Self Defence in Ireland by Jamie clubb - Chimera Martial Arts
It has long been my dream to visit Ireland. Usually my reasons for visiting a country are based on its historical heritage or, being a typical English tourist, the weather. With Ireland, however, my desire to visit the country is based mainly on its culture and, in particular, its people. The reason for this is that the Irish people have a well deserved reputation for being among the friendliest nations in the world. However, they also have a contradictory reputation – perhaps a racial stereotype – for being a nation of fighters. With both of these clichés in mind I did have some small concerns regarding why an Irish self-defence club should want to book me to teach a self-defence seminar.
These concerns were very quickly alleviated by my most hospitable and kind host, Aidan Caroll. Aidan is a remarkable individual who is spearheading the realistic self-defence movement in Ireland. I couldn’t think of a better person to do the job. He not only has a solid background in the martial arts and working in the security industry, but has also systematically worked his way through the minefield of self-defence information and operators to eventually end up with his own approach to self-defence. Along the way Aidan has progressed from being a normal martial arts instructor to becoming the spokesman for Krav Maga (the Israeli combative/self-defence system) and also the sole Geoff Thompson Real Combat Method representative in Ireland. Within the last three years he has made the next logical step in founding his own unique self-defence approach known as “Hard Target Self Defence Systems”.
As I feared and have pointed out in recent articles, the whole landscape of civilian violence is changing for the worse. In Ireland the “square go” approach of the one-on-one fight is still far more common than it is now in the UK. Violence would certainly be a lot easier to control and lessened if most violent disputes were ended this way. However, as the world becomes more industrialized and people become more alienated the threat of recreational violence (crimes committed for the sake of it) is growing and encroaching on community-based cities such as Dublin. Therefore in Ireland, as with the rest of the world, self-defence systems need to change and they need to progress. Hard Target Self-Defence Systems already ahead of the game in this respect. With Aidan Caroll at its helm it promotes a very open-minded approach to combative training. Aidan regularly books the best people he can access to teach workshops and seminars in Dublin, including such luminaries as Tony Somers and Matty Evans. Therefore I was lucky to be chosen to teach my CCMA Process at his club on 29th March 2008.
I teach seminars to people of all ranges of ability and experience. That is the strength of the CCMA Process. However, it is a joy to be able to really push the process forward when you have students who already have a strong self-defence baseline. Normally I have to spend a decent amount of time explaining such elementary concepts like the fence, pre-emption and the importance of pressure-testing everything, but with this seminar I could happily take this as a given and really make some positive progress.
We began with two intuition-based drills. The first was a drill I developed through coaching children. It is a basic Strategy One versus Strategy Two drill. For those unfamiliar with CCMA terminology, Strategy One tactics are those used to create and maintain distance such as pushing, striking, use of the voice and the fence, Strategy Two tactics are used to close the distance using such methods as grappling for positional control. In this exercise the Strategy Two students don head-cages and mill about the Strategy One students, who are restricted to occupying a certain area (such as the mats). At any given moment the Strategy Twos will initiate an attack. They are permitted only to grapple and most hold onto the Strategy Ones for a count of five unless they are caught with three clear strikes. Once the count of five is up those caught must leave the area until only one person is left. The drill is designed to promote intuitive and distinctive unarmed methods that can be used under pressure. Both sides are given a clear objective and a clear role to play. There are many variations that can be used to train different aspects of this procedure. Strategy Ones can begin with their eyes closed or on their hands and knees, incidental weapons can be brought in, times can be reduced and so on.
Another intuition-based drill is the “fast draw” drill I picked up from Stevie B’s Mongrel Close Quarter Combat system. Two head-caged individuals stand within uncomfortable distance of each other (on the “fence” line) and are labelled “A” and “B”. They are monitored by a third person who calls out A and B to strike. The non-striking person tries to block. Both students must begin each attack and defence with hands by their sides. The idea of the drill – other than confirming that action beats reaction most of the time – is to derive individual techniques.
