1. Those who expect to find techniques that are devastating, savage, and aggressive, techniques that brutalize the opponent and that allow them to easily defeat any adversary. They want to be invincible!
2. Those who expect to find in Systema a martial art that develops their inner energy, chi or ki, with techniques that transcend the physical realm and that, with no effort nor pain, allow them to easily defeat any adversary. They also want to be invincible!

• See the person and not their diagnosis/physical imitations. Don\'t assume the person can\'t do something, you\'re there to show them how they can.
• Think Systema and view the student in many forms; always changing; always adapting, help your student learn to do and study everything regardless of their physical, developmental or social limitations. However, keep in mind a person with autism may struggle with social queues and their dependence on routine makes it a challenge for any instructor.
• Systema can be applied to various ages and levels of cognitions and can be started as early as one likes, however, be aware that the person\'s capacity will limit the progress and level of interaction.
• Young children with special needs do well with games and activities.
• Implement breathing from the very beginning to help the child link their breathing to their movement.
• Children, youth, and adults with autism need special attention to detail and taking a meticulous approach to your work with them will increase one\'s creativity.
• Many people with autism are known for their mimicking behavior, thus, if you move soft and smooth, then your student will pick up on this very quickly.

• Autistic individuals often require constant reassurance and praise, therefore, after every direction to my young student, I praise and congratulate him (even if the task is as simple as inhaling through the nose and exhaling through the mouth). Remember, you may need to repeat yourself several times before getting a result.
• Patience is indeed a virtue.
• One must remember that if you are not emotionally interested in the person you\'re teaching, then, the student will notice your lack of care. Often a person with autism may have limited social interaction, yet, many can also be very receptive and highly sensitive to your mood, tone of voice, direction and even touch.

• Tissue Impact
• Bodyweight Massage
• Percussive Massage
• Joint Tapping
• Visceral Pressures

So don’t be fooled. Every form of competition-orientated martial arts (including UFC and cage fights) has very little or nothing to do with a real self-defense conflict.
There is no sport competition where you face the attacker who in the next second will attempt to hurt you deliberately or even kill you. There are no competitions where the mental condition of the attacker is so escalated that he seems to gain overwhelming power and feels no pain at all.
Realization hits the unprepared victim like a thunderbolt when his favorite technique that worked at the dojo every time won’t work at all against an attacker as described.
By this point, stress begins to limit the victim’s capabilities to defend themselves.

Countless big masters of the martial arts have trained endlessly to perfect their technical skills, but only few have considered the possibility that their technical skills might become blocked and unusable by the stress of a real threat. This explains how all-too-often, a well trained martial artist is defeated by a technically untrained street thug.

To understand the influence of stress, it is important to dive into its phenomenon and its effects on the motoric abilities. I’ll give you a brief scenario.

Imagine you are in dark alley at night. A man is coming directly towards you, wearing worn out clothes. A hood covers his face. Shortly before you pass, he jumps in front of you, you see something in his right hand, probably a knife. The man is shouting at you in a fiercely aggressive voice...

First, it is useful to know what processes take place in a human body during such a situation. The human eye is capable of sending between 2 – 3 million bits of information to the brain within a second. But the brain‘s capacity of processing the incoming information is limited to about 7 information bits per second, which includes the information from all senses (sound, smell, feeling etc.). So it is absolutely necessary for the brain to use filters to overcome the overwhelming input of information. Such filters can be “familiar situations”. For example, people, things or situations which are classified as “normal” can be habitual to the brain and are not registered as highly important.

Another significant filter function is the fixation on information that is classified as “unknown” or “dangerous”. If the incoming information is classified as “dangerous”, all other incoming stimuli will be set back by the brain. This again is not limited to the eyes, but on the input of all senses at once. A typical outcome of this filtering is the so called “tunnel vision”.
Tunnel vision often appears in self defense situations, as a detrimental phenomenon. The fixation on what the brain considers most dangerous could be a fatal error, because other circumstances which might be more dangerous are not recognized.

A simple example is a multiple attacker situation, where the brain unconsciously determines one of the attackers as the principal threat usually because he is the biggest or loudest in the group. The fixation on this person means that the others in the group are not perceived with the same level of attention, or even blended out completely. Subsequently, an attack from those others will hit the victim by surprise. This fact is certainly known on the criminals’ side as well. Street gangs who coordinate their attacks use this tactic of distracting the victim on one side, while attacking from the other.

The perception of the dangerous stimulus is only the first step in the chain of brain reactions. In this phase, it is critical whether the stimulus is also a new experience. The combination of dangerous and new is the basis for the following high-stress-phase.

Perception of the stimulus causing high-stress requires a time consuming decision by the brain. At the onset of this process, the body reacts with a complete stop of all movements. The well-known expression that one is “paralyzed by fear”, or scientifically “vagotonic shock-phase”, explains the moments where the body is not able to move or react. The duration of this phase typically varies from 0.6 seconds up to 20 seconds and can be even longer. The factors influencing the duration:

1. How dangerous and intense the stimulus is
2. Individual experiences and personal attitudes towards the stimulus
3. Action competence through training
4. Arousal level influenced by fear, anger and other emotions

In other words, the more familiar a person is with a dangerous stimulus (through adequate preparation and training) the shorter the paralyzing shock-phase is.
Longer shock phases on the other hand are usually caused by past incidents associated with negative experiences (injuries, pain, etc.). In the case of the latter, the stimulus often leads the victim to a complete standstill where no movement is possible. Self-defense in this state of mind is impossible even if under normal circumstances the victim would technically be able to deal with the assault. Consequently, how can we deal with the impact of stress in a real self defense situation?

First, it must be stated that every form of street violence is a highly exceptional situation for an average person. In most cases, the victim has never before encountered such a situation. This is even more true when he or she is threatened with a weapon and uncontrolled aggression.

It is helpful to examine how conventional martial arts training can influence the length of the shock phase, because we now know, that proper training can shorten this timing drastically. As previously mentioned, traditional martial arts training typically consists of practicing a variety of techniques repeatedly, or a defense against a fixed attack in a more or less sterile dojo-atmosphere. This form of training doesn’t take into account the most important aspects affecting the length of the shock phase:

• The aggression of the attacker which clearly shows the defender that he or she has to prepare for heavy consequences
• The atypical setting and situation (for example confined space, crowd and noise)
• The confrontation with a real weapon (such as a real knife, not a rubber one as in the gym)
• But because these factors are rarely covered by conventional martial arts training, it is quite likely that in a dire situation, the length of the shock phase will not be shortened hindering self-defense capability.

The aim of realistic self defense training must therefore go beyond the necessary technical aspects and include realistic simulation of potential situations and surroundings to familiarize the student. The best result is for the student to interpret a vastly aggressive situation as a regular and not high stress stimulus. The practicing of similar inputs during training will allow the situation to not be classified as new and highly dangerous anymore. There will be no shock-phase and the defender will be able to react against an attack instantly.
Some examples of such training:

• Training in unknown areas (make use of parking lots, bars, simulate trains, the inside a bus, etc.)
• Training with low light and in street clothing
• Practice with opponents you don’t know well
• Make use of deceptively realistic weapons (true weight steel blunt knife for instance) and tell the students that you will do a lesson with a real knife without telling them that it is blunt
• Make use of role playing (as in a bar situation, where you can simulate the realistic escalation of some aggressive actions)
• Try to simulate aggression not only by physical attacks but also through linguistic violence (shouting, insulting, etc.)

Systema training and especially the breathing methods, can really help to deal with dangerous situations. Through breathing, the defender is able to reduce the level of stress in a very short period of time so that the high stress level is not being reached even if the situation is considered new and dangerous. During my work with the SWAT unit, I used the Systema breathing method successfully to calm down before going into dangerous assaults.
This alone is one of the biggest advantages of Systema against other self defense systems and ironically it has no apparent connection with fighting at all.

The second phase of dealing with an aggressive self defense situation, which I would call “reaction-phase”, will be covered in a following article if of interest.]]> training@russianmartialart.com (Norbert Tannert) Systema Training http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=article_info&articles_id=104 http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=article_info&articles_id=104 Wed, 05 Nov 2014 21:56:42 -0500
The drive to be better. The first surprise when encountering Systema is the silence. In a well-lighted gym robust men calmly and orderly work through seemingly simple moves, interchanging them with sudden escapes, turns, and grabs. No leaps and shouts, nobody assumes stances that look like comic-book pictures. The instructor Vladimir Vasiliev remarks on what is taking place without raising his voice…

The school of Russian Martial Art that he founded in Toronto in 1993 received world-wide acclaim. The history tells us that this kind of martial art dates back to the 10-th century, the age of Ilya Muromets and other epic bogatyrs (warrior heroes). Nowadays its elements and principles are used in training and preparing the special operations soldiers.

- Who is a good warrior? One who is, above all, healthy, both in body and in spirit, - says Valerie Vasiliev, wife and helper of Vladimir. – He is then able to neutralize the enemy and to wage combat for a very long time without losing strength.
The fundamental principle of Systema is that a person should not be fighting aggressively, out of fear. People are taught how to control their inner state. A calm person can defend himself and others, not feel stress after a fight, and continue to live to the utmost in the family and in the society.

We work in Toronto for 23 years already. Started with a small group, and now there is a huge number of people training, every week we have 10 adult and 3 children’s classes.

The school became an international center, Systema Headquarters, people come from different countries.
Now Vladimir has more than 200 schools and more than 600 instructors all over the world. Each of them went through a certification process which allowed them to teach Systema. For example, in today’s class there are two people from Japan, four from Australia, and there are also people from USA, from France. They come – some for a week, some for a month, some even come for a year – live here and train to master this art…

Once every two years we organize a summer camp, this year we called it “Full Immersion Camp”, 150 people from different countries live in a forest by a lake and train from 7:00am until 11:00pm, for a whole week. They learn how to fight in the field, in the forest, and in the water, and in a way that enables them to do so in the dark as well. The camp is health-promoting, with the exercise, swimming, and full training…

- Starting with what age do you accept students into your school?

- The children’s class is from 8 to 17 years old, they train separately 3 times a week. The age for an adult class is from 17 and up; we even had people over 70 who trained very successfully. What is good about this style is that you do not need to do anything complex, no leg splits, leaps, big swings. Only what is simple and natural. One who is healthy and strong can do push-ups, heavy punches, etc. One who is weaker shouldn’t lose the fight despite his physical condition, because he learned to stay calm, regulate his breathing, see the situation, move correctly…

- How is Russian martial art different from the Eastern martial arts?

- Physical difference is that there are no stances, no “katas” – memorized moves. Vladimir does not even recommend to memorize anything. Because in a real battle the main thing for a person is to triumph over his own fear and not freeze. As soon as he froze, this is when he can receive a punch, a knife wound, etc.

The main thing is to be skilled in controlling one’s emotions, not give in to panic and confusion. If a person is tense, it means he didn’t yet master Systema. And if he is relaxed, and at the same time reacts speedily and precisely – then he is ready, and he already won the major part of the fight.

Another thing – in Systema practical situations are taught. For example, to fight in a crowd, to use your clothing and things that surround you as a weapon, to defend oneself in a car, in tight space, and to survive in any difficult situation.

- Do women also train with you?

- In the martial art classes – rarely. After all, what goes on there is real work – punches, physical contact, wrestling – and it isn’t something that suits many women.

For women we have excellent classes on “Breathing and health improvement” twice a week. All the exercises there are individual, no physical contact with others, the load is not strenuous, and the effect is magnificent.

- How can one understand if a person fits into Systema?

- We offer two trial classes for $20, no obligations, if you liked it, you stay. If, by chance, an aggressive person comes, after trying a few classes he either changes his approach or leaves. Many people train for years, sometimes they take a break and then return again.

We are in a constant contact, we send advice on training, articles, answer the questions. Our students do not need to prove anything, we do not have competition, we have serious training and excellent interaction. People become friends for life…

The class ended, and Vladimir Vasiliev joined our conversation:

- Systema changes people, they become stronger but kinder. Calmer. It is understood, of course, that if strength needs to be applied in a situation, then each one exercises his skills. What is especially good is that Systema provides you with something positive, not a negative, every day.
In other sports it happens that people are tired after training, they go back out into the street and cannot walk, everything is shaking, arms-legs. It is the opposite by us – after the training you leave the gym feeling vigorous, robust, not weakened.

In camp people train for 3-4 hours straight, then they laugh, wrestle… The body gets tired, but the spirit is vigorous…

The Systema school is located at:
39 Glen Cameron Rd Unit 2 Thornhill ON L3T 1P1
(Yonge Street north of Steeles Ave)
905.881.4711
Toll free: 1.866.993.0400
]]> training@russianmartialart.com () Systema Training http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=article_info&articles_id=103 http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=article_info&articles_id=103 Sat, 08 Mar 2014 00:00:00 -0500

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Spend 20 years in a field you're passionate about—when this issue of Black Belt hits the newsstand, I'll have edited articles for two decades—and it's easy to conclude you've seen and heard it all. It's a fair assumption, but it's a dead giveaway that the person doing the assuming has never been face to face with Vladimir Vasiliev.

The day of the photo shoot that yielded the images you see here will go down in my mental history, for it marked the first time I ever had an exchange like this:

Me: ‘Could you show us the first systema defense you want to demonstrate? That was perfect! Can you do it again for the camera?’
Vasiliev: ‘No.’
Me (my eyes bugged out and my jaw no doubt hanging slack): ‘You can't?’
He shook his head, then explained that in systema, everything a practitioner does is predicated on the actions and position of the opponent. If said opponent feeds the systema stylist a slightly different attack or even the same attack from a different angle, the response will be different—sometimes radically.

The Russian summed up his position in perfect-though-accented English: ‘I can't promise to do it again exactly the same way.’

At first, I thought it might be a touch of subconscious posturing, the kind you occasionally get from men at the top of their food chain—which is where Vasiliev has been since 1993, the year he set up shop in Toronto and founded the first systema facility outside Russia. But then, as the day wore on, the pieces fell into place. I saw plenty of evidence that what Vasiliev had explained was an essential component of his fighting philosophy. Before the session ended, I was a believer. The way the Russian and one of his instructors, Los Angeles-based British expat Martin Wheeler, who three days earlier headlined a systema ground-fighting photo shoot, had responded to every attack they faced was completely dependent on the nuances of the attacks.

That's not to say systema asks students to memorize thousands of moves for every conceivable situation, thus leaving them vulnerable to the much-talked-about mental logjam. No, Vasiliev and Wheeler seemed to respond with attacks and defenses that fit the situation—there's no other way to describe it. Nothing fancy, just the perfect choice for a given moment. When you think about it, that's the best any of us can expect from ourselves in a fight.

Mystery Demystified

All that isn't to say systema owes its existence solely to Soviet science of the Cold War era. The moves that make it up are believed to date back more than a millennium. ‘Russian warriors acquired a style that combined strong spirit with extremely innovative and versatile tactics that were practical, deadly and effective against any type of enemy under any circumstances,’ Vasiliev writes on his website. ‘The style was natural and free while having no strict rules, rigid structure or limitations (except for moral ones). All tactics were based on instinctive reactions, individual strengths and characteristics, specifically designed for fast learning.’

Systema is big on deleting tension from the self-defense equation. ‘You should use your movements to remove excess tension,’ Vasiliev said. ‘This way,you are always ready and free for your next action.’

Versatile, natural, no strict rules, instinctive reaction, no tension—after the photo shoot, I'd agree with all those descriptors. Apparently, Black Belt contributing editor Floyd Burk is way ahead of me on this one: Two years ago when we asked some of the movers and shakers of the industry to list their top 10 arts for self-defense, Burk replied with this: ‘Most people who observe this Russian fighting style will appreciate the spontaneity with which practitioners can fend off armed and unarmed attacks. It's practical and effective without the nonessentials.’

That's what I was going to say.

Looks Should Be Deceiving

‘There are times when deliberately unusual and less-natural body positions are needed in confrontations, but these would be assumed for tactical and strategic reasons to manipulate your opponent into the behavior you need.’

How are you supposed to know which position is best for a given adversary and assume it in time? The oft-repeated attribute known as situational awareness, Vasiliev said. ‘In systema, we have many exercises to specifically develop awareness of your opponent and your distance from him. You should feel comfortable to act, and there should be no excessive tension.’

I asked Vasiliev to demonstrate how that natural stance works. He stood there, seemingly unprepared for what was about to come his way. The opponent closed the gap and initiated his attack. Vasiliev's response entailed kicking him in the thigh—which dropped him like a sack of potatoes—and landing a punch to the back of the neck on the way down.

‘You kick his quadriceps not to damage the leg but to debilitate the muscle so it can no longer hold up the person,’ Vasiliev said. ‘The kick is not hard, but it's precise so that even in light shoes or bare feet, it will be effective.

‘As with all systema strikes, you must hit unexpectedly so the attacker is shocked but not in pain or anger. Pain and anger can cause him to strike and punch needlessly. If you hit properly, he will be off-balance and will fall onto you. This is very convenient for your further control. You now have a choice of finishing moves—again, not to injure him but to disorient him.’

Another way systema exploits the power of deception was revealed in a self-defense sequence in which Vasiliev dispatched a man who was about to uncork a haymaker. ‘The opponent prepares for the strike—there is no need for you to change your position yet,’ he said. ‘While he approaches, take a small step to the right; this should be done exactly with his movement so he will not see it. Raise your right arm—be sure to choose a trajectory he won't see from his viewpoint. Keep your shoulders down so he won't be able to tell what your intentions are and adjust his strike accordingly.’

Backup Plan

‘Hit the muscles not to destroy them but to debilitate them and switch them off temporarily. This way, the leg is no longer functioning to support the body. An accurate hit causes the leg to give. He will no longer be able to kick or strike with his hand.’

The goal, Vasiliev teaches, is to gain control of the assailant using economy of motion and unpredictable techniques. If that fails, however, you'll likely need to be able to take a punch before you can implement a backup plan—which is precisely why systema training devotes so much time to staying functional while you're taking enemy fire.

‘No matter how good you are, you will get hit,’ Vasiliev said. ‘Maybe it's because you didn't see the strike. Maybe it's because you moved into its path. Maybe it's because it was more powerful than you anticipated.’

In a previous interview published in Black Belt, he explained his rationale using an incident he's seen replayed ad infinitum in his schools: ‘A new student joins in. We begin a mass-attack drill, where everyone comes to the center of the gym and is hitting in all directions. Right away, the new guy gets punched on the head, turns to see who did it and gets ready to hit him back. At that moment, he receives a punch from the other side, and, with anger building, he turns to that side, his fist ready to fly in that direction. And then he is hit again from the opposite side. Finally, he realizes that ‘punch for punch' doesn't work in a mass attack, so he exhales and starts punching those who are close by and not those who hit him.

‘Unfortunately, most of us have an almost automatic response: When a strike touches us, we immediately go to retaliate. This is caused by pride. Systema training for taking punches deals directly with this pride.’

The only way to minimize the effect, whether immediate or long term, incurred from a blow is through another unexpected facet of systema, he said. ‘With proper breathing, it's difficult to sustain an injury. And if trauma does happen, the damage is a lot less severe than it would have been otherwise.’

The reason stems from the nature of a strike, which he described as a sudden force or impact that increases inner pressure in the recipient. ‘It's a quick transfer of tension from person to person,’ he said. ‘The tension comes not only from the physical impact but also from your perception of threat and pain.’

Let's say you're moments from getting gut-punched. The fear you feel as you see the incoming fist causes tension, and that tension creates more fear. The resulting fear manufactures even more tension and so on. Breathing, Vasiliev said, is the way to stop that from escalating.

Breathe right and the impact will be dissipated, the tension won't build and there will be minimal bruising, he tells his students. ‘Even a powerful punch will bring no damage physically or psychologically. Breathing helps eliminate the tension and thus removes the pain and negative feelings.’

How it works: ‘Keep your mouth lightly closed so air can move freely in through the nose and out through the mouth,’ Vasiliev said. At the moment of impact, allow the air to exit your mouth. Tensing up and holding your breath when you're about to be hit is the worst thing you can do, he said, because the pressure that comes with a punch or kick will have nowhere to go—which is why it damages tissue.

That's why systema teaches practitioners to take short breaths when the heat is on. A series of short inhalations and exhalations decreases the likelihood that you'll be caught in the middle of one long inhale or exhale, and it enables you to keep your torso in a more defensible condition. ‘If you only breathe with the top part of your lungs, your stomach muscles will remain slightly contracted even after a punch and the punch will remain on the surface,’ Vasiliev said previously. ‘This type of breathing allows you to take a series of punches while staying mobile.’

Learning to do this in a fight, of course, takes plenty of practice under a qualified instructor. If nothing else, my 20 years at Black Belt has taught me that when it comes to self-defense, a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing without proper guidance.

And that's precisely why I walked out of the Vladimir Vasiliev photo shoot with one thought: How far away is the nearest systema school?

THE MAN BEHIND THE MARTIAL ART

I have had the privilege to train under many great martial artists over the decades—men who have honed their skills through determination, rigorous training and full-contact experience. To describe Vladimir Vasiliev as simply the best one of them does him a disservice. His movement, his physical ability, the deep internal relaxation he has cultivated—all are attributes associated with a true legend. But the road he has taken to get there is not one many could have traveled. As a highly decorated member of the Russian special-operations group known as the Spetznaz, Vasiliev trained under such men as Col. Mikhail Ryabko, founder of systema. While doing that, Vasiliev experienced things that would be difficult to justify even within our highest-level military units—of course, in actual combat. Despite those brutal hardships, he is the most gentle of men. He's humble, sincere and filled with a genuine desire to share his amazing art as if it were a gift. The systema he teaches is profound and unique, as much a map of the human condition as a martial art. If I were to say Vladimir Vasiliev is simply the most decent human being I have ever met, I think that would be the most accurate description. His martial art, if you have been lucky enough to experience it, is purely an expression of that.

