are no superior fighting arts, just superior fighters? Well, those guys never really found out if their arts are superior or not, so they pass down to their puppies the saying that fighting isn’t everything, and sparring isn’t real fighting, and there are no superior arts. Those guys hid their arts in dances (whatever!) and taught their arts in secret… and one day taught those secret arts to their mga apo (grandkids), who already had Tae Kwon Do Black Belts and will one day argue with real fighters on the internet as a major part of their 10,000 posts.

Seriously, as martial artists we seek to improve the quality of the information we are passing down to our students. But how can you improve something when you don’t know where you need improvement? How do you guarantee to your students that you have a better way of fighting, when you haven’t tested it out against those other guys? Let me define two terms for you that will make this rather long post make better sense:

• Superior fighting art–a martial art that has been proven over the years to be a better, more effective way of fighting, if you use exactly what is in its curriculum. The fat has been trimmed, and the lessons are well defined
• Inferior fighting art–an art that has yet to be proven effective, or has been proven to be ineffective

Easy enough? So, where does your art fit? Can you point to actual combat experience (whether in streetfights or matches) that improved your art with each generation? Or are you still telling the story of some previous master’s 100 undefeated death matches? What have you done in this generation for the benefit of your students?

Or are you just comfortable believing that your art will back you when the attackers come a knocking?

Thank you for reading my blog. Please spread the word!

Hello All,

Last week I started a six week private lesson with a family. Their son is having problems with kids bullying him in school and they wanted him to learn self-defense to help him learn how to establish boundaries and have the confidence to reenforce those boundaries if they were tested.

My student and his family are from South Africa. After the lesson I sat down with them and we began to get to know each other better over a cup of coffee. Our conversation intially began with me asking them what they saw the differences between South Africa and America were. Their answer was that America is a utopia compared to South Africa… This was an interesting perspective for me to think about.

Here are some of the things that they told me about the cultural differences between South Africa and America

• At the age of 17 men have to spend 4 years in the military
• Detroit yes Detroit would be the safest city in South Africa if it were located there
• In order to get insurance on your house you have to have a security system installed
• Regardless of what city you are in people rarely walk by themselves anytime of day
• You are always watch out for people following you and be very aware of your surroundings

Here is what I think would shock most Americans who have not met people from countries like South Africa that have had a very violent recent history. My student’s parents were some of the most well adjusted people I have met in a while, it’s funny I came away from meeting them with the same feeling that I had the first time I met Pa Herman Suwanda who was from Indonesia. Wow they have seen and lived in what most of us from America would label as a pretty crazy enviroment but don’t seem to be affected by it the way that I thought they would be.

I worked with the son and father on basic self-defense training methods, the really cool thing about this was that because of their background I didn’t have to explain mental and emotional mindsets to either of them.

They understood that bullying in school is really kids as pack animals attempting to establish the pack. That while we as humans have evolved a long way from the rest of the animal kingdom when pushed we still have and will resort to basic survival instincts. The son who has a different accent is naturally going to be tested and while meeting aggression with aggression is not the primary way to resolve conflict it does sometimes need to be done. 

I know that it seems pretty harsh and basic that the kids that are picking on my student are acting out of a basic survial instinct and that it is not really a personal issue between them and my student. But it is really true if we boil this situation down to the basic thinning of the heard or survival of the fittest it becomes much less emotional and easier to logically understand.  

My objective when teaching self-defense is to make it a logical decision and it is not an emotional reaction and the above mindset is very important to understand in order handle the situation. And I believe that my student and his famliy understand this and this gives us a better chance for our lessons to be sucessful.

I believe that the “utopia” that we live in has dulled our survival instincts and that if we were plucked from our everday life and placed in an enviroment where those survival instincts were to be challenged a large percentage of us would struggle to survive. In the same token people who come from a more choatic enviroment like South Africa would be able to adapt to the changes of the situation because their survival instincts have been continually sharpened.

The reason that I named this post America the Utopia is because that I feel that our sense of our personal security and our sense of right and wrong often clouds our ability to stand up for ourselves and teach others to stand up for themselves as well. After meeting my student and his famliy it became much clearer to me that this a very important thing for us to understand. And that even though we live in a ‘”safer” enviroment we are really not as safe as we think.

In the Filipino Martial Arts, we sometimes forget that we are all born with a very potent weapon–if we learn to use it–the knuckles.  I will refer to the “fist” as the “knuckle”, because there are other parts of the hand we can use in fighting, but I will talk only about the knuckles today.

Many martial artists do not think much more about the fist other than ways to throw it. However, if they learn more about the parts of the fist, what damage the fist can inflict, how to train it, and where to aim it, the fighter will see that the potential for a deadly weapon had literally been in their hands all along.  The knuckle is a very powerful weapon because it is a bone at the end of a limb we use all day long–especially in training. However, the knuckle is not a stick, it is not a knife, and we must find practical uses for the knuckle as a knuckle.

A good start is to study the various punches and where they are best used:

• the jab–the eye, the corner of the chin, the teeth, the jaw, the nose, the center of the chest and the shoulder
• the cross/reverse punch–anywhere you’d like!
• the hook–the eye, the side of the nose, the jaw, the back of the head/neck, the side of the neck, the ribs, the solar plexus, the liver, the spleen, and the hip
• the uppercut–the chin, the throat, the armpit/upper-upper arm, the floating ribs, the solar plexus, the liver/spleen, the belly
• the backfist/back knuckle strike–the corner of the eye socket, the nose, the jaw, the teeth, the temple, the side/rear of the neck, the collarbone

There are other punches, but I thought these punches would be a good start, since they were universal to most fighting styles.

So, the next factor to consider is how the knuckles can be applied in each of these punches, relative to their targets. For example, a punch to the collarbone will use a different angle (slightly different, at least) than the same type of punch to the eye. you will use a different set of knuckles–the first two vs the last three–as well as alter the angle of the punch to hit the target.  When hitting the eye with a jab, you will have to consider the angle the opponent stands when you launch your attack:  an opponent who holds his guard to the side (like in a horse stance fighting stance, for example) vs an opponent who is squared shoulder when facing you (like in a traditional Muay Thai stance). The angle you hit him will change, as well as the side of the eye you will be attacking. How tall the opponent is will be significant also. A taller opponent will require a verticle fist/last three knuckles vs an opponent who is your height, against whom you can use the traditional palms-down/first two knuckle attack. (In case you are confused, consider this:  a palms-down punch, when aimed upward, will not hit with the knuckles, but the second knuckle of the fist)

Lastly, we must address training the knuckle. I did write an article about this subject. I would like you to take a look at it and utilize this system I introduce, as fist training is vital to your ability to use a fist.

Thank you for visiting my blog. If you have found this or any other article on my blog to be helpful, please spread the word and tell others about it!

The Running Kick

In this post I would like to introduce the technique of kicking in combination. There are many techniques to kicking by combination, and the most basic of them is what I call the “running kick”.

Rather than arbitrarily throw out multiple kicks–as many fighters do–or assume the opponent will stand still or back up once after being attacked (as almost all fighters do), we should plan our kick combinations to chase the opponent. Ask any seasoned fighter, most fighters being kicked will either back away in several steps if the kicks hurt, or they will rush you if the kicks do not hurt. This is a small tidbit that will be very useful to all fighters, as one cannot treat all kicking defense the same way. If you land effective kicks, your opponent will rarely stand there and try to block. Blocking a powerful kick is a good way to get your arm broken (ask Frank Shamrock about his fight with Cung Le). Once your opponent has felt the power and speed of a good kicker, he will realize that he cannot stop the kicks, and that they hurt. His strategy then will be to evade your kick and try to enter when the kick has passed. (This is actually a very effective way to deal with a good kicker)  When you face an opponent who deals with kicks this way, you can either follow up your kick with a barrage of hand attacks, attack his legs to disrupt his balance, or land more of those powerful kicks to finish him off. However, keep in mind that the opponent will likely look for an opening to enter for his own attack and if he is skilled enough with his footwork to evade and remain ready and poised, he will be able to return fire immediately.

