March 2016 Practitioner Grading, Stratford upon Avon

March 5th  2016

Stratford upon Avon High School

by Lance Manley

Still unable to retest for the much dreamed about P5 patch due to knee injury, I was determined to go along and cheer on the guys from my club and also eavesdrop the feedback from examiners to the P4 and P5 candidates.

Stratford upon Avon hosted its first national grading (courtesy of arrangements made between Krav Maga Global UK and my own club Krav Maga Midlands) last October. This proved a godsend for those of us in the middle bit of England. Before then a commute to Bristol or London was in order. Also, due to the event being hosted by KMM, there would be a P1 test, something the other national gradings didn't feature as all Practitioner level 1 exams are now held "in house" at the individual clubs throughout the country.

I got there about 11.30am and a lot of guys were already in the corridor outside the sports hall, waiting for our allotted time. Faces were looking nervous to say the least I spoke to Andy Wilkinson who was up for P3.

"Feeling nervous, ready but nervous. Graded in October and been in KMM for 2 years this June. If I'm not ready now I'm not going to be ready".

Expert level 1 examiner David Slade from Krav Maga Elite said:

"We've got a lot of people here. About four hours, three people examining so everyone's going to get a fair crack of the whip. They'll be a lot of attention, lot of focus, especially on the 2s and 3s".

Another examiner Alan Dennis, also Expert 1 from Elite Midlands said "P2s always a tricky one I find because they've done P1, the nerves have gone. There's a lot of new stuff on P2. You've got the add ons from P1. Overall, I'm expecting a good one."

As the practitoners made their way into the hall I got a quick word with P1 candidate Gulshen Bano who I'd chatted to at the knife defence seminar last month.

"Feeling OK not too bad, now or never. Done lots of training. Should be good".

Everyone got into it with a brief pep talk from KMG UK director Jon Bullock plus Alan and David. Jon stressed the importance of keeping safety at the forefront of your mind and that your safety plus your partner's was the most crucial thing.

The groups then split off into respective areas of floor with the P1s being overseen by Russell Brotherston who I work with at kiddy krav club JSKM on Mondays and Wednesdays. There was only ONE P5 candidate, Michaela Del Buono from Total Krav Maga who I had seen take P4 in the same venue last October.

KMM has 4 instructors, the most recent addition to the team being Tomasz Galuba. It was rare to see all four in a room together and inspiring that Bartosz, Al and Tomasz who weren't examining, had come out to see their students grade and cheer them on.

P1 finished first, shortly followed by the P2 group. 3 to 5 however were still going hard at it, proving my belief that these grades are "The Big Kids Club" and the perseverance required goes way beyond what's expected in the first two grades.

Once the techniques were done and dusted the gloves and shin guards (not to mention gum shields) were locked in place and everyone went at it in their respective levels. Michaela Del Buono had worked with the P4s for most of her grading and now was sparring with them. I know from my own sparrings at levels 3 to 5 that this is a gruelling and ultimately exhausting experience. You have to "suck it up" and carry on as you are being judged not only on fighting ability but more on your resilience in the face of a soaking wet T-shirt and a face like an overripe tomato.

Everyone gave it 100% and when time was finally called the groups split off to face either Jon or David for feedback. I listened in to the P4 and 5 chats from David and was pleased to see everyone had passed from KMM.

As people were glugging Lucozade or protein bars I got a few words from the candidates.

Andrew Wilkinson hadn't passed P3 but was optimistic and took the news with the determination to come back and try again.

"I didn't feel on my game. It was a couple of basic disciplines I failed on. However like the phoenix I shall rise again to fight another day".

Gulshen had passed P1 and told me:

"Absolutely brilliant, so pleased chuffed to bits. Today's been exhausting but so much fun at the same time. Won't stop grinning for the rest of the day."

Goz Goswell from KMM Solihull had passed P4:

"I feel shattered, challenged but really enjoyed it. Did my best, that's all I can do".

Great day, even as just an observer and now I'm going to head down to Bristol to watch it all over again.

