Krav Maga

[Jacob(smooth)]

Never done km, however I do have experience of goju karate, San shou, tkd and kyushinkai jiu jitsu.

My advice is to forget about Street combat situations Unless you are a professional doorman, (in which case KM is a terrible idea). If you want to learn to fight, I'd suggest something were you get punched in the face a lot. It's amazing how your careful drills dissappear in that situation. However, you're vastly more likely to be injured learning a martial art than on the street! If you want to learn something to keep you safe, psychology is a better bet. If you want to train for fun, shop around until you find an art which suits you.

Yeah, KM would be a poor fit for a doorman/bouncer (but a godsend for the customer's lawyer).

My background is Kenpo with a smattering of Wing Chun and Ninjutsu. I'm not interested in martial arts as sport; I want to train street-effective techniques. KM seems like it might be a good supplement to what I've studied in the past.

Your point about psychology is well taken and should be everyone's first line of defense, always. However, I live in a fairly dicey part of town, where muggings and random attacks are not unknown. I'd rather have the tools in place in the event they are needed.

Your other point about training in situations in which one gets punched in the face a lot is also excellent. However, I'm a bit long in the tooth to start training boxing seriously. Perhaps I can find a local gym where they wouldn't mind beating up on Grandpa once in a while.

Well, from personal experience I'd heartily recommend jiu jitsu for that. One of my sensais is a police officer and has a history of door work before he joined the force. He's an amiable fellow of middle years and expanding girth who speaks at length about how the techniques he's using are the opposite of fighting because he's far to old brittle and nice to want to put someone's eye out or crush their windpipe. Besides, as he said, if you get into a fistfight with someone it always ends badly for both people one way or another. However all the techniques are simple, flexible and applicable. It really is, to quote Bruce Lee, the art of fideing without fideing

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I spar with the best opponent I can find.
Sometimes I train with all kinds of items like knifes etc. The goal should be to be able to kill anyone with anything, anytime, anywhere.
But usually I don't use any equipment to make it more challenging. I often go up bare handed against knives, swords and guns.

Hmm. That doesn't seem a very good goal for a self defense scenario. Where you're up against a pissed up accountant who swings at you cos you spilled his drink, rather than a hezbollah insurgent I mean.

Going bare handed against guns sounds handy, however I'm not sure how relevant the training against swords might be. Did the idf cover that as part of your basic training on do only the SF do defence against swords? Did they spend a lot of time on that?

[tor]

Hmm. That doesn't seem a very good goal for a self defense scenario. Where you're up against a pissed up accountant who swings at you cos you spilled his drink, rather than a hezbollah insurgent I mean.

Going bare handed against guns sounds handy, however I'm not sure how relevant the training against swords might be. Did the idf cover that as part of your basic training on do only the SF do defence against swords? Did they spend a lot of time on that?

The training is against opponents with all kinds of items raging from knives to swords and broken bottles, guns or whatever.
But as I said in real combat the hand to hand is never used. The fighting ensues only when you have no bullets left to use. And the one who has no bullets left is either dead or surrender.

As for pissed off accountant I simply tell him to calm down and he will sense my domination and shut up. I don't have to fight.

[sven]

I've been interested in studying Krav Maga ever since I first heard of it. Now I discover that a studio has opened in my neighborhood (a five minute walk from my place)!

Has anyone here had experience with Krav Maga? If so, did you enjoy the training? What is your assessment of its effectiveness in street combat situations? Please share.

I've trained Krav Maga. Depending on the studio, it can be very challenging and can build a lot of conditioning.
Krav Maga is probably one of the few martial 'arts' that really work. (Fighting system would be a better word in this case) Its very aggressive, and you learn a lot of useful stuff like how to deal with opponents with knives, etc. Things that really are effective.
In comparison to Krav Maga, old school martial arts like Karate are almost a joke. I fought a guy once who was supposedly very good at karate, and he tried his moves on me. It was more or less completely ineffective. I'm not going to say I 'won' the fight (nobody ever does, really) but I'm not the one to had to have stitches in the back of my head.
I would say that MMA training is even better, though.
But please -- remember that getting the hell out of there is always the best option if you find yourself in a sticky situation. I know I would!

