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If you haven’t purchased Ultimate Unarmed Gun Defenses, Volume 1 yet, check it out.
**NEW LOW PRICE** $13.99 As the title suggests, Ultimate Unarmed Gun Defenses teaches the reader exactly what to do if threatened with a gun. The techniques in this manual are fast, incredible, and easy to execute – and the best part is that you don’t have to be an athlete to defend yourself! This book could save your life!
Now Available:
**NEW LOW PRICE** $17.99 Volume 2 expands upon the techniques demonstrated in the first volume, teaching methods to disarm an attacker who places a gun against almost any part of the body. Although written specifically as a gun defense book, this book teaches excellent self-defense techniques that can easily be modified for use against other attacks.
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Articles / Tips / Links IMAGING Here’s a little tip that can make all the difference in the world in your training. It’s called imaging. There was an experiment that was done at least 15 years ago, and some of you may recall the details better than I do. It involved a high school or college basketball team. The researchers divided the team into two groups, and attempted to improve their foul shot percentages. Every day for a designated time period the first group would go on the court and physically practice their foul shots. The second group was brought into another room, and would simply spend an equal amount of time imagining that they were shooting fouls. They would picture themselves at the foul line, holding the ball, feeling its weight and texture, bouncing it 2 or 3 times, flexing their knees as they brought the ball overhead, taking the shot, feeling the ball roll off their fingertips, and watching the arc of its path as it made its way to the hoop. After several weeks, both groups demonstrated significant improvement in their foul shot percentages, with no significant difference between the two groups. In other words, the group that took the time to think about shooting fouls improved just as much as the group that actually practiced! Just think about how this can help you in your training! If you take just a few minutes every day, in the privacy of your house, to mentally practice techniques, you can greatly enhance your performance in the dojo (and on the street). I recommend that you visualize the attacker and physically practice the technique. Let’s use one of the techniques that I teach as an example- a defense against a forearm choke from the rear. Visualize an attacker coming up from behind you (perhaps the friend of someone you’re arguing with). His right hand reaches over your right shoulder and across your throat, reaching almost to the top of your left shoulder. His forearm is in your throat, and he’s squeezing his arm in toward himself. Take a brief second and imagine his body position. He’s behind you, off center slightly to your left. His right hand is on top of your left collar bone, thumb up, and his head is slightly left of yours. Now reach up and imagine yourself grabbing his wrist with your left hand, and his upper forearm with your right hand. Try to “feel” his arm and dig the middle finger of your right hand into his upper forearm musculature as you pull downward with both hands. At the same time, tuck your chin and turn your head to the right. “Feel” your chin nestle into the crux of his elbow. Now he can’t choke you! Now, as you maintain a downward pull with your right hand, release your grip with the left hand and make a fist. At the same time, slide your right foot out about 1 to 2 feet to your right as you “sit” into a horse riding stance and strike his groin with the palm side of your left fist. His groin will be just outside your own left thigh. You won’t have to look for it, so keep your chin tucked into his elbow crease throughout the move. Remember, the side step, squat, and groin strike are one simultaneous action. You don’t have to hit his groin- you only have to be close. His reaction will be to withdraw his pelvis backward, forcing his face forward and down. Picture this in your mind as you swing your left fist upward from his groin to deliver a back knuckle strike to his face. Remember, you’re not waiting for his reaction to the groin strike- you already know what it will be, so immediately after the groin strike, you will swing your fist up for the back knuckle strike. This now forces him up and back, and opens him up for a variety of follow through techniques. The easiest follow through is to simply repeat the groin strike and back knuckle continually until he can no longer react. Remember to maintain your grip with your right hand on his forearm, so he can’t pull away (he put it there, and now you’re keeping it there – ironic isn’t it!). Okay, that’s one technique, and you can see how you can still train, even if you don’t have a partner. Repeat this exercise as if he’s choking you with his left forearm. By practicing this way, you are forced to think about body positioning, hand positions, open pathways, and so on, so when it happens for real, you won’t be panic-stricken, fumbling around for a grab. Practice whatever techniques you are learning in your dojo the same way, and you’ll be amazed at how quickly you master the techniques. The technique that I just described is one of 18 basic techniques taught in my style. It takes me less than 5 minutes to practice all 18 techniques, left and right-sided. So just think – 5 to 10 minutes per day of this training can help you improve by leaps and bounds! THE VERTICAL PUNCH Vertical punch – that’s when I punch upward, right? Wrong! The term “vertical punch” refers to your hand position while throwing the punch, and at impact. This is a punch that is used in Jiu Jitsu and in some of the more progressive karate styles. Let me explain the difference between this punch and the traditional karate punch, and why I’m convinced that the vertical punch is superior. In the traditional karate punch, you start with a clenched fist, palm side up, tucked in next to your belt. As you throw the punch, just before reaching full extension, you internally rotate your forearm with a snap, so that at impact your fist is facing palm side down, striking with the knuckles of your index and middle fingers. Your arm is fully extended with the elbow locked straight. Now, I’m not going to sit here and tell you that this punch is ineffective. I certainly don’t want to get hit with it! But, there are some flaws, and I’ll point them out to you. First of all, striking with two protruding knuckles slightly increases the risk of a hand fracture. Secondly, and more important, full extension of the elbow renders it more susceptible to fracture or dislocation if the arm is blocked or struck in a counter move. Also, notice the position of the elbow at the end of the punch. With the fist ending up with in palm side down position, the elbow faces outward toward the side, where it is more likely to be blocked or struck. And finally, sports medicine doctors have noticed that many karate and Tae-Kwon-Do black belts, who have trained for years, throwing thousands of traditional karate punches, have developed significant arthritic changes in the elbow joints. This comes from the repetitive micro-trauma that results from snapping the elbow into the locked position of full extension at the end of the punch. What a twist of fate it would be if, at age 65, when some thug picks you as his target, you can’t defend yourself because of the crippling arthritis that you got from your training! Okay, let’s see how the vertical punch differs. First of all, in the vertical punch, we strike with unprotruded knuckles, using the entire flat surface of the fist. Secondly, the vertical punch maintains a vertical fist position throughout the move. That is, the palm faces inward, with the fist thumb-side up. The punch starts with the fist at the belt, and as you extend your arm out for the punch, there is a very slight downward arc to the punch. The punch ends up with the fist in the vertical position, and with a slight bend to the elbow. Notice that at the end of this punch, the elbow faces downward, where it is less likely to be blocked. Also, since there is a slight bend to the elbow, there is some play in the joint motion, so the elbow is far less likely to break if it is blocked or struck. And finally, since we never fully extend the elbow with a vertical punch, we don’t suffer from the arthritic changes that result from long-term karate training.
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