–Martin Wheeler

About the author: Robert W. Young is the executive editor of Black Belt. For more information about systema, visit russianmartialart.com.

TAKE OUT THE LEG: Vladimir Vasiliev (right) remains in a natural, nonthreatening stance when confronted by an attacker (1). As soon as the man starts to close the gap, Vasiliev drives a front kick into his quadriceps—not to damage muscle tissue but to temporarily ruin the leg's ability to support him (2-3). Because he's not out to hit with maximum power, it's easier for the systema expert to execute the technique without being noticed by the assailant (4). As a follow-up, Vasiliev can deliver a light strike to the back of the head or neck to disorient the man (5-7). From that position, it's relatively easy to control him.

NEUTRALIZE THE PUNCH: In a natural stance, Vladimir Vasiliev (left) faces the opponent (1). The man prepares to strike, but Vasiliev doesn't move (2). It's only when the man approaches that Vasiliev steps slightly to his right—while the opponent is moving, which reduces the chance that he'll notice (3). Next, the systema master raises his right arm and uncorks a punch that has the fist follow a path of minimimal detection. (4). Vasiliev then redirects the arm downward (5). He uses his left hand to control the man's back and to prevent him from retreating while he uses his right thumb to hit him in the throat (6-7). His balance disrupted, the opponent falls, and Vasiliev moves his left hand to the back of the man's head to maintain the pressure of thumb to throat and to ‘lead’ him down to the ground in the event he grabs Vasiliev (8). He then can follow up or flee as the situation demands.

INTERCEPT THE KICK: The assailant (right) rushes forward and attempts to kick Vladimir Vasiliev (1). From his natural stance, Vasiliev uses his left foot to hit the side of the man's knee and begin rotating his body (2). Using his right hand, the systema instructor puts pressure on the opponent's left arm to further disrupt his balance and to give himself the option of delivering an unobstructed blow to the face (3). As the opponent falls, Vasiliev controls him with his right leg (4). He can use the leg to cushion his fall, thus making sure the man doesn't hurt himself when he hits the ground (5-7), or he can continue the counterattack by placing his knee under the falling foe's head (not shown). Systema philosophy encourages practitioners to use minimal force in self-defense situations.

STRIKE THE THIGH: Systema stylist Vladimir Vasiliev (right) assumes a natural stance in front of his opponent (1). As the man readies a kick, Vasiliev takes a small step to his left (2). It's crucial for him to act while the opponent is still concentrating on his attack because he's more vulnerable. Vasiliev uses his left fist to strike the lower part of the man's inner thigh (3). Unable to use that leg for support, the opponent can't stand or complete his punch (4-5). Off-balance and helpless, the adversary can be hit again, if necessary—a strike to the cheek, rather than the bony parts of the face, will protect the defender's fingers from damage (6). Note how Vasiliev steps slightly to the left to prevent his chest muscles from becoming too tense and to allow his right arm to punch freely.]]> training@russianmartialart.com (Robert Young) Systema Training http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=article_info&articles_id=100 http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=article_info&articles_id=100 Mon, 29 Apr 2013 13:21:36 -0400 It was my first day back in Vancouver after visiting the Toronto HQ for a dose of excellent training, I felt clear and recharged. Being as I had been away from home for a few weeks, I needed to run some errands and headed out to talk a brisk walk to my destinations.

I had been doing karate for 2 years that time. I took part in many competitions and I was really good at it in my category. I trained with nunchaks as well.

In pyjamas and slippers I got up, took nunchaks, which I had next to my bed, and I started going through our house. Our parents slept on the first floor. There, I heard some rustling. I found out, that next to my parents room, the balcony doors were open. I went to the balcony and saw a figure climbing down. I ran downstairs and out to the place where I saw this figure. It was February, cold, and I was still in my pyjamas and slippers.

Suddenly, I saw this figure in front of me. I was ready to hit him but he started running around our house, in the direction to the gate next to the garage. I ran after him but he suddenly jumped on the gate. That time I knew that now I had no chance to catch him. So I reached out and hit him with nunchaks. I hit him! He fell down but on the other side of the gate. Then he jumped up from the ground and began to run along the pavement. I ran to the lower gate, jumped over it and followed the thief. I reached him after 500 meters of running. He wasn´t in a very good physical condition. I took him away back to our house and we called the police. They came after about 30 minutes. They started to investigate.

Apparently, he was a soldier, who got drunk and didn´t know what he was doing. The policemen found out, that at the spot around the house where I saw him first, he lost a knife. During investigation, they also discovered that at a nearby house he tried to choke an old woman. She survived but was in shock. The thief constantly talked, he was confused and severely shaken up. This thief ended up in a military prison.

At that time I didn´t think about it, but nowdays I still remind myself of two things.

First, that he lost the knife. What would have happened if he hadn´t lost it? I can´t even imagine it. Because I did karate, but I didn´t know how to response to a knife attack. I am glad that Mikhail and Vladimir are giving us their experiences on how to work with the knife. Both of them know exactly what they are doing. I can recommend to you their seminars or you can learn from their DVDs. Especially the last one: Knife in a Fight. No one can be ensured that they will not be attacked, especially with a knife. Today in the Czech Republic, knife attacks dominate. It´s almost a daily routine.

Second image for me to remember is when the thief jumped over the gate, he got a blow with nunchaks from me. I hit his back, but what if his head was there? I think that in that case, I would be the one going to prison! In Systema, we learn how to stay calm and damage the other person as little as possible. Each situation can be resolved in many ways. In my opinion and the opinions of experts, Systema solves problems in the most humane way. Calmness gives you precision and sureness, reaction will be fast and simple. You will destroy the opponent‘s form and then you just control him.

You can practice some special technique against a certain attack a thousand times, but if the opponent uses a different way of attack, you will not know how to react.

That´s why Systema puts such big emphasis on natural movement. In most cases, we don´t know how our opponent will attack us. Systema prepares the students for such situations.

I wish everybody good health, because healthy persons can train and protect themselves. During training, learn how to be calm, study natural movement, breathing, sensitivity, humility and other important features, which you need in daily life.

As we approached the escalator (it was rush hour), we took the stairs. Here I noticed something more suspicious going on. There was an average dressed man standing right behind an elderly German couple on the escalator. He pulled out a large map, but not for its conventional purpose. This man was using it to cover other people’s view while he rifled through the poor old woman’s backpack, and he wasn’t working alone. Behind this thief, there was a very well dressed man and you would never think they are associated in any way. The first thief’s job was to pickpocket the goods and then subtly pass them on to the well dressed guy behind him. The former would then run off if/when suspected, while the other seemingly innocent would be able to escape with the stolen property unnoticed.

As I am not a police officer, I was content at stopping the crime from occurring (I was on a short holiday after all) and continued to observe the two pick pockets as they got off the escalator. At this point, I intervened to prevent the theft from happening. I simply reached across to the map and said “Hey, what are you doing?” The thief got scared and before he managed to steal or pass anything off to his accomplice, he took off. My wife was impressed too.

I remained aware and awake to my environment for several hours after the incident and was able to observe the pick pocketing system throughout the city, including the drop off point at the corner of a side street off La Rambla, the city’s main thoroughfare.

I have been surprised at how much my situational awareness has grown since the Systema Camp this summer. I feel as if I had been wearing blinkers before. What is more, I have also become more conscious of how many people are oblivious to their surroundings and engulfed in their own thoughts and internal conversations. They become deaf, dumb and blind to the actions and intentions of other people in their environment. I attribute these positive behavioral changes to my continuing practice of Systema tension and relaxation exercises which allow me to develop conscious awareness of my body whilst stilling the mind and emptying it of unnecessary thoughts. This, in turn, has helped me to develop a relaxed alertness of what is happening around me at any given time.   To me this is the essence of self-defense, remaining awake and developing a relaxed vigilance of your environment, avoiding the stories which your subconscious mind is attempting to lure you with, for example, that the extremely attractive girl in her mid 20’s is flirting with you because you really are that attractive… Always remember, as Marcus Tullius Cicero wrote: “True nobility is exempt from fear.”

He then demonstrated on me physically a dozen different prison knife killings that he had either observed or cleaned up after. The setup, the attack, the follow-through. Though he was a cheerful guy and it was all done with a smile, it was one of the most horrifying experiences of my life because I had no idea what was happening in any of the attacks. They came out of nowhere, I saw nothing, and all I felt was the total BAD INTENTIONS as his pseudo-blade (just a stick, because to him we were just playing around) impacted me over and over within less than a second.

These attacks were so incredibly sneaky in setup, yet so natural in action that, cheesy as it may sound, I hesitate even to write them up in case somebody picks up on it and does it to somebody for real. From that moment to now, I have had nothing but absolute fear and loathing on the subject of real world knife attacks.

But so what? After all, he was a corrections pro demonstrating a very specialized situation, right? Shank attacks at close quarters in a crowded, more or less locked down venue. No relevance to your life, as you aren't in prison and don't plan on going. But what I took away from it was that people who really know what they're doing, in prison or not, would go at you exactly as he'd shown. So now we get to KNIFE IN A FIGHT (I'll abbreviate it 'KIF' in this article), a new Russian Martial Art training video by Systema master instructor Vladimir Vasiliev.

I've watched many knife defense videos and done lots of edged weapon related training. But nobody hit my hot button, from my experience above, until in the introduction section of KIF, I heard Vladimir say:

"If you see a knife in his hand, lots of people have suggestions - to run away, grab, do something like that. Perfect, that's good - but sometimes the problem is that you didn't see the knife. Then it's already too late. When people start to stab you, it will be too late to run - or maybe you can, but not too far. You need to understand both how the knife came into his hand, and why you didn't see it."

Though I couldn't have articulated it so technically, that's a perfect statement of my feelings after undergoing the demonstration described in my opening. KIF is geared to the most realistic, most difficult, most frightening, most professional scenario. Why couldn't I see the attack? Why was I utterly unable to react?

KIF contains dozens of exercises clearly described, thoroughly and awesomely demonstrated, that will lead the viewer to an understanding of this horrifying topic that is far deeper than any other teaching material I've seen. Everything is laser-focused on how to develop the acute sensitivity that is your first and last defense and really your only salvation in a knife attack carried out with serious intent.

Vladimir's body effortlessly expresses that quality of extreme sensitivity in every one of the demo segments, but rather than hot-dog to impress (though it does), Vladimir always treats the demonstrations as his real-time teaching platform. He makes his crucial training commentary in the action context of unscripted movement. So the core integrated elements of this extremely fast, close, secretive, and subtle work (both attack and defense must be jointly understood to master the topic) are separately teased out for isolated inspection, and then reassembled in later drills.

Systema overall is an integrated method of full body/mind training and KIF reflects that. In my past Systema education, I've done some similar knife defense work in Toronto and Moscow sessions, but always in the broader context of Systema movement and combative principles in general. The beauty of KIF is that all the relevant work is collected in a seamlessly focused whole for the first time. I could go on and on listing the many dozens of KIF's training exercises, but that would miss the forest for the trees. You need to hear Vlad's real time commentary as he simultaneously presents the drills and demonstrates the work. It all adds up to the greatest contribution to the scariest topic in all martial arts, and I'm not kidding - experiencing a knife attack by a committed street-wise attacker is in fact THE scariest scenario that martial arts purports to deal with. KIF is the first program that really delivers. I have no doubt that KIF will end up actually saving people's lives who would otherwise die in such attacks.

http://www.russianmartialart.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=225#.UR7rtFrwKnY

Another interesting area in Systema is the ‘short work’. It is a very elegant and efficient way to deal with multiple opponents at once and includes many hidden principles in its application.

I have always been very fascinated by multiple attack scenarios, as it incorporates so many factors crucial for good Systema work. One very interesting aspect is the spatial perception we employ in ‘short work’.

SPATIAL PERCEPTION:

Our brain has many different brain maps (pictures of body parts) not only to control our physical body but for instance, also our immediate environment. Our clothes become part of us as they are integrated into our brain maps. So do tools and equipment that we use a lot. For example, we can easily feel the consistency of food that we are cutting through the knife as if the knife was part of our body.

Brain studies were done on a particular Japanese monkey, which does not use tools in the wild. When given a stick to hold, this was not integrated in the monkey’s brain maps. After training to use a stick for a few weeks, remarkably the stick started to become part of the monkey’s brain maps.

We can see this same effect when we give students a stick to hold for combat. An experienced teacher can spot straight away if a student is familiar with stick work just by the way they hold and handle this object.

Also when we drive our car, our feeling includes the whole car perimeter, not just our body inside the car. We can easily back it into a tight familiar garage. If we now swap cars with similar dimensions but very different shape, we will find that backing it into the same garage is not that easy anymore. We now have to form new, appropriate brain maps which include this new shape. Then it’s back to normal again.

When dealing with opponents, especially multiple opponents, it is important to do the same, namely include them into your brain maps. The important part here is, to learn to include the concept of an opponent(s) with all his/her traits and emotions. (We know from the prior mirrorneuron article that it is actually a projection of OUR emotions from his/her behaviour). In order to do this, we do require a certain state of relaxation so as to facilitate mirror neuron action. By doing this consciously we gently direct our attention to this task, thus amplifying the perception.

We might also feel that we control objects such as cars and knives, whereas we do not have the same confidence with our opponents. This however, is another reason why we need to consciously integrate our partners in training so as to cultivate a habit of inclusion and familiarity rather than avoidance and estrangement. We also want to cultivate a habit of generalised perception rather than focussed perception, as we want to become aware of their emotions without being too much infected by them!! This has the effect of helping us relax when confronted by aggression or violence.

In essence, we practice not to fight an external opponent but rather to include them into your brain maps, by making them part of our close environment. It’s almost like we are throwing out a net and capturing our opponents, pulling them in close. Then we play with these integrated brain maps, which include our opponents.

Our brain will do this to a certain extent automatically through our mirror neurons (see mirror neuron article), however, through fear and tension this process can become disjointed. By consciously training to include our opponents/training partners into our brain maps, we accelerate a process of familiarity and relaxation and widen our perception. We focus less just on one adversary at a time or one opponent’s quality at a time. We are working more inclusive with an open perception to all possibilities that present themselves to us.

This greatly improves our spatial efficiency in respect to our work with opponents. It can also allow us to minimise harm to ourselves as well as our opponents/training partners.

EXERCISES: Here are a few examples:

Close your eyes and breathe deeply. Then focus your awareness firstly on your body-outline. Then include awareness of your clothes and integrate them in your brain maps consciously. From there you can play with awareness of your training partners in close proximity and at different distances. You can start with a single partner but make sure you progress to multiple partners simultaneously. Add a variation by having them at different locations. Then the exercise can progress from closed eyes to open eyes. The initial closed eye exercises emphasise the visualisation and reduce the distraction of vision.

Add to it various emotional states from your partners, as well as active and passive focus from your partners on you. Your aim is to first simply feel the presence and location of your training partners. Then you progress to picking up their attitudes and intentions (make sure you include aggressive and violent intentions). You can also play with movements of varying speed.

The important aspect is to have a mental concept (visualisation) of a field (brain map), which includes and perceives your training partners with increasing amount of information. Also, remember partners will not always be in your field of vision, therefore this exercise should teach you heightened awareness of people outside your direct field of vision. Eventually you should progress to full contact exercises with your partners. Always keep track of your breathing rhythm and your heart rate.

In simple terms, you want to start to include everyone in a certain radius in your transient brain maps.

This is an exercise you can also do outside of training, say in a café. Sit as central as you can with people all around you if possible. See how many you can pick up and integrate, then try sensing their state of emotion, their movements. Can you do this simultaneously with multiple people? Does anyone stand out (not visually)? You can have a lot of fun with this training.                  

A very common question for people wishing to study Systema, “what DVDs should I get first?”

The following titles are highly recommended:

Systema Hand to Hand

Systema Breathing

The Combative Body

Breathwork and Combat

Strikes

Escape from Holds

Fundamentals of Knife Disarming

Take advantage of the discounted prices offered with our Combo Packages

Practical and real for confrontations, Short Work is one of the most appealing and challenging in Systema application. It is not to be confused with work at close distance, in fact it has very little to do with distance.

To clarify, we recently asked Systema founders to define Short Work. This is what they said.

Mikhail Ryabko:

It includes movements of minimal quantity and amplitude yet of top precision and power.

Short work is the opposite of moving around a lot, waving, long, broad, fidgety and redundant movements. Instead, movements are concise and calm, contact with the target is instantaneous, with pin-point accuracy and great strength.

Short work usually seems subtle to the observers and comes unexpected to the attacker.

The physical effort to apply short work should be minimal, while the efforts to achieve this level of skill are significant. Systema practitioners gain this skill though learning to control their physical and psychological tension, correct body placement, dynamic breath patterns, developing power-filled fists, freedom of movement, tactical diversity and other key Systema features.

Vladimir Vasiliev:

More specifically, Short Work is the result of the opponents’ tension and your relaxation. In a confrontation, your attacker is either tense and you need to see where or you can force him to tense up wherever you need him to. Then you bounce your strikes and movements off his tension. This allows you to deliver multiple strikes all in one movement. For example, you deliver a punch and your arm does not stop or pause upon contact, it does not return back towards your body but continues to travel and deliver more strikes in various directions.

There is great benefit in learning Short Work, for it allows you to defend from multiple opponents. It enables you to do multifunctional work – defense, offense, redirection and stopping of attacks.

The more tension the opponent has the faster your short work can be. But this does not mean that punches are quick and light, in Short Work the punches are heavy and strong.

Proper Short Work is precision in any direction, where for instance, you can tense up a part of your arm or move it regardless of the position and tension in the rest of your body.

It is extremely hard for the opponent to defend against Short Work. It has a devastating effect on a tense body. The only way to handle Short Work is to eliminate tension.

Very interesting to study and very useful for any confrontation, Short Work is truly a sign of mastery.

It will be clearly explained, openly demonstrated and practiced in a variety of hand to hand and weapons scenarios at the upcoming seminars by Vladimir Vasiliev. Short Work can become your indispensable self-defense weapon.

_______________________________________

]]> training@russianmartialart.com (M. Ryabko & V. Vasiliev) Systema Training http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=article_info&articles_id=83 http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=article_info&articles_id=83 Fri, 10 Aug 2012 14:54:49 -0400 Joao has shared his notes from Vladimir’s seminars, DVDs and online discussions.

HITS, STRIKES, PUNCHES

It is next to impossible to be in a real fight and not take a single hit.

While studying to deliver strikes based on Systema principles, you learn to pick an ideal distance from your partner, you learn to position your body in a straight and natural position, and you learn to align your arm, wrist and hand along solid lines in a relaxed and comfortable way. As a result, you get powerful and precise punches, and your punches do not injure yourself. This is great and exactly what we want, but notice the following: because you are relaxed and position yourself properly - you get minimal rebound and tension, thus you do not feel your own strength. Your partner may experience a powerful punch from you and to you itfeels like a light movement.

Moreover, the partner who is receiving a good “Systema” punch does not see the threat that is usually associated with punches – such as tough poses or facial expressions. Everything is done in a calm, relaxed and friendly way. So not only is the punch strong, it is also unexpected. If the partner on the receiving end did not learn how to take punches and to relax, he may get hurt, so make sure he learns to receive punches before you begin practice.

REDIRECTING

Redirecting takes less physical effort than delivering strikes. Therefore, it is good to use that if you are tired, injured or wounded. Be aware that when the work is quick, the danger for the attackers to get hit by the “friendly fire” is increased. During fast redirecting, fellow attackers can easily receive unexpected and unintended strikes from each other. This could lead to injuries, so be very careful when you practice redirecting.

GRABS

If an attacker grabs hold of you, it’s not necessarily bad. In fact, it’s good to allow him to grab you. That way you know where he is. You’re aware of his exact location and can fight other people simultaneously if necessary.

Don’t break contact. Arms should be sensitive. All the time, when fighting, you must look around, search for other guys, pay attention to the environment. Do not worry about where your opponent is if you’re in contact with him.

SLOW EXERCISES 

Slow exercises done with breathwork are extremely good for working with tendons and developing strong and elastic body. They allow to get rid of lactic acid. They also provide unique work for the fascia tissues and therefore, give us endurance and explosive potential. In addition to that, the nervous system gets stronger and balanced, because there is no stress. Breathwork removes the stress as soon as stress arises.

BREATHWORK IN DAILY LIFE

Watch how you constantly interrupt your normal breathing cycle throughout your regular activities. As soon as you catch yourself holding your breath, even if you have already completed the action, resume full breathing. Gradually you will be catching your breath interruptions half way through the activity and then with practice, at the earlier and earlier stages.

Your goal is not to interrupt your breathing but to accelerate it if your activity requires an additional effort.

INNER BALANCE

It is easy to see how ill we are - as soon as someone praises us, we get proud; as soon as someone criticizes us, we get resentful. We should run away from praise, but we always want more. We should be thankful for criticism, for it teaches us humility, but we get angry or offended. Things are reversed in our world and that destroys our inner balance and the result is fear.

The goal of training is not acquiring many quick and fancy moves, but learning to control your own pride, irritation, fear, anger and self-pity.

UNDERSTANDING SYSTEMA

If you live in harmony with yourself, with the people around you and with nature, evil in the form of an attacker is far less likely to present itself. Bad situations are far less likely to occur.

We train for life, while sometimes in martial arts they prepare for death.

In Systema it is fairly simple: everything that destroys is wrong and everything that strengthens and builds is correct. 

Let’s focus on two of these: darkness and water.  

Darkness has a tremendous impact on how we perceive our surroundings, while water changes our ability to move. We should get great mileage out of this in our training to help eliminate our stereotypical, “cookie-cutter” thinking.  

Here are two useful yet simple exercises for working in “special conditions”.

Getting ready for work in the dark.

Try the following sequence while it’s still light outside:

Stand in a clearing in a park or woods. Mark your spot with an object such as a rock, stick, or a hat. Pick a tree about 10-15 paces away from you. Close your eyes and try to find the tree and get back to the starting spot.