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Lance Manley is a member of Krav Maga Midlands and author of the book

WALK IN PIECES: DIARY OF A KRAV MAGA PRACTITIONER

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The Grate Outdoors

At KMM tonight we got shunted off to a much smaller room which can best be described as a shuttlecraft to a ship. The school we train at had double booked us and Chief Instructor Bartosz decided to make the most of the situation.

We'd used the smaller room before and the confined space is a mixed blessing. We lack the lovely spaciousness of the usual badminton court but the claustrophobic surroundings are great for some close quarter work and how to deal with limited range of movement.

The warm up consisted of the usual heavy stretching with some "moving between everyone else" stuff. We had to aim for heads and crotches with palm strikes while simultaneously trying to prevent anyone landing a slap on us. There were a couple of loud "clonks" as someone caught a wallop on the groin guard. Bartosz was heard to remark at one point "I love that sound!" which raised a laugh.

After a warm up we moved to hammer blows on focus mitts. One thing I've noticed with this kind of striking is that you need to keep your fists clenched tight. A few times I yelped as my wrist buckled and pain shot up my arm. Once we got that sorted we put the moves into combinations and then headed outside.

The area at the back of that classroom is semi-enclosed, with a metal fence on one side and a brick wall and windows on the other. The tarmac road surface slopes up to an access area. Ideal for some improv. We got into pairs and went through close quarter strangle holds, i.e. when your attacker is right in your face with little or zero room to manoeuvre. I got partnered with a much bigger lad named Dan who is a lot stronger than I am. A couple of times I was expecting him to use the wall to grate my face off. We drilled this and other movements, working in a "skipping kick" when being attacked from the side and then we had the final bit of fun.

Bartosz split us into two groups with guys dotted along the path leading up beside the classrooms and around the driveway. Some had plastic training knives, others strike shields and the rest their bare hands. We moved through one at a time and had to "simply get from one end to the other....twice." Getting shoved against a brick wall by a 17 stone, 6 feet 4 inch guy holding a strike shield can be tiring. I got my elbow cut on the second attempt and one of the attackers looked slightly narked when he grabbed my arm and drew his hand back to find his fingers had my blood on them. In the middle was a lad with a knife who'd scream for money and up the top a couple who worked together with a strike shield and a knife, making it hard to get past them. I love this kind of pressure drill as there's no time to think and you have to react on instinct. After everyone had had at least two goes each, we finally wrapped things up.

Forming the line for the final kida, it was clear that someone had really got into the spirit of the thing, as one lad had a muddy footprint on his chest where he'd been booted away while trying to attack.

Great fun and educational and it's always enjoyable to do Krav outside when the nice weather kicks in.

Looking forward to Thursday's class.

Egone

By Lance Manley, P4

Krav Maga Midlands

I am currently reading a very informative book entitled The Little Black Book of Violence by Lawrence Kane and Kris Wilder. It has the subtitle "What Every Young Man Needs to Know About Fighting."

This book was lent to me by a fellow practitioner at Krav Maga Midlands.

While perusing it last night, something struck a chord that is fundamental to the principles of Krav, but is sometimes oh so very easy to overlook in favour of the "sexy" bits of what we do.

A preface by Rory Miller (a police sergeant in the US when the book was published) states that he believe most people reading the book will simply cherry pick the parts they like. He goes on to say, "I don't think you can see past your own ego. I think that you will risk your own life and piss away good information to protect your daydreams."

Something that has occurred to me a lot lately is how violence is best stopped by anything other than violence.

I used to be a UK police officer and the experience was soul destroying in its stupidity, lack of basic common sense and political correctness over officer safety. We weren't trained to fight, only to subdue through holding and baton strikes absolutely COULD NOT be aimed at the head, regardless of what the Bad Guy might be coming at you with at the time. We spent 6 weeks on Race & Diversity training, but a measly 4 hours on use of baton and 1 hour on how to fire pepper spray (the only weapons 95% of UK cops carry on patrol).