Because CCMA does not list any techniques and promotes self-teaching methods it uses exercises such as these to promote the realistic response someone will have in a real-life situation. Despite countless techniques found in numerous martial arts, there are really only two ways a person will attack: in a straight line or in a curve. The only things that change are the lines of attack and the tool used to administer the attack. Both these exercises found efficiency in the straight line and curved attack for different reasons.
The next stage was to cultivate the techniques that the students had naturally found to be efficient. These techniques or tactics need to be versatile enough to be applied in any situation. One of the best drills we have devised to this is the CCMA transitional drill. Here a student strikes off the fence and then goes through a series of positions, striking all the way, until they get back to their feet and the coach puts the pad down. The positions are standing (with the fence), from the knees, from a seated position and on the back (holding the guard). These drills are done in intense one minute rounds. There is a straight attack and curved attack version.
The drill cultivates natural techniques that can be applied from all positions, it promotes the correct way to get back to your feet and the intensive nature of the drill keeps it as anaerobic as possible – replicating the feeling of stress in a real-life situation. At this point I covered the importance of good coaching. A pad holder is automatically a coach; their job is to get the best out of their training partner. By getting someone to teach the information they are being given they become more committed to what is being asked. Therefore it promotes better self-teaching. I illustrated this point further by showing how we at CCMA, in our attribute training, have developed kickboxing pad drills from sparring and then used them to further improve the sparring. This feedback system is our current area of interest and before our mid-morning break I had the students drill the application of the transitional drill with a partner. This drill began from the ground and the level of resistance went to full contact. At the conclusion of the drill we discussed the critical process of finding the flaws in all exercises. The flaw is the safety measure that makes the exercise safe, but stops it from becoming real.
After a short break I began the next half of the seminar with a white board discussion on the CCMA process in essence. For the very first time I introduced a flow chart method to explain how the process works. For more in-depth details on the “Process” please see the Clubb Chimera Martial Arts articles that deal with this topic on our website www.clubbchimera.com
The second half of the seminar dealt with contingency plans. All the contingency plans begin with a cover. By definition something at your fight management stage has gone wrong, so the cover is an important tactic to use in order to recover and attack. We began with multiples, which really inspire the need to escape rather than fight and then we went onto two-on-one that also covered transitioning from different positions before doing a straight one-on-one response from “code white” i.e. with your eyes closed. All of these drills worked the priority of striking from out of the cover. Next we looked at possible Strategy Two tactics, which are needed when immediately out striking your attacker is not a realistic option. The grappling options follow the simple procedure of covering and attacking highline, midline and lowline areas in order manoeuvre you into a better position to strike and/or escape. Finally we went back to striking or grappling from the cover in ground defence drills, which incorporated kicking from a low position. This was drilled one-on-one, two-on-one and with multiple attackers.
At the summing up stage I reiterated the importance of good coaching and the CCMA process of common sense, principles, strategies and tactics. Then, as a final word, I discussed the subject of the hierarchy of training. At the moment CCMA sees specific training methods to be the area that requires priority time and placement on a student’s schedule. These are those drills, which specifically train an area. Then there is attribute training, which should be fighting drills, which help develop tenacity and attitude. Finally CCMA places importance on functional fitness training, which are exercises designed to develop core strength and stamina specific for self-defence.
In conclusion the whole seminar experience was fantastic. I had the pleasure of coaching some great people with a tremendous amount of potential. Better still, Aidan Caroll’s approach is very similar to mine, which means that his students will continually develop as Hard Target Self Defence Systems continues to progress. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Aidan for his wonderful hospitality and compliment him on training some excellent instructors.
For details on Clubb Chimera Martial Arts classes, seminars, workshops and courses please contact Jamie Clubb on 07973681732 or jamie@clubbchimera.com Check out the official website: www.clubbchimera.com for regular articles, reports and interviews.
For details on Aidan Caroll’s Hard Target Self Defence Systems, Kickboxing or Krav Maga in Ireland call 003531879742566 email: focusfitness@eircom.net website: www.hardtargetselfdefence.com