Night
Outdoor Park/ 3rd Party Protection seminar
Friday
19th July 2013
RSC
Park, Stratford-upon-Avon
By
Lance Manley- Practitioner 2
Having attended the Armed Attacker Seminar
last February I was hyped up for attending this one too. Bartosz had promised 3
hours of training in how to protect “loved ones” (or in my case “some girl I
might pull in a bar one night”) from attack in open spaces such as parks or
woodland.
I arrived about 6.30pm and found a lot of
guys already there, chatting near the river while Bartosz waited at the gate to
shepherd people over. It was mainly club members, with one ortwo “civilians”
thrown in, brought as the hypothetical 3rd parties in need of
protection. In all there were about 40 of us.
At around 7pm Bartosz and Russell l got us
warmed up and then we split into pairs for the initial “protection” training.
This consisted of numbering ourselves 1 or 2, then jogging around the lawn.
Bartosz would intermittently bellow “ONE!” or “TWO!” and whoever’s number was
called had to find their significant other, and run to stand as a shield in
front of them.
Then we had the always enjoyable “slap other
people on the head” addition. This meant that while jogging around you could hit
anyone within reach. A couple of the civvies didn’t seem to like this too much
but it broke the ice and meant we were nicely warmed up for the main session.
After some stretching we split into groups of
3 and worked on protecting someone from perceived or actual attack from ne’er
do wells. My partners were a fairly muscley guy and a very small woman. While
she was totally gung ho with regard to getting stuck in, her technique needed a
little work as she was unable to push either me or the other guy out the way.
Eventually she cracked it and we had a lovely time shoving each other around.
The Educational Block is something I’d forgotten about but a quick reminder
session had me coughing and spluttering. It consists of pushing someone away
with the palm of your hand and then pushing your fingers into the soft bit just
above the top of their rib cage. Not nice!
Later on we had some amusing themes to work
with, one of which was shoving your VIP out the way of an oncoming cyclist or
skateboarder careening towards you. Very Indiana Jones.
Then it was “protect the VIP” from actual
attack. We had to take it in turns to be Attacker, VIP or Defender. Punishment
for letting the Attacker actually reach the VIP was 5 push ups. We couldn’t
stop until Bartosz shouted, “Switch!” so a lot of grunting, shoving and headlocks
were on display as people tired each other out on the grass.
An interesting variant on this was the “VIP
Acting Like An Idiot” scenario. In real life, those who are attacked will
usually run or stand still but some get lippy and either try to fight as well,
shout and scream or wander around like a headless chicken. The most difficult
situation was dealing with the oncoming Attacker while simultaneously trying to
keep a protective eye on your VIP who was now strolling round like a loose
cannon.
Stranglehold techniques were gone through,
which aren’t as hard to break as I’d imagined, albeit somewhat complicated with
regard to what arm goes where. Imagine a Chinese puzzle but with human limbs
instead of wood or string.
After a 5 minute break we then moved on to
knife and gun attacks and how to disarm an attacker. Golden rule of training for
pistol disarm is NEVER put your finger in the trigger guard…unless you want it
broken when your partner twists it out of your hand. Funniest thing was that 4
police officers wandered through the park just as Bartosz was demonstrating by pointing
the fake gun at Russell l. Luckily it’s bright yellow (as are 90% of the
training pistols) so they didn’t take cover behind trees and push the panic
alarms on their Airwave radios for an Armed Response unit to attend.
We then had another quick break and got stuck
in to VIP protection against knife, gun or strangling techniques on a pressure
drill. This was hard as you had to walk to the left of your partner and attempt
to disarm or avoid anyone who was “armed” coming at you. As all 40 of us were
in one small area it was very intense but a lot of fun.
