Self Defense Street Fighting--Mental training and the violence of a street fight

Much more important than the ability to fight is the WILL to fight, or being able to ignore the fear, pain and confusion that you might be suffering from in a real street attack.

Street Fighting's Mental Edge

Street Fighting's Mental Edge

Hey ,

Since I released my Street Fighting Mastery Program,
I've gotten requests from a lot of people who wanted only one specific part of the training: The Mental Edge.

Contained in month two of the Mastery Program, it consists of four downloadable
mp3 recordings covering the following topics:
--Situational Awareness
--Turning Fear into Agression
--Mental Training of Physical Techniques
--Dealing with Pain

Now, if you have ordered my Mastery Program, don't order this, because it, along with all my other current and future programs, is included, but, if you just want the mental training, you can get it here.

I will be back tomorrow with my next video blog, Situational Awareness, which just happens to be one of the topics that I cover in my new program, Street Fighting's Mental Edge.

Until next time, train smart and watch your back!

Christopher "Bob" Roberts

Never run from a street fight!

Rule # 1. Always avoid dangerous situations.
Rule # 2. Always walk away from a "challenge fight."
Rule # 3. When attacked, NEVER RUN FROM A FIGHT AFTER IT HAS STARTED ! !

http://www.Extreme-Measures-Institute.com

Does your instructor teach biting and headbutting?

Biting and headbutting WORK. They are both very effective and intimidating techniques and any self defense instructor who disregards them or decides not to teach them could very well be lacking in his knowledge of other very important areas of self defense as well . . .

For more information about street fighting based self defense, go to:
http://www.Extreme-Measures-Institute.com

Ten Questions to Ask your Self Defense Instructor

Not all martial arts based self defense instructors are bad. Try asking these ten questions to see how much knowledge of a real street self defense situation your instructor has.

For more information, including a FREE, five-part video interview series, go to:
http://www.Extreme-Measures-Institute.com

Self Defense Street Fighting - Why Bouncers Make the Best Self Defense Teachers

Go into a martial arts school and you will see pictures of the master meditating, stretching, doing forms and winning medals. However, should you one day leave the school and be attacked, the only thing in the world important to you will be your ability to fight like a street fighter. Being a good street fighter is what it takes to survive street attacks.

So, who is really qualified to teach you to fight like a street fighter? A martial artist who has never been in a fight in his life or someone who has gone out of his way to get a job that basically consists of him getting involved in fights that other people start?

I would say that the best instructors are either bouncers, some police or some military guys, but the most qualified to teach self defense to civilians are the bouncers. Here's why:

1. Bouncers have the same (lack of) equipment as civilians--Attack a cop or soldier with a knife or gun and he will do his best to shoot you. Attack a bouncer with a weapon and he will be in exactly the same situation you would be in on the street. Some bouncers carry lead gloves, retractable batons or pepper spray, but most don't and even those weapons are things that any civilian could obtain and carry. What a bouncer does when faced with armed and / or multiple attackers will also work for you because the circumstances are the same.

2. Bouncers are constantly fighting--Street fights and attacks are over so fast that, if someone is attacked and another person calls the police immediately, they can't possibly arrive before the fight is over. Bouncers are there from beginning to end. True, some bouncers work for years in a high-class disco and never have to do anything to get their hands dirty. A good trainer would have experience in a place like I work in. Last week I was in three serious fights in one night. Ask your strip-mall karate master if he was in three fights in his entire life.

3. Bouncers have to rely on themselves--There are no SWAT teams or quick reaction forces for bouncers to call when they are outnumbered or in trouble. A bouncer can never back down from a fight. If he gets hurt, he has to ignore the pain and do the best he can. There is no referee to stop the match if he cannot defend himself. Exactly the same situation as you will be in if someone would try to mug or rape you in the real world.

