Archive for How-to guide
How to avoid shoulder injuries in the martial arts.
Posted by: | CommentsShoulder injuries are one of the most common injuries in martial arts, regardless if you practice MMA or traditional arts. If you’ve been training for a while, chances are high you’ve faced them before. Unfortuntely, so have I. Case in point:
One of the wrestling drills I do in my Sanshou class is “King of the hill”. The concept is very simple and many teachers use it:
- Two students face off and try to throw, sweep or trip each other.
- The first one to fall (or the one at the bottom if both fall) leaves the mat and is replaced by the next student.
- The goal is to stay on the mat as long as possible, fighting fresh opponents every single time.
We do this drill regularly at the end of class as it’s always fun and it really wipes you out if you manage to become “king”. Even if you don’t, it’s good training as you get enough rest to really go at it when it’s your turn again. So everybody gets something out of it.
No, not that one...
Last week, we did the drill again, everything went fine and we had a blast. I went home after class, watched some TV to wind down and when I got up, my shoulder ached. I figured, no big deal, been there before. But the next morning, I ached a lot more and I’d lost some mobility and gained some pain whenever I lifted my arm. At that point I went “Damn, again..” and started assessing the damage before beginning on a rehab program. My shoulder’s better now but I’m keeping up the exercises to make sure there’s no lasting damage and I can train at 100% again as soon as possible.
What causes shoulder injuries?
The list of potential causes is long but here are the usual suspects: Read More→
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Bus beat down, part 2
Posted by: | CommentsHere’s the next part of the bus beat down:
Me? I’d have left before having to throw the first punch. If I couldn’t de-escalate the situation, I’d have been gone ASAP. Not stay there ranting and give the guy the chance to either come at me again or get some back up.
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Share this Post[?] THE BRUTAL ART OF RIPPING, POKING, AND PRESSING VITAL TARGETS: THE VIDEO
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Loren W. Christensen has a new video out called “The Brutal Art of Ripping, Poking, and Pressing Vital Targets” and it looks like another good one. You can get it here.
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Share this Post[?] How to learn techniques from video, Part 3
Posted by: | CommentsOne of the most common misconceptions of our day is the assumption that the camera tells the truth. We see so much television and movies that we become conditioned to believe what we see is all there is to it. Because “seeing is believing”, right?
Nothing could be further from the truth.
What you see in a video is never 100% what the instructor/demonstrator/performer/participant meant to show. Sometimes, he makes it so on purpose but in most cases, this happens because of the limitations of video as an information carrying medium. I’ll use my video, the one that started this whole series, as an example
Camera angle/depth perception.
A good camera man makes or breaks what you put on the screen. There are a multitude of camera angles and all of them have a different effect on how you perceive the action:
- Imagine we placed the camera behind my back. How well would you have been able to see the techniques?
- Imagine we only used an overhead camera. It’d be great to see the angle my arms move in but hard to know at what height they’re moving.
Depth perception helps you interpret the action you see:
- How far is my fist from the pad when I start each punch?
- What distance does it travel before it lands?
Here’s the thing: Read More→
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Share this Post[?] How to learn techniques from video, Part 2
Posted by: | CommentsIn part one of “How to learn techniques from video“, I mentioned there are different kinds of videos. Let’s look at that a bit closer.
You can make three broad categories of videos: Live footage, demonstration, and instructional videos. These three are all vastly different from each other and that’s where the trouble starts: if you expect one and get the other, you think it sucks. If you believe instructional videos are “The Truth”™, then you’ll think demonstrations are bullshit. If you truly believe the best way to fight is what you see in live footage (because it’s “real” and the everything else isn’t), then you’ll laugh at instructional videos .
I believe these two sayings apply whenever you want to learn from a video:
- Don’t compare apples with oranges. Know what you’re looking at and judge it as such.
- Don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater.Instead of focusing on what you perceive is bad, look at what is good, interesting and potentially useful for you.
Especially this last part is crucial. I’ve been reviewing books and videos for a long time and I have only one goal when I write them: Find the value in the book and who would benefit from it. Maybe the book didn’t do much for me, but that doesn’t make it useless. I always try to write something positive in a review and only rarely fail to find it. It’s a matter of picking the good between the bad and mediocre that may also be there.
Throw out the one, not the other.
It’s the same thing with watching a video: If you want to learn from it, whatever that “it” may be, start looking for the positive. If you only want to validate and reinforce your own ideas, that’s fine. But then don’t complain you can’t find any decent videos because you find them all crap.
Back on track, let’s talk about those three categories:
Read More→
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