S.WA.M.P !!!

[** Serge **]

Regardless of application by "combatives" guys, I think SWAMP can be used as a power generation method.

I pretty-much agree, and four out of the five SWAMP principles are right on the money - it's just a shame that the die-hard SWAMP advocates don't seem to be able to actually do these four as claimed!

To my mind, the 'weapon-first' nonsense completely invalidates the SWAMP deal as a whole, and this is the only point I raise really - as it is 'sold' as a combined concept, a whole, that is given a cool-sounding acronym to bind it together, it is wrong - surely if you have to start re-writing it, cherry-picking it, or back-peddling as some attempt, this is proof?

There's often a significant degree of emotional investment in certain practices, or personalities, that can create either an unconscious 'blind-spot' that hides obvious issues - or else someone has a lot of 'other' investment, and consciously chooses to ignore the bleedin' obvious...

With regards impact, everything - every movement - generates power, but I feel that people are too quick to draw a 'that will do' line under it, and not compare it to what could be generated by better means. Is it me, or isn't this 'training' stuff about continually striving for improvements, either within our own attributes and performance, or within the material we utilise? If you reckon that you hit hard hard enough, or shoot straight enough, and 'that will do' as-is, then good for you...congratualations on finding a nice hobby...

I come across this as a 'defence' of my fairly 'steadfast' rebuttals all the time. People will reference some 'name' on an instructional clip and point out that he is using SWAMP, and/or the drop step, or some other flawed dogma, and insist "...there...you see...he hits really hard..." and then go on clinging to the classic 'appeal to authority' approach as the sole 'proof' of their belief.

Point out that this 'hero' isn't hitting weapon-first at all, despite what he might be insisting, and is actually the reason why he has some power, but he's wasting plenty by clipping the target - not 'plunging' as he also claims - with the clue being that if the 'tool' is no longer in contact with the target surface, but still continuing on it's orginal path, you can say 'plunge' until you are blue in the face, but this is a glancing blow...like it or not. Then see the body, feet, head, etc, moving in different directions - for example, moving to your right whilst throwing a right cross...ending up punching yourself away from the target, or dropping into an upward travelling blow...this sort of thing... Any translation in component-movement cannot be exact - not with the way a human body is bolted together - but it shouldn't be significantly converging or diverging, or else the force you generate obstructs itself, or is split - more wastage...

So the 'hard hitting' used to prove SWAMP, etc, actually is hard hitting - it just isn't anywhere near 'hardest' hitting, as it claims to be. Without viable comparison, opinions are hardly objective are they? One thing that I do like to remind people of in such 'debates' is that these video clips are only visual...how the f**k do you know how hard someone is actually impacting a target, to base a realsitic conclusion upon? Does it look hard? This is as reliable as judging taste by sound! It's all-too easy to confuse effort with effect in such matters, and be convinced that something must be effective because of how much effort was expended - especially when hitting bags and BOBs...

As for the drop step, I often got the impression that people were thinking so hard about the step they forgot about the punch.

This is absolutely the case I feel - I've seen some truly absurd demonstrations of the drop step that almost defy belief...from world class experts no less! Every martial art I've ever come across has a version of this particular technique, a lunge that accelerates body mass by a combination of removing the support of one leg, and driving with the other. To understand it, not only identifies when it is a good idea to employ...and it's not all the time, everytime, as some would insist...and how to achieve the desired effect in a fairly subtle fashion, without even moving the feet even.

I'm torn between my absolute favourite 'drop step' demonstration being the 'lift the knee as high as possible to the front, stamp on the floor as hard as possible...wait...then hit the target...' or the 'leave the knee exactly where it is, bring your foot up behind you to your ass, kick the floor as hard as you can...wait...then hit the target...' and the jury is still out - but both are pretty amusing...



Mick Coup - http://www.totalprotectioninteractive.com/forum/showpost.php?p=185794&postcount=7 - 02.05.2012

[** Serge **]

I first heard of SWAMP via Kelly McCann's combatives videos and later attended the Sudden Violence course at Crucible.

The big thing I always keep in mind with World War 2 combatives is the context in which they were designed -- DURING WORLD WAR II:

- Limited amount of time to train (16 hours IIRC).

- Limited to no amount of time to sustain.

- The student is the "average trained person" (draftees possibly).

- Limited to no safety gear.

- Students must be physically able to deploy after completing the training (read -- avoid injuries).

I can see how within the above context, a nation sending hundreds of thousands of people off to war with a limited amount of time to train them that World War 2 combatives may have been the best solution.

However, I don't believe these moves to be some kind of panacea for any situation one is likely to encounter.

Also, and as everyone here knows, if you can't spar it, it's just masturbation -- it feels good but doesn't lead to much.

Stan,

Regarding McCann's use of SWAMP, he's one of the worst culprits in my opinion for 'hard-selling' the notion but failing to execute it as claimed. He seems to hit with some force, but this isn't because of the principles of SWAMP at all...can't be...because contrary to what he says, he doesn't physically use them! This can be plainly seen in many of his DVD offerings - says it...doesn't do it. What's that all about?

He could hit a lot harder in my opinion, and just plain...better... I know he's held in high regard by a great deal of people - beyond critique it would seem almost - and this is probably for a whole host of very valid reasons, but I really feel he should steer well away from giving instruction and expert advice concerning effective 'body mechanics' based on the mess I've seen him make so far...

I agree regarding the WWII stuff in the main - to regard it as being the evolutionary pinnacle of personal combative methods is utterly ludricrous...but a common sentiment it would appear. Imagine applying this thought process elsewhere...medicine perhaps? Fans argue that the human body hasn't evolved, so it's all been done - and to a point this is true - but if this is the case, in athletics and sports, etc, it would appear that progress is still being made with these unevolved bodies?