This is the time to use the running kick. The running kick is a series of rear leg attacks (kicking off your back leg) that land with the cadence of a running step. This is not easy to apply, because the distance must be perfect and each kick in the combination must land with good power if your next move is to be successful. Should the opponent stop moving, you should stop “running” and finish him where he stands. If you keeping moving towards him when he stops, you will clash and smother yourself–or worse, run into his attack.  The combination is not much different from any rear leg kick combination you already know, but the idea is to minimize the gaps between each kick so that your opponent cannot seize and opportunity to strike back.

You can use a combination of finishing kicks (see the previous article), balance-disrupting kicks, and leg attacks. I do not recommend using kicks that do not pack much power for this type of combination because the idea is to weaken your opponent and his defense with each attack. A weak kick will give him an opportunity to turn the tables on your attack. As each kick is launched, you should do your damage and then return the leg to the ground as soon as possible, and closely as you need to the opponent to land your next kick–and then fire again. The cadence should sound off like popcorn, while covering ground as the opponent is on his bicycle.

Once you have successfully landed a series of these kicks, your opponent’s attention is now drawn to the legs… which you can use to set up an unexpected hand attack. Or, if you like, you can continue attacking and wear your opponent down with your legs and then finish him.

I would like to address the opponent who does not evade, but stands his ground and tries to block. This may happen if your kicking skill is not very accurate and lands with power only on occasion. There are two strategies you can use for this situation.

1. still use the running kick combination, but rather than move towards him you will orbit the opponent towards his back, or
2. use his failure to move as an opportunity to follow up with a strong hand/arm attack

Perhaps at a later date I can elaborate on this strategy.

Thank you for visiting my blog. Please check our Offerings page to get information on my book, Mustafa Gatdula’s How to Build a Dominant Fighter in 12 Months! Have a good holiday!

I begrudingly write this post, as up to now I have resisted giving any insight to my style–even to most of my own students. When joining my school, Kuntaw is no longer available to brand-new students. The influence of commercial martial arts has reached all the way into my school, making it an unpleasant for me to take on new Kuntaw students. I have read about Masters who seem to not want students, who refuse many students and must be asked several times before accepting them. Now, after many years of seeing students come and go–even having some stay for a while and end up leaving and teaching our art in other schools–I stopped accepting new Kuntaw students in 2007, and do not plan to accept more until 2010. So, for me to share anything about this art with strangers on the internet is a huge step for me. And trust me, there won’t be much more than what I offer on this blog. There will never be a “Kuntaw” book from me, never a “Kuntaw” DVD, and certainly no “Kuntaw” seminars! In my classes in Washington, DC, I teach basic hand to hand and Eskrima in one class and sport Karate in the other. After a lot of pondering, I am offering a small bit of advice from our style.

Fallacy of FMA Kicking

I have seen so-called “FMA Kicking” on Youtube, VHS and from friends who learned on the seminar circuit, and I can say that 99% of it is pure garbage and impractical. You would be better off going to a local Tae Kwon Do dojo to learn kicking, and I am not very fond of a lot of that style of kicking–from a streetfighting point of view. If it makes me sound like a hypocrite (being that I am a kickboxer and point fighter), so what? There is a difference between tournament fighting and combat. I know that. And although I believe that sport fighting will improve one’s combat ability, they are not the same, and definitely not equal.

As a fighter, you must look at what your kicking is supposed to accomplish. Then ask yourself, “Is it capable of accomplishing those goals?”  Here are some of the purposes of kicking:

• to break the opponent’s legs
• to punish the opponent’s legs
• to knock the opponent down
• to disrupt the opponent’s balance
• to break the opponent’s ribs
• to knock out the opponent
• to set up a hand technique for success

Theoretically, kicking accomplishes all of these goals. However, in the Filipino Martial Arts, what is called “Sikaran/Tadyakman/Pananjakman” is too stylized to be of any use. Lots of it that I have seen that is useful is ripped off from Kenpo and Muay Thai. Those who practice them are often so much into the demonstrative part of practice that they rob themselves of any use of the valuable aspects of the skill of kicking. 

Uh-oh.  I have to make a confession….

I may have exaggerated a little when I called 99% of that kicking out there “garbage”. Actually, almost all of it IS useful. But the training methods and the methods of employment are what ruins it for you. Sometimes, I will go overboard with my criticism to get your attention, and to either piss you off or get you to really, REALLY look at what you’re doing and reassess if you are capable of proving that your art is valid. See, that is what they call a “challenge” (yes, I realize that this is the internet)–something that causes you to prove what you can do.

Anyway, I would like to offer some tips from my style that may help you with your skill of kicking:

• Define each kick in your arsenal and place each kick (and variation of each kick) into one of the “purposes” listed above. NOT “front kick”, “round kick”, etc…
• Determine the footwork pattern you need to apply each kick
• Determine the footowork pattern you will need to apply each kick in the event the opponent moves or attacks
• You will need a hand action with most of your kicks. A rear leg round kick to the knee will be slightly different behind a front hand hook than a front leg side kick to the knee. That same situation will change if the opponent is punching you before you employ the kick
• If you are kicking as a counter attack, choose an attack that will match the technique you are defending. I’m sorry, but a rear leg round kick is a horrible counter against a jab. Put those JKD videos away and get up and spar to see if this crap works (sorry!) 
• Angle is everything. Where are you moving in relation to the opponent when you land your kick? Hopefully you are not standing directly in front of him. That is a foolish technique
• The front leg round kick is a different kick from the rear leg round kick. I know they look similar, but they are not the same
• Learn to use your hips and shoulders in generating power for kicks
• Learn to follow punches with your kicks
• Learn to punch immediately after your kicks
• Here’s a vital concept:  RECOVERY TIME–the amount of time it takes after landing a kick before being in a position to follow up. This is useless trying it in the air; it must be developed on a heavy target. Once you land a hard kick, your balance will need to be readjusted before being able to punch. Develop this sub-skill
• What kicks will finish a fight? Are you sure?
• Some kicks are fight-finishers. Some kicks are better for set-up of the finishers. Some kicks are for the long-term damage they cause and will not end the fight… right away, if you have time
• The kicks that knock an opponent off-balance or knock him down will need a quick following technique. Do you have any? How fast can you follow up in the event the opponent falls down or merely falls off-balance?
• Those pretty kicks you throw in your “panatukan” (lol) techniques. Can you hit a man with it and send him to the hospital? How many kicks in your arsenal have this capability?
• How often do you train your kicks for destructive power?
• Can you fight a man with ONLY your kicks? If you cannot, you are not a good kicker. “Good” kicking is not about doing splits or spin/jump kicks. “Good” kicking is the ability to land kicks, unanswered, with power, when you want to, and get the desired purpose (see the third paragraph) accomplished. “Good” kicking ability requires knowledge of strategy technique, possible counters and follow-ups, and timing and power. Go light on the concept, go heavy on application. Take a lesson from the Olympic TKD fighters and see if your kicking ability will really stop a man, or are you theorizing your way to a waste of training time (and a good ass-whipping). Spar with only kicks regularly and you will see fighting from a completely different set of glasses

I am ending this article now, because I don’t want to give it all up. But I hope you go back to the drawing board and take another look at your fighting style. Since most FMA people don’t really spar with their empty hand, they have no idea whether or not their art will stand up to everyone else’s. We have spent so much time and so many generations on garbage, FMA empty hand has become some of the least practical stuff around. But we are really not that bad, just have to re-apply real FILIPINO philosophy to what we are doing. Think practically and then try your theories out. Then–whatever the outcome of that technique-testing–go back to the drawing board and refine and perfect the best way to do it, in your experience (not opinion. opinions have no place in combat training).

