525 - Breathwork for reaction speed, movement and power
Aide - memoire: 10 part check list for solo training and beyond (VIDEO)
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Part one - Evasive body skills
This will be a two part post derived from coaching notes for a client, and will form a kind of prequel of sorts to other posts dealing with evasion body skills.
Evasion skills or “Dodge and evade drills” are straight forward to learn but, as like many other areas of learning, require a high degree of practice as they need to become autonomic reactions to threat.
They need to be understood too as a progression. Starting with static drills for dealing with sudden ambush through to dynamic ideas for fights that are already underway.
They are also sets of standardised ways of dealing with threats, and that is something that needs to be considered too as they do not represent “the only way of moving” but rather “ a good way of moving” or perhaps a good set of moves to have to start using right now in lieu of a more free-form ability that might be possibly developed over much more time.
These sets of moves are not random in nature but rather “high percentage” ones which possess better potential for follow up action, they have a logic behind them.
However, when your life’s on the line, you will move in ways other than just standard ways, you’ll move in ANY WAY you possibly can to try and survive depending on your physical potential, the only logic will be evasion.
The incredible defensive movements in the video below are the desperate attempts of the male to avoid multiple close range gunshots but they are ultimately not enough:
Sometimes though, there can be a hurdle to training the movements in that the trainee cannot do some of the ideas for various reasons, one of these can be due to excess tension.
Tension can be from conscious or unconscious factors.
These following notes were written down after I’d encountered a barrier in the learning process during one session and had improvised these ideas as a way of coaching in a different way and preparing the client for better progression in training the drills.
They are some quick and simple ways of getting a newer person to become aware of breath and it’s role in causing, releasing and controlling tension.
It’s also important to point out that tension in itself is not a bad thing, without it you would lack any structure. Rather we need tension in some areas and not others to be able to move and also to possess an awareness of tension that is carried as I mentioned before , either consciously or subconsciously and analyse if it is hindering fighting potential or indeed, potential in other areas of life as well.
In this post, I’ll look at laying a foundation of breathwork that will help with learning evasive body skills (and just about everything else for that matter) and will divide the notes into ten general parts or rather points.
I’ll then continue this write up in a separate post looking at another aspect of preparing for evasion, so as to keep the two ideas clear as these are fundamental ideas that bleed into all other areas of learning, practice and most importantly, performance - without them, all of these will not achieve their potential.