Along these lines, as a relevant comparison, consider the 'high jump' track and field event, and the evolution of better and better techniques - not to mention the absence of becoming so invested in a method, for whatever reason, that you are unwilling to change...

Typically, high jumpers used either a scissor-jump or just leaped straight-on. Now I'm betting some fairly impressive heights were achieved like this - but was either of these methods adopted as being 'it' and any attempt of progress resisted with cries of "...but the world champion does it like this..." perhaps?

Of course not - this is sports, with measurable results, not martial arts...with great expectations...

Then came the Eastern Cut-Off, the Western Roll, and the Straddle techniques...each yielding better and better results. Athletes wanted the best material to work with, and sought it out - if you couldn't teach them the Straddle jump? Goodbye! No clinging to old news purely out of sentiment, and once Fosbury invented the 'flop' technique...same happened again...

Where are the world class high-jumpers still using the Western Roll method now? In 1936, Cornelius Johnson jumped 6' 8" with it, so I suppose that's what the current high jumpers should be using - look how effective it obviously is, after all? Guys are hitting 8' these days with the Fosbury Flop...I rest my case.

Compare this to the 'combatives' industry - it's a whole different story isn't it?

Guys like Fairbairn, Sykes, Applegate, etc, are placed on impossibly high pedestals in my opinion - lionised and held beyond reproach, critique, question, whatever, and zealously defended from anything but awed reference. For their services to the free world, I have immense respect for them, and what they were involved in - same as for my late Grandfather who was wounded in-action during WWII, and every veteran of that era...but this respect does not extend to believing that any of them were never wrong about anything, or the final word on anything! This isn't respect, it's blind loyalty - spelled...S...T...U...P...I...D...

On the one hand, stories abound of these deadly elderly men, taking on all-comers who were generally younger and fitter, often experienced combat veterans, and defeating them with ease using brutally effective techniques requiring almost no effort.

On the other hand, via old footage you see these same individuals in action looking decidedly...ordinary? I'll go out on a limb to even say uncoordinated and off-balance...harsh critique of these titans of combatives from a mere mortal I appreciate, but this is how it looks to me:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhUdT...92E00B62F7DB8C

Presenting this argument oftens changes a few things. The stories are amended somewhat, and it's usually pointed out that in the clips they were old men... Strange that the 'age' issue was originally used as a boast! Which is it to be I wonder, that they were amazing and could still do the business whilst old men in the stories, or that the reason they look a little 'off' is because they were old men in the clips?

When the age thing rears up, I refer the WWII fans to my friend Steve Morris...who is 68:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nTGNf...feature=relmfu

Generally the reply is that Steve's a phenomenon, so it doesn't count - but apparently the other guys were too...hence the tall tales?

Incidentally, Steve is a phenomenon certainly - and his profile/bio is worth perusing! I don't agree with everything he says, but there is no doubting his encyclopedic knowledge of fighting and the science that surrounds it, not to mention his constant research, and physically I can't imagine what he must have been like in his prime, such is his ability at 68...

As far as the WWII combatives material is concerned, and the manner which it was taught, I feel a few points should be considered...

It's often said that 'combatives' is so simple, whatever is learned in the lesson can be used that day in the parking lot, or words to that effect. I'm fairly certain I've been guilty of issuing this statement myself - to my embarrassment - and it's nonsense in the main. The only way this could be accurate would be if you drilled, and drilled, some singular highest-percentile technique or tactic for the entirety of a session, and then the exact same circumstance presented itself for real later! I could simplify speaking German to 'ein bier bitte' but you'd be lost if you landed in Germany straight afterwards, unless you were in a bar!

I feel a lot of this is leveraged from the amount of time allotted to such training during the wartime special-unit training efforts - I've even heard "combatives is so effective, it can be learnt in only eight hours..." which goes so far as to prove just how ignorant some folk really are about the whole military training 'thing' and what it entails!

Getting only eight hours of training in a subject is no testimony as to how effective the material is at all - it simply proves how low-priority the subject-matter actually is! I'm fairly certain that the various commandos got a lot more than eight hours of instruction covering navigation and communications...

As far as the choice of material - the chin-jabs and edge-of-hand blows, etc, well I'm of the opinion that if anything, such sessions might have been 'interest-periods' more than anything more 'crucial' and that most of the recruits were already versed in boxing and wrestling to a degree, so a few 'dirty tricks' were instead added for special occasions - not for in-fight use at all. This is speculative obviously - but what isn't, however, is taking the 'WWII' material and failing to see a cohesive 'fighting-system' anywhere. Rather a 'collection' of low-percentile techniques, and set-piece sequences - like a bad martial art.

As for the material being 'battle-tested' and 'proven in combat' etc, as far as I know combat statistics tend not to extend towards such specifics, but I would put everything I own on simple punches to the head, penalty kicks to the balls, and bar-room headbutts being far more prominent during any hand-to-hand engagements than any altogether more esoteric 'axe-hand' blows...

This is all a little harsh and disrespectful I suppose - and I wholeheartedly don't wish to level it at those late pioneers of their time at all, since I truly doubt they'd be inclined to cling on to outdated material themselves, just for the sake of nostalgia, like their fan club insists upon doing - these are the ones I'm being harsh and disrespectful to...because they earn and deserve such treatment...

In my opinion, of course...

Mick Coup - http://www.totalprotectioninteractive.com/forum/showpost.php?p=185798&postcount=9 - 02.05.2012