With the social media glare, I can assure you that will be in the thinking process. Even we are not immune here, doing a protective detail two weeks ago, we took some rounds on the vehicle. Once back, the first question was not if someone got shot, it was: " did you have to return fire?" “Did any civilian get shot”?
Would it be possible to load sand bag rounds into the under barrel shotgun on an m4? You’ve got a less lethal option ready to go and lethal on the other trigger if the sand bag round didn’t work.
@Basement_Gainz Elegant solution. I know in these parts at least there’s a lot of emphasis on keeping your lethals and less lethals well separated. The thinking is if you inadvertently go lethal when less was called for, it’s a bad day.
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I don’t know, they are not used in my line of work, if we need less lethal, we use a modified M-37 with either the bean bag or widget wood projectile. In the past, I have seen M-4’s or the older M-16’s with a cut down 870 attached, could use them then, the problem is they are heavy and awkward on entries. not very popular with the guys who have to carry them. But, this is old technology and I am not up to speed on less lethal methods. When I have the time, I will research NTOA for current methods.
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Thought for the day: What do you think?
I am going to post a comment below about fighting. Now, the author doesn’t specify what type of fighting, but, it is definitely not with weapons. His opinion is that “absolute strength” is a far greater asset than fighting skill, even thou, in full disclosure, I really don’t know what “absolute strength” is.
From being around the Combat Forum for a number of years, I am going to assume that BJJ is the most practiced art. I know that several of you have started threads about “Strength vs Technique”, so you should have some opinion on which is best: Skill or Strength.
I still follow BagofBro’s standards he set out several years ago on areas of importance to a fighter and their relationship in training: Skill, Conditioning, and Strength.
The author’s opinion:
It can’t be overstated, skill in fighting is incredibly important, but it is not the most important factor.
Anecdotally, I would estimate that for every 20% increase in strength, you would need about 40% more skill to overcome it.
Most folks are fairly weak, eat like shit, and sit on their asses too much.
For you readers out there, I would recommend you familiarize yourselves with the basics of fighting, striking, blocking, and grappling. Once you understand these basics, and learn not to panic when someone’s trying to punch your lights out, you will have received most of the benefit from fight training. You should, of course, try to maintain these skills or improve them, but you should always emphasize absolute strength training. I have never heard anyone say that they would be better off if they weren’t so damn strong.
It can’t hurt to be strong or get stronger but, if strength is so important then Marius Pudinowski (spelling) should be the best mma fighter in the world but he isn’t.
I’m interested in who the quoted author is. I tend to agree with his statement that for every 20% increase in strength a 40% increase in technique is required to overcome it. I think raw strength is more important in the grappling phase of fighting than in the striking phase though. However , there are so many examples of where this isn’t true. My 155lb bjj coach routinely kicks the shit out of me and I outweigh him by 100lbs. However, because I am so much stronger than him, even with his vastly superior skill set and experience, he has to work very hard to so. It sounds like the author is referring more to street fights than to combat sports. I think he is right in stating that after getting down some basics the average person would be better served by focusing on strength. Due to the chaotic nature of most street fights, I think that focusing on advanced techniques that are often only applicable in the specific constraints of the particular combat sport would not have as great a return on investment as focussing on a more basic and widely applicable attribute as strength.
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A big day for the Australian and New Zealand Defence Forces today. We not only give thanks and honour our fallen troops but also to the troops of all those who fought in the wars past and present.
All my respect to the fallen:
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If we are talking about average people getting involved in street fights, I would put “gameness” as the most important attribute. Every fight I was involved in as a bouncer was “won” by the person who was most willing to escalate the violence and do damage quickly, which didn’t necessarily mean hurting anyone too bad. Simply being willing to fight is the first hurdle to clear, and a lot of people just freeze up.
In terms of stopping those fights and getting the people involved off the property, gameness again came in first place (in my humble estimation). Simply stated, if you aren’t mentally prepared to involve yourself in violence, you will do poorly when that time comes. My replacement at that bar got a lesson in that very recently, which cost him a tooth and a good beating. He’s coming to jiu jitsu soon, or so he tells me.
Being strong is also great, don’t get me wrong. If you’re talking HUGE size and strength disparity, it may be the most important.
Skill can definitely overcome strength, but that happens after a lot of training. In a fight between some asshole and an average joe, my money is on the person who is most aggressive and willing to do violence.
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I was thinking about this some more. If we set aside gameness and a persons willingness to scrap, Im coming down on the side of skill. Let’s say we take two twins who have no combat or strength training…
We put one of them on 5/3/1 or whatever for a year with a good lifting coach and a nutritionist for good measure. He eats, lifts and sleeps as well as it can be done for exactly one year, training four times per week.
We take his brother and put him in a solid jiu jitsu school that teaches self defense first, sport second. He also trains 4x per week for a year.