If successful, pick another tree about 10-15 paces away from the first one. Then close your eyes and from the spot, go to the first, then the second tree and without opening your eyes get back exactly to the starting spot.  

If you complete the exercise comfortably after 2 or 3 trials, your special orientation is great. This means that the night will always be your ally. 

Water and strikes.

This exercise is best done with a partner. Pick 10-15 pebbles. Walk into the water until it’s up to your neck. Ask your partner to throw the pebbles into the water, one at a time, landing about 50-80 cm (1.5 – 2.5 ft) away from you. Your job is to catch the pebbles by hand in one move. Your arms and hands stay in the water. Try that and you will quickly get the meaning of shortest trajectory, relaxed body, muscle coordination, and quick reaction – everything required for the development of solid striking skills.

If you were able to catch at least 7 out of 10 pebbles, your strike is going to be unstoppable.

Wishing everyone success in training and great results!

Have you ever wondered how we can sense other people’s movements, intentions and emotions? How we read facial expressions or can control expressing our emotions? Can we really trust our gut feelings? What makes our movements visible or invisible and how does conscious thought and tension interfere with intuitive subconscious action? Where does fighting originate in us? ... In other words, what makes Systema such an effective combat art?

All of these questions have something in common, namely Mirror Neurons – MNs (neuron means nerve cell).

Until recently, it was always thought that we would figure out the opponents intentions and movements by doing this. We first observing them, then create a mental picture and evaluate their movement and expressions through intellectual thinking (cognition), based on our experience and acquired rules. The discovery of MNs has shown us that our brains have a much more elegant and efficient ways.

In short, when we observe another person, our brain will immediately perform this person’s actions using MNs in our own “brain programs”. This happens without us activating our muscles (primary motor maps) and without our conscious awareness. However, everything else is as if we were doing it for real. Our brains will activate hormones and link up emotions and feelings as well as memories just as if we were moving ourselves. The only conscious experience (if any at all) we usually have of this mirroring is a “gut feeling”. This elegant method allows us to immediately figure out an opponent’s intentions via our own intentions that we would have, if using those movements, facial expressions, etc.

As we know from my previous article (Systema, Neurological Reaction Time and Learning), before we become aware of it, our brains will now formulate a response to this observed and mirrored action. If we manage to stay calm and relaxed it is almost like our brains are on autopilot. By the time we react we’ve already been well engaged in our brains. We can see that our actions are starting to intermingle with our opponent’s actions. In order to activate our muscles and avoid confusion however, our brains have specialised areas, which are tracking our movements, distinguishing them from the mirrored movements.

Interestingly, if our own body response turns out as expected our visual picture of ourselves in the brain will be cancelled, so we are not aware of it any longer and can focus entirely on our external opponent(s). We only have an active visual picture of the opponent in our brain. However, if we make a mistake or get caught out, the conscious visual picture of our action remains, thus giving us an opportunity to learn and rectify this mistake. So our nervous system is constantly assessing our performance and comparing it to our expectations.

Since our response is very much tainted by our own training and experiences, these MNs work best for dealing with opponents of similar or familiar background. As soon as we cross cultural, gender or species barriers our MN response will have to be paired with thinking (cognitive) processes based on learned and stored information or past experiences. This requires a lot more brainpower and thus is much slower.

We can therefore see that when a Systema practitioner works with adversaries who do not possess motor programs that respond in an effective defensive way to our innocent, natural movements, their reactions to our actions will be inappropriately delayed. It will be confusing to them or even invisible until it is too late. By the time they experience our intention, they are already heavily under attack. This is what makes our actions invisible. They are simply invisible in the context of their meaning and since the brain sees things instead of the eyes (they just gather and transmit light), those actions can be literally invisible to the brain!

Facial expressions are particularly interesting as they are created from two brain parts, a conscious motor part (Premotor cortex) and a part called Insula, which stores and processes emotions, internal organ sensations, pain maps etc. In other words, it is produced by a dual modus of conscious and subconscious sources. In reverse, when we read a face we run the expression through our MNs, which link into the same two brain areas. This gives us a reading of the voluntary expression, as well as the subconscious emotional expression. This is how we can immediately pick if a facial expression is not genuine, even if we actually can’t put a finger exactly on what is wrong. For instance, a fake smile looks precisely like that…fake. This is a typical situation where you should trust your gut feeling! (It is worth remembering that body posture typically shows emotional influences as well).

 MNs however do not simply respond to visual information of things around us, they also respond to sounds, touch, temperature and abstract symbols like written text and possibly even electromagnetic field changes. That is how we can enjoy books and become emotionally involved in stories. That is why certain sounds can either make our hair stand up or make us feel relaxed. That is also why a certain touch feels threatening to us, where as another might appear harmless.

All this sensory information can activate our MNs in a multimodal way, thus our external world fuses and becomes blurred with our “private” inner world. Like it or not, we are experiencing through our own sensory maps and motor programs our external world as if living it internally and very directly…other peoples actions become our own actions with all OUR associated emotions. This is called “Embodied Simulation” (ES).

In addition to the external triggers of our MNs, we can also trigger them through internal means, which is through our imagination. This, for instance, is exactly what happens when we daydream and visualize a combat scene. We actually relive it internally through embodied simulation…hormone activation, emotions and everything.

Interestingly, we currently know of two types of MNs: broadly congruent mirror neurons (BCMN) and strictly congruent mirror neurons (SCMN). The mixed application of these MNs allows us to learn as if we would have a zoom lens. We can appreciate the general-purpose related movements (BCMN) as well as specific intricate actions (SCMN). BCMN are approximately twice as common in our motor maps and are the MNs we use initially for the ‘principled’ learning of Systema. The more familiar we become with Systema, the more we are able to activate SCMNs and thus, see specific details.

So how can we take advantage of all this knowledge in our training of Systema?

1.     MENTAL CALMNESS:

The first and often stressed as the most important aspect seems to be that we should train with mental calmness (relaxation). If we become tense in our minds through whatever reason, such as fear, impatience etc., we will inhibit MN action thus, we are failing to connect with our opponents and we will struggle to figure them out efficiently.

In order to minimise being infected by mirroring aggression and behaviour of our adversaries we also need to become aware of our “triggers.” What is our emotional baggage and what triggers a stress response (sympathetic nerve response) in us? Systema has many helpful and innovative breathing exercises to help us discover and overcome these idiosyncrasies.

It is also important that when we are training a response to this mirroring, we train with the trigger action!! In other words, when people simply train static techniques out of context, they will not necessarily connect them to a recognised trigger-threat, thus their reaction time will be greatly delayed. In Systema, we tend to work in what is called “play mode”, meaning that we constantly integrate our movement responses with the trigger (mirror) movements. This is crucial to decrease reaction time for combat learning. Interestingly we also see this a lot in nature e.g. young lion cubs play-hunting with one another. If we also use realistic and aggressive trigger-threats (from time to time), we can furthermore train a calm response to an aggressive action by interphasing some control between the MN action and our response.

This is also one reason why we punch and slap each other in order to reduce fear-induced tension and train proper responses to physical insults.

2.     OBSERVATION

We are often taught not to look at an opponent but rather to use peripheral vision. This makes sense when we are in the thick of fighting, as peripheral vision focuses on movement and positioning rather than specific expressions and form, and encourages a more relaxed brain state. Peripheral vision will also improve special awareness of adversaries during multiple attacks, whilst still activating MNs. However, there are times and places where facial (and body) observation is useful to enhance mirror information for us. Of course this also applies when socially interacting with others and when attempting to defuse a situation. In short, use common sense.

3.     MOVEMENT

I think one of the most fascinating and effective principles of Systema combat is that we are using normal, everyday movements and actions where traditionally (evolutionary) humans are using aggression and tension. As we can see from our MN information this is supremely clever for many reasons:

·       Firstly we can confuse and slow down our adversary’s response as they are struggling to make sense of our attacks. Even experienced fighters will struggle, as their ingrained cues of defence are not activated properly.

·       Whilst our calm actions can induce confusion and fear in our opponents, they can also reduce a hurried attack as our calmness can be infectious (through their MNs) and slow down their rhythm and reduce their aggression.

·       These relaxed movements allow us to escalate in speed if necessary but also they enhance our MN perception of our attackers. We become one with them, which improves our ability to read them and anticipate their next move.

·       Another brilliant feature of Systema is the “leaving things behind.” By learning to touch or leave parts of our body on our opponents without threat (see MN information), we can take advantage of a given entry to counterattack. Very much like the Trojan horse.

We also know from our information on MNs that we learn by mirroring through two different ways; one is firstly via gross movements that are mostly outcome based. These will usually not look quiet right yet and will carry too much tension, however we have not formed our correct brain programs yet. Then the more skilled we become, the more we can take advantage of (and see) detail in what we are learning (see BCMN and SCMN). That is why a skilled practitioner will work with much more detail and foresight as well as less effort than a beginner.

4.     FEELING and VISUALISING

As we understand now, MNs are truly multimodal, meaning they transmit information that is visual (actions, writing, films etc.), touch, smell and temperature (sensory), hearing (auditory) and more. It therefore makes sense to train by using all our senses rather than just vision (and thinking). This is also why Mikhail and Vladimir teach us to feel rather then think when training (analysing is for before and after training, feeling is for during training!).

In order not to overload our conscious nervous system it is also wise to be aware of our different senses and by being calm, to let the mind prioritise them. Pay attention during training how each sense can give you information of different ranges and of different qualities!! For instance, you may smell an adversary before you see him, you may sense his body heat giving you information, you may hear his elaborate breathing etc. Use it to your advantage by being relaxed, calm and maximising your MN input.

Also note that daydreaming or visualising can be a very good supplement to training as it can activate our MNs and help us train while we are “resting”.

Further, let’s not forget that when we make a mistake while training, the visual picture of that action remains so we have a chance to correct it. How elegant and beautiful is our nervous system?

We should now understand why we are taught in Systema to work with our opponents not against them! We already have all the information necessary running through our brain programs, we just need to decrease conscious interference and allow our training to be activated (trust).

We are actually fighting in our brains and that is where most confrontations are won or lost.

For a great example of this, watch Stealth Striking by Mikhail Ryabko: http://www.russianmartialart.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=22&products_id=178

Mikhail Ryabko

If someone attacks you or your family and you already know that you will be fighting – do not be nervous and do not add emotional content, just work.

Do not break the person; break his desire to attack you.

Provide an illusion that your opponent still has control, but make sure he does not.

Those who think they are very strong die first in conflicts.

Every person that works with you is your instructor. And those who want to beat you up are your best instructors.

Vladimir Vasiliev

When you know there will be a fight – start relaxing beforehand. Do not try to fight, just work.

Control the situation in such a way that nobody understands how you control it.

Remove yourself not just from the line of attack, but from line of opponent’s attention.

When you counter on the move, the strikes seem to come out of nowhere.

When you hit somebody – remain human.

People die from non-lethal wounds, yet do not die from lethal ones, all depends on whether you mentally give up.

Konstantin Komarov

Endurance is a psychological phenomenon.

Your emotional base controls the situation.

The more you discover yourself, the more tension you see in yourself.

There are several ways to remove stress, the most important are breathing and movement.

The stronger someone grips you, the more you need to relax.

People do not die from wounds or impact, they die because they cannot handle psychological effect of the impact.

translated by Dmitry Trufanov

There is a key factor in Systema shooting, which has to do with breathing. Shooting in real situations and therefore in Systema training is done mostly on the move. Thus you cannot apply breath holds as recommended by many other schools of shooting. When actively moving about, the body’s oxygen demand is high and breath holding would lead to excessive excitation of one’s psyche and muscle tone. Therefore, breathing on the move should circulate freely and continuously.

Hence the need for the correct type of breathing, which does not affect the shoulder level even at a very high work load. This means that inhalation and exhalation should be done mostly with the diaphragm and abdomen, rather than chest and shoulders. Let’s use a simple drill to check if your breathing is a good fit for shooting on the move.

Take 10 pebbles and throw them into a tree trunk from a distance of about 15 ft (4-5 m). Do not spend more than 15 seconds for the 10 throws. Complete 3 series of 10 throws each and calculate your average success rate (total number of hits divided by the number of series). Then complete 25 squats while holding your breath, then as you start recovery, immediately do 10 throws in less than 15 seconds. Remember your result.

Then do the same after 25 pushups while holding your breath, then after 25 leg raises, also with breath holding. Calculate your new average success rate and compare it with the previous result achieved with normal breathing.

Note that the number of Systema core exercises (squats, pushups and leg raises) can be less or more depending on your physical abilities.

If the new result is lower by 30% (i.e. by 3 hits per series) or more, then you most likely have adopted a counterproductive type of breathing not suitable for shooting on the move. This means that during intensive breathing you engage your shoulders, neck and many other muscles that are not needed for the task.  This in turn brings excessive tension to the body and psyche.

So, how does one develop correct breathing? It’s very simple! Practice Systema breathing exercises gradually and regularly. Once in a while ask someone experienced to observe your breathing and provide feedback. 

If you are a confident shooter and have access to a range, try doing this exercise with a pistol. You will need an upper-body target at a distance of about 25 ft. (8 m) and 5 bullets per series. Facing the target, shoot from the chest level while holding the pistol in one hand. While shooting, keep walking on the spot. The sequence and result calculation is the same as with the pebble drill described above, but a 20% reduction in hit rate is now considered significant.

Give it a try. Monitor and correct yourself. Let us know how it worked for you. Best of luck!

Enjoy the essential breath program for persons of any age, any fitness level and any profession who wish to get more proficient, stronger and healthier.

Vladimir: I find that despite the large size of seminar groups, it is getting easier to teach Systema. This is because many people are seeing the depth of this training. There is less superficial interest in tricks and techniques, rather people think and analyze more.  A greater number of people are now ready for the more profound work of overcoming themselves. It was an amazing positive working atmosphere at both seminars.

Reporter: Systema is rapidly growing. What are the goals of training and developing this beautiful art?

Vladimir: Just recently, we have discussed this with Mikhail Ryabko. The goals in Systema are the same as for every aspect of our lives. For those who are religious, we can say that in whatever we do, we try to glorify God. For those who are not or not sure, we say that we train to get healthier and stronger; and thus, give more to the people around us. We train to see and understand our limitations, but that does not get us discouraged, because Systema gives us the tools to overcome these weaknesses. Instead we gain the joy of strength, courage and humility.

Reporter: Is there one thing covered in the Paris and Hamburg seminars you would like to mention?

Vladimir: Strikes and punches was a topic of prevalent interest at these events. As funny as it sounds, we saw that we learn how to hit properly if we learn the correct way of doing a simple pushup. The seminar participants will know what I mean. Rather than dull working out of the muscles, we use the pushups to remove tension and fill the fists with precision and power.

Reporter: What can you say to people who are not able to travel and train with you at the seminars or at your school in Toronto?

Vladimir: There are many training options for everyone – instructional DVDs, hundreds of certified instructors and Systema Schools all around the world, there are a couple of thousands informal training groups (listed on the Training Partners page by their geographic locations). We also have a Video Correspondence Program where people can send me a video clip and get feedback and direction on their progress.

I’d like to express my deep gratitude to the seminar hosts.

First, Jerome Kadian of Systema France – one of the most experienced Systema Instructors and my friend since 1998, for his amazing hospitality and event organization.

And second, Jörg Wagener, the head instructor of Systema Hamburg and his partner instructor Christian for making my first visit to Hamburg an enjoyable one.

Thank you to all seminar participants for the wonderful opportunity to meet you and share Systema with you, for your keen interest, hard work and excellent results!

I look forward to more great training and friendships.

To overcome my fear of darkness I would crawl into dark cellars or venture into the woods at night. To conquer my fear of heights, I’d jump down from roofs or dive from cliffs. Despite being afraid to fight, I’d pick fights with stronger opponents or go to boxing practice. The list goes on and on.

For some reason, even as a little kid, I instinctively knew that if you succumb to fear, it would grow into a huge monster that you cannot get rid of. I also knew that you can’t hide from fear. The problem is that it lives inside, and you can’t hide yourself under a blanket or on a pretend “home base”. So for me, there was only one way out: to meet fear full-on, face the scary situation, and overcome myself. It was always tough but it always worked. The second time around it was not as hard to overcome the fear, and the third time it felt almost easy.    

Now I understand that many of my crucial, far-reaching life choices were made subconsciously, while striving for courage. Yet during our early years, we tend to make important decisions without thinking too much why we make them… 

During the war it was different somehow. I don’t mean the training missions but in real combat, dealing with tough and dangerous situations. It was understood that an officer could not show his fears because his soldiers would always watch and imitate him, following the key principle: “Do as I do!” which applies to war and life in general. Well, all of us were kind of fearless, sometimes borderline reckless. Yet this fearlessness was based upon a few very specific things:
· Unshakable belief in our comrades
· Confidence in ourselves
· Confidence in our weapons

The ordinary, mundane fears sort of faded into the background. For whatever reason, we never thought of death. Everyone was prepared for possible injuries and pain. However, some new and previously unknown fears surfaced. It was not until now that I can verbalize them; back then they were held deep inside, sometimes breaking out and getting in the way of my decision-making. The fear of letting down our comrades was at the top: things like not making it in time, straggling or getting lost in a combat zone. The second was the fear of helplessness: being unarmed, captured, or losing control over a situation. These were not just my personal fears, but rather universal among my friends.   

Once in South Ossetia, while resting on the base, we got a garbled radio transmission from our convoy. The operator could only make out the words “…we’re pinned down in the city…” then the transmission ended. About 10 seconds later the emergency response unit was off while everyone else abandoned their dinner, jumped onto the vehicles and anxiously waited for the ‘go’ signal. That’s when I saw fear on everyone’s faces. No, it was not the fear of combat because everyone was eager to fight. We were not afraid of what might happen to us. It was the fear of what might happen to our comrades: what if we can’t find them? What if we’re late? Well, that time everything ended well: we found them and got there on time.

I will never forget the expression of fear on my friends’ faces. The best remedy from this kind of fear was our combat brotherhood and “Perish yourself but rescue your comrade!\" as said by Suvorov (a great Russian general who has never lost a battle). It worked!

Speaking of other fears, one thing I remember distinctly is carrying a hand grenade in my pocket wherever I went. It was not just me. Almost everyone did. Was it inconvenient and dangerous? You bet, but somehow it was comforting. No one ever asked why. No one ever talked about it or had to explain it to anyone. This means there was a common reason, a silent understanding.      

For about ten years afterwards, I had the nightmares of not getting to the meeting point on time, or running out of ammo, or realizing my gun got jammed… I would wake up sweating, short of breath, my heart pounding like crazy… 

These feelings still come up once in a while. Thanks to Systema, now I quickly recognize these emotions as they appear and no longer allow them to control my actions.

Thank God, during my service I never let down my comrades even once. Yet, I experienced the full-blown fear of helplessness twice. First, being alone, practically unarmed, in the midst of a war-torn, enemy-controlled city. A few years ago, I already wrote about this experience in the story called “The Final Argument”. And the second episode was falling down in a helicopter jam-packed with people. Let’s talk about the helicopter incident. 

It happened in early spring of 1992 in mountains of Armenia.

The military conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh area broke out and the fighting was very close. The 46 of us were flown in by helicopters to our base, which was surrounded by more than 500 Armenian guerrillas. A day before, the guerrillas had assaulted the base and taken its commander and 10 officers hostages. In exchange for their lives, the bandits had demanded that we relinquish all the heavy weapons located at the base, including artillery and ammo for ‘Grad’ and ‘Uragan’ rapid-fire systems.

We did our job. How we did it is a different story. It included repelling another attack and completing the mission in the surrounding territory. In a few days, all hostages were brought back unconditionally. However, there was still a very real threat of attacks.

The next shift was flown in to replace us. As we were leaving for the mainland in four MI-8 helicopters, we decided to take along the wives and children of the officers. The load in each helicopter was more than double the permitted weight. People were sitting tightly on the floor and on their packages. High elevation and rough weather conditions (wind, snow, and darkness) only added to the complexity of the mission.

Our pilots were top of the line. All crews went through Afghanistan. They knew very well that there would be no other chance and tried to pick up everybody. It was risky, but the risk was well calculated based on the capabilities of the pilots and the equipment.

My chopper was second in the first pair. There was only a small area for the take-off, so we could not gain speed by running like an airplane (a maneuver often used by helicopter pilots in high mountains). I stuck out the barrel of my gun in the window on the left side and watched how the leading helicopter, swinging heavily from side to side, took off after three attempts. It veered to the left, narrowly missing electric poles and trees, but regained its balance and started ascending.

Immediately, our chopper started shaking violently. There was the roar of the engine as we started taking off… Then I felt it diving down and bouncing heavily off the ground… Another take-off attempt and one more dive with a thud… Our chopper was bouncing like a ball. Then again, lift-off, going up and a sharp right – all I could see was the sky… There was someone falling off the bench, a piercing shriek of a woman, yelling, something crashing, sounds of metal scraping, another crash, then deafening roar of the engine, and jittery convulsions of the chopper… I don’t know how long it lasted – more than likely, it was only 3 or 4 seconds but it surely felt like eternity. Out there, in the twilight zone between life and something else, there is no sense of time. It felt like everything inside of me shrunk and froze, my limbs got weak, my breathing stopped. There was this sudden, acute awareness of how helpless, fragile, and useless everything was…

Somehow we took off. We made it. Our flying aces pulled it off. I can’t thank them enough. Unfortunately, we could not properly thank them – right after dropping us off on an impromptu landing spot they flew to their home base. That was the last time we saw them alive – in two months they crashed high in the mountains and we had to get their bodies from the snow slopes at an elevation of over 11,000 ft…

Later on, people from the second helicopter pair told us that during the take-off we were blown smack into a two-story headquarters building, a wheel and chassis support got stuck and tore off the water spout and a piece of the roof, the propeller blades chopped off the antennas… It was a miracle that the pilots pulled it off.

