Combatives & The Combative Mindset

Those of you who have trained with Dave Ashworth, this time, or previously will have heard and/or me talk about and use the term “Combatives”, and I thought it would be worth writing a Blog post on exactly what “Combatives” is/are, and how the term relates to Krav Maga in general, and Krav Maga Yashir specifically.

The traditional martial arts approach to fighting and self-defense, is one that takes a long term approach to building the necessary skills and abilities needed to become a competent fighter – in many arts the techniques and the system is not really tested as to whether it adheres to reality or not e.g. many sparring styles such as sport Karate and Olympic Taekwondo have rules which are designed to promote competition and demonstrate certain abilities rather than to replicate a street fight; this is not to say that there aren’t individual practitioners who are able to take the skills they’ve learnt and apply them to real life situations, but rather that the system itself doesn’t work to promote such an end . Combatives systems on the other hand are based solely on real-life situations and look to train an individual in a very short period of time in how to successfully survive a violent confrontation.

To do this the development of physical skills takes second place to the development of a combat mindset. In fact techniques are often used as a means of developing the ability to act violently and single mindedly when a person is attacked and has to defend themselves. The accuracy and form of a specific technique is less important than the effort and degree of commitment that is used when executing it e.g. a sloppy technique delivered with maximum intent is looked on as being more effective than the perfect technique thrown with sub-maximal focus, effort, intent and concentration. To this end combatives techniques tend to be very simple and rely on large body movements that can be driven and powered emotionally rather than by any conscious thought process. Doing is everything.

If you’ve ever witnessed a street fight where one or both parties rail in on each other, “wind-milling” and swinging repetitive wild punches at each other, with full aggression, commitment and utter abandon you will get an idea of what the combative mindset entails. Whereas many martial arts may attempt to promote “calmness” under pressure, combatives training sees the practitioner adopt many mental characteristics of the successful untrained individual. The combatives mindset is in this regard a very natural mindset to adopt – it’s what we are naturally equipped with for dealing with violence and something that doesn’t require much training to enhance e.g. it is easier to cope with violence, by becoming violent than it is to adopt a calm and neutral state of mind. Staying calm in the face of extreme danger is not a natural skill for most people.

Where combatives training steps in, is that it attempts to focus this mindset and apply it to the execution of easily performed body movements – in a repetitive fashion. Any technique that is difficult to perform when under duress is dropped, any technique that comes naturally is adopted etc. The Krav Maga Yashir system, uses proven martial arts training methods to help develop the necessary skills for close combat, but recognizes that in real-life conflicts it is a combative mindset coupled with simple techniques that will ensure survival. Many other Non-Israeli Krav Maga systems simply concentrate on the fitness aspects of combat to help develop this mindset.

Tomorrow, Dave Ashworth, with teach and demonstrate proven combatives – along with the mindset – that has seen him survive and be successful in a large number of high risk and dangerous situations. Dave continues to work in some of the hostile environments on this planet, and importantly with little time of in between operations. If you have time to attend one or both of tomorrow’s seminars with him, take the time to do so.