4. Bouncers haven't been there and seen that, they've been everywhere and seen everything--Most bouncers have martial arts or sport fighting training. Most bouncers don't train in sports or arts anymore. The best ones have taken what they have learned in the gym, tested it on the street and combined it with the rough and tumble street fighting techniques that they have seen work, time and time again. This is the proving ground that has produced my concepts of street fighting based self defense.

5. Bouncers are masters of the mental aspects of self defense--Situational awareness, fear management, killer instinct, pain tolerance. The mental aspects of self defense are the most important by far and exactly these aspects are missing from the repertoire of 99.9 % of the strip mall martial arts masters or self-proclaimed self defense instructors out there, whereas 99.9 % of the real bouncers out there have mastered all of these areas. Some bouncers are fat, others skinny, many smoke, but they are still capable of constantly surviving every violent encounter they might face. How can that be? Well, without the mental edge, a bouncer has a very short career.

Keep in touch with us on the Self Defense Street Fighting Facebook Fan Page!

How important is the mental aspect of street fighting based self defense?

Physical techniques for self defense can be compared to weapons, like guns and knives.

Without the proper mental preparation, a "normal, law-abiding citizen" can be frozen in fear or lack the agression to use his weapon and be hurt or killed without having even attempted to defend him or herself.

On the other hand, an untrained individual who has overcome his fear to fight and is prepared to injure an attacker can effectively defend himself by grabing a tire iron and "agressively swinging away . . ."

To recieve training in all aspects of street fighting based self defense, starting with the most important dirty fighting tricks and mental aspects, go to:

Street Fighting Mastery Program

Self Defense Street Fighting -- Eye Grab from Behind

An example of an eye grab from the "Street Fighting Self Defense" video.

This is an example of a hold that will move anyone. For those of you who need to move or control larger or stronger people, it causes enough pain to make up for a difference in strength.

Should the person being controlled attempt to draw a weapon, the pressure against the eye can be immediately increased, causing much more pain and then damage to the eye itself.

Get the Street Fighting Self Defense videos here

Why do you "freeze" in street self defense situations?

A video answer to this question from a newsletter subscriber:

Hi Christopher,

Thanks for the last two emails. After listening to your second email on hitting your attacker, I wanted to ask you a question which is something that really bothers me.

I have been in situations where I simply freeze when I see violence. I have studied martial arts for most of my life and believe I am physically capable to win any street fight however something happens when I am presented with the opportunity to fight in the real world.

It is really important to me that I overcome this for my sake and my friends and family.

Can you please help me?

Thanks, Paul

****************************************************************************

Join the NEW Self Defense Street Fighting Facebook Fan Page

How long does it take to learn self defense?

A concrete example of how self defense that is based upon street fighting, as opposed to martial arts and combat sports, can be learned in a very short period of time and make the student more street-effective than if he did learn a martial art for months and years on end.

For Memorial Day I am offering all of my training products for MASSIVE 40% OFF REGULAR PRICES!! Check it out at:

http://www.selfdefensestreetfighting.com/sale.html

Choosing a Self Defense Instructor: Street Fighter or Martial Artist

Hey guys,

After receiving many requests for additional products to cover different aspects of street fighting based self defense, I've decided to do something even better than that: I've combined "everything that I know about street fighting" into one membership and done it at a much lower price than what you would have to pay if you bought all of my products separately.

Called the "Street Fighting Mastery Program," it is a series of weekly videos that will provide you with just the right amount of information at just the right time, starting from the most important things (like smashing an attacker with easy-to-learn "dirty tricks") and continuing on in the next weeks and months to the most specific things like defeating fear, ignoring pain, dealing with armed aggressors, throwing powerful knockout blows and even how to employ street-effective restraint techniques.

Nothing in this program is politically correct, pretty or nice, but it is all fast and easy to learn and this information will make you more capable of defending yourself on the mean streets than ten black belts!