[Jacob(smooth)]

In comparison to Krav Maga, old school martial arts like Karate are almost a joke. I fought a guy once who was supposedly very good at karate, and he tried his moves on me. It was more or less completely ineffective. I'm not going to say I 'won' the fight (nobody ever does, really) but I'm not the one to had to have stitches in the back of my head.

Horses for courses. Karate is essentially a sport, whereas things like KM are designed for pragmatic use. Bit like comparing an off road vehicle with a city car. Both do well in their own area. I wouldn't describe Karate as a joke, its just a different type of system. Depends what you're after.

Likewise MMA. Not really better, just different.

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As for pissed off accountant I simply tell him to calm down and he will sense my domination and shut up.

Wow. And you said that describing techniques has no value. This is self defence gold! You should totally write a book.

[tor]

The "calm down" domination technique is not part of krav maga though
It's just the way I was since the day I was born. One of thousands of reasons why I was accepted in special ops.
But people rarely fight people who are not afraid of them. So I never had to fight anyone.

[KUSA]

My advice is to forget about Street combat situations

This doesn't make any sense. Unless someone is only interested in sports the combat style training is the best route to take.

[sven]

In comparison to Krav Maga, old school martial arts like Karate are almost a joke. I fought a guy once who was supposedly very good at karate, and he tried his moves on me. It was more or less completely ineffective. I'm not going to say I 'won' the fight (nobody ever does, really) but I'm not the one to had to have stitches in the back of my head.

Horses for courses. Karate is essentially a sport, whereas things like KM are designed for pragmatic use. Bit like comparing an off road vehicle with a city car. Both do well in their own area. I wouldn't describe Karate as a joke, its just a different type of system. Depends what you're after.

Likewise MMA. Not really better, just different.

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As for pissed off accountant I simply tell him to calm down and he will sense my domination and shut up.

Wow. And you said that describing techniques has no value. This is self defence gold! You should totally write a book.

I should perhaps have said I meant for 'real fights' and not competition fighting. That's what the OP was talking about.
If I was to go up against a good Karate fighter with my non-existent karate skills in a karate match with karate rules, I would get my ass kicked, obviously.

But if you watch some MMA you quickly see that using just karate in the cage would end your career before it even started. There is in fact only one world class MMA fighter that I know of who calls himself a karate fighter: Lyoto Machida. But he happens to be very good at BJJ as well.

[Jacob(smooth)]

My advice is to forget about Street combat situations

This doesn't make any sense. Unless someone is only interested in sports the combat style training is the best route to take.

The problem is that martial arts training of any flavour tends to give people confidence which makes them more likely to actually get into a fight. Hence I'm very skeptical about learning any method for Street combat, lest it contribute to the situation.

For me, a pragmatic combat art should be trained in plain clothes, without warm up, in a bar or on a street, and after the participants have had a few beers. That's the reality of street combat. What I don't like to see is people training something like krav maga and going out thinking they can handle themselves better than the 23 year old chap with no teeth who's been getting in bar fights since he was 16. He will know how to handle an adrenalin dump, tunnel vision, situational awareness etc. We generally don't.

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The "calm down" domination technique is not part of krav maga though
It's just the way I was since the day I was born. One of thousands of reasons why I was accepted in special ops.
But people rarely fight people who are not afraid of them. So I never had to fight anyone.

Yes, I think I can tell that.

Wow. Born able to face down drunken louts and able to make perfect arguments. I bet the idf just snapped you up. I didn't even realise you were Jewish Btw!

You should consider a career as a doorman. Your domination technique sounds a very saleable skill!

[My imaginary friend is GOD]

You don't have to join military. There are krav maga clubs all over the world. I simply said that in israel special ops it's a part of the training which is a must.

NONE of them are close to ME though!

I might have to DECIDE to suddenly live on the OPPOSITE side of the country in order to train in Krava Maga... SIGH...

[tor]

You don't have to join military. There are krav maga clubs all over the world. I simply said that in israel special ops it's a part of the training which is a must.

NONE of them are close to ME though!

I might have to DECIDE to suddenly live on the OPPOSITE side of the country in order to train in Krava Maga... SIGH...

You can invent your own fighting style. Bruce Lee did that.