Krav Maga to me is what the English police should be about. It teaches you to avoid conflict. That "F**K OFF! STAY AWAY!" shouted at the top of your lungs is the best method to try first, if you have the distance and time. Krav talks about avoidance, de-escalation and getting the hell out of there if it can be achieved. It says violence is a secondary alternative that is played only when less confrontational options won't work.

But as we know, Krav also teaches us to be as brutal as possible, as quickly as possible with the minimum of effort and THEN get the hell out of there.

It's how the English police should be. Common sense and a lack of ego but able to be baddasses if the occasion demands it.

Problem is for me that it's very easy to get enticed by the funky side of Krav. We've all seen sparring sessions at our clubs where two good fighters go hammer and tongs on each other with grace and power. I personally imagine being whoever is the victor.

Then there's the everyday interactions we see where we wonder exactly what we would have done had someone called us a "c**t" in traffic or pushed in front of us in a queue. I personally imagine them being humiliated, maybe even working in an Educational Block like Krav Vader, to make certain they keep their distance.

Problem is that my daydreams quite often cloud my judgment.

I don't like sparring cold bloodedly, although I'm not bad at it when I actually have a go. I can assess threat reasonably well and I'm not a coward. But all my badass fantasies, as I move further into Krav Maga and up the grades (currently P4). I got a busted finger 6 weeks ago in training for trying to block a stomp kick with my fingertips (I was tired, error in judgment...that I'm still paying for). Having seen movies where people simply pop dislocated joints back into place I never envisaged in a thousand years, having to be on restricted duties at work for 9 weeks, repeated visits to the fracture clinic and a special splint being made at Warwick hospital.

The least useful appendage on my entire body has affected my ability to train and means my cardio is so out of practice that I get out of breath running up the stairs.

Ego can be a killer. I've had it for most of my life and always imagined it to be a friend, mistaking it for confidence. Ego isn't confidence. Confidence is feeling that you are able to deal with what is in front of you. Ego is feeling that you can not only do it but do it perfectly and then have loads of women want to shag you because you're such an awesome badass.

It has taken 30 minutes of Yoga a day for over 2 months before I've become supple enough to kick higher than the belly button level of an opponent. My lack of flexibility was something I worked around until I became a teaching assistant at a Kiddy Krav class, and was having rings run round me by 6 year old girls (not to mention wincing as my back strained every time I bent down to pick something up during the class). I now have flexibility again, like I did in my 20s. But it's through adherence to a regime of stretching instructed by someone who knows more than me on the subject.

I see rude or threatening people in public a lot and 10 years ago I'd have jumped in to tell them to leave Mrs A or Mr B alone and be on their way. On some weird level I used to take all obnoxious behaviour as being somehow directed at me, if I was around when it happened. I think my logic was, "You know I'm here and are still doing this in front of me. Therefore you must think I'm a pansy who won't try and stop you."

Krav (plus a few other things) has helped me to mould and tailor my ego so I no longer feel that I'm a superhero. When I'm drunk, all bets are off, but over this past year particularly I've got involved in things that have made me realise my own limitations and not to be ashamed of them but work with them.

Nick Maison and Jose Silva's Air Safety seminar was a sobering experience and as close to a hijack on a plane as I ever want to get. Forget being a hero, you are lucky if you can even see straight as the "terrorists" shove you around, order you not to look at them and do their best to disorientate you. Nick even said before we started, "If any of you feel like taking on any of the hijackers then feel free...but we WILL give you a kicking and then throw you off the plane"

Having met both Eyal Yanilov and Zeev Cohen they are both softly spoken and humble men who appear without ego BUT are badasses. After the second day of P Weekend in December I was in reception at Harlow Leisure Zone when they both left for the evening. They did not stand out at all, did not swagger and would have blended into any crowd.

Ego can be dangerous. It ties me into adolescent fantasies about vanquishing the evil hordes and being the bully hunter I always wanted to be. It's only be accepting the drab reality of my own limitations that I can now build upon that and walk through life in a way that means I will assess situations logically and with my mind, not my ego.

Egone.