Anyway, as soon as we started steady ascend, my fear was gone and I dozed off. We flew through the night. I remember how a sharp sideways jolt woke me up; what I saw through the window looked like chains of lights streaming towards us from the darkness. My sleepy interpretation was peaceful: maybe those were fireworks or simply a faraway train down there… As we were getting off, I noticed bullet holes in the helicopter’s body.

It’s been many years since that night, but I still vividly remember the fear. I also remember making a promise to myself to try and avoid any situations where I had no control. Now I understand that often I could not keep this promise.

With the foundation of strength and security in Systema, it is easy to reflect on your life (both past and future) and discover many things about yourself. I believe this is the only healthy way: through calm training, unraveling your own memories, impressions and thoughts, gradually figuring out your fears, tracing their roots, and learning to live fear-free today! This is what recognizing your fears and mustering courage is all about. I hope that during the upcoming Systema Summer Camp, we’ll have enough time for both.

Question-When did you encounter Systema for the first time?

Vladimir Vasiliev (VV): It's in the early 80s that I met Mikhail Ryabko.

-You were serving in the military at that time. What kind of martial arts were you training in?

VV: I was mostly training for a close quarter combat. Those martial arts have good points but Mikhail showed me a completely different approach.

-Do you remember your first impression of Mikhail?

VV: I watched him with a skeptical eye. He didn't look like a fighter.

-What made you realize that he is so special?

VV: The things he showed were very special. I was wondering if he is an ordinary human being, how can he show such amazing things? He is just a good person. Nothing spectacular like a mountain hermit or a bearded wizard from the movies.

- Did you start learning at that point?

VV: Mikhail didn't introduce himself as a "teacher". So we were just training together. I didn't feel that I was a student of Mikhail. Of course we can say that we are students of Mikhail but he never presented himself as a teacher.

-I thought you were training with Mikhail very closely. Did you take many classes every week?

VV: We started as being friends in our city of Tver, Mikhail would come to my home for food and drinks and to talk. He is a master but interacts as an ordinary person. Through such a relationship, I gained respect and friendship for him even outside of the training. At that time I took about 3 classes per week 2 or 3 hours each. And we’ve been friends for over 30 years now.

-Did you get some particular word of advice from Mikhail in those early days?

VV: His advice was "Relax and don't rush".

-Did you find it difficult to study movement rather than technique?

VV: Usually in martial arts practice, we agree on the speed of the attack and which weapon or part of the body the partner will use, but Mikhail would not prearrange anything. It means any unexpected attack would be OK. Any speed, any direction, a kick or a punch, it is all fine. This is the thing that surprised me more than anything else. Initially it was very difficult to adjust to such a freedom. The boxing that I did before was not like that.

-Normally we train with some kind of pattern. Did you learn such a freedom by osmosis?

VV: The more I know, the more of my mistakes I find, I felt that I lost the illusions about my skill. Now too, I see my mistakes and rather than getting discouraged, just try to work on them.

-I feel that you are talking very high level. How many years did you train with Mikhail?

VV: About a year and a half. Of course sometimes I couldn't go to the training. I was not a good student.

-In the 90s you moved to Toronto, Canada.

VV: Yes.

-After your coming to Canada, you did not see Mikhail for a few years. Did you feel he had changed when you met him after this long interval?

VV: We talked on the phone when I moved and saw each other again 8 years later. Mikhail had changed a lot.

-How did he change?

VV: His movements were even more short and simple. He had more variety than in the past. He also became more spiritual and gained a lot of strength from there.

-I believe that the spirituality of Systema is Russian Orthodox Faith. Is that a part that is absolutely imperative?

VV: Systema has its roots in the Faith but I don’t think it is absolutely imperative. Learning Systema might be within the process of being a good human being. This kind of topic is difficult to discuss because each person has his own reaction.

-You control multiple attackers very easily in this seminar. Do you expect the next attacker when you are controlling the first one?

VV: I'm looking out for the next attacker for sure but I'm not waiting for him. I'm trying to feel. Actually it is possible to control them with looking. I know how they are going to react to my movements and I position myself accordingly.

-I understand because of your very smooth footwork, you control multiple angle attacks without moving from the spot. If you need to move, you move back and come around behind. Then how can you develop the "Feeling"?

VV: It is difficult to explain but the more flexibility and comfort you have in your body, the more you begin to feel.

-Can you find or invent movements yourself?

VV: We can practice our own free movements in the training. The important thing to remember is to find out your own movement without imitating someone. Everybody has their own special ways to move.

-Again, the key is to keep moving, right?

VV: That's what I believe. We forget the technique when the fear comes. Efficient thinking gets shut down by the fear.

-What is your current challenge? I can't find any defects in your work.

VV: (Shaking his head horizontally) I think that I have too much tension. The more I understand Systema, the more I find deep tension. I also have too much play.

-Too much play?

VV: I mean that I move too much. If you watch Mikhail, you can understand what I'm saying. Mikhail is the best for me.

-Frankly speaking, the movement of Mikhail is too high to understand.

VV: Exactly. I would like to learn that.

-Andy Cefai, a Systema instructor and head of Systema Japan. Andy, go ahead.

Andy (A): You advised me "Look more inside of yourself". For instance you told me "When somebody is trying to punch you, you shouldn't look at the opponent or analyze his movement. At that time you should look inside of yourself. Then you know yourself and you move based on yourself. You can break new ground with such an approach." Could you give me more details on that?

VV: When you look at the opponent during practice, it means you want to show something as an instructor. The more you try to show, the more fragile you are. Instead, try to work while looking inside of yourself. Then you can bring a positive change for everybody.

A: I understand. Not looking at the opponent but at yourself.

VV: Trying to assist somebody in training can indicate your ego. People who can't help themselves cannot assist other people. Whereas, if you can work on yourself while helping other people, you are the master. The more you practice this type of training, the more you will know what I mean.

-Thank you very much for the time you've given us today.

VV: Thank you.

My service in the army also taught me to overcome any negative impacts. The thing is, I had to learn differently, through overcoming myself. Over the course of four years of study at the military school, by running I have probably circled the Earth. We would run so much daily, morning, day or night, in freezing cold and sweltering heat, always wearing boots and uniforms, often with weapons and full gear, sometimes on skis, through obstacle courses, through the woods, across fields, on- or off-road. I hated running with my guts. I would ask myself – “at the age of cars, IVFs, APCs and all kinds of armored vehicles why, oh why do we need to run and march on foot so much?” Back then I could not answer that question.   

In addition to that, physical training was also a part of other disciplines such as tactics, firearms, topography, defense from weapons of mass destruction, or military vehicles. This “PE component” included many miles of walking or running with weapons and gear, often wearing personal protection equipment; timed getting in and out of vehicles; loading / unloading ammo; mounting and taking down weapons, among other “pleasures”. In short, during the first two years I moved about exclusively by either marching or running. I kept asking that same question “Why do we need this?” even in my dreams!   

Suddenly, after the graduation and getting to my first assignment, I got it. I knew why I had suffered. My commanders and teachers had helped me develop a stable psyche and stamina – the two qualities that determine one’s readiness to withstand negative impacts, and therefore survive. As the old military saying goes “what does not kill you makes you stronger”. Indeed, by overcoming yourself, you can tap into inconceivable powers! I realized that I had this internal strength, and so did my subordinates. Otherwise, they would not have followed my command. 

So, the army taught me well to overcome myself, while Systema teaches self-understanding. In the army I shaped myself through a variety of drills, while in Systema I can develop myself directly. Under a good Systema instructor, this is a shorter route. Yes, there are drills, but I know exactly how each one changes me and why. I can build myself from the ground up, discover and correct my own shortcomings and strengthen the qualities I need. Systema is a marvelous, subtle instrument of self-development, which helps build a sound foundation for any movement, any activity. And not so much through overcoming but more through understanding yourself. Trust me – this process is faster and much more enjoyable.

Try a little experiment. Watch a video recording of a relatively simple dance (modern or folk) and try to copy the moves for a minute. If it is working, you are on a right Systema path. See, Systema training gives your body freedom to easily repeat any unusual and complex moves.

Would you like to take the challenge of overcoming yourself and reap the benefits? Try crawling without the use of arms or legs, non-stop for 20 minutes and up to 90 minutes depending on your fitness level. Then, in a class, do some wrestling with a partner or practice simple strikes, grabs and escapes on the move. Those of you, who succeed in overcoming yourself, will get an amazing, outstanding long-term result. This happens because we do most activities with our arms and legs, while the trunk is less capable of movement. But this approach is not for everyone. At Systema Camp this summer, I’d like to share with you the tasks that are easier, more engaging, and more fun. Together we will master
most interesting things! See you there!

You may find this question odd.  For me it is not.  I travel weekly as a business entrepreneur and executive and I have awoken in many hotels reminding myself where I am and what are my objectives for this trip as my first conscious act.  But this morning was different.  I smelled mud and sweat.

I also immediately took note that I wasn't in the Four Seasons.  I was in an orange tent.  Sunrise had occurred and I noticed light peeking in the front.  I thought I should get up.  As I attempted to rise I immediately felt a cramp and collapsed back to the ground in pain.  Why was I here?   What was happening?

I tried to assess what hurt. Damage control.  I soon ascertained that every joint, every muscle and every tendon was sore.  Nothing had been left behind.  And then, as I lay there, I began to remember the day before.

After a flight from Dallas to Toronto I had gotten on a bus to an undisclosed location three hours away in the Algonquin Forest.  And although I had not camped since about the age of 13, I was now 49, I had decided to attend the week long Systema Camp.

I had attended some Systema seminars and I was intrigued by the emphasis on relaxation and breathing.  As a 49 year old hard driven entrepreneur, executive and lawyer, the idea of learning to breathe and relax while engaging in martial arts intrigued me.  I had a karate background and had gotten a black belt in 2005.  I knew katas and techniques and I could spar, but honestly, one of the guys I got my black belt with had died of a heart attack two weeks after our test and I thought that could be me in a few years.

As I lay there that chilly August morn, I questioned my sanity.  I had a big house in Texas, a Porsche, a beautiful wife of 29 years and a great job running a successful and large company.  Why was I here?  I called my wife.  She said I sounded like I never had before and maybe I should come home.  She offered to send a helicopter to airlift me out. I laughed – that hurt as well.

I tried to sit up again but fell back down in pain.  What did I do?  It was then that I recalled the first day.  Breathing exercises.  Breathing exercises turned out to mean doing more core exercises than I had done in my entire life.  Three hours worth!  There was walking and breathing, working around obstacles in the woods, striking, knife disarming, rolling across a wet rain soaked field in the dark, learning to fall softly on concrete and then roll.  We learned how to sense someone's intentions in daylight, dusk and the dark. We had to find our way back to camp from the woods without a light.  We worked out and sparred in the cold waters of the lake.  An endless set of challenges on the first day.  No wonder I couldn't rise.

A bell rang.  I stopped thinking about my pain and I decided to breathe.  I used the very breathing principles I was taught to get up, put on my boots and got out of the tent for another day of training.  As I felt the sunlight on my muddy clothes, I saw others rising also. I was standing now and ready for more. I called my wife back and told her to hold the helicopter.  I was going to learn how to breathe and live – out here in the woods.  And I was going to bring this back home.  This sense of
being alive; this health and relaxation.

When I returned home and to my corporate life, everyone said I was different, and I was.  I returned to Toronto for Camp 2010 and I will be at camp in August 2012 http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=camp2012

I can't wait for my third week of breathing and training fun. 

Many thanks to Vlad and Valerie and the extended Systema family for my health and now nearly 53, I feel younger every day.

About the Author: Steven Cash Nickerson is lawyer and businessman. He also has over 15 years of various martial arts experience. Steven is a Systema Instructor certified by Vladimir Vasiliev, training and teaching Systema since 2007. Big D
Systema in Irving, Texas has recently moved to a new expanded gym location and offers regular classes and hosts seminars.

A few years ago, when I was visiting Mikhail Ryabko in Moscow, he demonstrated a slow fist pushup against the wall. I still clearly remember how standing next to him, it felt like a huge beast filled the room, the wall was droning and buzzing under his fists.

Pushups in Systema are not just exercises for shoulders and chest, they are a comprehensive method to prepare for fighting and strikes. The way Mikhail did it, he had full sensitivity of the surface his fists were on, and he was not just moving his body up and down, he used the points of weight bearing to work through his entire body. The pushing off force moved though the arms down to the feet and back up, smooth, strong and solid.

Fist pushups are great training for punches. When done correctly, they help us learn how to strike without tension in the body. When we learn to do pushups while keeping the body relaxed, using only the muscles we need – then we will be able to do the same during strikes – that is to keep the body tension-free while delivering a punch. Control of our muscle tension gives us power and precision, it allows us to choose the distance correctly, there is no longer a need to reach, punches become short, strong and accurate. Tension-free punches produce no side effects of straining and fatigue, the recovery time from training and fighting becomes minimal.

When I practiced karate many years ago, before my Systema experience, I noticed a definite vulnerability there. At the point of completing a strike, the body was fixed, in a rigid structure, not moving and tense. I found that this often created a very fragile structure for real confrontations. If the striker was hit right at that moment – he was easily injured. A tense body lacks sensitivity and agility, it cannot react, escape and counterattack quickly and smoothly.

So here is how you can practice pushups.

• Stand on the fists in the pushup position.
• Place as much of your fist surface as comfortable in contact with the floor.
• Execute the pushup and continue to feel the ground with the same fist area as you started with throughout the entire range of movement.
• In the meantime, watch for any tension in the body. As soon as you feel that part of your fist surface no longer has full sensitivity of the floor – you know that tension has set in. In that case, continue the pushups and try to relax through breathing and movement. 
• Repeat as much as you feel is necessary.

Also, as Mikhail explains, such pushups with tension control have a tremendous health benefit. They ensure that excessive pressure does not go up to the head but instead gets evenly distributed through the body. We know how damaging the excessive pressure to the head can be during striking. Once mastered in pushups, the pressure control will also be occurring while delivering a punch.

I hope to cover this topic in more detail at the upcoming seminars and camps.
http://www.russianmartialart.com/main.php?page=seminars

Dmitri also assisted his son in creating this crossword.

Check your Systema knowledge and have fun.

To play the online game version: http://russianmartialart.com/pzl/pzl.html

To receive the answers and/or this crossword as a file attachment, please email your request to:

training@russianmartialart.com

Review by Valentina G. (Systema Student)

I’d like to describe an exercise we did at the seminar that I found most interesting and helpful.

ROLL AND CONTROL is a perfect preparation for fighting from the ground.

Partner # 1 is walking in various directions. Partner # 2 follows him by rolling on the ground. All this is done with proper breathing and continuous movement for both practitioners.

This drill provides relaxation through good pressure and stretch to the cervical spine.

Cervical vertebrae from 1 through 6 are covered with fascia. When we make a roll, we cause the fascia to stretch in a natural way. This relieves pressure from the nerve endings and improves blood flow to the head and to the entire spine and well as normalizes the status of the nervous system. This dynamic stretching of the fascia and muscles attached to it is the best way to relieve the tension.

This exercise is a simple and fun preparation for ground contact.

The drill progression was as follows.
Partner #2 aims at his opponent and tries to contact him with the feet in order to re-direct him and control his movement. All this continues on the move.

As a further progression, Partner #2 also adds his arms into the work. He continues to roll after his opponent and attempts to control him with both his arms and feet in order to finish with a takedown.

While doing this exercise progression, a realization comes that the legs can be used just as effectively as arms for grabbing, re-directing, free movements and as a very powerful lever for takedowns. At the same time, because there is large soft tissue areas on the legs, the takedowns are very save and not damaging to the partners. It is almost as if you have two extra strong arms to use.

I want to share an additional note with you, just for a more complete understanding of ground work in general. When I train at Systema HQ school with Vladimir, he introduces these drills to us as training tools. We have to keep in mind that in real confrontations, we would not be able to roll around in this way. The terrain might be too hard or steeply slanted or uneven or with obstacles, our opponents might be stepping on our clothing, etc.

Unlike the ground training Vladimir does at his camps, these rolling practices should be viewed as gym training variations to remove tension and develop movement and orientation skills.

I saw once again how great Systema is for improving and maintaining health, psychological condition. There are amazing opportunities for everyone to grow and excel.

Yet, it wasn’t always like this! Just a century ago, it was not uncommon for a man to stake a claim on the frontier and begin to build a new life for himself without the benefit of pre-plumbed water or electricity, without having a cell phone or computer and without the services of police or rescue workers. Why wasn’t he more fearful? What has fundamentally changed?

We have become people paralyzed with fear. We no longer believe in ourselves and our own self-reliance. Promoting fear has become a big (and lucrative) business. You can “buy” a fix for just about any fear. Fear death, disease or losing property? Buy insurance! Fear losing status? Buy a fancy car! Fear cavities? Buy this toothpaste! The list is endless. 

We can choose to accept a fearful life or we can pause, take a look around and consciously decide to find a different path. We can learn to not only give the appearance of being confident and unafraid but to actually find and retain a true state of calmness even in the face of a multitude of pressures.

Fear makes a man unstable, tense and brittle. Fear is suppressive. We need to learn not to fear. The core principle of SYSTEMA is the gradual liberation from human fears - big fears as well as small ones. SYSTEMA  provides the foundation for this freedom... a path to live fearlessly, to breathe fully without apprehension over anything or anyone, to be a man!

If we don’t work purposefully to confront our fears, if we don`t pull them out into the light from the depth of our being and work with them, then we limit our advancement in training and in life.

The topic of the seminar was Combat & Health – especially relevant after the 3.11 triple disaster here in Japan. We were blessed with around a 110 participants each day and coverage by Japan’s largest martial arts magazine. This despite having to use a gym 40 minutes out from the centre of Tokyo, as a result of many sports centers being closed and used as refugee centers.

(If you would like to receive the group picture at a better resolution please email us)

The seminar included breath work, work against knife, strikes, kicks and movement and working on the ground. The drills were varied and many, unplanned but structured and one building on the other from Vladimir’s observation of what the group needed.

Vladimir worked with every group in the room and at times with 20 or more people all at once. The mass group work was unscripted and masterful. With Vladimir never injuring nor leaving any doubt as to the effectiveness of his movements. Even in the middle of so many attackers you could see Vladimir varying his response to meet the ability and intention of the attacking students. Including those that came from behind!

Of all the drills and exercises that we covered it was the Breathwork that stood out to me as having the most fundamental impact not just on our health, but on our combat skills and our ability to actually do the fighting work. It felt like an extension of the work we had just been doing in Moscow with Mikhail Ryabko a few weeks earlier – and with Vladimir’s explanations we were able to understand this work deeper still.

I think it happens to most of us that the longer we train the more interest we have in the fundamental aspects and drills of Systema training – especially – if not more than anything else - the Breathwork. I commented something along these lines to Vladimir and he pointed out that we shouldn’t forget that Systema is a whole package and that people come to Systema to be warriors in one way or another. If we will focus on breathing to the exclusion of other aspects we would be best to be clear and call it Systema Breathing.

I thought about the wisdom of this advice and reflected back more than a decade to when I first crossed the doors of Vladimir’s training hall in Toronto at the age of 22. I do wonder at the age of 22 if Vladimir had not represented “the whole package” to me, including throwing me around the training hall, that I would have had experience and knowledge to understand the depth of the Breathwork, and its fundamental connection to both combat and health, that I am now starting to appreciate.  

The seminar started with breathing and Vladimir took us through various oxygen deprivation and recovery drills. The focus of these drills was explained as making absolutely sure we were achieving “full recovery”. As this in turn allows us to understand how far from our normal state we are under varying levels of stress and how to proactively return to our normal state.

The first drills involved work held on the out-breath (breathing out most but not all the air), and then secondly held on the in-breath. The rationale for the order of the work was explained as it being psychologically easier to work on the out-breath. Since breathing out releases tension vs. breathing in which actually produces tension. Despite the illusion that work on the in-breath initially seems more comfortable because you have a larger base of oxygen to work from.

The interesting thing about the order of these fundamental exercises is that each exercise, press-ups, squats and then leg raises, takes you through a longer range of movement – thus increasing the psychological challenge.  

I am sure the application to combat is obvious to most on this forum, but Vladimir explained it in very simple terms for us. When something stressful happens to us we experience all or some of the above effects that these drills produce. Be it anxiety, frustration, anger, fear or even panic, from an emotional perspective, to increased blood pressure, pulse rate, body temperature, tension, tiredness etc. on the physical side. As Mikhail had said to us in Moscow, if one cannot recover from the initial surprise or shock of a situation (e.g. getting hit), then all the skills you have will be meaningless as you will not be able to deploy them (until you have recovered enough to do so). Thus the faster one recovers… 

Vladimir told us that ultimately we should be able to recover ourselves completely with one breath. Obviously very important when response times matter.

We may also start to recognize more mundane situations in our daily life that cause stress and know how far we have become from our normal state – and recover ourselves without getting sucked into the situation. For example, an irate taxi driver taking out his own stress on the “innocent” immigrant passenger... internal voice of innocent immigrant passenger, “oh boy that’s about 5 push-ups worth already” - breath – recover… (real story with me as the immigrant passenger and Vladimir and Ryo Onishi sitting in the back seat of the cab – much to Vladimir’s amusement).

After 2 hrs of Breathwork, the room was alive with energy and glowing faces– quite the opposite of what some might expect!

We then moved on to knife work and the results of working from this increased state of relaxation, having faced and worked with our own fears in the earlier held-breath drills, was obvious. Personally, it seemed as if there was literally more time to see what was coming – as in my perception of time had changed as a result of the earlier work. I was not the only one who experienced this. I had gone past my “normal” state and was working from a much deeper state of balance – if only it was so easy to keep it that way! 

Around this time Vladimir said something else which immediately and fundamentally changed my ability to work through the remainder of the seminar and caused me to reevaluate my training overall. Vladimir was watching me work and  commented, “move for yourself”.