Thank you for visiting my blog. Come visit us again!

I was reflecting on this subject, and how I came to be a martial arts teacher, and how my children have no choice but to train (including my younger siblings). I realized that a lifelong Martial Arts teacher will make his children “favorite students”.

Besides love, knowledge of family history, and religion, what can we bequeath to our children, but a skill or trade we learned in our lifetime? How many times have you seen the child of a great singer and expected that kid to be a chip off the old block? Or a great athlete’s child? Or a scholar?  We actually expect the children of great men and women to learn from their parents–whether by genetics or by osmosis–and to excel as they had been around their parents and their parents’ craft all their lives. This is not an absurd idea:  parents who love their children and love their children will want to share their gifts with them.

For the martial arts Master, this is a subject closer to home. We have no control over our students’ lives, but we certainly have control over our children’s lives. If ever we were to develop the perfect martial arts fighter, what better guinea pig to do this with but our own children? I am not talking about Wu Bin-style cruelty that does not fit in the western idea of martial arts training, but is guaranteed to produce only the best martial artists in the world… but then again, I am.  In my own upbringing, I was not allowed to date, join school sports, or run the streets and instead only had the martial arts and boxing to occupy my time. By the time I was in high school, I was old enough to cut school and communicate with kids who thought my family was wierd, but I chose to continue on the path I was raised on. There were definitely struggles, but in the end my mother was right on the money, and I am glad she and my grandparents stayed on me to stick with my martial arts.

You will find that the offspring of great men and women who live up to their parents’ greatness and onlookers’ expectations lived this same life.

At the same time, I have seen the children of great martial artists who couldn’t hold their father’s jock straps. I have also seen feuds where the son was nowhere around when Dad was training his students, and now that Dad is dead and gone, the son resurfaces to call himself the “New Grandmaster”, by birthright. WRONG. You see, birthright is bestowed upon birth, but your place must still be earned. You cannot expect others to respect you just because you share facial features and the same last name. You must pay your dues when you are young, and work your way up through the ranks like everyone else did. Even when you are in a system that passes father to son, as a son, you must earn your stripes among your father’s generals when you are young. And when it’s your turn to take the reins, they will be behind you 100%.

As the Master, you must make sure your children AND your students understand this. I would hope that if I died tomorrow, my students will continue the training I am giving my children and make sure they walk in my footsteps. I believe by genetics my kids will excel in the martial arts and remain in this life. But I want them to earn their knowledge as I did. Your generals must be humble enough to handle this and see it through. Your kids must have the name, the respect and the skills to stand alone as you have when you are gone.

Just some thoughts. Thank you for visiting my blog.

PS

Just remembered something. As teachers, we must get our children out into the community so that they will know people and so that people will know them. This includes fighting in tournaments and accompanying you to events. They must be with you in the classroom when you are teaching, and when they are old enough, teach as well. As children, they must train every day, and you must ensure that they become better than you were (as you should for all of your students). This is how you raise children in the martial arts.

Thank you for visiting my blog.

Now, before you get all up in arms about how Mustafa Gatdula is advocating favoritism, give me a chance and hear me out.

I am pretty much opposed to a traditional, age-old idea:  holding back knowledge from most of your student base and pouring all you have into one or a few favorite “chosen” group. This is common mostly in Kung Fu, but a natural tendency for martial arts teachers of all backgrounds and cultures… we are the Masters who “show up” when the student is ready. The truth is that most of your martial arts students will not be as committed or as serious or even as gifted as you’d like. It is commonplace for the student with seemingly “natural ability” or a knack for skill or just a fanatical student to get most of the attention… especially when they come into the school 7 days a week and practice like no tomorrow. Favoritism is a negative way of describing the practice of discipleship–called the “bai si” in the Chinese Martial Arts or “nang alagad” in the Filipino martial arts. This is a student who has pledged his allegiance to a teacher and is allowed into an “inner circle” of study with the hopes of being a future Master in the style.

The practice is rooted in the lack of suitable inheritors of a Master’s art, as many teachers took his art and its secrets to the grave. Often, the most precious bits of knowledge a Master had acquired is held for the student who will best represent his teacher. And sadly enough, this student never appears. I have known Masters to have gone to the grave without having that “perfect student”. I have also seen Masters turn over systems to inferior students simply because his best students moved on, or he just never had one.

Then there are those teachers who only want to pass on the best parts of his system to a worthy student who has paid his dues with dedication, practice and service. These students are even more difficult to find today, as we often must compete with our students’ career goals…. we are looking for the next future Master of our arts, but the ones we thought would accept the baton want to be rich lawyers instead.

So what is a proud teacher to do? Let his art die with him? Force a son to study the art full-time, rather than pursue his true life’s passion?

This question is not easily answered. The ideal situation is to have a ton of students who want to become teachers one day, who are naturally gifted with ability, have a good work ethic, and enough money saved to train with us every day. Not likely. So, do we turn these techniques over to a student who may forget them in a few years? Or a student who will sell them on DVD? Or give it away for free on Youtube to show off how he knows some rare style or technique? You will have to think this out. Many teachers do not possess techniques worthy of such consideration. Most of us know the same junk you can buy on video or catch in some random clips somewhere. But then there are those of us who actually have something unique, that very few have seen, that–if executed properly–will enable any fighter to gain a huge advantage over his opponents. We just don’t pass stuff like that down in a random Thursday night sparring class to a group of students who have not proven their worth to have this knowledge.

So, many teachers will assume a favorite student. One who has promised to train with his teacher full-time, possibly forego a college education or career to do what his teacher wishes. A student who appears to want the same for himself that his teacher acquired in a lifetime of learning. This student will know his teacher more intimately than even his own children, be privy to secrets about his teacher or his teacher’s upbringing, and learn things about this art that the teacher wouldn’t sell for a million dollars. Few of us can assign a price to what we know, and it is even that difficult to find a student we believe is valuable enough to do what we hope they’d do with it.

This is one of the secrets of the art:  Rarely will a Master impart all of his knowledge to anyone but a select few. Trust me, any Master who disputes the existence of this type of information is most likely not a “Master”, or does not possess anything so valuable he would screen who gets to learn it.

So, I advocate doing this if you have valuable art. If you do not have valuable art, then share what you know with whomever you please. But just know that a teacher who releases all he knows for a price either has no sense of value for what he has, or what he has is worthless.

Thank you for visiting my blog.

I’ve been wanting to write on this topic for a long time, so finally I am getting this one out. I hope you find it informative.

There are many things in the martial arts that can only be learned by teaching–or, I should say best learned by teaching. I have had some discussion with freelance martial artists about my opinion that martial arts development requires full-time indulgence. There are many part time martial artists who feel that one can pursue the art a few hours a week and attain the same results as one who does the martial arts all day long. This is an absurd, arrogant notion, and not worth my blog time disputing. Bottom line, you can’t. And I’ll prove it to you.