As we were getting ready a drunken Chav with
a rather flabby belly wandered up and stood near to me watching what was going
on. His breath reeked of beer and I was starting to get drunk off the passives
when Bartosz asked him, “You OK?” He
smiled and went, “Yeah, just interested
that’s all” which was fine until he picked up a fake knife and swung it
around saying, “So what would you do if I
attacked you with this?” Bartosz snatched the knife off him and shoved him
away growling, “Just go away f!!!” He
mooched away with his tail between his legs looking very embarrassed.
VIDEO FROM THIS CAN BE SEEN HERE :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaQjDXZsPW0
As it got dark we then had the “surprise”
that we’d been promised. Near the river was a bit of pathway with lots of
overhanging trees and dense bushes. Bartosz asked, “Who wants to go first?” and I volunteered. He sent me to stand out
of sight while he got 4 or 5 other guys to hide along the path. When he called
me back he grinned and went , “Right
Lance. Just walk down that path until you come out the other end, OK?”
It was very dark by this point and hard to
see. As I set off I saw Charlie Hale come bursting out of the bush to my left,
I was about to kick him when he shouted, “Alright
mate! You got the time?” I relaxed a little, realising this was the Red
Herring and said, “Sorry mate no. You
gave me a fright jumping out like that!”
Then a female student came at me with a fake
knife. I booted her in the groin and took the knife off her, spinning round to
find someone crouching in the bushes. I was about to give a pre-emptive kick
when I realised it was Bartosz’s girlfriend Iwona, who was taking photos. Two
more lads then came hurtling towards me shouting threats and swearing. I kicked
one of them and pushed the other away, warning them with the fake knife I still
had and yelled, “JUST FUCK OFF OK!!!”
Bartosz said to back away but that I’d done
well and to return to the main group round the other side.
As other guys went through one at a time a
group of four elderly people wandered up to see what we were doing. They all
had baseball caps on with “STREET PASTOR” printed across the front and were
working for the local church, offering spiritual advice to people. To my utter
delight they came up just as a student went through the “tunnel” who
misunderstood Charlie Hale’s role in the scenario. It went a bit like this:
Street Pastor: “So what are you doing here then?”
Me: “We’re
with Krav Maga Midlands, we’re learning about how to protect against attacks in
the dark. The guys over there are…”
Charlie: “Excuse me mate, you got the time?”
Student: “F**K
OFF YOU C**T!!!”
(GRUNTING.
STRUGGLING. SOUNDS OF PUNCHES & KICKS. SOMEONE FALLING DOWN. SWEARING.
etc.)
The Street Pastors looked horrified until I
reassured them that this was just a scenario and Bartosz was walking behind the
student to make sure no one got hurt. It then turned out that one of them was a
guy I work with (hey, it was dark!) and we shook hands and had a laugh. I’ll no
doubt be ribbed remorselessly over this on Monday morning.
Then I had a go as a “bad guy” in the bushes
and Bartosz said, “Just abuse and push
them.”
First guy through was OK, pushing me back and
then facing my neighbour who simply stood in his way being a nuisance. The
third lad through was a big, Indian bloke and when I shouted, “Think you’re f**king hard do you?!! Come on
then!!!” and shoved him, he dropped me with a push kick that sent me on my
arse into the bushes.
The last-but-one bloke is a former kickboxer
and wanted to have a stand up fight with everyone who tried to “mug” him. This
isn’t the principle of Krav Maga but was fun to see as he wouldn’t back down no
matter what was thrown at him.
Finally everyone was done and we gathered
with the “civilians” and Russell . Bartosz decided to give one last piece of
advice and pulled Charlie Hale over and put a fake knife in his hand. He then
said:
“A
lot of you are trying to take the knife when you see it. If it is only being
held, you should do this instead.”
He then slapped Charlie’s knife hand away and
booted him in the crotch. Charlie immediately groaned in pain and fell to his
knees. Turned out he’d already taken his groin guard off. Bartosz was very
apologetic and said, “Sorry I thought you
were still wearing it!” while Charlie staggered to one side to recover.
A brilliant night’s training and I really
hope to do this again soon.
http://www.kravmaga-midlands.com/