Check it out and let me know what you think:

Street Fighting Mastery Program

By the way, did I mention the financial advantage you receive with this program? With such a low monthly cost, that would mean that you would become a discount of up to 68% on many of my products!

Until next time, train smart and watch your back!

Christopher "Bob" Roberts

Self Defense with a Rolled-Up Magazine and Other Bad Advice

Guys,

I just have to say that you are the best blog community in the world.

I mean it, really!

First of all, someone saw me demonstrate a block and strike combination with a magazine in my video blog post on women's self defense training and sent me a link to a video of a guy who did the same thing, but was serious about it!

Check this out, a vintage 80's clip of some guy cashing-in on the "ninja craze" by teaching the lost ninja art of first getting in a fight over who sits in a chair and then killing his musical chairs opponent by smacking him with a rolled-up magazine!



Did he really say ". . . bear in mind that bones are going to be damaged and death can result" while telling you how to hit someone with a roll of paper?

Can someone teach me how to do that and still keep a straight face?

You guys do know that I was jokingly demonstrating a bad technique as I showed a clip of me doing the magazine fighting thing, right?

Then, another person read my blog post about biting as a self defense technique and sent me an article about another real encounter where a person was injured by a street fighting criminal who used expedient weapons AND BITING during his strugle to escape. Like I said before, the bad guys (street thugs and criminals) already know how to use the dirty fighting techniques I teach in Street Fighting Self Defense. All that I'm trying to do is enlighten law-abiding citizens and even the playing field for them.


Rob

Here is an article that details a real street fight that happened in the New Orleans, LA area just a day or so ago.


Man has part of ear bitten off during struggle with suspect by WWLTV.com

Posted on April 9, 2010 at 2:13 PM

Updated today at 3:07 PM


NEW ORLEANS - An apparent victim of a car burglary was bitten on the arm, beaten in the face and had part of his ear bitten off after he came upon a suspect rummaging through his car and the two had a struggle Thursday evening.

According to Major Greg Elder of the NOPD's Third District, the victim had a flat tire near the intersection of I-610 East and St. Bernard Avenue around 6:45 p.m. and received a ride to a tire store in Chalmette to secure a replacement.

The victim told police that while at the store, he told a store worker that he was in a hurry to get back to his car, which had several valuable items inside. The victim said he mentioned the location of the breakdown.

According to the police, the victim said he noticed a man quickly leave the tire store after he had made that comment, though he said he thought nothing of it at the time.

The victim said he returned to his car and noticed a Jeep right next to it and when he got out he saw that someone was unloading items from his car into the Jeep. He said he recognized the suspect as the man he had seen hurriedly leave the tire shop.

The victim said the suspect tried to get into his Jeep and drive away, but that he blocked him from closing his door.

During the ensuing struggle, the victim said the suspect bit him severely on the arm, hit him with a tire iron, jabbed at his face with keys and eventually bit off a part of his ear and spit it out on the ground.

The suspect was able to get away in the Jeep along with a compressor, nail gun and other tools that had come from the victim's disabled car.

The victim suffered four bites on his arm, several facial lacerations and the ear injury.

The victim said that the perpetrator was a Hispanic male, about 36 years old, about 6'0", 170 lbs, wearing a Dickie work shirt that has "Santos" on the left breast side, and blue Dickie work pants.

If you have any further information on this incident, suspect or vehicle, please call the Third District at 658-6030. You may also call Crimestoppers anonymously at 822-1111.


So, thanks to Albert for the newspaper article and to the guy who sent me the ninja video on Linked-In.

Until next time, train smart and watch your back!

Christopher "Bob" Roberts

You can't survive a street fight if you get knocked-out before you know you're in a fight!!

The importance of situational awareness in modern street self defense simply cannot be overemphasized. In the ring or cage, you always know that you'll be fighting against one person, he's got no other weapons than his two arms and two legs and you know that he won't attack until after the bell sounds.