But that isn’t to say that you can’t learn and excel at the art while pursuing it part time. Of course, what you do when you train makes a significant difference, and if you couple serious training with active testing/sparring/competing, reflection and teaching you can certainly benefit while training part time in the arts. Today I am going to discuss how teaching the art can enhance your experience.

#1:   Seeing things you hadn’t seen before

The first reason I recommend you teach at some point in your career is to experience the arts from the outside in. By saying “outside-in”, I am referring to the switched role of student/fighter to teacher. As a student of the arts you think you understand the techniques, but you are really following directions and often your opinions are mere regurgitations of what your teacher has said, or whatever you have read in a magazine, book or internet. But as a teacher, you must take a novice from scratch and teach him the finer points, until the student is performing the way you want him to. In doing this, you will make adjustments to how the technique is executed, answer “what-if” questions, and be in a position of defense if the student is not easily convinced.  This is quite difficult to do because you cannot treat the student as an adversary, so you must find the most logical way to explain the technique as well as demonstrate it. Once you have done this many different ways (as students all learn at different levels), you have looked at this technique from many angles that you most likely have not done before. 

This is much like how football players look at football in a smaller way than the coach, who is on the sidelines watching everything.

#2:   The Student Who Doesn’t “Get It”

In our career, we will meet many students who has the coordination of a bowl of Jello or the rigidity of a statue, and you must firm up the Jello guy or loosen the statue. You will say to yourself, “If I can teach this guy, I can teach ANYONE!”  And that’s true! Not everyone walking through your door will be a child progidy. Many people are terribly out of shape, uncoordinated, difficult to explain concepts to, or so excited they try to talk and learn at the same time–without listening. As the teacher, you must take them all. Our martial arts is far more than just repeating what our teachers have taught us. We must grasp what we know, mix that knowledge with what we have heard, seen and felt, add a little of our own prejudices and opinions, and then mold it into the learning and physical level of the students who are attending our classes. Good luck!

This is a skill that is mostly learned by trial and error. If you are one of the fortunate few who had a teacher who also taught you how to teach, then it will be easier. Yet, most teachers learned on their own, as the art and teaching the art are like day and night, or vinegar and water. Rarely will you be able to enjoin both skills. I would say that the majority of your time, you will have to reinvent the wheel because you will find a better way to pass on the art that suits your needs.

#3:   Leading your men into battle

This is one of the most important parts of being a teacheer, as it relates to your role as martial artist. It is unlike most other teachers, who teach a skill and send students to the next level (like the work force). The martial arts teacher is expected to accompany his students into the battlefield, and often maintains the teacher-student relationship well after graduation. This means in addition to being a fighting arts teacher, we will be their coach when they fight, and their debriefing officer when they return from the battle.

You are responsible for helping the fighter connect his learning, to his training, to his fight plan against each successive opponent–if you lead your students into battle. Fail to do this, and you have done nothing more than a DVD from Panther Video:  teach movement alone. It is important to take your students to a place where they can fight with other fighters and refine what they have learned afterwards. This is an important stage in a martial arts student’s learning career. Prior to matches, he has learned nothing more than movement. After he has had an abundance of matches under his belt, he has learned a skill. Your job is to help him navigate through this process.

I understand that many teachers did not have this experience:  learn, fight, refine. But you can still help your students with their learning. No–you must help your students with this experience. Once they have had it, they will have better command of their knowledge and what they can do will catch up with what they know, and they will do it better. And you, as the teacher, will understand your art much better and can do a better job teaching the next generation of students.

This is what mastery of the art is all about.

So, I return to old arguments that have been rehashed in the martial arts community for ages:  Can one become a Master without teaching? Probably not. Can one become a Master without fighting? Absolutely not. See, somebody has to do it. The teacher may not have fought, but his student better have, or that art will become diluted with every generation. Teaching your students, and then taking them to matches and teaching them some more is a very healthy, important stage in each of the levels of the martial arts:  the teacher’s development, the student’s learning, and the art’s propogation.

And one last argument:  Is there a such thing as inferior/superior arts? The answer:  YES.

You see, the quality of an art is only as good as the ability of the students and the knowledge of the teacher. If the teacher has not proven his knowledge, and he has not proven the students’ ability, he will end up passing down unproven, untested art. “Testing” does not take place in the classroom amongst friends and family. “Testing” is an event that must be proven to adversaries who intend to prove that his way is superior to your way. You cannot get this by taking pictures and holding hands in a seminar or gathering. If a style has skipped this process, it’s teachings are not worth the paper it’s “certifications” art printed on.

Thank you for reading my blog. Please visit us again!

There is an idea called the Flywheel Concept which is an important part of the Good to Great concept.

To answer the question about which notch in a gear is responsible for turning the machine–the answer is all of them. In business, there is rarely no one thing that leads to success, but is a combination of many things. The great thing about it is that most activities push the business forward a little at a time, with a lot of energy invested, but eventually the gears and the momentum from their movement will propel the machine by the law of inertia. This article was inspired by something I read over on MartialTalk in response to my post about how to succeed in an FMA school. Two posters wrote about how they thought flyers were a waste of time because they had schools and flyers yielded no results. I thought this was worth an article, as I understand the low ratio of flyers passed out to new student. However, I have built my business off of flyers and I believe strongly in them. The difference is that I focus on the positives of my efforts than the failures;  the truth of flyers is that you will have to pass out possibly thousands of them to gain a few students. But they are new students I didn’t have before I pass out flyers, and your efforts–if you stay at it long enough–will ultimately pay off. That is, unless you quit.

Sort of the Michael Jordan “missed shots” phenomena:  some men define themselves by the number of successful attempts, while others define themselves by the number of unsuccessful ones. In his career, NBA great Michael Jordan missed over 9,000 shots. But we don’t address those, do we?

So, you may waste 998 flyers while attracting the attention of 2 potential students. Do you focus on the $80 you lost on flyers? Or the $300 you made off of the two students?

Okay, someone out there just thought to himself, “but I can’t feed my family off of 2 students”… But how long did it take you to distribute 1,000 flyers? 4 days? A week? Is that the only form of recruitment you use? Each mode of recruitment will bring you a little success–a student here, two students there–and in the end, they add up. So the flyer brought two students this month. If you charge $150 a month, it’s $300. An ad you placed brought you 2 students, another $300. Your website brought you one student, $150. A poster you put up in the local library brought you two students, another $300… and so on. So far, I’d say you made at least $1,050 more than you made last month. What’s the problem?

The Flywheel Concept of business says that every little function in marketing helps to push you along, and one by one, little by little, success by success. No one thing is responsible for your success or failure–everything helps if you do it, hurts if you don’t. We cannot afford to turn anything down, as long as it adds something to our bottom line.

The Flywheel Concept also applies to the martial arts. In training, no one exercise or drill is responsible for good skill alone. We must use everything that adds to our skill’s “bottom line”:  stretching, endurance training, power mechanics, sparring, techniques practice, hands, feet, evading, etc. Many martial artists try to discount one aspect or another because they dislike it or lack skill in it; then another martial artist will overemphasize another. The truth is that everything we do develops some part of our skill–even forms training and one-step techniques practice–and whether we like it or not, something will be lacking if we choose to ignore it.

So when someone emails me, asking what can they add to their training to develop power, or improve sparring ability, or increase their ability to evade and chase on foot, there is no one answer. At the same time, there is no shortcut! Many of us look for the few things that will help us get rid of the middleman on the road to skill, and there is no middleman. You must first begin with a strong, well-planned training regimen, and then fulfill all its requirements. This takes patience, diligence, commitment, discipline and TIME.

