I received an interesting email from a reader of the blog who is also a Kurgan TV member, in it he mentioned how he felt his hand-to-hand skills were probably his weakest link.
It is a sad fact of life (or maybe a divinely good one, it’s hard to tell while we are still roaming the Earth) that as you become older wiser your body begins to tell you that you no longer need to do all that physical stuff quite as energetically. It can tell you this in a number of ways, including failing you in ways that take long to heal.
At some point, I would not want to get into a fight with a half-dozen twenty-somethings with my bare hands.
I did once hold off about 25 “youths” ranging in age from I’d say 12 or 13 to 23 or so. This was in December 2015 so I was 45 already, but I had managed to get myself in a doorway, meaning they could only come at me at most 2-3 at the time and none actually stepped forward. If they had it would have been reminiscent of that scene from a Bruce Lee film. There were no camera in that particular spot of London and as some had bottles in their hands and such, it was likely some might have had knives too. If they had stepped forward I would not have held back with any strike at all and I would not have been concerned about consequences afterwards, as 25 people, even if untrained and pack-like can definitely kill you if you give them any leeway, but inside a gateway that was flanked by solid face-brick columns, I really was not worried. They clearly were as they repeatedly taunted me to try and get me to step out of the doorway, and I taunted them back about being weak little bitches who couldn’t take me even though they were a couple of dozens of them. One threw a bottle at me, which I caught and threw back, narrowly missing his head, but none of them ever stepped forward so after a while I just went through the gate and closed it behind me and went home.
The mentality switches too though, even as your body changes, and as I get older, I think while on one side I’m not as prone to the impatience, and quick temper of youth, and will generally try to avoid issues before they even become issues, if I were forced into a situation now, I would be far less forgiving in my approach. I would be far more concerned with ending the threat as fast and absolutely as possible than whether the other guy would be able to walk or chew solid food again or how badly they might fall flat on the floor and never get up again.
I learnt from 4 decades of martial arts that if I am injured or somehow limited, or scared for others near me, paradoxically, I become far more dangerous than if I am fighting fit and not worried about the confrontation. And an older guy is a bit like a wounded animal. He just wants to be left alone and if you attack him, well, he’s not going to play nice. At all.
If you are only starting martial arts in your fifth decade, you need to approach it a bit differently. Train slower and do a lot more repetitions (ie the “boring” training that the young guys don”t like, but that is really how you develop a skill) and make sure your movements are correct and as perfect as you can get them while you do them at super slow speed in a controlled environment and progress to faster and harder only gradually and always keeping excellent form. A fitness regime to complement your training is also advisable and you need to figure that out yourself on the basis of where you are and what you wish to achieve.
Nothing is impossible, there are 90 year olds doing 20 pull-ups a day, and there are 30 year olds that are obese and will almost croak of heart seizure if they have to run 30 metres.
All that said, my dad, when he was in his 60s stopped an armed robbery. He did karate from a young age and was renowned enough in Italy that when I took a taxi to see his old Sensei in Italy, the taxi driver, knew who my father was by reputation alone. And he’d been away from Italy for over 20 years already. However, when faced with multiple armed robbers in a store, he did not rely on fisticuffs. He used his .45. And he didn’t just wave it about either.
The point being the as you get older you need to adapt to your changing physical circumstances. If you live in a country where it is possible for you to get GOOD combat training with firearms, then do that. And become a regular. Most people, even “trained” ones, completely fall apart under real life scenarios, so your training needs to incorporate high stress and realistic situations within the realms of keeping safety standards too. And no matter how “realistic” training will NEVER get the adrenaline flowing like a real-life live or die scenario, but this is where obsessive repetition under as many different conditions as possible becomes paramount.
These are just some general points. There are, of course, freaks of nature that will take healthy 20-something thugs out while they are in their 70s.
A local man was in the newspaper because he saw two immigrants of African descent harassing a young woman, who was also an immigrant, but of European descent. The man was in his 70s but nevertheless confronted the two thugs, and when they thought they could get physical with the old man, he laid one out with a right cross. he’s been a semi-pro boxer in his younger days. The other thug ran away after he saw his friend hit the pavement cold.
And I am aware of a little old Russian soldier kicking the crap out of two guys that were twice his size and mean, without breaking a sweat. So, while I hope to not have to deal with young punks in my 70s, if I do, I will be taking very much a more Jonah Hex/Punisher approach than a Batman approach.
