From: drury@helix.nih.gov (Richard Drury)
Subject: Re: 2 questions.  Please read.
Organization: National Institutes of Health, Bethesda
Date: Thu, 9 Apr 1992 06:27:47 GMT

In article <1299@hydra.bucknell.edu> cammarta@bucknell.edu (aaroncammarata `93) writes:
>
>A couple of quick questions I'd like some opinions on:
>
>1) In the unfortunate event that you're attacked, say on the street
>somewhere, and you're not stretched out, as you would be before and
>during training, how do you deal with it?  Obviously, kicks aren't
>going to be as high, and the danger of a sprain or tear is much
>higher.  How do you cope?  Any special ideas out there?

I have a few ideas off the top.  First, this is exactly how it is
going to happen.  You might be lucky enough to get attacked while
jogging or otherwise warmed up and stretched out, but it doesn't seem
real likely to me.  And then there is the clothing problem.  The stuff
I wear most of the time would severely restrict my ability to deliver
high kicks.  Being cold and tight wouldn't stop me from kicking a high
target in a self defense situation, but clothes that restricted my
range of motion sure would.

So, how to cope?  Kick low is one answer.  Low kicks can be
incredibly effective.  But this is not as simple as it sounds,
especially if your art does not really cover leg kicks in terms of
exactly what targets to kick and how to kick them.  In
tournament TKD for example, leg kicks are illegal, so the
practitioner never really develops a  systematic understanding of what parts of the leg to
kick and which kicks work best on which targets.  I got some supplemental training in this
area and feel it was well worth the time and bruises.

Another answer is to round out your training with hand and grappling
techniques.  If you can't kick, there is nothing to keep your
assailant from blowing right through your kicking range.  That
becomes much less of a problem if you can use your hands effectively
or can take it to the ground and prevail with your superior
groundfighting skills.  I hate to pick on TKD all the time, but I
think it tends to be weak in these areas as well.  Again, the answer
for me was supplemental training.

>2) When sparring, what goes through your head?

Different things at different times.

I spend most of my time looking for weaknesses that can be exploited,
especially physical patterns or habits that make my opponent's
reactions predictable.  Any time my opponent becomes predictable, I
can usually punish him for it. I hesitate to call this "thinking"
since it happens almost on the physical level.  It is as if my entire
body is engaged in this constant calculation of opportunities.

I am also usually working on some flaw(s) of my own.  So, when I'm not
too busy trying to prevail, I tend to think a lot during sparring
about doing a better job of specific things.  The particular things I
work on are often related to the type of opponent I an facing.  For
example, I spar with one guy who has me way beat on reach and weight,
so when I spar with him, I spend a lot of time working out how best
to defeat a reach and weight advantage.  I spar with another guy who
is a master of deceit, so with him I think a lot about how to avoid
falling for his fakes.

Sometimes the only thing going through my head is a stream of
encouragement I feed myself in an attempt to ward off exhaustion or
minimize the emotional impact of having been hit hard.

Sometimes I don't seem to be thinking about anything at all.  
--
Richard A. Drury                                    drury@helix.nih.gov
National Institutes of Health