Who wins that fight? The guy who has been training to fight ALL DAY. Do it for two years and my money is still on the bjj brother. Do it for two months and my money is still on the bjj brother.
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What say we give the 5/3/1 brother 2x week of jiujitsu? My money is on him.
If bjj brother gets to spend an equal amount of time training fight skills, I’m still coming down on his side. Especially if we put him in Muay Thai and some wrestling too on top of BJJ.
In this particular thought experiment bjj brother will also be getting stronger, since we are taking people with no training history. He won’t be laying down slabs of new muscle, but he will be getting stronger nonetheless, and he will be getting stronger in planes of movement used in fighting.
You don’t get THAT much stronger in a year of serious lifting.
Agreed. Thing is how I read the premise a better scenario would be one brother does bjj/mma 6× a week and the other does it 2× a week and lifts. Bjj bro is going to have a more refined skill set, be more smooth and technical and have a bigger bag of tricks. Bjj + lifting bro will have a basic grasp of base, posture, frame, pressure and some simple, high percentage attacks, subs and escapes and will be significantly stronger. If we eliminate the rule set and allow slams on a hard surface, strikes etc, I think the stronger person’s chances go up faster at sub elite levels, if he at least has a clue what he’s doing. I pretty much suck at bjj, but I grasp the basics. I regularly hang with and sometimes beat people who are way better than me by being stronger, especially in terms of grip, frame, base and ‘postural strength’ (if that’s a thing). In a real fight I like my chances against most people in our club, but that has as much to do with raw aggression and the fact that I’ve been in some actual scraps.
I’m in the same basic boat. Strength matters… a LOT. It just takes so long to develop. I spent four years doing nothing but strength training and began bjj with a tremendous advantage in size and strength over everyone I train with. If I only did that for one year I don’t think it would have mattered so much. I would have just been a bit stronger instead of having a disparity similar to a normal adult handling a young teenager.
Back to real fighting, it is chaotic and unpredictable and there’s sure as hell no guarantees. A big strong motherfucker with aggression and readiness to take damage can definitely cause problems. For sure 5/3/1 bro has a chance, even a good one, especially if he gets just a little bit of the basics down.
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I agree with a lot of what you say here. If we are talking about a “real” fight ie. no rules than I think a lot of the more advanced techniques that are learned in most fighting arts / sports quickly lose their applicability. Using the example of the bjj bros, I would put much more stock in someone’s chances who can pick up and slam the other one on the pavement than I would on the one who can perfectly execute a berimbolo. In my limited understanding of reality based martial arts, I believe that most of the focus is on quick, large motor movements that don’t depend on complicated set-ups and stringing multiple techniques together. Every one of the fights that I’ve witnessed or been a part of, even the ones that have included people with varying degrees of martial arts training are pretty damn sloppy. If one individual isn’t immediately incapacitated by the opening punch, it quickly degenerates into a grappling scramble where both guys intuitive focus is on achieving a “top” position to either restrain or rain blows down on the other guy. I think that the main benefit in real world applicability of combat sports / martial arts is that if you’ve had a lot of live sparring training, you are less likely to panic when it hits the fan for real. You get desensitized to being attacked and you are better able to maintain composure and make good quick decisions.
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I agree on that, but berimbolos won’t be on the white belt curriculum of any BJJ school that’s teaching self-defense first. You’re going to be learning a lot of stuff from the clinch, side clinch, bodylock defense, simple takedowns, arm-drags, punch-blocking from all positions, footwork, breakfalls, nothing that’s throw-away in a real fight, like a berimbolo or worm guard or donkey guard.
My instructor’s instructor’s entire teaching philosophy revolves around getting new students ready for violence as fast as possible. He’s literally weeded everything out of his white belt curriculum that isn’t a high-percentage technique that can be done under stress in a real fight situation. He operates under the assumption that most of his students will quit within a few months and he wants them to be as ready as they can be under that time.
Not all BJJ schools are the same. I once hijacked @Benanything 's log to talk about the differences in training focus that can take place from one BJJ school to the next. There can be big difference in sport vs self-defense. Real big. My hypothetical BJJ bro is not learning Berimbolos until he’s at least a blue belt.
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Well right now I’m considering moving to Maine simply to attend your school. It sounds amazing. All the schools around me are purely sport focused. I would much prefer to learn that type of bjj than a lot of what I’m getting. If that’s the type of training your hypothetical bjj bro is getting I’d throw my vote in with him.
If I could train there, I would. It’s an hour away and I just can’t fit that in. My regular school falls in between, but leans toward sport. I’m lucky enough to train two or three times per week with a four-stripe brown belt from the self-defense school at his home in my town. The dude is a wizard (and also an international Master’s weightlifting champion).
Love this.
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