Clubb Chimera

Image via Wikipedia 18.04.11 This was the last lesson before our Easter/May bank holiday break. Hopefully if we can get some more classes running on another day the interruption won’t be too severe. Today we continued work on the clinch and transitioning.  This time we worked on transitions to the clinch and from the clinch to the ground. After some footwork drills moved straight into basic positional drills. We went back over the arm-drag/counter and arm-drag/double leg takedown drill before […]

Image via Wikipedia Having explored a classic opening move, the jab, and a classic finisher, the armbar, it was time to look what can happen in between. We focused on the transition from stand-up to clinch in our MMA session. The class warmed-up with footwork drills and then onto some clinch positional work; this included neck-wrestling and pummelling before moving onto some basic “entry” drills. We looked at the arm-drag and arm-drag counters, and then arm-drag/double leg takedown combinations. Moving […]

10.04.11 Day 2 of “Mo Teague’s Hard Target System”, as taught by me, began with a warm-up through postures. Self Protection training should be time managed. It is my view that hard skills should be taught by maximizing every area possible. So if you are kneeling I would advise a combat base posture to be able to move more efficiently. If you are seated then a disconnected butterfly guard posture is preferable, so that you have all four limbs active. […]

09.04.11 This was my fourth time teaching Mo Teague’s Hard Target System, as a solo venture, for Response Security Training at their full-time centre in London. This time I taught a class that consisted of a mixture of martial arts students, door supervisors and students on the close protection course offered by RST. Backgrounds, ages, experiences and personalities were really across the board, which always makes for an interesting session. Diversity in a group often presents a challenge to an […]

04.04.11 I was amazed how much we squeezed into tonight’s session! We began with a shadow-boxing warm-up, using the jab. The jab provides such a rich area to explore. In self defence I see it as the sensory tentacle of the “fence”. The lead hand that negotiates the situation, determines whether or not the altercation will become physical and, like all good jabs, maintains distance. You can also strike off the jab, although a reasonably high skill level needs to […]

Image via Wikipedia The Witney Boys Brigade invited Clubb Chimera Martial Arts back for a one hour self defence workshop. It was great to see that nearly all the students in attendance were those who were with me last time and encouraging that they retained a lot of the information I taught them back in December. Nevertheless, we revised the soft skills section covering awareness and the effects of fear. This brought us up to the fence and pre-emption. First […]

Image via Wikipedia 30.03.11 I was delighted to be invited to give a brief one hour workshop on self protection methods for Leicester University as part of their “Study School” day. Students from a far a field as Salt Lake City, Utah, attended this inaugural event, which featured an extremely diverse array of subjects all loosely associated with the positive and negative aspects of risk. Despite living in possibly the safest times in recorded history, the developed world seems to […]