On the street, things are different. You never know how many people will attack you, if they are armed, when they will attack and when they will stop. That is the reason why TRAINED sport fighters usually loose against EXPERIENCED street fighters:

A sport fighter is stabbed and then says "I never saw the knife coming," because he is TRAINED to expect a fair fight without weapons and the street fighter is EXPERIENCED enough to draw and palm his knife until he has cut his victim once already.

A sport fighter takes a street fighter to the ground and has his head kicked in by the street fighter's five friends because he is TRAINED in the luxury of being in a cage with only one opponent and a referee to "keep things fair."

A sport fighter gets sucker punched and then says "I never saw the punch coming," because he was TRAINED to not expect any attacks until after the bell rings, while the street fighter is EXPERIENCED enough to know that the person who lands the first blow usually wins a street fight.

I've seen this phenomenon many times in the past. The last time was when I had a Thai Boxing trainer and fighter in a seminar and the entire class was trying to compare him to me in terms of "who is better," "who can beat who," "who is tougher" and so on. While practicing traffic stops using role playing, he stood outside the door of the car and asked me if I would get out and open the trunk. I said yes, while reaching for the rubber knife that I had hidden under my left thigh. I opened the door with my left hand, concealed the knife behind the car door and thrust the knife into his chest, just under his rib cage. What did he do? Nothing at first, but then he jumped into a boxing stance, looked down at the rubber knife "sticking" out of his chest, murmured a profanity and realized that he would have been mortally wounded long before he even knew he was in a fight.

Who would have won in the ring? I honestly don't know. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and say he would. But remember, that I don't train for ring sports anymore and he's getting ready for street duty, so I would say that he was able to learn a lot more from me than I could have from him. And the chances of an untrained sport fighter recovering from a broken nose tend to be better than those of an inexperienced street fighter recovering from a slit throat.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN THE FOUR MOST EFFECTIVE TECHNIQUES THAT STREET FIGHTING BASED SELF DEFENSE HAS TO OFFER ! !

The Self Defense Effectiveness of Brutally BITING an Attacker in a Street Fight

In yesterday's blog post I listed the five simple guidelines to the effective use of thumb gouges to the eyes as taught in my video Street Fighting Self Defense. Today I will share five reasons why BITING AN ATTACKER can be so effective in a street self defense situation, another, even more brutal tactic taught in my video:

1. Biting works, period--I have a very high pain tolerance. I have trained myself to "notice" pain, but to accept it and fight on. I once broke my toe and didn't make a big deal about it because I was more worried that I may have damaged a tendon in my ankle, until an x-ray showed the break, BUT the one time that I was bitten in a street fight was so intensely painful that even I was shocked for a second or two. Now, take note that that much pain was caused "just" from a bite to my bicep, not one of the more damaging targets in the head and neck area that I teach in my video! To escape, I had to grab into the biter's eyes (as taught in Street Fighting Self Defense) and pull the guy's head back until he let go, but 99% of the people out there would have been combat-ineffective from the pain alone. Oh yeah, I also ended up bleeding, and receiving a huge black bruise that took weeks to heal, but who cares--biting is just for sissies, right?

2. Biting is primal, brutal and will supercharge your killer instinct--Have you seen those nature films of lions jumping on their prey and biting them to death? Do the lions look scared or worried that they will survive? Believe me, if you can bring yourself to be brutal enough to bite an attacker, you will experience such a boost in confidence and killer instinct that any fear will quickly fade away. It will suddenly become clear to you that you are the predator and the fool who attacked you is now your prey!

3. Biting is primal, brutal and will strike fear into an attacker--Be honest, have you ever been bitten? Have you ever seen someone being bitten? I sincerely doubt it. Now, what do you think your response would be to seeing someone being bitten? What do you think your response would be to being bitten yourself? When I teach street fighting tactics, very few people believe me when I teach biting . . . until I show them the scar on my arm . . . then the room gets really quiet and everyone tends to realize just how serious a hand to hand fight can be . . .

