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Old 05-21-2012, 01:42 PM   #28
Alberto_Italiano
Join Date: Dec 2009
Posts: 296
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Re: Arm locks... really???????

Quote:
Andrew Macdonald wrote: View Post
in a recent revival of a old thread it was stated by a few people that the most effective technique in a fight is an arm lock. to start of a discussion about that i would like to ask 2 questions

1. when you are in a fight what is your goal? or to put it another way what is a win for you

2. What s the purpose of the arm lock? or at least what comes after?
The reason to emphasize the usage of armlocks (emphasized not only by me) relies on several reasons:

1) You have to imagine that your opponent knows how to fight (keep in mind I always have this evenience in mind, because everybody can beat a drunkard - but your real challenge and your real danger comes when you have to face a guy who knows the "business"...), and by knowing how to fight it means he has experience in competition matches like say MMA or boxing.
If you haven't that experience you won't stand a chance. If you have never faced before an MMA fighter or a boxeur, believe me it may be shocking - you may not even be able to hit him once and he will set the whole agenda...
His experience, rapidity of execution, mobility on feet and hips, brutal strength, ability to take away your maai (distance) with mere millimetric moves (you see an incoming punch and you make big movements to get away from it right? well, a boxer doesn't, he moves just for the few centimetres needed for the purpose!) are all factors (to quote just a few) that would simply startle you if you're used only to ukes in an average Aikido dojo. You risk of finding right then and there, for the first time in your life, that many of the techiniques that worked smoothly in your dojo are simply ineffectual against such an adversary. And then you will be game.

2) at this point, your goal is to make fighting impossibile and your ornly real option against such a foe is to produce an armlock.

3) Even if your opponent does not know how to fight, if you hit him or project him you risk of making him go into a coma, or even kill him - the accounts of guys dead for one punch (normally as a consequence of bumping their heads on concrete or corners while falling - and unexperienced guys have a tendency to fall with just one good punch, unfortunately) are endless on our newspapers and we also had a tragic account, recently, on these very same forums.
You then have to live with the (manifold) consequences of your unintended actions.

Please note that such unintended consequences may occur also with neck grabs.
No way they happen with an armlock instead...

4) Once produced the armlock what "comes after" is very simple: nothing. If the armlock is effective (and most of the times they are), you simply keep him there untile either he cools off or security takes over, unable to fight any further.

ps if you are facing multiple adversaries, you've got a problem in a real situation.

I hope this helps.

Last edited by Alberto_Italiano : 05-21-2012 at 01:48 PM.
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