For those who are still confused about how the Flywheel Concept applies to you, I recommend reading Jim Collins’ book, Good to Great. In the meantime, this definition should explain it better than I can.

Thank you for reading my blog. I hope you found some value in this and other articles I have posted. And as always, please spread the word!

Fighting by Interception

Often, fighters on the circuit want to prove who is the quickest. In some cases, the fighter knows he is quicker than his opponent and wants to end his match quickly by using his speed to rack up points without the opponent being able to do anything about it. Either way, the fighter will not bother with blocking or evading, but fight by interception.

This technique does not emphasize speed, but timing and position. I think I have written enough about timing on this blog, so to spare you the headache of reading (again) the same old thing over and over, I will discuss position in this article.

Let’s take the skip roundhouse kick attack. My opponent and I both have our left foot in front, and the opponent attacks with his left skip roundhouse kick. Most fighters would lean back or step/slide back and block. Some, more confident, fighters would stand his ground and block the kick right where he is standing. But a fighter using this strategy would use the attack as an opportunity to launch an attack of his own. Not a straight line attack (see my series on footwork and the “secrets” of fighting superiority), but an angled one just slightly off the opponent’s centerline… a little towards my own left. In this position, you can attack with hands while the opponent’s leg is still off the ground. By doing this–instead of blocking or moving and then countering–you cut out the middleman and go right for the juglar.

This is more a mentality, than a technique. The fighter who attacks when attacked will never be a victim. Rather, he is a sleeping lion:  one whom you don’t want to wake up. The fighter that blocks an attack is showing his respect for the opponent’s power and attack, while the one who doesn’t bother defending shows that he has NO respect for the opponent’s ability to damage. When facing this type of fighter most opponents will lose confidence and become less aggressive, as he must look out for a strike or kick each time he attacks. You will find that your accuracy increases since you are no longer chasing your opponent; he is delivering the targets right to you.

I know this is a simple, short post, but I am offering a great piece of advice. Try it the next time you spar!

Thank you for visiting my blog. Please stop by again!

Hello everyone,

I would just like to give everyone an update on the progress of the book. The book is complete, and is being edited for the second time. Within the next week, it will be sent out for printing, and returned to me within 5 business days of receipt. As soon as I receive the books, I will send them to the folks who have pre-ordered.

Simultaneously, we are working on a training DVD for building power and strength for martial artists. This project will take a little longer, and I estimate that we should be done by summer 2010.

Thank you for all your emails, comments and support!

Mustafa Gatdula

Wow Last Night was amazing, it snowed heavily and froze the roads.

It was also the first Get Me Googled Seminar and it was held in Cheltenham, Glouscestershire!

Yes a Wopping 300 miles away from my home town in Colchester Essex. I drove through the night to make it back at 20 mphfor the last 90 miles and would you believe it 200 meters from my front door the got stuck in ice and wouldn’t move so had to leave it over night.

The Seminar was a success, everybody was able to get listed on google, twitter, wordpress & profileomat. believe me it was amazing as these ladies had no really geeky mentality. but now all profiecient marketers!

So there are absolutely no excuses for any of you reading this not to be promoting yourself online either…

Yours positively
www.richardsaupe.com
call me now to sort out your internet strategy 07 538 538 138

Hello All,

Wow has this month been super busy!!! We have had some really cool things happen @ Synergy Martial Arts this month.

• We have added 2 new students this month. Not too bad for a holiday month huh?
• We are building some very cool relationships with the Personal Trainers @ Hamburg Fitness Center (www.hamburgfitness.com)
• Tonight Jeff Lopes and I begin coaching @ Gladiator MMA from 7-9
• Our fundraiser event Kick Domestic Violence’s Butt on 1-16-09 is really beginning to take shape. 100% of the proceeds will go to LACASA (www.lacasa.org)
• Also we are working on setting up our very first out-of-state seminar. It will be early Summer in Southern Ohio @ Deane Wagner’s School (http://www.wagnersmartialarts.com) topics covered will be Filipino Martial Arts and Clinching. Check back soon for dates and price of the seminar.
• For the next 6 weeks I am doing private lessons with a young man who is having issues with being bullied @ school. I love to work with young people to help them build confidence and feel that they can establish boundaries and have the confidence stand with them.

We at Synergy Martial Arts wish you and your loved ones a very Safe and Happy Holidays!!!!

Shawn

This came from an email exchange between Guro and a martial arts competitor he had met and given advice to. I thought it was very informative, so we are sharing it here. It is rewritten from items from that email, and I’m sure you will find it helpful.

It was answering the question about whether the one-two and one-two-three were too simple to be effective.

One of the most effective old-school techniques that can “translate” (lol) directly to streetfighting is the “old one-two” and the “old one-two-three”. It is so simple, yet most who practice the technique either undervalue its effectiveness or misuse them.

Basically, the one-two is a jab-cross, and the one-two-three is a jab-cross-straight left (if you are fighting left foot forward).

It is more than simply throwing the punches right behind each other ala Tae Bo/JKD/faux boxing style. Let me give you some pointers how to use this techniques effectively:

• because opponents move, it is always recommended that you use footwork when throwing the technique. the question about how many punches can be answered by considering how far the opponent moves and where he is in relation to you. if the opponent moves while you attack, then you move. either way, you should move as far as you need to hit the opponent, plus about another half-step. this should be self-explanatory, but you would be surprised how many people (possibly you) practice this technique standing still. there should at least be a step off the first punch. if not for distance, at least for power mechanics
• you want to throw your waist behind the second punch. when i say this, i mean that i want you to hit him while your hip is still twisting. easier said than done, i know, but the timing must be that perfect. twisting hips and shoulders equates to power generation, but only while in motion. the moment your hips stop, the power generated from that movement stops. this is including the third punch in the one-two-three
• the gap between the first and second punch, and the second and third punch, must be as narrow as possible–even invisible. by saying this, i mean that the punches should feel like one punch because they landed so closely behind each other. this is not as much a speed issue as it is a timing issue. instead of a “pop-POP!”, it should be a “popPOP!”  I might have you show you this in person for you to understand what timing I am referring to. but the punches should sound like popping popcorn or machine-gun fire. doing this will keep your opponent from being able to answer or stop your attack
• a good lead to these two techniques would be some type of power kick, like a knee or low round kick, which hurts enough for the opponent to both lower his guard and start a retreat. both of those movements (the lowering of the hands and the retreat) will distract the opponent from defending himself and cause him to be off-balance, which interferes with his effectiveness
• pause after throwing the technique, regroup and then finish the opponent after you have thrown it. I say to pause, because it will allow you to carefully choose the right attack to finish your opponent. sloppy strategy will make a man smell blood after landing clean shots, thinking the opponent is ready to go to sleep and then just start attacking on instinct. nothing will help your opponent clear his head than a series of missed, overshot punches. it is better to move to a better firing position, look for an opening, then take the killing shot
• the one-two and one-two-three is a linear attack. get the opponent moving in a circle by circling him, and when he tries to follow… stop your orbiting, and then move straight in for the attack. your opponent will be caught off-guard and off-balance

As simple as these two attacks are, they are very quick–blink-of-an-eye quick–and very effective. If thrown properly at the right distance and at the right time, it will not be stopped. And if you don’t knock down your opponent from it, will still enable you to buy the time and opportunity to finish the opponent off with the right follow-up.