Now, what do you think an attacker would think if he gets bitten in one of the primary targets in the head and neck area using one of the biting techniques that I teach in Street Fighting Self Defense? My guess, as well as my experience is: fear, pain, panic and prolific use of "the F-word." Plus, he has a cool story to tell: "How did I get that scar on my face? Oh, I tried to rape this 90 lb chick and she kicked my ass."

4. Biting an attacker won't get you infected with a disease--Biting an attacker will not get you infected with Hepatitis or AIDS.

First of all, if you're in serious trouble and your only chance to survive is to bite an attacker instead of being stabbed, choked or raped and you don't because you are afraid of being infected with a disease, your thinking is flawed. I mean, do you seriously think that having unprotected sex with a rapist is less of a risk of infection than biting him?

Second, what would you rather do? What would be safer? A punch? When I was in basic training for the army, a guy threw one punch at another guy and cut his fist on his teeth. It got so infected that he needed a surgical treatment to remove the infection from his painfully swollen hand. And that was just because of the germs in the mouth, imagine if he had Hep or AIDS! Would you now advise against punching because of infection risk and recommend that people just allow themselves to be mugged, beaten and raped without fighting back?!?!

5. You can bite in any range and in any situation--You can bite from any range. I can cover up, rush in from kicking or boxing range and bite an attacker in the clinch. In the clinch, on the ground or if an attacker is grabbing me I can IMMEDIATELY bite without any preparation or telegraphing at all. Biting works even better if an attacker is holding my arms, because that means that both of his hands are occupied with holding me still and he can't stop me. If he does let go of me to try to stop me from biting him, then he let me go and the first part of my defense was successful.

Ok guys, the bottom line is this: Biting is easy, fast and effective. As a matter of fact, biting, along with headbutting is my litmus test for self defense "experts." If someone claims to know something about street fighting or self defense and then goes on to say that biting or headbutting is ineffective or that it is not necessary to learn to use or defend against those techniques, I immediately know that he's a fraud. Believe me, both of those techniques are taught in Street Fighting Self Defense for a reason.

Until next time, train smart and watch your back!

Christopher "Bob" Roberts

Street Fighting's Five Secrets to Effective Eye Gouging and Grabbing

Ok guys, today I am going to fully describe exactly what the finer points are that sepearate ineffective from street effective eye gouges and grabs, as I teach them in my video, Street Fighting Self Defense.

Done wrong, the thumb gouge to the eye is almost useless . . . but done right, it is one of the most dangerous and effective self defense techniques that street fighting or WWII combative training has to offer. Read on, to learn the five simple guidelines to the effective use of thumb gouges to the eyes:

1. Don't "poke" the eyes, gouge past them--Regardless of whether you are trying to control someone through the use of pressure against his eyes or are actually trying to destroy the eyeball, don't ever just poke at the eye itself like a little kid. Rather you should try to force your thumb between the eye socket and the eyeball into the skull. This will cause more pain, more fear and continued, increasing pressure will either destroy the eyeball or pop it out of the skull.

2. Thumb the eyes from the inside--If you were to place your thumb between the eyeball and eye socket on the outside of his eye, near his temple and he were to push your hand away, that would be the end of your thumb gouge. If you had chosen to gouge the eye between the eye and the nose, on the inside of his face and he were to force your hand to the side, he would have to rake your thumb across the entire surface of his own eyeball, causing pain and damage to himself.

3. Don't gouge with one hand, keylock around his head or neck--I hate it when I see pictures of inexperienced trainers just grabbing a person's head and forcing their thumbs into his eyes. If you were to do that, he could easily just push or pull your hands away. Now imagine holding his head in a sort of headlock, keylocking your arms (a keylock is a way to cross both forearms to control a part of an opponent's body and simultaneously combine the strength of both arms on a hold) and then thumb gouging his eye. Its hard to explain a keylock in words, but, if an aggressor were to try to push you away from him, a keylock will automatically force your thumb even more forcefully into his eye.