I now understand there is more than one layer to this comment – on the one hand I needed to start from “my movement” and “where I needed to be” to work comfortably in relation to the oncoming attack (and go there) vs. reacting to what the
attacker was doing to me (and ending up somewhere advantageous).

I later also understood the comment in relation to the attitude we take with us to go teach our classes (for those of us who teach). Vladimir explained if we go to train, rather than to teach, then our students will improve with us naturally and aspire to test themselves as we test ourselves. This is how a warrior should train and how a warrior will inspire others to develop themselves.

In an interview with the Japanese martial arts magazine, Vladimir was asked about his time training with Mikhail back in the early eighties. Vladimir commented that whilst they referred to themselves as Mikhail’s students, Mikhail never once referred to himself as the teacher – he was there to train and they trained with him. I felt I had been given the chance to hear the same lesson twice.

Vladimir’s generosity, professionalism and humility never cease to amaze and on a personal note never ceases to leave a deep desire to be better person and to tread more honestly on the path toward being a warrior. Vladimir is the true bench mark to aspire to for any instructors travelling to teach seminars. To anyone considering attending a seminar with Vladimir I cannot recommend it enough and or anyone luck enough to host Vladimir do take it with both hands and an open heart.

I guess, I shall start with the commentary often heard in seminars and classes (I think the first time I heard it was from Konstantin Komarov). It was “SYSTEMA BREAKS YOUR WORLD OF ILLUSION”. How?

When a newcomer enters Systema class, he has some sort of a preconceived idea regardless of his previous martial background. As a matter of fact, he might actually have many more pre-conceived ideas if he has had experience. These ideas are based on his physical abilities, his ability to move with another human being, control stress and pain and (let’s not even mention fighting). Well, soon enough all these ideas that constituted his form of reality – collapse. He quickly realizes that he cannot breathe, handle stress, wrestle those who seemed to be much weaker opponents, perform simple drills like staying on his fists in a push-up position for more than 2 minutes, put his legs behind his head and let’s not even start with breath holds!

In short, if the newcomer does not run away or resort to violence (two typical human reactions when facing fear), he will soon realize that what he knew about martial art can no longer be accepted as “real” and that there is much more to it. This is a great opportunity to learn the right way but it is also scary. It is even more frightening when one realizes that “THIS APPLIES TO EVERYTHING WE DO”. And this is something that I particularly love about Systema. Systema principles, whether they concern a certain exercise, a form of training or fighting in general, they apply to all parts of life. Anyway, let’s continue… To venture out of one’s world of illusions is not something most people would dare to do. A golden cage is a very comfortable thing and the first step is to realize that one is in a prison. This is harder than we think because most of us have been raised on fear and lies. To break out and step into the unknown means leaving a lot of what we knew behind and admitting we were wrong in many ways. Freedom is gained at that price...

Now the above may sound a bit too abstract to some of the readers. So what is the real value? In my opinion, the best application would be to look at our weaknesses honestly while training and not postpone them to a future imaginary world. Let me explain…

Let’s say you are wrestling or doing some grab/escape with a partner or doing some knife work. Imagine that, for whatever reasons, you cannot get much done and you are constantly overpowered with better skills or experience. A natural reaction that I was personally falling for (for years actually) was to tell myself “oh yes, he is stronger here in training but in real life I would do this or that and I would get him” …Unfortunately and sorry to say but this is a lie. In real life, things will only get worse. So whatever you think you’ll do in real life, why don’t you try it in training? I mean TO A REASONABLE DEGREE, don’t go stab a friend in the eye just to prove something (this would not be a learning experience and life brings enough drama anyway). Don’t try to go faster either because that would be a lie too. Enough has been said about slow work in Systema but I can always expand on that next time for the interested readers. Simply try to move with this idea of reality and see how the other person reacts.

If it is not going anywhere close to where you want it to go, do something else, bring it to the ground, keep moving ALWAYS OBSERVING WHAT GOES ON INSIDE OF YOU; check yourself!

It might be hard to face your weaknesses and fears by looking at them honestly and accepting them but it is the only chance we have to work on them. Most of us have the luxury to live in a time of relative peace so we have a great opportunity to take our time, train truthfully and not be lazy. To state that we have all the time we want is of course relative, we will all die at some point. I read something that fits well here “use your time in constant pursuit of education and self-improvement. Time is limited but to recognize this urgency is a positive thing, for a warrior turns it into an advantage to clear his mind and focus his attention towards his objectives whatever they may be, day in and day out…”

We should train like we’d fight and live like we train, otherwise what would be the point…  Honestly, we train for life here… it is as simple as that.

About the Author: Vincent Kurmaer is a Systema Instructor training with Mikhail Ryabko and Vladimir Vasiliev since 2008, and teaching in Geneva/Vaud Switzerland at Subrosa Systema school: www.subrosa-systema.com

Before I found ystema, I’d trained sportive and traditional martial arts for about 15 years and proudly served Brazilian Marine Corps for another 4 years. I thought I had seen a lot of interesting things... So, what would bring me to an 8000 km trip to study a Russian Martial Art in Toronto, Canada? What have I learned that I couldn’t find here? What great teaching have I brought with me in my bag? Secret techniques? Super-human skills? Severe training methods? 

I have brought a phrase. “Remember the feeling”. A short phrase. It looks simple. It looks vague. But personally, this is what I have been carrying so I can understand Russian Martial Art and this is what allows me to study continuously. It is a big journey but at the moment, this phrase keeps me growing to explore and achieve my whole potential.

Vladimir Vasiliev has a stunning virtue. When you meet him in person, he looks deep through your eyes and instantly you feel like he already knows a lot about who you are. Then, at the right moment, he communicates to you exactly what you need. That might be a punch right to the face, an advice, or even a joke. This power of precision, conciseness and sincere support is unforgettable. If you are humble, generous and have heart and mind open enough to really listen to him, you can learn great things. And sometimes, we have to listen to his fists... But it is the short phrases, simple orientations and words that he always repeats, shared along every class, which could be easily unnoticed, that I remember the most. The more I remember, the more I see the depth and matter, over and over. Also, I cannot forget Maxim Franz’s help not only by his orientations but what one can learn just observing his attitude.

“Systema at Full Range Seminar - from Soft to Devastating” was held in Toronto this past June. During that seminar, we explored the concepts that can be considered as basics as well as the more complicated ones. However, it was at the very first moment and the most “basic” drill that I understood how deeply we can reconsider every subject. To explore the whole potential in every step and stage of our study, and it doesn’t matter how simple or easy we think that subject is. Each theme can be studied deeply and that only depends upon us.

Vlad started the seminar with breathing exercises... The pace, his orientation, his tone of voice, everything makes you relax completely. Air starts to flow through your body smoothly. You look for tension in your body and get rid of everything that is unnecessary. The cleanness you feel inside is so strong that you can feel your pulse, temperature changes, it is almost like your body is made of air. We have only our skin to separate us from outside world and we feel a strong integration with the environment. It’s a fullness feeling and it’s very good. So here is the key: remember this feeling! Keep it. Know it. Grasp and acquire it. You’ll want to remember it from now on.

Once this reference is established, each new drill is challenging and puts us in a tense situation. Then we should go back to that state of relaxation, free of tension. “Remember the feeling”, Vlad said. “Find the tension in yourself!” That would be the purpose of a simple squat or someone stabbing you: to always find tension in yourselves and then get rid of it until you find the relaxed state achieved previously, or the closest you can get to that. When we meet this comfortable feeling, this is where we want to be. We want to go back there. Having such as a goal keeps us extremely focused on ourselves. Instead of worrying about what has to be done with your opponent, we turn our attention to our own condition. When trying to achieve that feeling that we’ve already met, almost automatically our body starts to Relax, Breathe, Move and search for a Natural Position (or some combination of those principles at different degrees). We look for comfort, and it’s amazing what we can achieve when we find ourselves comfortable!

When can we “remember the feeling”? When we find physical and mental comfort, we eventually find a good tactical positioning, we don’t easily show our actions and we apply a proper measure of control - without aggression. We have freedom of movement and with freedom, we have choices. We don’t think only about escaping, defending or counter-attacking... We look for comfort first of all and then, if possible, we try to make our opponent uncomfortable. This is how we explore the full range of each and every task that we do.

You can apply this concept in the simplest way: tell somebody to stand by your side. Then just position yourself in a way that you feel comfortable, while at the same time your partner feels uncomfortable. Continue to think and position yourself this way throughout every drill and you’ll notice the difference in how much control you have gained. This is the very first step in controlling the aggressions that surround you. It might look easy and simple but actually is pretty hard.

To have focus at the Present is a central key to survive with fullness. Worrying about “how was that move I learned anyway?” or “I’m going to look bad if I fall!” is typical reasoning that holds us in the Past or in the Future. Paradoxically, “remember the feeling” is at our individual Past, however when we look for it, we get very aware of our individual Present. While searching for that comfort feeling, we keep the focus on ourselves, to the moment, to the Present, until we get that feeling again. We keep scanning our tension, inch-by-inch,
second-by-second, at current situation. Inner focus and inner awareness. And yet something very interesting happens: exactly the reverse! When feeling uncomfortable, allowing the tension to grow and dominate, we leave the Present and hold to references of our Past through negative feelings we already know. Emotions arise. And a spiral of tension might escalate...

An example of this situation happens at breath hold exercises. I heard about a student who experienced despair holding his breath because it made him re-live his childhood asthma attacks. Another person remembered a drowning experience. And I, when looking for my limit, had flashback images from the rigorous military training. Other examples might happen during different drills: such as being crushed to the ground by an aggressive and heavy attacker might awake old humiliation feelings. Being grabbed and held by several people, unable to move, might arise emotions from tough times in someone’s life, like losing a loved one to an incurable disease. If Systema training leads us to tense situations, it also teaches us how to handle them. We learn how to deal with previous traumas. We discover our fears. We face them. And get over them. Soon, we begin to apply the same tension-removal methods in our day-to-day lives. Everything we do, we try to search for comfort, find the tension and then get rid of it. Daily, we begin to relax, breathe, move and find a natural posture. Not only physically, but mentally and spiritually as well. Systema eventually turns into the way one deals with his or her being and we see Systema principles in everything we consider to be good.  

I believe Brazil and Brazilians have something of Systema too. Our fighters’ outstanding performances, for instance, or our soccer, our carnival, and other things... result from (among other causes) a constant incentive to creativity, to adaptability, to collaboration, to playfulness yet keeping seriousness, which are equal to the way we train here, at RMA Systema Headquarters. In my humble opinion, I think a lot of factors that make the excellence of Russian Martial Art do exist right here in my country in different ways. I am very happy to find in Systema something that can be so suitable for the Brazilian characteristics. I’ve travelled far away to see that. I’ve travelled away to find... myself!

About the Author:

Joao Carlos Furia has been studying Systema since 2009 and was recently certified by Vladimir Vasiliev to teach Systema in San Paulo, Brazil.

How is a fast move different from jerky?

1. A truly fast body movement is smooth. It begins instantly without “collecting” the body together first. Without the haste, there is steady acceleration and it reaches its maximum speed at the target point.
2. If a body is already relaxed and in tone it does not require to take the extra step of “collecting” or stabilizing itself first. If the body is calm and ready to move, the change from rest to moving and accelerating is effortless and therefore subtle.
3. A jerky movement begins with “gathering up” of the relevant joints of the body, with tensing of the muscles first. Once the body is stabilized or pulled together this way, only then there is an “explosive” muscle contraction that sharply pushes out the body or body part. Next, the movement continues by inertia with gradual decline of speed.
4. Jerky movements are a result of over-tension. Thus, they damage us physically and psychologically.

- A tense construction is always more fragile and when shuddered, needless stress is created to the joints and body organs.

- Jerky movements attract attention, therefore, they make us a more visible target. In most cases, this is very undesirable for any combative and professional work.

- Jerky moves are a sign of instability in the psyche, and the more they are practiced the more they disturb the psychological strength.

- Over-tension leads to quick fatigue, thus endurance for any combat or sport is dropped.

- Clearly, jerky movements are less precise because a tense muscle is less responsive and less adaptable.

- Jerky movements create the illusion of power, but in reality, the power is in smooth and steady acceleration. If a movement seems slow to you – look again maybe it is just calm.

Is Systema the best self defense solution?
Self defense for women, is Systema the best choice of martial arts?
Is Systema most applicable, realistic and useful of them all?
For those who wondered at least a bit what the answers might be, I recommend to learn more about self defense, self defense for women and what Systema has to offer.

Self defense

We witness people joining martial art schools every day with the single motive, to become more capable to defend themselves. What is self defense? For start, it is one of the most basic human rights. The question whether some martial art is good for self defense or not must contain another part too. Is it good for that specific person (and self defense)? Is that person a soldier about to be deployed, policeman working on the streets every day, 185cm/85kg young civilian boy, or a small girl returning from late shift down the dark street?

People seek defense for a solution because they are scared. Actually, fear is the root of the whole problem. Usually, we have only the perspective of the potential victim’s fear. But fear is on the other side too, the attacker is scared as well. Now, you probably shake your head, and I will proceed with three example scenarios.

A robber wants your gold watch:  

1. If you are asleep, he will sneak up, take it off and leave. You won’t even feel it happen.

2. If you are sick or drunk, he might pretend to help you and take the watch off your wrist. Or take it away and push you down.

3. If you walk down the street straight and healthy it’s almost certain that he will hurt you. He may jump out aggressively, flash a weapon and if you do not surrender the watch, you will end up injured or dead.

Where did the aggressive act in the last scenario come from? From fear that he is not going to make it, that you might hurt him, restrain him until police arrive or even kill him. Aggression is the derivative of fear. From the psychotherapy standpoint, it is the state of constant neurosis - permanent need to hurt. The background of this destructive need can be the attacker’s fear too.

In a fight, the victim can turn his/her fear of danger into aggressiveness and use it as a platform for counter-attacking (defense). It is the easiest and fastest thing to do. But is it the best thing to do – is the big question. I don’t think so! Especially for the people who train “just in case”. Programming them for aggressive behavior usually means triggering the same internal mechanisms as when they are scared to death. Stress is re-created in the organism and that can lead to sickness.

Violence brings more violence and by responding to danger with aggression it will lead to conflict helix, or escalation. That does not mean that the response shouldn’t be adequate, powerful and terminal. Just the opposite! The action should be there but different in form, or if I may, it must come from different philosophical, ethical and spiritual base.

In my opinion, aggressiveness as a driver is as harmful as the paralyzing fear. Russian Martial Art treats both the same way.

Self defense for women

When we read through modern violence statistics, it is stunning how many girls get sexually assaulted before they turn 18. The numbers vary, but it is close to 25%! Considering that in some societies such incidents remain not reported that number might be even higher.

Subject of women self defense is more complex. It includes all said earlier but has specifics.

Any ordinary criminal has problems on his mind. Rapists can be a lot worse psychologically. Their goals are different; they are usually mentally and emotionally disturbed and react unlike other people. Women have different musculature and bone structure than man, so in most cases they are destined to face heavier and stronger attacker. Experience from previous situations can additionally disturb the emotions causing panic or freezing.

What can Systema offer as a solution?

MOST IMPORTANT: In our classes we don’t drill people to develop some above average athletic abilities in order to defend themselves. We teach you how to save yourself using capabilities you already have, learning to work with fear, evaluate situation, overcome shock, develop mobility and free movement, and develop the feeling of distance and timing.

Movement is defense. It is that simple. But not any kind of movement. Nervous, angry, aggressive or broken movement will give out your tension. That will either provoke the attack or raise attacker’s awareness and make him more dangerous. Natural movement which is fluid and inconspicuous is the best ally. To quote Vladimir Vasiliev: “You should be able to fight as long as you can walk.” and Mikhail Ryabko: “Good movement brings joy”.

Systema is unique for one more thing. People usually forget that from the perspective of law, it is very important how you defend yourself. A confrontation can easily gets to the point where the boundary between the attacker and the victim doesn’t exist anymore. The saying “It's better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6” is well known, but is it always applicable? Do we destroy-to-death a thief that is working his way to our car stereo? Should a girl poke a drunken boy’s eye out because she
didn’t want that kiss? Skill and calmness we gain from Systema training are excellent, if not the best option for confrontations. 

If we want to be both smart and effective in self defense, the priorities of training should be set like this:

1. Gaining the skill - developing the abilities to defend

2. Non-destructiveness of training - without negative impact on the physical or psychological composition of the person, training without stress or physical damage

3. Necessity for defense - not becoming an aggressor

Systema fits perfectly, doesn’t it?

IMPORTANT: Do not be mistaken. Such an approach in Russian Martial Art doesn’t mean that work is not sharp, in full speed, with full power. The point is that we can deal with fear in better and healthier way, without turning it into aggression that will damage all involved parties - and that lightning reaction, strength, devastating strikes and precision come from calmness, proper breathing, good form and free, biomechanically correct movement.

In what way can Systema training help ladies to be safer?

Russian Martial Art should be ladies’ choice for several reasons:

- Systema’s unique features, such as natural movements and clearly seeing one’s own strengths and weaknesses, allow women to fit in quickly even if they are completely unfamiliar with fighting.

- Women can progress same as men. They often progress faster than most men.

- Being built smaller and usually physically weaker than men, women find principles of non-resisting and blending into the movement very natural, while men may have more trouble with that.

- Using inertia to manipulate the opponent’s body is not difficult for women. That’s the only way they can work with a large attacker.

- Naturally higher joint mobility, flexibility and graceful movement is an advantage in Systema.

In return, Systema offers the freedom to discover best answers for different attacks, to learn how to deal with panic, how to fall and roll injury free, compensate lack of brute force with good movement and insight, raise awareness of surrounding situation, avoid dangerous areas...

However, there are a couple of deterrents that might drive ladies away from our classes:

- Military image. Many of civilians training today wear army pants to class for practical reasons because they are durable and tear-proof. No worries, you won’t be joining paramilitary, these pants are optional.

- Then, there is that renowned striking. An important part of Systema is powerful, heavy and devastating strikes. They are not only “a weapon”. They are a tool too. The tool we use to work on our partner, help him discover where fear resides in his body. We use punches as an echo locator to deep scan the tissue for tensions. In my group, this part of class is modified for ladies. There is no heavy striking. They are free to do striking as much as they feel it’s good for them, or can do pushes instead or something else entirely.

- Men. Yes, this problem can be described with this one word. Men sometimes find it hard to accept women as equal training partners. They take too much care of them; treat women as something that can be broken. That can lead to alienation, and we can often see girls partnering up with girls in class. For ladies, especially in terms of self defense, it is a must to train with guys who are heavier, taller, stronger! Men should train with women, because there is a lot to learn from their agility, lexibility, joint mobility and attacks to sensitive areas.

- Not too much women in Systema. Russian Martial Art is growing fast and as it does, there will be more ladies proportionally.

As a conclusion, I can point out that learning Systema can only benefit one’s health, psychic stability and self defense capabilities. Systema is good for people of all ages and both genders. Honestly, I am not focused on self defense for women, and discussed this just to address a common question. What I know for sure is that many arts, styles or sports claim to offer the ultimate self defense solution, and yet they don’t have one third of what Systema has to offer. You have to give it a try.

In Systema, there are a number of simple things to understand and practice to help you gain control over your external and internal opponents (i.e. your attackers and your own emotions).

• The first skill to acquire is moving away from the line of attack. It is important to learn not to freeze when a threat comes at you.
• If you are not very experienced in working against two or more opponents, your tendency will be to keep them in your field of vision all the time. You will find that fear and tension will not allow you to turn your back to the attackers.
• At this initial stage of training, get your partners to walk at you and just move away from them without making any contact. Keep up with continuous breathing and movement.
• As you get more comfortable, you can turn your back to them as well.
• The more you train in Systema the more you will be able to control any situation, regardless of the number of opponents, positions, types of attacks or weapons.

There is also further development to this drill.

• You begin with your partners walking at you at normal speed, then they accelerate, and finally they begin to run at you.
• This progression of speed will allow you to see that as the speed increases, your degree of fear and movement restriction increases too. Your goal is to realize that.
• Note your restrictions while the opponents are only approaching you, not even striking and you are not striking back, which would challenge your reaction and coordination even more…

Redirecting

When the opponents come at you and try to strike or kick as well, one of the effective strategies is to redirect the attacks in such a way that the opponents always end up hitting each other. Imagine if you were to get hit by your friend each time you are supposed to work together. Psychologically, it is unexpected and quite frustrating. As a result, a conflict develops between the two friends/co-attackers and they start to watch each other more since they have a common “enemy” so to speak. This allows you to dissipate the confrontation.

• Redirecting takes less physical effort than delivering strikes. Therefore, it is good to use that if you are tired, injured or wounded.
• If you move unexpectedly for the attacker, your moves will work well.
• All the movements should be smooth and continuous, steadily flowing from one partner to the next.
• It is very important in training to proceed gradually to higher speeds and with calmness and control.
• A word of caution here. When the work is quick, the danger for the attackers to get hit by the “friendly fire” is increased. During fast redirecting, fellow attackers can easily receive unexpected and unintended strikes from each other. This could lead to injuries, so be very careful when you practice redirecting.
• Fundamental to Systema, is being in a normal and natural position without any stances and without fear or tension.  If you are able to  maintain that, your opponents will not be afraid of you and they will come up closer. They will be
  less prepared for your unexpected actions. Therefore, you have much more control over them.

Different fighting disciplines have implemented various
strategies in order to gain a time advantage over their opponent.

A common approach by many professionals such as SWAT Teams,
Special Forces etc. is to use just a handful of very generic applicable
techniques based on gross motor skills. The idea behind this approach is:

- One, to decrease decision time of the mind, thus, to shorten your reaction time (response time) to a given
attack.

- Two, the gross motor skills allow people to still perform under duress.

Whilst the response in our brain to physical attack is very
complex and varied, there is an intriguing aspect, which I would like to
discuss. It is important in understanding the response time of the subconscious approach (Systema) as opposed
to the conscious choice approach mentioned above.