Thank you for visiting my blog, and please look out for my new book, Mustafa Gatdula’s How to Build a Dominant Fighter in 12 Months… available soon (Dec 2009) for purchase. Please refer to the Offerings page for details!

Also, if you like what you read here, please tell others about it!

Welcome to Inland Empire Filipino Martial Arts!

Inland Empire Filipino Martial Arts (IEFMA) is your source for Sayoc Kali, Atienza Kali and Lacoste-Inosanto Filipino Martial Arts in Southern California’s Inland Empire.  IEFMA provides instruction in edged, impact and flexible weaponry as well as their unarmed compliments.  Commonly known as Kali, Eskrima or Arnis the Filipino Martial Arts encompass combative strategies and tactics born from centuries of combat, by Filipinos and Filipino Americans.  IEFMA is a Sayoc LA training group, and strives to continue developing and producing the capable individuals that Sayoc LA has fostered throughout Los Angeles and Southern California. 

Guro Joe Marana began his training in the Filipino Martial Arts in 1998, and has since then received instructorship in Sayoc Kali under Pamana Tuhon Christopher Sayoc, Sr., Atienza Kali under Tuhon Carl Atienza and the Atienza brothers, and The Filipino Martial Arts under Guro Dan Inosanto.  Coming up in Southern California under Guro Travis Downing and Guro Joey Pena, and continuing his training at the Inosanto Academy of Martial Arts in Marina del Rey, Guro Joe Marana has now taken his practice and instruction back home to the Inland Empire to contribute to the growth and perpetuation of these martial arts.

Please feel free to contact Inland Empire Filipino Martial Arts via email at jmarana@verizon.net or by phone at 909.319.1991.

This is a question that seems to reappear every once in a while… but can an art be truly or purely a “Filipino” art?

This is like calling an ethnicity or race a “truly American” race; you really can’t define some things in the culture as being purely Filipino. Everyone knows that the Filipino culture and history has been infused so much with foreign cultures and influence, we really cannot denote something “pure” or originally Filipino. There are many things that are uniquely Filipino, but more than often, they are just combinations of other cultures that spell F-I-L-I-P-I-N-O. Like Filipino food, a combination of Malay, middle eastern (yes, middle eastern), Chinese, and Spanish tastes. Together, those flavors are distinctly Filipino–like the combination of sour and peppery or salty and sweet–but their origin came from some place else.

Have you ever heard a native Indonesian “sfeek inglis”? Day sound barry motts like a peenoy win day sfik inglis. Becows ob dare ak-scent. Eats barry close to ours.

But the Filipin0 martial arts have some things that really spell Filipino well. Like the absence of forms in our arts. Or the tendency to want to show off or best the next guy. The emphasis on the application of the art, rather than the demonstration of it. Or the preference to keep things simple… but then we have many things that are very flashy!  As uniquely Filipino as our arts may be, there are some things that we own that actually came from some place else. For example, check out how Filipino karateka perform kata. I can always look at a kata from a distance, and tell if the performer is Filipino trained or not. I really can’t describe it; but you can tell if you know your Filipinos. Regardless of whether he is demoing a Japanese, Korean or Okinawan form, there is a certain look.

Filipino styles often have Karate, Judo/Jujitsu, Aikido or Tae Kwon Do blended in. And they don’t always tell you that they’ve added foreign elements to the styles. I’ve seen so much of it, I am skeptical when someone tells me that they have not added anything in, or that they’ve learned the art “from their Lolo”. I learned from my Lolo, and his art is very simple, as is most grandpa arts I have seen. So when these Lolo arts (LOL) have “pormas” that look like Shotokan kata…

So to answer the question I think there are several things that would make an art “Filipino”:

• if the art was compiled or developed in the Philippines
• if the art built its reputation in the Philippines
• if the art contains FMA
• if the art was created by a Filipino and used some Arnis/Eskrima techniques
• if the art is using FMA philosophy
• if the art was created by a non-Filipino, but the developer calls it “Filipino MA”

Wait, did I just say “created by a non-Filipino, but the developer calls it ‘Filipino MA’?”

Yes, I did.

If some guy wants to give credit to the Philippines, then I say, more power to you. Just don’t give it a fake history and don’t “steal” ideas from another teacher. That means a Filipino who has never been to the Philippines can create an FMA. That also means a White guy who’s dating a Filipina and has never been to the Philippines (and doesn’t eat balut) can create an FMA from seminars/video tape learning. The only thing that matters, is does your art work, and if you are called to the carpet–will you show up or make excuses? This is a free world, and who are we to say what is or isn’t Filipino? Hell, most of don’t even know our history that well to even judge. I mean, how many people really believed that there was a Filipino Muslim art called Kali that was the Mother of the FMAs? I know I was one of them!

I don’t have energy for arguing origin or names. But I will argue telling the truth all day long. There is a difference. In the Philippines, we have unique Filipino Kung Fu styles which have no Arnis, just like we have Filipino Aikido. But some guy here in the US can’t call his new Arnis/Eskrima/Jujitsu blend “Filipino” because he doesn’t speak Tagalog? Really, some of us should get a grip and get a life.

In a future article, I’d like to discuss some of these non-Filipino foreign arts. In the next decade, I’d like to import an art to the “Fphilippeens” (lol) that is not an FMA, but will be when I get there. I’m pretty excited about it too. But in the meantime…

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I have a couple of things to worry about when I teach, and all martial arts teachers have to think about this.

One of the things that’s obvious, is if what I’m teaching will really save a student’s behind when he needs it. This is something that I have in the back of my mind every time I teach a class. I’ve been doing it so long, it is second nature and I train all of my students as if they were going to fight a full contact fight in a few months. For this reason, I believe in developing real, functional skills as soon as possible. I take a lot of pride in knowing that my students, if anything, can fight. This is my specialty.

The second thing to consider is, what if the art was being misused. None of us want to find out that our students are going around starting trouble or hurting people, and it is too late to kick them out and take back what we’ve shown them. Basically, as martial arts teachers, we have armed our students with a weapon we cannot take back. If they begin to abuse their training , it is too late and we are responsible for the damage they inflict.

I recently received a phone call from the Sacramento Police Department, that one of my students had been arrested for assault, among other things. I was floored. This student had gotten into a fight with a gang member (who started the fight, btw), and MY STUDENT was arrested. Not knowing enough information, I had to make a bunch of phone calls, and do what needed to be done to find out what happened with the little bit of information I was given. All sorts of questions entered my mind. Had I taught the wrong person? What happened? I am going to beat his behind when I see him. It took 24 hours before I could go to see him, and even then I wasn’t allowed to visit him. It’s now been 3 days, and I still don’t know all the details. But this is what I do know… he was defending himself and the attacker went to the hospital with multiple injuries.

My student is a child. He is a straight A student, he comes from a good home, and has never been in trouble in his life.

What kind of world do we live in where our children (some of whom have never been in a fight in their life) are forced to injure another child in order to stop an altercation while a group of children watch? There are questions on top of questions to consider, but one of those things is, how much do we teach? What do we hold back? What if he needs those dangerous techniques to save himself?

Had I not taught my students what I teach them, he and a few others who have defended themselves would have been the ones in the hospital. But now that I’ve taught one to defend himself–and he did–he is in juvenile custody. Chances are, nothing will happen. His parents will be sued, he will have to move to another school (after all, the attacker was in a gang, which is a big deal in California), and he will carry the stigma of having been led away from school grounds in handcuffs. Not to mention, that this young man may be risking his life, should he ever hesitate to defend himself again.