Training in Hand to Hand after 50
I received an interesting email from a reader of the blog who is also a Kurgan TV member, in it he mentioned how he felt his hand-to-hand skills were probably his weakest link.
It is a sad fact of life (or maybe a divinely good one, it’s hard to tell while we are still roaming the Earth) that as you become
olderwiser your body begins to tell you that you no longer need to do all that physical stuff quite as energetically. It can tell you this in a number of ways, including failing you in ways that take long to heal.At some point, I would not want to get into a fight with a half-dozen twenty-somethings with my bare hands.
I did once hold off about 25 “youths” ranging in age from I’d say 12 or 13 to 23 or so. This was in December 2015 so I was 45 already, but I had managed to get myself in a doorway, meaning they could only come at me at most 2-3 at the time and none actually stepped forward. If they had it would have been reminiscent of that scene from a Bruce Lee film. There were no camera in that particular spot of London and as some had bottles in their hands and such, it was likely some might have had knives too. If they had stepped forward I would not have held back with any strike at all and I would not have been concerned about consequences afterwards, as 25 people, even if untrained and pack-like can definitely kill you if you give them any leeway, but inside a gateway that was flanked by solid face-brick columns, I really was not worried. They clearly were as they repeatedly taunted me to try and get me to step out of the doorway, and I taunted them back about being weak little bitches who couldn’t take me even though they were a couple of dozens of them. One threw a bottle at me, which I caught and threw back, narrowly missing his head, but none of them ever stepped forward so after a while I just went through the gate and closed it behind me and went home.
The mentality switches too though, even as your body changes, and as I get older, I think while on one side I’m not as prone to the impatience, and quick temper of youth, and will generally try to avoid issues before they even become issues, if I were forced into a situation now, I would be far less forgiving in my approach. I would be far more concerned with ending the threat as fast and absolutely as possible than whether the other guy would be able to walk or chew solid food again or how badly they might fall flat on the floor and never get up again.
I learnt from 4 decades of martial arts that if I am injured or somehow limited, or scared for others near me, paradoxically, I become far more dangerous than if I am fighting fit and not worried about the confrontation. And an older guy is a bit like a wounded animal. He just wants to be left alone and if you attack him, well, he’s not going to play nice. At all.
If you are only starting martial arts in your fifth decade, you need to approach it a bit differently. Train slower and do a lot more repetitions (ie the “boring” training that the young guys don”t like, but that is really how you develop a skill) and make sure your movements are correct and as perfect as you can get them while you do them at super slow speed in a controlled environment and progress to faster and harder only gradually and always keeping excellent form. A fitness regime to complement your training is also advisable and you need to figure that out yourself on the basis of where you are and what you wish to achieve.
Nothing is impossible, there are 90 year olds doing 20 pull-ups a day, and there are 30 year olds that are obese and will almost croak of heart seizure if they have to run 30 metres.
All that said, my dad, when he was in his 60s stopped an armed robbery. He did karate from a young age and was renowned enough in Italy that when I took a taxi to see his old Sensei in Italy, the taxi driver, knew who my father was by reputation alone. And he’d been away from Italy for over 20 years already. However, when faced with multiple armed robbers in a store, he did not rely on fisticuffs. He used his .45. And he didn’t just wave it about either.
The point being the as you get older you need to adapt to your changing physical circumstances. If you live in a country where it is possible for you to get GOOD combat training with firearms, then do that. And become a regular. Most people, even “trained” ones, completely fall apart under real life scenarios, so your training needs to incorporate high stress and realistic situations within the realms of keeping safety standards too. And no matter how “realistic” training will NEVER get the adrenaline flowing like a real-life live or die scenario, but this is where obsessive repetition under as many different conditions as possible becomes paramount.
These are just some general points. There are, of course, freaks of nature that will take healthy 20-something thugs out while they are in their 70s.
A local man was in the newspaper because he saw two immigrants of African descent harassing a young woman, who was also an immigrant, but of European descent. The man was in his 70s but nevertheless confronted the two thugs, and when they thought they could get physical with the old man, he laid one out with a right cross. he’s been a semi-pro boxer in his younger days. The other thug ran away after he saw his friend hit the pavement cold.
And I am aware of a little old Russian soldier kicking the crap out of two guys that were twice his size and mean, without breaking a sweat. So, while I hope to not have to deal with young punks in my 70s, if I do, I will be taking very much a more Jonah Hex/Punisher approach than a Batman approach.
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