It is relatively unknown that when our brain prepares for a
movement, for example, in response to an attack on our person, it will always
do a dry-run first, without activating our muscle and without our conscious
awareness. This means the brain has something like an emulator. Before we
become aware of our intended movement, our brain will dry-run the movement
through its brain maps. This will include hormonal activation, blood pressure
changes and all the usual psycho-physiological adaptations. The only thing,
which is missing, is the activation of our muscles (and our awareness). Only
following this dry-run will our intended movement become conscious and we will
perform this action with our muscles activated. To our conscious minds this
movement appears spontaneous and original, as we are not aware that in actual
fact we have already done it in our brains.

Now here is the difference: if movement is directed by our
subconscious mind or as we call it, if the movement happens spontaneously, then
our conscious response will be the second run through by the brain. However, in
the example of conscious mind control (SWAT team, Special Forces…), if a
technique selection is required, then the brain will repeat the dry-run with
the chosen technique, before activating the muscles in a third run through.
Whilst a small selection number (of technique choices) decreases selection
time, it still remains the third fully performed run through by the brain when
applying a conscious mind approach. Systema, however, relies on a subconscious
response, meaning that we can act on the second performed run through. 

Whilst this advantage represents only a fraction of a second, it is nevertheless very significant.

This yet is not the whole story. Where do the brain’s initial
ideas for the subconscious response originate? Neurologists refer to these
sudden reaction movements as Fixed Action Patterns (FAPs). A FAP is a chosen
system by natural selection for a reduction of choice and decision time. In
other words, through past experiences the body has learned to react in a
certain way under certain circumstances (Trigger Event), and in order to reduce
reaction time a quick “movement package” is applied in a coordinated fashion
whenever needed, without the brain having to repeatedly re-invent the wheel.
These patterns are very deeply rooted in our response system. They can range
from very simple withdrawal actions to complex movement patterns. That doesn’t
however make them the best or most efficient choice under any given
circumstance.

Let me give you an example: if you touch a hot object, you will
withdraw your hand immediately in a FAP, nothing wrong with that. On the other
hand, if someone grabs your finger in a finger lock, this same FAP will be
activated putting you in a much worse situation as you have just increased
pressure on your finger lock. How then can we change this situation and how can
we change FAPs or any other rapid reaction movement? …The answer is training.

Training has the ability to override current FAPs.

Let’s look at this a bit closer. The brain has many body maps
spread throughout its different areas. The most basic (and famous) are the
primary motor and sensory maps also referred to as homunculi. These body maps
interact in hierarchical fashion from lower-to-higher-grade maps. Information
from the body enters the primary sensory map and then rises through complex
processing and constant reassessing procedures up to layers of higher maps. The
higher up they travel the more information gets incorporated in the processing
of an action such as emotions, memories, body images, beliefs, pain patterns
etc, etc. On the way up, information gets constantly fed down the chain again
for reassessment and confirmation with new sensory information just entered.
Eventually, appropriate action is decided on and emulated, then fed down
through the hierarchy and all the way to the primary motor maps, from which
muscles are activated and conscious movement arises. Let’s bear in mind that
these complex procedures and interactions take but split seconds to occur. We
also can see that no matter how much we try, every action has an emotional
association attached. We might not be consciously aware of it but it is
unavoidable!

Through regular training we can teach our body to behave with
chosen patterned responses to particular situations. The interesting point here
is that we can learn specific patterns (techniques) or we can teach our body principled responses such as relaxed generalized movement patterns.

The difference being is that we allow our bodies to come up with its own solutions to problems as long as it adheres to chosen principles such as relaxed, efficient, natural
movements as in the case of Systema.

In order to allow for this wide range of body applications, we
have to understand that the nervous system works via what we call facilitation.
In simple terms, this means the more we use an action the more likely the same
action will be chosen the next time. Now, if we use a mirror action over and
over again we will eventually reinforce this action in a specific way as a FAP
to be used by what’s deemed as relevant situations (Trigger Event). However, if
we continually vary the specific movements, whilst keeping the modus operandi
more constant, this being a calm, relaxed way of movement, then the quality of
this habit will start to instill itself as a FAP response without a specific
hyper-facilitated movement pattern attached. The brain will then pair up its
own choice of movement pattern, which it regards as most appropriate. It will
draw from familiar movement patterns that have been trained, however, more
‘freedom’ exists, which will be advantageous in adapting precisely to
individual situations.

Once the initial subconscious response has taken place, we can
include a consciously directed action if necessary, as we can perform it
concurrently with the already happening responses, thus, we do not suffer an
apparent time delay. In simple terms, the brain is multitasking (although strictly
speaking due to the on/off nature of the nervous system it is actually an
alternating action).

A subconscious approach requires a certain level of faith, as we
teach ourselves principles, hoping that the best response will be chosen
subconsciously at a time of need. It is a very different approach to training
specific names and techniques for specific situations.

An advantage of the ‘principle approach’ versus the ‘technique approach’ is that the brain does not get bored through endless repetitions of the same movements, as every movement is slightly different and somehow novel. Once the principles have established themselves, a marvelous thing occurs: Instead
of a limited set of technique responses, we now have an unlimited array of
‘principle responses’ available (often referred to as body memory). We have trained our bodies to come up with its own creative solutions to a given situation. Of course the body will
always develop its favorite idiosyncrasies, largely due to neurological
facilitation, individual body parameters and individual abilities.

It is also very important to mention that RELAXATION is
absolutely imperative in order to work subconsciously. When afflicted by
tension (fear, aggression etc) our brains will lose their ability to be creative,
to multitask and eventually to function efficiently altogether. Much has been
written about the debilitating effects of tension on our performance,
especially in the flight-fight situation. It is not the purpose of this article
to discuss this, but I simply would like to stress that it is crucial to instill a relaxed manner of working, if we want work efficiently subconsciously.

It is also important when training for conflict situations to
incorporate regular human-to-human interaction with significant contact such as
strikes, aggressive behavior and the like. This will assist in providing proper
trigger events and help in reconditioning specific ‘approach and avoidance behaviors’
already present in FAPs. If done properly, it will also assist in reducing fear
and pain-based tension.

An additional interesting point is that research has shown slow
training of complex movements to significantly shorten the learning time
required for those movements… sounds familiar?

Now the more we train the lower down on the brain-map-hierarchy
we move the processing. This means that after many years of training our
principled responses can be processed mostly in our primary motor maps. At this
point, we have made the system our own and we will instinctively and spontaneously
respond with FAPs according to our training. In other words, our subconscious mind will now start to
respond spontaneously to an attack in a smooth, creative and intelligent
way just like in training, instead of in a rushed, abrupt and tense fashion. With
appropriate training, we will also be able to work with much less emotional
involvement and less disruptive fear-based tension.

Obviously, technique-based training can override the spontaneous
FAP response too, however, if we continue to involve our conscious mind for
technique choices, we will still react with the third brain run through only.
Alternatively, if Systema practitioners miss this point of subconscious action
either through faulty training or lack of faith/trust, then they too will
respond to the third run through only. This is particularly apparent in new
students and will only change after considerable training.

As mentioned, it is very acceptable, even advisable to use
conscious decisions during a physical conflict but the trick is not to initiate
with a conscious action if spontaneously challenged. Rather intermingle it
sparingly amongst plenty of subconscious work. This will minimize interference
and allow your work to be fast fluid and natural, whilst still maintaining some
conscious strategic control.

As simple as this all may sound, and as easy and natural as a
competent Systema practitioner can look in motion, this is actually very
difficult to achieve. Difficult inasmuch, as it takes dedication and years of
mindful training in order to acquire this natural and efficient
subconscious/conscious response process when under attack or duress. A good
dose of playfulness, dedication and faith can make this journey spectacularly
joyful and satisfying. Not to mention the insight into our persona and our
emotions, which we can gain through introspection and through feeling during
training.

I was in Tokyo at that time. The tsunami did not hit
the metropolitan area, but the quake rocked the city of 13 million people with
an intensity I have never experienced in my life.

Considering the temblor’s strength, it was quite
natural that most of the people in Tokyo were scared and panicked. However,
there were a few people who did not.

For instance, one old woman who happened to be at a
post office when the quake happened. Post office workers there fell into panic,
but she remained calm. She brought them together to a place that seemed to be
the safest in the building.

“Stay calm,” the elderly woman told them. “There is
no earthquake that won’t end.” When the earthquake ended, one of the workers
asked her, "Why could you remain so placid even during the big quake?”

There is another example: A mother holding her baby
was at a shopping mall when the earthquake happened. Most shoppers there became
frozen with extreme fears and could not think clearly. But, this young mother
was able to keep moving and thinking properly, she was able to escape very
quickly to save herself and her baby.

Why could these two ordinary women stay calm even in
a very terrifying situation? Actually, the elderly woman and the young mother
are regular students at my Systema classes in Tokyo.

The two shared the above incidents with me, and
there are many other students, who told me of similar experiences they had
during the earthquake. All of them said that they could keep themselves under
control and take appropriate actions thanks to Systema breathing.

"An earthquake is similar to a strike,” a male
student of my regular class told me. “The strike of Mother Earth is certainly
strong. But I know how to reduce the damage of a strike with Systema
breathing."

He confessed that he panicked a bit at first when
the quake occurred. But, he could come back to himself with Systema breathing.
He is a beginner who joined my Systema class just three months ago.

It is amazing to see that not only those who have
practiced Systema for a long time but also beginners could benefit equally from
Systema breathing when they encountered this natural disaster.

Systema Charity Workshops around Japan were held to
help the many people who lost their families, friends, homes and jobs as a
result of the great earthquake and tsunami. The charity workshops were held in
Tokyo, Osaka and Shikoku, and many people participated in them.

It was also wonderful to see that many instructors
from abroad kindly donated their Systema T-shirts for the workshops. T-shirts
donated from countries around the world have symbolized the warm friendship of
the Systema community. The T-shirts were sold at the workshops and the profits
were donated to relief funds for the disaster victims.

The charity seminars were planned and carried out
quickly by Systema Instructors in Japan such as Ryo Onishi (Systema Osaka),
Kousuke Imai (Systema Shikoku),  Andy
Cefai (Systema Japan) , Kazumasa Okuuchi (Systema Kobe), Ryusuke Tsuchie
(Systema Hiroshima), Kakuo Goto (Systema Sannomiya) in cooperation with many
other Instructors-in-Training.

Systema Instructors from abroad such as Arend
Dubberboer, Frank Arias, Peter Annazone, Erika Ortega, Edward Whalen, Edgar Tsakouls donated many T-shirts and Systema goods to us.

Vladimir Vasiliev sent a warm message of support to
the Japanese Systema community immediately after the earthquake. It lifted our
spirits very much. Additionally, the Toronto Headquarters sent donations to
Japan.

Mikhail Ryabko and the people at the Moscow
Headquarters also held a charity event for Japan, and the earnings were donated
to a relief fund through us.

On behalf of the Japanese people, I would like to
express our heart-felt gratitude to the Systema Masters and great people of the
Systema community.

Though the major earthquakes seem to be over, small
aftershocks have been continuing. What is more troublesome is the ongoing
crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, and Japanese politics and
the economy are in turmoil.

However, the real and biggest problem we must
overcome now is FEAR. A lot of people in Japan are flustered now.  We must face this fear, and its negative
effects directly and constantly.

Fortunately, we are learning Systema. We try to
apply Systema breathing first to pull ourselves together. If we are able to
restore our nerves, many people then would wonder "Why can these people
remain so calm?"

That gives us an opportunity to share Systema
breathing with others. In fact, it is already happening.

In the wake of the earthquake, one publisher in
Tokyo thought that Japanese people need to learn Systema breathing, and asked
me to write a new book about Systema. In the book, I have included teachings of
Systema masters on how to control fear.

Vladimir Vasiliev, Martin Wheeler and Arend
Dubberboer will hold Systema seminars in Japan this summer and fall. In
particular, I have requested that Arend makes Fear Control the main theme at
his seminar. I am sure that these seminars will help Systema learners in Japan
make a great leap forward.

The March 11th earthquake and tsunami caused a lot
of damage and sadness.  These are huge
challenges for us. If we can overcome these challenges, it will help us grow.

And I believe Systema is the best tool to help us
promote this growth.

About the author:

Takahide Kitagawa is a certified
Systema Instructor under Vladimir Vasiliev and Mikhail Ryabko. As a
professional writer, he has published some articles for magazines and a book
about Systema in Japanese language. He has been teaching Systema to people of
all ages in Tokyo since 2008. 

http://www.russianmartialart.com/catalog/default.php?cPath=22

Juan Pedro and Frank kindly translated the interview from Spanish and offered it to all of us to read and enjoy.

Juan Pedro Serna: How did you first discover Systema?

Frank Arias: In 1996, on New Year’s Eve, I was confronted with a situation where I had to unexpectedly defend myself against multiple attackers.  I was able to survive this dangerous moment thanks to some previous martial art training (Asian Arts).   It was at that precise moment that my interest in martial art was reborn and I started to search for training that would help me be ready for this type of unexpected circumstance.

Juan Pedro: How has Systema influenced you as a human being and as a martial artist? Or perhaps the right question is how has Vladimir Vasiliev influenced you?

Frank: It’s difficult to compress thirteen years of Systema experience in a few paragraphs but I will try….

The training itself has always kept me on the journey of self-improvement and it has always had me to move forward. The time in class fuels the fire for me to keep coming back to find out more and more about myself.  It feels like a never-ending process and I know it feels right.

The major shift for me happened when Vladimir asked me to concentrate, train and develop my skills to become an instructor.  He explained to me that when you become a teacher, your development of Systema will grow and you will improve in your work.  He was right.

Through teaching, I am now aware of the responsibility of guiding others.  It requires me to be clear and clean in all parts of my life.  Through teaching I understand Vladimir’s instruction even more.  You have to be caring and be there to help people on their journey.

I am grateful that I have received so much from Vladimir and from Systema.

Juan Pedro:  What are the main principles of Systema? How would you define the most important aspects of the art?

Frank: The four main principles of Systema are breathing, relaxation, posture and movement.  From this you will learn to trust your intuition, align your senses, free yourself from tension and achieve a high level of fluidity.

To the beginner, these principles may seem straightforward and simple but as you progress in this work, you will find that each of these principles has a lot of depth. For example, movement is not defined only by the physical body but also by one’s thoughts, intentions and emotions. When used positively, every principle has the capacity for healing.

To “Know thyself” is where Systema will ultimately lead you.

Juan Pedro: What kind of people practice Systema?

Frank: Whether you are a combat soldier or a civilian, this work has a lot to offer.  From police officers to accountants to stay-at-home mothers, people of all ages, cultures, physical shapes and abilities train together in one space.  Essentially, Systema is for everyone.

Juan Pedro:  Recently you taught some seminars in Latin America to law enforcement units. What was the result of the experience? How was Systema received in these countries?

Frank: In South America there is a lot of crime from the street to government corruption. Kidnapping, knife stabbing and robbery at gunpoint happen far too frequently.  Of all the people that I met, I was surprised how many of them had been mugged two or three times already.  

There are a lot of companies that provide security such as body guards.  I found that the police wanted to focus on how they could control or submit a perpetrator without violating his human rights.

My experience with the Marine infantry was different.  They wanted to know practical techniques that they could use in real life.  They were not interested in a sports-orientated martial art.  However, once they were introduced to the training they could see for themselves how much Systema can really offer.  Tested throughout the ages, Systema is alive and strong today.

Juan Pedro: The Latin character is very different from the Russian. How does the Latin character adapt to Systema?

Frank: Without perpetuating stereotypes, I will say that Latin people are known to be passionate and hot-blooded. In fact, this romantic poeticism is celebrated in Latin culture. Whereas Russians seem to show less emotion and to value self-control more.  How does this apply to Systema?   A challenge for the Latin character might be because they tend to be expressive with their emotions it is more difficult for them to be detached in their work.

It gives you an entrance into a high skill and deeper spirituality.

Juan Pedro:  Systema never trains specific techniques. A frequently asked question is “How is it possible to learn a martial art without practicing technique?”

Frank: One of the fundamental principles is movement.  Through movement technique will flow.  Systema does not teach specific techniques because then it would be a formulated linear, mechanical response.   

Juan Pedro: What advice would you give to new Systema practitioners in their training?

Frank: Go in with an open mind. Don’t let your old habits or prior knowledge obstruct the development of this martial art.  Systema does not follow specific formulated steps.  Initially, this can be frustrating for new students but if they stick with it they will quickly learn the benefits.

We are not even aware of how much tension we accumulate and carry in our bodies. If we realize and get rid of that tension - we can free up and be open to the fluidity and effectiveness of Systema.

Un fuerte abrazo.

A few months ago at a Systema seminar in Phoenix, Arizona, ICSA Founder Brandon Sommerfeld and his senior combatives Instructor Kwan Lee seized a rare opportunity to quiz two masters of Russian Martial Art SYSTEMA - Vladimir Vasiliev and Konstantin Komarov.
Brandon and Kwan caught up with these fascinating masters of combat during some seminar downtime and they generously agreed to wax lyrical on everything from faith and fighting spirit to the changing face of modern military combat. Enjoy.

Brandon (B): Thanks for agreeing to the interview - I’ve been looking forward to it.

Vladimir (VV), Konstantin (KK): Our pleasure.

We have ten or so questions for you. The one I’d like to start with is: what would you consider to be the most important virtue of a warrior?

VV: Calmness and faith, connected together. If you believe, then you are calm. If you don't then you are full of haste.

B: Okay. Now what would you consider to be the most important skill or attribute of a warrior?

VV: If you have spirit, then skill will come. You cannot focus on skill alone - if you do, it will be empty, incomplete, and not productive or practical in reality. But if you have real substance and spirit, then skill will just be built naturally upon it.

KK: I would add the skill of knowing why you're doing what you're doing - what it is for. You have to understand the underlying principles. The real skill is in understanding yourself - then things become clear.

VV: It is very difficult, because soldiers should not think too much, they just need to do.

KK: But thinking is one thing, and understanding yourself is quite different.

VV: This is true. A soldier needs enough skill and understanding to carry through his mission and come out alive. That's it - just protect the country and stay alive.

B: What are some of the changes you have noticed, if any, in comparing modern-day military combatives with those of the past?

KK: Before, it was more shoulder-to-shoulder, fighting together. Now people are further apart, it becomes more difficult. People used to love their motherland more in the old days. You cannot fight for money, only for an idea. If it's for money, you're not willing to go to the end, you're not willing to die. (or, who's going to enjoy the money that you earned..?)

KK:  Now it's different also because of the development of technology. It used to be more face-to-face; now it's ever more distant. You shoot, and you don't really see the person. Before, in the old days, if there was something rotten inside your fellow soldier, it would show immediately during battle. Now, with technology, he can live with this rotten approach for a much longer time.

B: Were you initially attracted to the combative arts, or was it something you were simply assigned to?

KK: I liked them from childhood.

VV: I always liked it, my whole life. It was a true calling!

B: What do you consider to be the major difference between military combative arts and civilian martial arts?

VV: You can't even compare - they're not even standing next to each other.

KK: In military arts, you have to achieve your goal in the shortest amount of time, with the smallest amount of means, whereas with civilian arts it's a whole process... it's very long.

VV: In the military, you learn to kill. The whole idea is to kill. Not to "fight" - that's different. Special Operations Units, they study more. Even within these Special Ops Units, people usually come with some sort of background in boxing, grappling, ground fighting, and they use this. But to give the solider the idea to "fight" is wrong. It's completely wrong. He cannot fight. It's impossible. If he's "fighting", it means he's not ready. If he's not ready, it means he will not survive.

KK: Sometimes Spetsnaz has both. It has the ability to perform a variety of work.

For example, when the special units have to capture the opponents alive and do specific work with them.

Kwan Lee (KL): Specifically for hand-to-hand combat, at what point is the soldier or operative expected to come up with his own way of fighting?

KK: If there’s a need for it. First, you need to look at the question of why do you need an army? It’s not to defend the motherland. The army is needed so that a young person matures. So that he stops being infantile and grows up. And you have to understand this; otherwise you get a weird view of the purpose of military training. Hand-to-hand combat is needed not to solve problems, but to make a person into a person, in the full sense of the word. So that a man becomes a man. That’s a more global and complete challenge, compared with just beating someone up.

KL: So ideally, they should be working to better themselves and to develop themselves from the very beginning… But I was thinking more of the military combatives that we’re trying to drill into the lower-level soldiers. There’s a certain point, you have said before, when there’s a need to transcend the basics and move to more advanced work.

KK: In Russia, the way the military structure was built, it was not important to have these things – it was more for bringing people up. The army is just an excuse to make men go through this “manly” training. Of course, you also learn things, and become more capable to defend the motherland. But that was secondary. Only when a man matures can he develop his own style and techniques.

B: How important is faith for the warrior?

VV: It's the foundation.

KK: In challenging times, you must have faith. And there are different levels of faith. There is faith in God - that's the highest one. Then faith in your country, then maybe faith in your commander would come next... it's different for every person, but you must have it.

VV: It is the fundamental point of origin, this faith. Sometimes you will lose it. You know, in Russia, during communism, people lost it. But there was a point that connected even people who didn't formally accept faith. They still had that connection, because they were ready to die for their motherland, or for their loved ones. And that's close - it connects to God.

B: I like the saying that "there are no atheists in foxholes". You know, that's true. I know I've seen it in myself - and in other people - when it's time to go to war, they all start praying every day. I know I did. Every day, right away...

Okay - next question: what makes Systema unique compared to, maybe, Combat Sambo or to other fighting arts around the world?

KK: All the other martial arts have a specific goal: achieving victory in a certain competition, or achieving a certain technique or level of skill. Systema is very wide - from Systema, you can go into any martial art. It's like you're up at the top of the hill, and you can go down in any direction. But notice that it's a going down process.

VV: It's hard for people to understand or accept Systema sometimes. Because the primary thing is to work on yourself, and people don't usually like that. It means facing their laziness, pride, and other things.