We are told that the reason for the legal overkill is that the boy was injured, and the incident occurred on school property. Never mind that the “victim” was a known school bully who picked the wrong honor roll student to try and push around. At the same time, the student may have gone too far in his defense, besides the fact that he did not simply walk away. Even after being punched. Many martial arts students–even adults–can’t wait to use what they know for self-validation that “I am no punk”. As teachers, we have to consider this and should perpare our students for this internal struggle. We have a duty to both use discretion in determining who we teach and what we teach them, and we must also teach them when to use it. The difficult thing is expecting 12 year old boys to take it easy on thuggish bullies, when they don’t know if they are in a simple fist fight, or if their attacker is going to try an kill them.

If this was a perfect world, I would go to the house of the bully, drag his father into the street and beat him like a slave. After all, we are responsible for how we raise our sons, and if my son were a “gang” member, I would beat him every day until he got tired of the whippings (or just send him back to the Philippines to live with his grandmother… but they have gangs in the Philippines too). I could accompany my students to school and to work and on the street at night, and protect them myself. But I cannot, and instead, I have to turn them into their own bodyguards.

So, as teachers, we will have to balance developing superior fighters, but arming them with the ability to know when and how much to use. And if we are teaching children, it is more difficult because children are not always mature enough to monitor themselves, nor do they all understand whether or not their life is in danger.

When you teach your martial arts, you are giving them a gun and expecting them to use it wisely. Some of us are giving water guns, some of us are arming them with Uzis. But we have to study the art of discretion.

Just a few thoughts.

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A question was posed:  What can be done to get the Filipino arts to be as big as the more mainstream arts of Karate, Tae Kwon Do and Kung Fu?

Before I get into my thoughts on this subject, let me qualify this subject by saying that I believe that the arts are just as popular and then they aren’t as popular. I say that the arts are just as popular as mainstream arts because the FMAs are a (possibly) multimillion dollar business. If you look at the amount of money being made in the DVD market alone–let alone the seminar industry, tourism (folks going home to look for and compete in the FMAs), and regular classes in the FMA–I am sure millions of dollars are being made of the arts. It’s just that the audience for the Filipino martial arts is a different, more specialized audience. It is an adult-oriented, first step through the gateway, mature man’s art. People in the West springboard from other arts into the Filipino arts because of our simplicity and the combative nature. Then you have those who are more interested in arts that are exotic, and we have plenty of salesmen who would accomodate that request, with our moro “costumes”, kulintang music, headresses, stories about secret family arts and death matches… But on the other hand, we’ve still got a shortage of full-time FMA schools around and are doomed to backyard classes and side classes to Karate and TKD, next to Tae Bo, ”Tiny Dragons” and kettlebell classes. There are those, especially the TEACHERS of these arts, who don’t believe people will want to study the Filipino arts, beyond an occasional seminar or videotape every once in a while; or 15 minutes of “sticks” practice within a self defense class.

At the same time, I really don’t want the Filipino arts to be as popular. I mean, we’ve got some of the worst martial artists on the planet in an art once it gets popular (and trust me, we in the FMA family have our share of them too) because it is difficult to control quantity vs quality after something starts getting popular. I am glad our styles are somewhat obscure here in the West, even in the Philippines. I can’t imagine walking into the mall and finding an FMA school–complete with Afterschool Arnis, 2 year Black Belts, and 8 year old Guros. Ugh! Disgusting! No, I am happy that the FMAist is seen somewhat of a self-defense/streetfighting expert, as it helps us keep some degree of respect.

It is all about respect, isn’t it? Well, if that’s the case, I’d say that we FMA people are still in trouble. Despite the amount of money being made in the industry. The truth is, the FMAs really don’t have that much respect–at least, not enough respect–in the martial arts community. If that were the case there really would be more people looking to the FMAs for all of their self-defense needs, and to be honest, they just don’t. No, we are the go-to people for folks wanting to learn a gimmick art, like “the sticks” or some blade work, but if you are interested in actually getting out there to fight, most people are turning to Muay Thai, Wing Chun or some other style. It seems the only people who really believe in the Philippine arts are, well… Filipino martial artists. And JKD people, who are basically just FMA people who wanna be like Bruce Lee. In fact, FMA people don’t even believe in their art enough to get out and really do some scrapping with their FMA. They’d rather just show their wares on Youtube and in nice, safe, friendly seminars.

But I digress.

So, why is it that the Filipino arts are not as popular? Here are my views:

1. Our instructors only use the art as a side art. Filipinos and non-filipinos with joint problems seem to be the only folks out there who make the FMAs their main art. If the guy teaching it doesn’t even think it’s worthy of full-time study, why should I? The students are being taught as soon as they walk through the door that FMAs are a complement to other styles. Kinda like Chinoy (Chinese and Filipino) restaurants. Or Filipina girlfriends, that you dump later and marry a girl from your own country. Okay, getting personal. Sorry!
2. Not enough FMA guros who look like they can kick some butt. Sure we have a few tough guys out there, but a Kajukenbo friend of mine commented that he used to think of FMA folks as the only martial arts styles where you regularly find big bellies. And don’t hand me that crap about a layer of fat being protection from a knife technique (I know you saw it in “Ninja Assassin”, but it’s a movie!) But it’s more than just fitness levels. Many FMA people practice their art with no amount of athleticism or toughness at all, and certainly no power. And this just isn’t going to excite many people. Power is a display of destructive ability, but there are many in our arts who look past it and think “flow” is “deadliness”. Yeah, right.
3. There isn’t enough FMA coverage in the media. When people see it on TV, they will believe it. Sad, I know, but in order for folks to know it’s out there and it’s good, they will have to see it on TV. I’m sorry, but Leo Gaje blew it when he was on that cable show with the buffalo and chicken blood. That was embarassing, and pure bullshit. No offense intended, but either you’re going to spread the art or you’re going to live up to some fantasy image of the art. And come on, we’re not all 12 year old boys with comic book glasses. How about something a little more realistic? Like one Arnisador beating up an entire Dojo full of Karate Black Belts? That’s a little more believable than slaughtering a KFC martyr everytime a new student signs up. Back to my point, the movies that have contained the FMAs have had the arts buried so deep in the script you have to do some digging to even find out that there were FMAs in the damned movie. And the few FMA movies we’ve have have been awful. I even made one in the 80s (and I’ve never watched the whole thing)… so, I’m guilty myself.
4. I don’t think many FMA people want the art to go full-time. When Filipino masters come here, the draw of getting on the seminar circuit and making a killing sounds a lot better than struggling with a school (like I do), just to have great students. Why build and wait, when I can make a thousand at every city I travel to, and someone else will do the administrative/marketing stuff? It isn’t enough time to fully develop students, so what we have is about 75% (I’m guessing) of our practitioners are really just dabbling. The few teachers who are doing it full time are teaching the dabblers, and they really don’t care that the art is the way it is, just have my money when I come to town.
5. Too easily available. Anyone wanna know why Maasaki Hatsumi makes $5k each time he walks in your dojo? It’s because (1) the man is well-skilled and definitely knows his stuff, and (2) he has not cheapened learning from him by limiting what you can find on him. He has written a few really good books, but you won’t find excessive footage of him or his people on Youtube showing off what they know, so in order to learn from him you can either fly to Japan or attend one of his workshops around the world. The Filipino arts, on the other hand, is so easily available, we have people actually learning entire curriculums on video and Youtube. With access like this, no one will value it. It’s like a woman who will sleep with everyone she meets. No matter how beautiful she is or how nice or smart she is, everyone will look down their nose at her. The Filipino arts is being treated like that woman, we have no dignity, we have no standards. We will teach our deadliest techniques to anyone on a $50 DVD, or for free on the internet. We put on demonstrations, we do not require loyalty of our students–we have basically turned our arts into a whore that can fatten our pockets or pad our egos if we do it right.
6. Many of us are “jacks of all trades”. We are so bent on showing how the stick translates to the knife, the hand, the tennis racquet (lol), that we can demo everything including the kitchen sink, but most of us can’t do most of it with skill. I’ve actually met a guy who told me that he teaches projectile weapons and the whip as part of his eskrima/kali. Yeah,whatever. Like some guy is going to look at the few little snaps you can do with the whip and think you’re an expert. And exactly how does this translate to the stick or a punch again? You can’t do half-hearted martial arts and think people will take you seriously. If we are going to be true stick and knife arts, then let’s do it right, and do it well. Nuff said.
7. Relating what we do to the average guy. The non-martial artist, who wants fighting and fitness. Many of the things about the FMA that hurts us is that it has gotten too technical. So technical, that it isn’t practical anymore. Too many drills, too many fancy disarmings, too many patty cake explanations that most folks would look at and think “that isn’t going to work”. This is the reason I wrote the post “FMA for Streetfighting” on MartialTalk. FMA people get more into flow and fancy, and don’t even think about using their stuff in a real fight. Hell, most of us can’t even fight!
8. We are not putting our FMAs out there against other styles. Basically, we are staying in our own little world. We stay in FMA circles, and come out to learn the other guys’ stuff to import back into our FMAs. Don’t believe me? Look at a Jujitsu seminar. Or Silat. Or Aikido. Take a look at each FMA guy you see there, and then look at his website. Chances are that he’s doing the stuff he learned in that seminar as part of his FMA. But where you won’t see him is on the floor at some open martial arts tournament, unless it’s the Kata division, or he’s safely in a chair judging, or running around exchanging businesscards while wearing his “Arnis/Kali/Eskrima” T-shirt. You said, you do empty hand, so… can we see some it? Oh, sorry, you do the art of “fighting without fighting”. And you wonder why they don’t come to you to learn empty hand.

