The
Ultimate Guide
To Fighting and Winning
By Dr. Russ Horine, President, Fight-Fast Direct, Inc.
Part 12
Dear Friend:
Let's continue on with the next two "D's" of personal
combat -- here's #3.
3.
Disruption – Basically this is any tactic
or technique that messes with your opponent’s plan of
attack. Understand that once again we’re dealing with
simple human psychology. Whether your opponent is a
Predator, Emotionally Hijacked, or a Bully, one thing
is certain. He’s threatening you because he “envisions”
in his mind’s eye that this will all turn out to his
benefit. Believe me, the picture show in his head doesn’t
show that he will
be hurt or killed. Nope. The movie in his head has a
happy ending for him.
So
the point of “Disruption” is to make it clear to him
that his plans of easy victory are nothing but a fantasy.
You need to screw up his little plans, take away his
options, and “convince” him as quickly as possible that
this could end very badly for him. The faster you can
get that through his head, shift HIS focus inward –
and get him “back on his heels” -- the better off you’ll
be.
Here’s a few ways to “disrupt” his plans.
a.
Surprise – The quickest and most effective
method to surprising your adversary is to initiate the
attack – ie “hit first”. As one world-class streetfighter
put it… “you need to demonstrate,
to your adversary, that you have a total disregard for
his well-being.” This is a nice way of saying that you
should try to hurt him. Why? Because the psychological
effect is to take the wind from his sails. To strip
away his will to fight, and get his “internal chatter”
going. Consider, for example, the football team who
has a “safety” scored against them.
It’s only ONE damn point
for goodness sake – but the effect is devastating --
a complete moral buster… caught with your pants down
in your own territory… tackled in your own end zone…
utter humiliation and degradation. This is exactly the
same effect you’re shooting for with surprise.
Yeah, I know that doesn’t sound “nice”, (and
we covered this earlier), you MUST get over the idea
that a real man “never hits first”… or that you should
“never hit a guy with glasses”… or that you need to
draw a line in the dirt with a stick… or some other
nonsense that essentially gives your opponent an edge.
b.
Close the distance-- If there’s no escape
and you’ve determined that a fight is imminent -- you
should move-in. If you’re opponent is armed with
a knife, you should RUN.
Studies show that fighting
someone with a knife is a bad idea, no matter what your
skill level. Anyway, in a hand-to-hand situation, “moving-in”
is another very effective tool to convince him he’s
made a terrible mistake and that the happy movie he
envisioned is turning into a horror flick.
This is not some kind of bluff. By moving-in
you’re about to “take the fight to him” and ready to
inflict damage and pain. This is where the rubber meets
the road and when target acquisition becomes critical.
You MUST have a good idea of how and where you’ll strike
him.
You do NOT want to close-in and then pause and
do nothing. The result will likely be initial surprise
and possibly some “back peddling” by your opponent,
then (when he sees your essentially bluffing), a quick
recovery and a counterattack. So don’t “fake”. You should
move in with the 100% intention of attacking.
By
closing the gap, you effectively neutralize the attacker’s
two main weapons, the left and right haymaker. This
is a major disruption to his strategy and he’s forced
to stop and consider a new
strategy. Meanwhile you’re busy attacking.
c.
Forward pressure – I touched on this earlier,
but I want to explain this further… it’s important.
My research has PROVED that the guy who most often wins
is the fighter who uses whatever means possible to initiate
surprise, get his opponent back-peddling, then continues
forward pressure against his opponent. You do NOT want
to let up.
Keep yourself in a fluid
state and fire continuous shots at open targets, never
“letting up” your attack until he’s been removed as
a threat or you’ve had the chance to escape effectively.
Watching raw video of real streetfights
has further proved this point and demonstrated a certain
rhythm to it (it’s typically a wham, bam, bam, bam,
bam, bam -- fight over). The incoming shots are like
clockwork with little or no pause to “assess” the damage.
4.
Destruction – The fourth and final “D”
in the “Four D’s Of Personal Combat” is Destruction.
This involves breaking down your opponent physically
to remove him from the fight using your own personal
“arsenal” of fighting tricks. Okay, this may sound like
a fancy way of saying “kicking his ass”, but there’s
actually more to it. The better you understand his vulnerable
targets and the specific striking techniques to attack
those targets, the more effective a fighter you’ll be.
The two most critical elements
for effective Destruction are, 1) target selection and,
2) how you’ll strike that target. The key is to attack
the targets that’ll give you the most bang for the buck – ie targets
that’ll produce instant results with high-damage potential.
What’s surprising is that even an unsuccessful
attack on a high damage target so “disrupts” your opponent’s
evil plans (spinning up his internal dialogue) that
he’s suddenly putty in your hands.
For example, Fight-Fast instructor Tom Cruse
points out that many times the “elbow snap” technique
(designed to break your opponents elbow) does not always
break the elbow. But the horrid reality that you attempted
to bust his arm like a twig is so disturbing to your
opponent that his “internal dialog” can turn him into
that deer in the headlights. This can all but shut down
his ability to vigorously fight back as he unconsciously
switches to a more defensive mode.
This is the value of high-damage targets. If
you succeed (break his elbow for example) in most cases
the fight’s over (although I’ve seen determined fighters
battle with a broken arm flopping in the wind, so don’t
take that for granted). On the other hand if you don’t
succeed, the “Surprise and Shock” value is high and
triggers his internal dialogue. In that case you can
take advantage of his hesitation and continue your forward
pressure attack.
Now busting up people is serious business that
involves one or more of the following: blood, hospitals,
jails and morgues. So you must ask yourself a couple
of questions. The first is:
“Am I willing to hurt this person?”
You’d better be damn sure that what you’re about
to inflict on this guy will be justifiable in front
of a judge.
Ask yourself this before
any confrontation as pondering this question during
a confrontation is bad idea. You need to be clear about
what will trigger an all out attack from you and what
you’ll simply walk away from.
Okay… assuming there’s a definite threat and
you’ve answered the first question “yes” – you must
act. So the second question is:
“What is my target?”
The next question is.
“What is my next target?”
And so on. Keep going until the threat has ended
or you have the chance to get the hell outta
there.
There's a lot more ground to cover -- so stay with me.
Til next time...
Regards,
Dr. Russ Horine
Fight-Fast, Inc.
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