krav maga

 

I’m finally doing it.  I first heard about Krav Maga from the TV show Human Weapon on the History Channel which aired in the latter half of 2007.  I’ve been thinking about it ever since and finally, one and a half years later, I joined Krav Maga Worldwide.  So far I have only taken the intro class and one level one class, taking it slow to start, but hopefully I’ll be attending more regularly soon.  I liked the intro class well enough to sign up, but it took a whole two weeks for me to go back and take a real class.  That class was awesome and I really want to go back!  Warm-up wise I hung in there except when in came to push-ups and lower ab work.  As usual, drills started with punching which is by far my weakest attack.  One of the instructors actually called my punches “love taps”.  Shortly after, however, I got my redemption as we moved onto round kicks, my best attack.  As a kid doing karate, this is how I scored probably 80% of my points during sparring.  Round kick to the back of the head, they knew it was coming, yet somehow they rarely could stop it.  Anyway, while I probably can’t kick as well that high anymore, it didn’t matter since we were only doing round kicks to the waist.  The instructors were impressed, but of course all they knew was that it was my first class and not about my background in martial arts.

Next was elbows which is a wicked attack and pretty instinctual in my opinion.  Praise for that too.  Then it was choke defense which I definitely still need some work on.  The choke defense technique is different from what I’ve been taught in the past, but after I get it down will most likely be much more effective.  And that is pretty much my reason for wanting to take Krav Maga in the first place… because it is more effective.  Yes I trained in Karate for about eight years and have a black belt, but no that does not make me feel confident that I could defend myself in a fight.  I’m not saying that Karate is not effective, just that the training I received was not.  UFC fighter Lyoto Machida on the other hand, he gives Karate a good name.  What I did though, that was mostly performance oriented, as was the three months of WuShu training I received in Beijing.

But now… now it is time to learn to fight and defend, for real.