Okay, word count is approaching 2,000, so I am being guilty of long-winding. We’ll close here, and if I can think of anything else, there will be a “Part II” (there is).

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Wow, I didn’t think people were still selling their marketing skills based on the simplistic approach of 4 p’s. Product – Price- Place – Promotion this system has been disregarded by top marketers, but is still the core principle of old school marketers whom have decided to stick with their comfort zones.

If marketing doesn’t evoke a reaction to do something, like pick up the phone, take out your wallet. Then In my mind and other Guru marketers like Jay abraham, Eben Pagan & Dan kenedy (i’ve studied their works and it is oftern eluded to that marketing is selling in print, in other words direct sales) then it hasn’t worked!

Marketing is first and foremost about people, not a product, when you understand that, then you’re marketing becomes instantly more effective. What HOT buttons does your product hit fear, frustration or a want and a desire.(read persuasion by robert cialdini)

Remember people on the whole will do more to protect £100 than earn £100. this is fear

I’ve been in business now some 29 years and it constantly amazies me how in experienced small business owners are at effectively driving business to their doors.

It also amazies me that any one can call them selves a Marketer with out the slightest bit of experience. and charge through the roof for an inadquate poorly instigated strategy.

get me googled. is run by chief marketing director from Appliance Repairman Ltd. which has gone from T/O of 15Kpa when he started to a current T/o of £250k in four years. with a marketing cost of 11k offline and about 1k online.

Online Marketing for appliance repairman currently equates to about 30% of turnover.

You can see from the above example that when the right plans are put in place and then implemented. staggering results can be obtained…

Sooooooo. what can you do for me? the whats in it for me.

Great question. first thing I ask myself whn I meet a future associate is ask the qestion can we work together.

More coming soon from the Social reaper and get me googled.com

Richard Saupe
call me now on 07538 538 138 or 01206 43 43 43
There is no reason y your business is can not be successful. U just need more market share, only about a 3rd of people looking for some one are referred so just think how you can tap into the other 66% of propective clients.
I once read that out of every 100 people there is 1 person that can buy or is looking for what you have got now! So get out there and start talking to people

There are many ways to approach fight training, and one of my favorite methods is a skill-based fighting style.  Some fighters look at fighting analytically, and believe that if you drill specific responses to techniques, when the opponent attacks you with a back-hand hook (for example), you will automatically respond with the practiced counter. This is a valid form of training, but I consider it to be an advanced form of fighting that does you little good if the foundation is not laid first.

And that foundation is the Skill-Based fight strategy. This method requires the fighter to place emphasis on individual attacks as separate weapons and little else, besides a few combinations. In the Filipino arts, the method is terribly ignored in favor of more complex strategies that sell better on DVD and in seminars… and looks good in demonstrations. But a well-developed advanced strategy is useless without a strong base of strong punches, kicks and basic strikes. For the fighter, he must have these skills well trained in order for more complicated manuevers to be effective.

It is not a very difficult method. First, you must identify all the weapons you will have in your arsenal. This would be every strike you would use, every thrust, every block, every kick, every push, etc., even grappling techniques like disarmings and locks. Next you should find all the variations that these skills would be launched from and to. This includes rear hand vs. front hand, open stance vs closed stance, static opponent vs mobile opponent, and so forth. It seems like a lot, but the variations are very small from situation to situation, and simply need to be identified and understood in order for practice to be effective.

In case this is confusing, I will offer the following example:

Round Kick:

• back leg round kick against standing opponent
• back leg round kick against mobile opponent
• back leg round kick against an attacking opponent
• back leg round kick as an initial attack
• back leg round kick as part of a combination
• back leg round kick as the finishing move of a combination
• back leg round kick to the leg
• back leg round kick to the head
• back leg round kick from the outside (where you are off the opponent’s centerline)
• back leg round kick from the inside (where you are off the line, but inside his guard)
• back leg round kick at close range

Each attack should address each of these situations because there are many slight nuances that will change from one situation and position to the other. They will mean a major difference between being accurate and effective most of the time and struggling to apply your attacks. Most fighters are unaware of the differences and can be thrown off by simply moving; it would frustrate even the most skilled fighter, if he is unprepared.

Now, once the list is compiled, one needs only to drill these skills to a high degree. We want to practice the techniques and their best applications until you are able to fire away with the appropriate attack when the opening presents itself. This is why some fighters seem to always hit their opponent regardless of what he does, while others have trouble landing. I think most fighters know what to do if you demonstrate a “what-if” situation to him, but most cannot execute it in real time. In fact, you would probably have to wait a few seconds for the fighter to try and think of what should be done, or to search his memory for the best answer. However, the effective fighter cannot afford this; all plans must be thought out in training and drilled to second-nature. This way, when a slight adjustment is needed, “the strike hits all by itself”.

Use 500 as a target goal for training and then make this a regular part of your training. I recommend having this as your blueprint for your students’ first 2 to 3 years of training, before getting into a bunch of complicated strategies and drills. It is difficult enough to simply land an abaniko to a moving opponent, than to consider doing so under pressure, with full power, speed and accuracy. Make sure your fighters are focusing on develop skill at each individual technique and he will have success at the higher levels of fighting.

Thank you for visiting my blog, please visit us again! If you like the Techniques and Fight Strategy section of my blog, then I’m sure you will love my upcoming book (Dec 2009) Mustafa Gatdula’s How to Build a Dominant Fighter in 12 Months, located on the Offerings page!