4. Aim your thumb gouges with your palms and fingertips--If you were to try to shoot your thumb directly out into an aggressor's eye, you would miss much more often than not. Instead, first make contact somewhere on your attacker's body with the palm of your hand. As soon as you have made contact with your palm, you should be able to run you hand along his body and find his head, even with your eyes close or in the dark. When your palm is on the side of his head, find his ears with the tips of your fingers, which will bring your thumbs automatically into position to gouge the eyes. Try it on yourself right now: Put the palm of your right hand on the right side of your face and touch your right ear with your fingertips. Now circle your thumb around and it will automatically go between your nose and eyeball, as when using a thumb gouge to get out of a choke from behind. Put your right palm on the left side of your face, fingertips on your le ft ear and your thumb automatically goes into position to gouge the eye, like a thumb gouge to someone standing in front of you.

5. Make hooks with your thumbs--As you can imagine, the optimal body weapon for causing pain to and / or damaging the eyes is a small or pointy one. Therefore, you need to be sure that you are always using the tip of your thumb and not the wide and soft pad to apply pressure. A very simple way to make sure that you do this is to make a hook with your thumb. In other words, curl your thumb in so that contact with your opponents head is only made with your palms and the tip, not the flat pad of your finger. This holds true regardless of whether you are attacking with your thumb or the other fingers.

Ok guys, that's it for today. Tommorrow I'll be talking about BITING in self defense, another brutal technique I teach in Street Fighting Self Defense.

Until next time, train smart and watch your back!

Christopher "Bob" Roberts

Women's self defense doesn't exist! But women CAN learn to defend themselves . . .

Once, while being interviewed about street fighting based self defense, I totally shocked the interviewer by stating a simple fact that shook his belief system from the very foundation.

His question was: "What would you recommend or what do you personally teach women in terms of self defense?"

My answer was: "There is no such thing as women's self defense."

Now that doesn't mean at all that women cannot or should not learn to defend themselves, on the contrary, it means that I give women more credit than even they give themselves!

What I mean when I say that women's self defense doesn't exist is that there should not be a difference between the way a woman defends herself and the way that a man defends himself.

Read these five reasons why street fighting based self defense works and how they are just as applicable to women as to men:

1. Street fighting based self defense works just as well against bigger attackers --Women's self defense supposedly has to be different from self defense for men because women tend to be smaller and weaker. Well, I weigh 175 lbs and work as a bouncer. Can you imagine that I have ever been attacked by a smaller guy? Neither can I. Now, if I weigh 175 lbs and street fighting based self defense allows me to defend myself against someone 100 lbs heavier, why can't a woman use the same concepts to defend herself against a much bigger man?

2. Street fighters aren't afraid to strike first -- A surprise attack by a bad guy is called a sucker punch. A good guy used a preemptive strike. Either way, it is the same thing, a way to take an attacker out before he even knew he was in a fight. What do you think would be a better choice for a woman to do, wait for an attack and try to block and fight back or to suddenly knock a potential attacker down and out before he attacks, as soon as she feels threatened and knows that there is no way to avoid a fight.

3. Street fighters practice very good situational awareness -- As a bouncer, I am constantly trying to see a fight before it starts, to be able to respond before things really get out of hand. A mugger or rapist spends time observing potential targets before he chooses the easiest mark. How can so many "women's self defense" instructors tell their students to run away from a fight if they don't give them the tools to notice a potential threat before it is too late? If your situational awareness, or your ability to see a potentially threatening situation coming and react before you are ambushed or attacked is on point, you won't ever have to fight at all.