KK: First of all, Systema is victory over oneself. When you can overcome yourself, then you can fight other people.

B: Systema places a huge emphasis on proper breathing. Why is this so important?

KK: Because the internal processes of the body cannot be controlled by any other means. We cannot consciously control our internal organs. There is no other key to our subconscious and nervous system, other than through breathing. And if you cannot control your nervous system, you cannot do effective work.

B: My last question - where do you see the future of Systema heading?

VV: Well, we're building a new, website with enhanced training opportunities and have moved to a new headquarters gym. In a wider sense, strong people should be holding Systema. Unfortunately, there are not too many of them. Weak people take Systema apart, bit-by-bit. If strong people could hold the whole thing - that would be ideal.

KK: We can talk about ideally where we'd like to see Systema, and then realistically where it's likely to be. Systema carries within it a fundamental background for any athletic preparation, and that's where we would like to see it. Also, Systema has huge potential for working with youths - especially difficult, challenging youths. I have been working with groups like these for a while. Also, Systema has huge potential for helping ordinary people deal with everyday stress. Really, Systema can answer all of the challenges a person faces in everyday life, because it makes a person calm, able to think clearly, and able to see things clearly. But here is the challenge - and this goes back to what Vladimir said about strong people - not everybody is able to make the sacrifice, accept it, and work on themselves. It's a big thing to digest. So here we are, working from an ideal situation and facing reality...

B, KL: That’s it from us. Thank you very much. Those were some great answers.

VV, KK: You had some great questions! Thank you.

About the Authors:

Brandon Sommerfeld (russianmartialartwestpointva@gmail.com) was a Systema Instructor certified under Vladimir Vasiliev. Since 2002, he was training with Vladimir Vasiliev and Mikhail Ryabko and teaching Systema at his school, Russian Martial Art West Point located in Virginia. To our deepest regret, Brandon Sommerfeld passed away in January 2013.

Kwan Lee (kwan@systema.us) is one of the most experienced instructors of Systema trained by Vladimir Vasiliev and Mikhail Ryabko. Kwan is a structural engineer for military aerospace. Currently residing in Seattle, Washington, he teaches classes and seminars for professionals as well as the general public.

The more I learn… the more I realize I don’t know.  I first encountered Systema as I embarked on a new phase of my life, the year I started medical school.  Although still in my mid-twenties, I recall thinking that I had already lived a lifetime and that although there were things to learn, they were mostly academic in nature, easily acquired through work and study. 

In my mind, becoming a good doctor was accomplished through acquiring the knowledge and mastering the necessary skills and techniques to perform those duties.  So too was my initial approach to Systema… As a black belt in both Tae Kwon Do and Karate and having trained in other styles such as Kung Fu and Ju Jitsu, I knew that if I could just learn the skills/techniques that I had seen performed by Vladimir and some of his senior instructors, I would undoubtedly be able to defend myself in any situation.  Okay, I know that some of you senior students are already laughing at the naïveté of these assertions, that many of you just came because it looked cool, looked extremely lethal and effective or because you wanted a challenge or perhaps to challenge... hmmm maybe even Vlad himself?  And I am sure you quickly learned that this is just not how it works. 

Do you recall the frustration of asking a senior student or an instructor to “show you that move” or asking “how did he do that”?  Or perhaps asking a deeper question and getting the answers “just breathe” or “move” or dare I say it …“pray”.  As a member of the military for several years prior with the experience of serving overseas, I remember thinking: “Now, here is a style that looks extremely effective in accomplishing what needs to be done”.  So meeting Vladimir and being told to “relax”, “stop fighting” and “breathe” was incomprehensible.  I wondered how someone with so much military experience could say these things and keep a straight face.

I even thought that perhaps he didn’t take me seriously; that perhaps he didn’t understand that I really wanted and needed to learn in order to defend myself.  Well I now know, several years later, how little I knew then; about life, the art of medicine, and even about myself.  As many of you experienced Systema practitioners know, Vlad can see what we need better than we can.  His amazing ability to say just enough to make you think (often for a long time) in a most sincere way has helped my growth immensely; not only in my practice of Systema but personally as well. 

One of the most fascinating aspects that I have learned about Systema is how soundly it is based on the natural physiological aspects of the body.  As a medical student hearing physiological claims in class, I continuously went to the books to see if the assertions were based on scientific evidence.  I can assure you that I have never heard a claim made by a senior Systema Instructor with respect to physiology that I have found to be untrue. 

Most recently, I recall a discussion at a seminar where Konstantin was asked about breath-holding.  Basically, his response was that it was not harmful… that the worst thing that could happen is that you would pass out and start to breathe again.  From a physiological standpoint, this is absolutely true (as long as you have a safe area to do it where you won’t bang your head or injure yourself if you fall).  I can go into depth about the physiological receptors for oxygen, and how these act on our breathing, but I do not want to bore you with details.  Instead let me give you an example…

Oftentimes, parents bring a child to see a physician worried that their child holds his/her breath when he is angry, that he turns red, purple and sometimes passes out.  As a physician, I simply reassure parents that this is not unusual for a very young child who is throwing a tantrum. The child is not harming himself and he will immediately start to breathe again if he passes out, as at that point, he would have lost his voluntary control.  It is very disconcerting to the parents who, naturally, react afterwards by hugging the child and showing a great amount of concern; thus encouraging a maladaptive attention-seeking behavior. 

Adults also have a maladaptive behavior that a young child does not – for grown-ups it is being limited by fear.  A young child does not fear that he will stop breathing, whereas an adult does.  Most adults cannot control their fear and panic enough to hold their breath until they pass out.  Systema breathwork exercises help us to confront fear and to overcome it. 

Systema now pervades every aspect of my life.  Whether I am calming my upset child, holding the hand of a dying patient and talking about fear, helping a patient deal with pain through breathing, helping a soldier relax before a mission, or utilizing minimal effort and movement to draw a gun and pull a trigger – it all comes back to the simple, yet profound, words I heard the first day I trained and most every session since: “Breathe... move... relax... stop fighting... pray”.  And as I begin to understand these concepts and incorporate them into my daily life, I realize how much I don’t know, not only in Systema but in the practice of the art of medicine and in life in general.  I am truly blessed and grateful to have this knowledge, for it means that there is much yet to learn and that this wonderful journey of discovery has really only just begun.

I found myself anticipating my partner’s move and planning my response to his/her moves or appraising results according to effects.
2. Ineffective, and purposeless movements.
As the class progressed, I started to increase my speed and the number of movements. The biggest problem with ineffective moves is that they perpetuate excessive tension, which produces more ineffective moves (vicious cycle).

The cure.
I prepared my mind to allow certain detachment and then effortlessly bring my attention back to the training. I needed a catalyst and I found it right between the physical and the mental – Breathing. Breathing is a necessity, which can bring mind and body to a relaxed and harmonious state.

At that moment, I had the components for a very interesting session and I was ready to test my cure. The work is very simple! If I catch myself distracted, I calmly bring my attention to the breathing, which enhances my fluidity, and increases the effectiveness which, in turn, helps my breathing.

So what did I discover?

My breath became a beacon for my mind's attention, movement and awareness. I experienced a timeless state of mind. Even after class I felt very present on the street and at work.
Best of all, I adopted this new behavior of my breath leading my actions, and allowing my breath to lead me in my actions.

I am looking forward to the opportunities to test these exercises in day to day situations...

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“What I do know and can explain about Systema, often feels less important than what I don't know about it, yet feels more valuable than any vision I have about ambition, because it protects me by chiseling away at fear, opening my mind to reality”. Let me explain why Systema practice is as fundamental to my life as is my blood.

“Systema... what is that?” Something I hear at least once a week. Usually I only get a chance to explain that it is from Russia and maybe talk a little about Systema being unlike other martial arts. But every time I'm faced with this question I feel compelled but mute to explain it. Systema rugged training, ancient philosophy, clarity of being, it's personal, it's genuine fun and natural, it's me. While explaining Systema I try to keep it simple and be thankful that I know anything at all about Systema life.

Over the last six years, since I began to study Systema, a lot has changed about what Systema means to me. It began as the coolest thing since baggy jeans and sideways hats (and continues to be so) then it molded into my love for being athletic. It offered challenging exercises that were fun and different and left me feeling strong and healthy. Also, it was always on my mind, so it led me into all sorts of engaging conversations and deep thoughts. I talked about how cool it is, how tough my trainers are, how we don't use pads when hitting, and of course how many ways there are to break a fall. But as the days became tougher and training also more impossible and difficult, my expressions became softer. Today one might consider me a marsh-mellow of a man in everyday life. But the softness has roots like a big old Red Cedar tree. It’s because Systema always surprises me; it even makes me surprise myself.

The inspiration to do Systema health practices such as cold water dousing and serious training comes in part from knowing Vladimir's history of rugged training, and the basic desire to be a person of support to my family and the people around me. Every Systema experience can be unique, bringing its own flash of lightning, striking my heart with powerful internal wisdom.

Being a human being alone puts one in the same league as those who accomplished great things, be they top athletes, warriors, saints, or all of the above. I chose to include myself, reach up, and be proactive with my health and life. Systema gives me the “tools” to do that.

My inspiration is continually fueled as I dig deeper into Systema. In Systema I find methods of genuine holistic conditioning, “tools” as I like to call them, that support life. I have learned that the attitude that I bring to class is probably the most important topic of attention and discussion. “Don't feel sorry for yourself” resonates within my body while swimming in the Pacific at 10 degrees Celsius, standing on my knuckles or really doing anything at all. It is a bizarre statement at first, but like a phrase from the Gospel, is so profound it can be studied everyday of life and still be engaging.

Where is self pity? and how truly damaging can it be? Call it a blind spot. Call it destruction. Call it fear. Systema life for me is taking action to prevent the harm from fear every day. When we truly practice Systema (the Systema that Vladimir and Mikhail govern today), we learn to dive into ourselves and develop the awareness and discipline to spot fear, and work with it. Until then, it can remain invisible, built into the fabric of our “identity”. Spot this tricky and sneaky “piece of our identity” and place it into the hands of your Systema tool box. See it next to your soul and learn to exhale it. Knowing how to control fear keeps my ability to think and reason when a situation becomes immoral and offensive, physically and/or emotionally.

“Poznai sebia” -  discovering myself through the “tools” offered by the Russian Martial Art Systema is to begin and continue a proactive life towards true strength, and to regain the natural attitude towards life that overcomes diverse and difficult situations with courage, love and humility.

Systema training can seem violent, void of such noble qualities if a group is not working with knowledge of fear. It is easy to hit hard, work up the heart rate, be tough and learn where we are strong and have talent, this is important; but when we neglect the mystery of what we don't know, and are too bold to the world, we can become lost in fear and our knowledge becomes proud, thus dangerous and destructive. Not that it is wrong to have fear, but if our attitude is undetermined and we are missing the skills to work in our fear, we are apt to hurt ourselves or others. But this is why we train in Systema, to gain understanding of fear. Class is a place to stir it up a little, then calm back down 10 fold. In training we learn physical and mental exercises that rattle our “everyday identity” then rejuvenate us and make us stronger and calmer. I like to make this point time and time again to myself and throughout my work, it keeps my students and I solid and easy.

In class, we must all take part responsibility as “trainers”, to watch out for each other. The drills I teach are very simple, and sometimes so simple that people are keen to ask “what’s next?”, but Systema is a bit counterintuitive. A simple drill like gentle pushing on a partner that is relaxed, might seem mundane for the first 5 or 500 hours that its practiced, but a sense of physical intuition and understanding about you and your partners body will build up in a genuine way. A way that is unique to each person and that no trainer can “give” to a student. A way that will be useful at full speed in any location at any time. The practicality that the Systema community is always speaking of, begins simple, becomes deep, and ends simple.

For me, diving into Systema head first has since proved itself a compliment 10,000 times over. It is here that I begin to see the truth of my being, my life, my family, and my community. It is here that I rejuvenate my body from the stresses of life and become the whole person I was born to be.

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'The Survivors Club' explains why some people live through things that creep your flesh even to read about - mass drowning events, horrific fiery infernos, metal spikes through the heart, and beyond. Sherwood makes the crucial distinction between "surviving" and "living". The idea being that you need to apply the same calm awareness and rational sensitivity which have probably served you well in the calmer waters of your daily life, to the maelstrom of a life-threatening emergency. He thoroughly explains all the recent cutting-edge survival research, and spices his narrative with incredible anecdotes that will make you proud simply to count yourself one of the same species as these "ordinary" people who walked (or swam, or fell...) through hell and back again.

But, not to take anything away from the scientific pursuit of survival science (now being researched in secret military labs and the psychology departments of major universities throughout the Western world), that same distinction, the difference between "SURVIVE" vs. "LIVE" was not news to me. I already understood, because I'd been taught exactly that point almost ten years ago, when I first took up the practice of Systema under Vladimir Vasiliev, Mikhail Ryabko, and Konstantin Komarov. They taught it and mirrored it to us, because it has been part of them for a long time. That's why they're still around to pass it on.

In "The Survivors Club", Ben Sherwood paints the best broad picture of survival research ever assembled. But here, I want to focus on a particular point. Consider the following observation from Dr. Gordon Giesbrecht of the University of Manitoba, the world's foremost authority on hypothermia (freezing to death), as quoted in The Survival Club:
"Some 95 percent of those who perish in cold water aren't actually hypothermic. In fact, their body temperatures turn out to be almost normal. The cold doesn't kill them. It's the terror that leads to drowning and heart attacks."

This is a truly shocking fact. 95% of those deaths were entirely needless! How can this possibly be? Sherwood continues the explanation, and here is the crucial link to Systema training: "So what should you do if you end up in cold water? Professor Giesbrecht recommends a straightforward 1-10-1 system: You have one minute to get your breathing under control, ten minutes of meaningful movement, and one hour before you lose consciousness. Survive the first minute and you're on your way to saving your life. The most immediate danger comes from what's called cold shock. This includes a gasp reflex followed by uncontrolled breathing known as hyperventilation. As you gasp for air, you're more likely inhale freezing water. This response also makes it very difficult to coordinate your swimming movements. Your first goal is to fight the panic and get control of your breathing."

Do you understand? Did you get the key lines?

"You have one minute to get your breathing under control".

"Your first goal is to fight the panic and get control of your breathing."

There it is. But this great book does not really explain How-To. He has to get on with his narrative of plane crashes, fires, kidnappings, ferry capsizes, parachute deployment failures and other mishaps. And Sherwood wraps everything up with a fascinating psychological profiling protocol, so that you can self-analyze your survival strengths and your likely reactions in an emergency.

But now, here, I want to stay with his key sentence for a while. I want to reiterate this sentence: "You have one minute to get your breathing under control". But: HOW exactly are you going to do that? No really - how? I don't mean give a breezy nod and a mental thumbs-up "Yep, that's the stuff!"

I mean suppose RIGHT NOW your entire body was plunged into freezing water, right this minute, could you do it? Get control of your breathing - within one minute? And if not, how can you learn this? Can it be trained at all? Or maybe it's magic, or an innate ability that you either have (- and live), or lack (- and die)? Neither Mr. Sherwood nor Professor Giesbrecht offers any specifics, beyond the key word: Breathing.

There are many breathing disciplines. You might want to explore them all. You may think training in some of these fashionable practices could pull you through. For example, I personally trained in Ashtanga Yoga. This venerable yoga tradition, despite the tortuous appearance of some of the advanced postures, is primarily focused on teaching the student breath control. This yoga system is widely taught and practiced, and I can say I've become fairly proficient at it over the years. But, would yogic breathing, as typically taught in a warm and peaceful studio get me (or you) to the other side of our own One Minute? I'm sorry - it would not.

You see, there's a ... gap... between every breathing method out there and the real world of pain and danger that any of us could face at any unpredictable time. It's a narrow gap, so you could go for years without ever detecting it. It's so narrow that it's only about... One Minute wide. You need breath training that has been entirely formulated with that goal in mind - laying you a plank over the gap and bringing you to the other side of it alive. I'm talking about the One Minute "reality gap" that can suddenly crack apart your ordinary life, your ordinary training, and your ordinary breathing. It doesn't apply only to cold water and hypothermia. When you read Sherwood's book (you are going to read it now, aren't you?) you'll see that it applies everywhere. It applies to every single emergency, because he's essentially saying: You have to control yourself before you can save yourself.

To the best of my knowledge, having studied and practiced dozens of breath and energy cultivation systems in great depth for decades, among all training systems known to me, only the Russian Systema breath training program pioneered by Mikhail Ryabko and brought to the West by Vladimir Vasiliev bridges the gap. It's the bridge you'll someday need to walk over from death to life, when nothing else is there for you. Nothing else is real - for bridging that space.

This is not to criticize other methods and systems which are so enjoyable, delightful really; in the visions they paint of an ideal world of perfect serenity. But, as Sherwood's book makes painfully clear, the real world doesn't care about your visions. The message I took from this book is that when it counts, you'll have only a short time to control yourself if you are to save yourself.

The breath training program presented in the DVD "Systema Breathing" and the ever-popular book "Let Every Breath... Secrets of the Russian Breath Masters", both by Vladimir Vasiliev, teaches exactly how to master that One Minute gap. Coaches you on how to bridge it and cross over to the other side, and not to waste your energy and throw away your life when you could have survived. Though this term itself ('One Minute') never appears in the book, still make no mistake, that's what we're talking about here. The effect of the training is to address with steely precision the challenge Dr. Giesbrecht had in mind when he said:

"You have one minute to get your breathing under control... Survive the first minute and you're on your way to saving your life."

Carve that quote into your mind with a laser scalpel. There is no program, not meditation, not yoga, not anything, known to me other than Systema Breathing that can install this into your body/mind. Install it so deeply and unconsciously that it self-activates when you face death head-on (as I have many times).

And it isn't only about breathing. Chapter after chapter, as Sherwood surveys the charred ruins of airplane crashes (yes, there can be survivors!), multiple car pileups, falls from mountains and out of helicopters, and much more, again and again the core trainable attributes of the Ryabko Systema program are cited:

For example, Sherwood writes about RELAXATION as a critical attribute of a survivor of extreme impact:

"... [The survivor of a fall from a high building] may be physically relaxed at the time of impact, which appears to be, in itself, an important criterion for survival of free-fall"

"... People who are drunk also appear to have a disproportionate survival rate among free-falls of extreme distances because they were abnormally relaxed"

So you may think: Great! At least for THIS attribute (relaxation) we ARE given the training method: hoist another cold one! But it isn't that simple. Alcohol is shown elsewhere in the book to be a negative factor in an emergency. All kidding aside, HOW are you supposed to acquire this degree of relaxation control over your mind and body, facing an unprecedented situation of absolute terror? Sherwood doesn't hold your hand here; no path is laid out for you. He offers the "what" and the "why" but not the "how". So I am offering you the "how" right here and now. Relaxation, again, just like breathing, is one of the fundamental attributes explicitly engendered in you by the Ryabko Systema breathing program.

Finally, Sherwood discusses the role of faith and spiritual connection, as he writes:

"When I started writing this book, I was somewhat skeptical of the role of faith in survival. But as I began to interview survivors around the world, I noticed a remarkable pattern..."

I won't go into that aspect further in this brief article. You may read Sherwood's book. But I will drop you a bread crumb: Faith is the cornerstone of the Ryabko Breath Training program, and is also covered in great depth in Vladimir Vasiliev's book: 'Let Every Breath... Secrets of the Russian Breath Masters'. I'm not going to disclose too much here, but ... Faith is one of the secrets that the subtitle refers to.

This brief present article is dedicated to those 95% of lost human lives, needless deaths. I'm writing this in sorrow for them. Even a few hours of Ryabko Systema breath training would have saved them - this is the scientific fact.

You can take up Systema training for many reasons: the cultural interest of the amazing Russian ambiance, for the warmth of the camaraderie, and/or to fulfill your visions of "winning" in some imaginary street combat in your head. You can do it for fitness and fun, and for that there's nothing better. But after you've read The Survivors Club, and pondered the bridge I've tried to build for you here - the bridge between Sherwood's generalized research results and immediate reality of surviving your own One Minute - at that point you'll know why you're really in it.

'The Survivors Club' presents the THEORY of survival - Ryabko/Vasiliev Systema training is the PRACTICE.

Student: We heard that you are currently working on a new book on STRIKES. One of the topics covered in that book will deal with the skill of taking strikes. It is of great interest to anyone studying martial arts, self defense or even human psychology. In Systema training, this skill is recognized to be very important, quite a lot of time is devoted to learning it. Why is that?

Vladimir: Why study this, you ask, but when they get hit, students also ask Why Me?..
There are 2 reasons for training to take strikes. The practical-apparent one and the underlying-psychological one.

No matter how good a fighter is, sometimes he gets hit. Some strikes you just do not see, some pleasant ones may come from the back, unexpectedly, or can be more powerful than you anticipated such as when you are hit with an object or a weapon.

In my experience with numerous martial arts and martial artists, fighters avoid getting hit by trying to be the first one to punch, by learning escapes, evasions and blocks. But they rarely talk about dealing with the strike that actually landed on you.

There is also an approach of taking strikes by withstanding pain, deliberately toughening up and tightening up various body parts. Aside from the ultimately destructive effect of such practice, it would only work for a visible, anticipated strike, while in place. But what if you have not seen the strike come or if you were on the move?  Then you would need alternate relaxation of muscles.

I have seen how an unexpected punch can send a skilled martial artist into a state of disorientation, shock, panic, resentment, and many other counterproductive conditions. Moreover, I have never seen anyone capable of avoiding all strikes in a mass attack or crowd fight. You can easily verify it yourself in a group of 10 or more fighters.