4. Street fighters have conquered their fears and don't back down from anything -- Ever hear of the concept of the "cornered rat?" Well, rats are nature's masters of street fighting self defense. Just like a rat, a good street fighter becomes much more dangerous when cornered and endangered. Bite, claw, give your attacker(s) everything you've got and die fighting because being afraid and giving-up didn't ever win a fight or save a life.

5. Street fighters don't train -- Since developing my concepts of street fighting based self defense, I train much less than ever before in my life and am much more combat effective than ever before in my entire life. How should a working mom or business man find time for work, family, household and the hours of conditioning and technique training that most self defense or martial arts instructors claim are necessary to ensure your street survival? How about spending a few hours to learn a few brutally effective concepts of dirty street fighting and then having them for the rest of your life, on call to be used any time without maintenance training? Like I always say, if a technique is simple enough to use with minimal training, it is simple enough to use effectively on the street. If a technique is complicated enough to need to be drilled constantly, it is too complicated for use in a real street fight.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN THE FOUR MOST EFFECTIVE TECHNIQUES THAT STREET FIGHTING BASED SELF DEFENSE HAS TO OFFER ! !

Self Defense Street Fighting's Mental Edge--How Simply having a Violent Attitude can Save your Life!

Street fights and attempted muggings and rapes aren't pretty! They involve someone wanting to hurt an innocent person for pleasure or profit and those types of human predators tend to enjoy success because they're willing to do anything and everything to achieve their goals. If their victims are hurt, injured, maimed or mortally wounded, they either don't care or are proud of the results.

So why is it that they almost always tend to enjoy success? I mean, why is it that we so often hear about another beating, mugging or rape and so rarely about how a victim successfully defended him or herself? Well, let me put it like this—you've already read the answer in the first paragraph!

The reason why most human predators are successful when performing criminal acts and so few law abiding citizens are successful in their self defense attempts is that a criminal is willing to do anything to overwhelm his victim with pure, raw violence and a law abiding citizen, by his very nature, is overly concerned with the well-being of his attacker!

A barroom brawler grabs a bottle and slams it against his victim's temple with as much force as he can muster. The victim would have been afraid that would have killed his attacker.

A mugger punches his victim in the back of his neck, pushes him to the ground, kicks his grounded victim in the head as hard as he can and takes his wallet. The victim thinks that kicking someone on the ground is unfair and would have stopped defending himself as soon as the attacker was on the ground, (although he probably wouldn't have gotten that far) which would have given the mugger the opportunity to get up and finish the job.

Because I teach my students to take the most brutal and destructive strikes and direct them to the most vital areas of the human anatomy, I am capable of making anyone capable of effectively defending themselves in a very short time or even in a video format—if they are willing to do anything it takes to survive! That is why mental training is so important to me. Just because you understand a movement, doesn't mean that you will be willing to use it in a real situation, fully knowing what consequences it will have on your attacker.

The next time you watch a self defense video, try to imagine a mugger using those movements. If you can't, press stop immediately and get yourself instruction that consists of pure destructive violence from beginning to end. Leave joint locks, throws and gentle restraint techniques to judo champions.

If you want to survive, think and act like a human predator. Imagine the kind of damage that a mugger would try to do to you and then take that level of brutality even higher when defending yourself, if you want to survive!

Until next time, train smart and watch your back!

Christopher "Bob" Roberts

By the way, this month I'll be releasing two resources for those who have been asking for help learning street fighting based self defense on their own! One is an audio series covering complete training in all of the mental aspects that make street fighters so successful (killer instinct / agression, fear management, pain management and situational awareness) and the other is a series of videos that teach you the most direct, brutal and effective street fighting techniques that the bad guys are counting on you NOT knowing.

www.Extreme-Measures-Institute.com

Street Fighting Self Defense Training and Protective Equipment--Help or Hinderance?

Although many mixed martial arts based self defense trainers use boxing equipent to train their students, the street fighting elements of the techniques and principles that I teach and put emphasis on usually prevent me from using any protective equipment at all.

Gloves, for instance are only used for closed fist strikes, which I don't teach. I also think that the use of gloves promotes the idea that closed fist strikes won't damage your hands because you will grow accustomed to the support of wrist wraps and padding on the knuckles that you won't have in a real fight.

Because I begin with street fighting techniques, like biting and eye gouges, (boxing) gloves and mouthpieces will prevent you from being able to use them and naturally cause you to ignore those techniques in training, which will therefore cause you to forget them when you need them in a self defense situation.

When teaching strikes, I would rather have my students striking at a training partner in a slow and controlled manner and actually make contact with the exact vital areas and following through in exactly the same way as he or she would have to when defending himself on the street, instead of striking full contact at a face protector, which will train one to hit an attacker "in the face," instead of a certain part of the eye, nose, jaw, etc.

Any kind of cage or visor protecting a person's face would also prevent my students from training eye gouges and grabs and biting, just like boxing gloves and mouthpieces would.

What I DO like to do, however is get my students to do a few reps or 30-sec intervals of power strikes (inside or outside forearms, elbows, palm heels, hammer fists, etc.) against thai pads so they see and feel for themselves how damaging it would be to be hit by such a strike when delivered with proper body mechanics. This isn't what I consider to be physical training, rather mental training because it shows you what power you have and holding the pads for your partner lets you feel how deveastating it would be to be hit in a vital area with such a strike. Especiall for those who have never been in a real street fight, this training helps build confidence in your abilities.

Finally, I am in no way a fan of MMA for self defense, but I have "stolen" a drill from the modern army combatives program called "achieving the clinch." In it, I train my students' minds and give them confidence to overcome a violent, swinging attack by attacking them with repeated roundhouse punches using 50-80 percent power and padding my hands with boxing gloves or focus mitts and expecting my students to cover up and burst through my strikes until they are close enough that my strikes loose their power and they can effectively eye grab / bite / choke / take me down and kick me on the ground.

Other than that, I don't really spar, rather use slow and controlled strikes in situational-based scenario training with the emphasis on teaching people to see the opportunities to use dirty fighting techniques and concentrate on puting them under psychological stress.

Just what works for me,

Bob

www.Extreme-Measures-Institute.com

The effectiveness of Self Defense BITING!

I don't know where you stand on the
subject, but when I tell people that I teach
BITING as a self defense technique in my seminars
and in my "Street Fighting Self Defense" videos,
lots of people, none of whom have never been in
a serious fight themselves and therefore should
keep their mouths shut, start to laugh at this
very serious topic.

Now, when I say that these people were never in
a "serious" fight, I mean one where one or more
of the participants was carried to an ambulance
and driven to a hospital and all participants
feared for his life at one point or another.

Only then do you realize the extent to which
you would go to get out of the situation alive
and that includes biting, if necessary and possible.

So, for those of you who were never in such a situation,
I found a video that shows just how powerful and
damaging biting in close-quarters fighting can
be.

First, read the Associated Press article:

February 16, 2010
Vt. man testifies in trial over bitten eyebrow
By The Associated Press
Advertiser
BARRE, Vt. -- An Iraq war veteran whose eyebrow was partially bitten off at his wedding reception in Vermont is testifying at the trial of his alleged attacker.

Thirty-five-year-old Kevin Gartland, of Fayston, is accused of aggravated assault and if convicted could face 15 years in prison.

Prosecutors say Gartland got into a fight with Ryan Kessler at Kessler's June 2008 wedding reception in Duxbury. After the two were separated, Gartland allegedly lunged at Kessler and bit him on the face.

Kessler lost half of his left eyebrow in the incident.

A two-day trial in Vermont District Court in Barre (BAYR'-ree) got under way Tuesday, with Kessler describing the events that led to the alleged attack.

Gartland contends if was self defense.

Now watch the television report, which shows a picture of
the injury and post your comments below:


Vt. man testifies in trial over bitten eyebrow