Here is a typical example seen in class many many times. A new student joined in, big and strong guy, experienced in martial arts. We began a mass attack drill where everyone comes to the center of the gym and is hitting in all directions, each man fighting for himself. Right away the new guy got punched on the head, he turned to see who did it ready to hit him back. At that moment he received a punch from the other side, and with some anger building up, he turned to that side, his fist ready to fly in that direction. And then of course he was hit again from the opposite side. He was twirling like a good punch bag. Finally, he realized that a punch-for-punch does not work in a mass attack. So he exhaled and started punching those who were close by and not those who hit him.

Unfortunately, most of us have an almost automatic response: when a strike touches us we immediately go to retaliate and hit back. This is caused by pride. Systema training of taking punches deals directly with pride.

Student: When did you realize the need for learning how to receive punches?

Vladimir: When I was young and involved in many confrontations, due to my body type, I had an easy time evading and escaping any punch, I could move, roll and twist my way out of any situation. Although it worked for some time, I knew that I will not always be able to escape. And true enough, I learned though my injuries. First torn neck muscles, then broken ribs, and later torn knee ligaments.

These injuries clearly showed me the limitations of my agility. That led me to very serious thinking that good agility, reaction time and strength do not guarantee success. I realized the incompleteness of all martial arts teachings that I had known, or almost all...

By the way, these injuries of mine happened while I was training with my legendary teacher Mikhail Ryabko. Being a restless student, every so often I would try sparring outside of my gym, tried other ways of fighting or tried to prove something. Now, through the 15 years of teaching at my own gym, I see a very similar picture with my students. An injured student arrives to class. What happened? His answer is usually: I was wrestling with a friend on the weekend, or played some soccer, or had a volleyball game.

Student: So how does that relate to taking punches?

Vladimir: A punch is a potential injury. And there is only one sure way to minimize or prevent destruction from a strike and from physical stresses to the body. This sure way is offered in its completeness only by Systema. Of course, it is breathing.

With proper breathing it is extremely difficult to sustain an injury. If the circumstances were very serious and trauma does happen, then the damage is a lot less severe than would have been otherwise.

Breathing is the most interesting, useful and largest physical resource that we have. If we want to enhance ourselves we must incorporate this key element into our training and our life. If we look at a person (as a human being), we see that he or she is complete, our training method also has to be complete with all the components present and connected into a system, or Systema.

Student: Can breathing really help that much to take a punch?

Vladimir: Let's look at it step-by-step. What is a strike that landed on you? It is a sudden force or impact or increased inner pressure, in other words, a quick transfer of tension from person to person. Keep in mind that the tension not only comes from the physical impact but also psychologically from our perception of threat and pain.

I have seen punching sessions where one or several punches were signaled or shown in a convincing way, but the fist was stopped just before making contact with the body. Although the recipient was not even touched, he became sick to such an extent that he had to throw-up.

This clearly shows us the vicious cycle of fear causing tension, tension producing more fear, fear leading to more tension, etc. This is where breathing comes in as the best method to break the cycle in such a simple way.

The effects of proper and improper breathing are very well described in the book Let Every Breath... If you have not already read it, please check it out.

Let's say you are punched in the stomach. If you breathe properly, the physical impact of the strike is dissipated, the tension does not build up in the area, there is no excessive blood flow and therefore, minimal or no bruising. Moreover, what is extremely important: breathing does not allow the feelings of fear and self pity to enter the body; you literally exhale them. This way, even a powerful punch brings no damage physically or psychologically.

Tension always builds up in the muscles from the anticipated pain of the punch and from the real pain of the impact. Breathing helps to eliminate the tension and thus removes both pain and all the negative feelings.

Student: And still, people do not really want to get hit, so if we are training to receive strikes, do we have to overcome this weakness and just force ourselves to get punched.

Vladimir: It does not have to be forced, it all depends on your instructor and training partner. Over the years of teaching, I never stop being amazed at what happens when we work on strikes at Systema seminars.

As you know and have seen on DVDs, Mikhail Ryabko can hit with the power of a cannon ball. He stands calm, relaxed and smiling and from his subtle punches, the recipients drop on their knees, totally loose focus of their eyes, laugh or cry. Yet, what is most incredible, every seminar there is a huge line-up to experience his punches. Out of a hundred participants at least 50 voluntarily stand in line. These are people of all athletic abilities including the frail ones, all ages including the older ones, instructors, new students, as well as women.

Each volunteer gets from one up to several punches. Each participant gets a different reaction, some are in real pain and Mikhail instantly shows them how to come out of it, some go though a whole spectrum of feelings, but all come out enlightened. And guess what, at the next seminar day the participants line up to get hit again. The people have reported that with every strike delivered correctly and received with proper breathing fear leaves the body, replaced by peace and strength.

Student: I realize that training to take strikes is an extensive and exciting process and I look forward to the next class. Could you give a few tips on how Systema applies breathing to taking a punch.

Vladimir: I will be glad to.  There are training tips related to preparation for striking and the actual things you do while your are receiving the strike.
Most people have the primary fear of contact. Of course the degree of fear varies from person to person. I have met some who came to my school afraid to get hurt to such an extent that they were shaking even in a peaceful setting of the gym. Learning to take strikes should follow a good progression.

One day at Mikhail Ryabko's class in Moscow one of his students brought a friend who was not a fighter at all. In fact, the man had no experience in any martial art or any sport, he was from the world of science and classical music. He wanted to know how to take strikes, but he was absolutely unprepared to have any contact with a fist. Despite his interest, he was completely unable to understand the principles of breathing and taking strikes. Even talking about punches made him panic.

To help this man understand, Mikhail demonstrated this fundamental drill.

• In order to gradually reduce the fear, do not punch right away, but begin with pushes.
• If you are the recipient of the push stand comfortably with your mouth slightly open to allow exhaled air to flow freely out though the mouth.
• Have your partner place his fist on your upper stomach and apply intermittent pushes in a pumping action without breaking contact with your stomach.
• Allow the air to be expelled freely with each push though your mouth.
• Once you got the feel for exhaling the extra pressure, just to sense the alternative, close your mouth and try to take the same kind of pushing. You will immediately realize how much less effective this is. The extra pressure now cannot exit and you will clearly feel the discomfort that builds up.

For another easy test, try to keep your mouth closed as you are just standing and doing nothing else, you will feel tension increasing inside. So imagine if you have tension to start with, then pushes cause more tension, strikes cause yet greater tension and hitting with an object or weapon would cause even more tension inside. This is the very thing we want to avoid, since as we know, unresolved tension leads to destruction.

Student: Can you explain what you mean by that.

Vladimir: If the impact of a strike enters a space enclosed by tension it has an accumulative power; it is explosive from inside. A strike that penetrates past the superficial muscle layers carries this force and destroys the internal organs and structures. That is why it is so important to make sure that the strike does not enter inside.

Student: During these drills is it better to exhale quietly or to make a sound?

Vladimir: You see, due to the everyday stresses, people arrive to class very tense. Their breath cycle has been constantly distorted and interrupted throughout the day. And they were not even aware of that. At the very least, what an instructor can do in class is to teach them to breathe. If breathing is audible, or obvious to the person himself, he will be more likely to remember that he is breathing, it will take less effort for him to concentrate on breath work rather than muscle work. Thus, it will be easier to reduce the tension.
For more description of Audible Breathing please refer to Let Every Breath... page 50.

Student: When I am comfortable with pushes and exhales can I begin taking punches?

Vladimir: We need to advance the skill by building a strong foundation. Continue working on the exhale phase of the breath cycle. Take light punches only. But now have them delivered to various body parts such as shoulders, arms, upper back. You can have your partner walk around you as he strikes. This drill will help you control tension in different body areas. Your goal here is to acquire an instinctive exhale to any contact.

When you have gained this automatic response of contact-exhale, then you can start on real punching. You may like to prepare by doing a few sharp inhales and exhales to prevent the fear from developing. As we discussed in the first part of our conversation, such dynamic breathing interrupts the fear-building process. Sharp breathing keeps you in control while at the same time fills your muscles with oxygen needed to match the physically active condition of your partner.

When you begin to practice taking punches, make sure you stand in a natural and straight body position, as described in Let Every Breath..., pages 51-54, at a comfortable distance to each other. At the very moment that your fist touches your partner's stomach, he exhales sharply though the mouth. Then he immediately draws a short and sharp inhale though the nose with the mouth closed, ready to repeat the exhale at the point of next contact.

Punches can now get stronger than in the previous drills, but stronger for that recipient and his level of skill. Your primary goal is to teach your partner to breathe, so as you strike watch your partner vigilantly and make sure that your strikes do not make him tense.
In Systema, we call these short and sharp inhales though the nose and exhales through the mouth Burst Breathing. It is widely used in endurance exercises and in combat. More details in Let Every Breath... pages 69-70 and throughout chapters 5 to 7.
When training, the more discomfort and pain you get from a strike the more you accelerate and intensify your burst breaths. This way you do not allow the pain to penetrate. By doing Burst Breathing you can also stop the destructive feelings of self pity, anger and resentment from arising within yourself.
In Russian, Burst Breathing is also called The Saving Breath. There are numerous instances where this type of breathing helped to prevail in a confrontation or saved a life.
I heard about one such dramatic episode from Mikhail's student in Moscow. This young man was in a horrible accident. The minivan with several people in it fell off a cliff and rolled down a steep and rocky hill. The minivan took one shattering bounce after another and each time this young man tried to group himself, move and roll, he kept doing Burst Breathing constantly.
Tragically, all other passengers were killed in the crash. He was the only one that took Systema classes with Mikhail, and he says that it was Divine providence and breathing more than anything else that saved his life.

Student: Why does it have to be short breaths? It seems that slow deep breathing is a lot more relaxing.

Vladimir: If you do a big long exhale when you are punched, it will make you take a big inhale and that is when you drag the pain and all the unwanted emotions into yourself. Whereas if you only breathe with the top part of the lungs, the stomach muscles remain slightly contracted and in tone even after a punch, and the punch remains on the surface. This type of breathing allows you to take a series of punches and allows you to stay mobile in a fight.

Student: How many times should I hit my partner when we are practicing?

Vladimir: Your partner is not a punching bag, so quantity is not important. What is more important, do not hit until your partner is ready. Make sure that he has totally recovered himself from your punch, that his face, position and breathing clearly tell you that he is ready to go on. Only then do you continue and take turns.

Student: I noticed that when I am being punched, I sometimes close my eyes for a very brief moment. Why is that?

Vladimir: Many people do that, especially during sparring or real fight. Your fear of getting hit is bigger than your will to protect your body. You can not handle the tension of anticipating a punch and therefore avoid facing it.

You can deliberately make this an element to work on. It is important to watch and see when the strike comes at you so that you know exactly when to exhale. With more experience, you will be able to catch the right moment even with the eyes closed. Keep in mind that the perceptions of pain are different when the eyes are open and closed.

Student: Some strikes make me kind of disoriented for a moment. What can I do to control that?

Vladimir: The reason is that you begin to concentrate on the pain and other body sensations, you become too consumed with these and thus lose the control of your surroundings and become disoriented. During practice, it is useful to look at your partner, remain in visual contact with him. It does not even have to be him, you can maintain eye contact with another person in the gym. Burst Breathing will also help you restore your awareness much faster.

Student: Is it beneficial for an experienced martial artist to practice strikes with a non-experienced student?

Vladimir: I often ask more experienced students to work with newcomers. It is a great opportunity to check oneself, because the new person presents something unknown and unpredictable, a chance to control the tension of anticipation and adjust to a variety of punches.

Student: What kind of things can we do to accelerate our learning progress?

Vladimir: Make a habit of breathing properly all the time in class, during any exercise. No matter where and how you are training watch the tension as it appears from any contact or any effort and exhale it. Apply the same to your everyday life, do not let the stress, tension and negative feelings get in.

Student: Are there any words of caution in training to receive strikes?

Vladimir: It is important to proceed gradually, preparing your body physically and preparing yourself psychologically.
Systema also recognizes that the one who strikes transfers his internal condition to his partner. As the skill of striking improves, it becomes easier to transfer inner feelings to the recipient. This is a word of caution especially to those who teach. An instructor may not even recognize it himself but he may be trying to prove that he is not just an ordinary person... Sometimes we forget that we cannot be the strongest ones. The desire to be the strongest makes us the weakest. An ideal teacher is a calm and balanced person with no ego. His strikes would be safe to take.

To read this article in French visit:

http://www.systemafrance.com/spip.php?article136

This happened over 20 years ago in Russia. My friends and I were at Mikhail Ryabko's class. The format of classes was such that a student could choose absolutely any form of attack and Mikhail would just demonstrate his amazing variety of spontaneous defenses.

We would rarely choose a stick as an offensive tool because it was so painful. But that evening, one of the guys who was probably new to the class came at Mikhail with a stick in his hands. After a few moves, Mikhail tied him up with the stick. Yes, tied him up. The guy was lying on his back holding the stick with both hands, he could not let go of it and could not get up. He was not hurt or twisted, yet he could not move as if he was totally restrained. This was one of the many small miracles of Mikhail's classes, and it was so hard to believe that I regretted that this was not recorded.

Years went by and I almost forgot that episode and even thought it might have been my imagination. Then in the year 2000, Mikhail, my close friend and teacher, came to my school in Toronto to teach a seminar. The night before the event, we were talking about the good old days and some fun incidents. And what do you know, the next day at the seminar Mikhail demonstrated a similar thing again.

One of the participants, a police officer, very experienced and solid man was fairly new to Systema and had some doubts about its effectiveness. He started moving against Mikhail and after a few moves and a bit of contact, Mikhail had him laying on his back in a very odd pose - arms and legs bent and twisted looking awfully uncomfortable. Mikhail stepped aside and there was nothing preventing this man from standing up or from getting into a more normal lying position. The man seemed surprised himself but totally relaxed and content with his strange position. A crowd of amazed seminar participants gathered around. The man on the floor could talk, blink and make some fine movements with his hands, but he was stuck and could not do any bigger movements, his body looked very uncomfortable yet he looked happy and relaxed.

When the people asked Mikhail what is going on, Mikhail replied that the man is "frozen". He also said that if we leave this man alone now, he would just go deeper into himself and would not try to get up. In a couple of minutes the questions, comments and jokes gradually got the man moving. It seemed that he was checking out his muscles as if finding new ways to move his body for the first time. Mikhail smiled at him and in a total "matter of fact" way went about teaching the rest of the seminar.

Now back to the topic of tying with a stick. Over the years of my military work, I have seen many effective restraining tools rope, chain, belt, etc. Stick can also be used of course but always in combination with a rope or clothing. For example, when the arms are raised to the sides, the stick is put though the sleeves and then tied to the wrists. Or in the sitting position, stick goes under bent knees, the arms go under the stick, the elbows bent, the wrists are up and tied. All this makes sense and works, but imagine restraining someone, without causing any him any pain, using the stick alone. I saw that not too long ago and this time got it on tape!

As you probably heard, in October 2007 Mikhail Ryabko and myself were asked to present Russian Martial Art at the United Nations. The presentation went very well, and while in New York City, Mikhail taught a seminar at one of the Systema schools at Fighthouse, Manhattan. One of the topics of interest was the stick. Since Stick Defense was already covered on the recent DVD, people now wanted to see the Offensive tactics.

And again Mikhail amazed the group. He started with the drills to prepare the hands, fingers and wrists for handling a stick. The fingers and wrists is what control the stick directly, so the exercises should originate there and gradually work through the rest of the muscle groups. In a simple and unique way he showed drills to fill the hands with power without tension and how to tense up only the muscles required for the movement, while keeping everything else relaxed. He did both partner and solo work, fun and practical for using a stick or any other similar weapon such as a sword. There was a progression from simple to more challenging exercises, such as using the wrist alone for subtle and extremely powerful work. Each drill and technique was chosen for a reason to attain the final goal "mastering the weapon".

During a later part of the seminar, without any special preparation or announcement, again in a completely casual way Mikhail "tied" one of the participants up with a stick. One of the drills was learning to control the opponent when he grabs the stick. The guy grabbed Mikhail's stick and in a few motions, he was on his back twisted laying on his own bent leg, one arm raised and bent, still holding the stick but completely unable to move. Mikhail let go of the stick and stepped away. The guy was still on the floor one hand holding the stick that laid across his body as if it was pressing him to the floor. In disbelief, he tried to get up a few times, or use his free hand but it was not possible. So he continued to lay there for a while until Mikhail "untied" him by softly kicking his leg from underneath him.

You will see and enjoy this moment in the new DVD Stick Seminars

Professionals in this line of work know that dangers associated with a car can be divided into 3 categories. The CAR FIGHT film deals in great detail with each one of these 3 types of threat:

- Accidents

- Criminal activity

- Terrorism

CAR FIGHT gives you the following:

- Intellectual skill - important information you must have to survive

- Physical skill - how to act and prevail

and

- Psychological skill - controlling your fear and panic

Imagine you are being chased and you have to run to your car as fast as possible...

or the light in the parking lot got switched off suddenly...

and what if you were hit from behind, your head is spinning but you have to open the car door before it is too late...

moreover, you have a child with you that you have to put into the car as well...

Possibilities like these are numerous and real, and could happen to any driver or passenger.

During extreme stress, a simple action of opening a car door from the inside or outside of your own car can become next to impossible to perform. In these situations, as you may know, two major things happen to us physically and psychologically. On one hand, our hearing, vision and awareness become extremely limited, to the extent that we can not see the door of our own vehicle. On the other hand, our fine motor control becomes totally inadequate, so that we are no longer able to coordinate any small movements, to the point of not only being unable to pull out the key and unlock the car but even being incapable to finding the door handle on the inside of our own car...

We have to recognize that everything that seems to us plain and ordinary, changes totally in the face of a threat to our life.

Based on their crime prevention and combat experience, Systema instructors suggest for anyone wishing to enhance their survival skills to practice some useful drills. Here are a few that are just a tiny sample of what is coming up to your screens...

- Try to open your car door from the outside in one movement, at speeds higher than your usual. Have a go at using your right hand and then your left, place your hands at different grips of the door handle, and practice some uncomfortable grips. Then try all that with your eyes closed. Your will realize how much you rely on vision and thus how vulnerable these simple actions become when you are under stress.

- Next practice opening the car door from the driver's seat and from the passenger's seat moving a little faster than usual and using different grips. Then go though the same movements with your eyes closed. (Training with the eyes closed has a stronger psychological effect).

- Try to enter your car from the driver's door and exit though the passenger's door and vise versa. You will quickly realize that you do not have a good functional knowledge of your body or of your car, especially when you attempt to do it with your eyes closed. This drill would be helpful if for example your vehicle door was blocked by a criminal car on one side.

- During a road accident, the front of the car may be smashed and the driver may have to escape though the back door, or if the driver is hurt a passenger from the back seat may have to make his way to the front. Therefore, practicing to move from the front to the back seats and vise versa is also useful with eyes open and then closed.

- As an example from the specialized Russian military training, you can also try the following exercise. One person throws a small object such as a rock into an open car window and at that moment his partner has to leave the car instantly. Of course, you understand that in combat situations that small object would be a grenade or tear gas pack. The skill of instant escapes has also saved lives when a car is rolling downhill into the water or off a cliff.

- If you wish to make your training more serious, you can make a roll out of a car or escape and assume a certain position of readiness for further action. Konstantin shows that exceptionally well in the film. When soldiers did this drill they had heavy ammunition and weaponry on, they had to jump out of various vehicles in the right way to avoid being shot at, to be ready to open fire at once, or to find cover.

As for a setting more familiar to most of us, this happened very recently in the city of Moscow. A young woman was being kidnapped. She was shoved into the back seat and the aggressor put the doors on automatic lock and drove off heading out of the city...

 After the initial shock, the woman was able to pull herself together and acted decisively. She figured out that the front seats in this car reclined manually and when the car stopped at a red light she was able to reach for the recline lever of the driver's seat and quickly pulled it up. The assailant fell back with his seat and she grabbed his throat and began to choke him with her bare hands. It was completely unexpected for the man, plus he ended up in an extremely uncomfortable position so could not really fight her off so the struggle lasted enough time for the light to turn green.

The cars behind started signaling, people in the car near by saw some serious commotion and rushed over to their car. The criminal got scared by the people banging at the car windows and he unlocked the doors. The woman escaped. He took off, but she was alive and unhurt. 

As Major Komarov stated in CAR FIGHT: "There are no inescapable situations, just unescaping people."

If you'd like to have the foundation for dealing with fear, for moving and breathing correctly, contact Systema Headquarters located in Toronto @ www.RussianMartialArt.com

We did it all year round, with weapons, fully equipped. The work was so intense that the backs of our coats were soaked with sweat; our knees, elbows, fingers, heads and other body parts were bruised and covered with blood due to banging and scratching against hatches, walls, doors and car ledges. An hour after this kind of training, sweaty, angry and tired, we were able to fly through the narrow hatches and vehicle entrances in a single movement not even paying attention to our sticking out weapons and equipment.

We kept asking ourselves: why in the world are we doing all this?

The answer came during our second year, when during a Tactics class all of a sudden an armored infantry vehicle with the unit inside it caught fire. Eleven people wearing winter uniforms, with gear and auxiliary equipment, left the burning vehicle in 6 seconds! No one was injured, no equipment left behind, the fire was put out quickly and without panic. Only then we began to understand the importance of the "small things" such as a simple ability to correctly take one's place and leave it.

This habit, developed at the military school along with sweat, bruises and scratches, saved me more than once in various situations. This habit helped me jump out of a vehicle rolling off a cliff; take a running jump during cross fire to the safety of a vehicle's armor; in split seconds in pitch black darkness move from the driver's seat to the gunlayer seat and activate the shooting gear of the armored personal carrier...

This old habit is alive not only during the military service, but also in daily civil life. Once I watched an old army friend of mine, Andrei, who had purchased a new car. He parked the car, walked around it for a while, then started entering the car from one side and getting out from the other. After having done this about 10 times, he got in the driver's seat and started moving to the passenger seat and back.

I could not help but ask him what he is up to. Andrei's response was a story with a valuable lesson.

In 1994, he retired from the army and started a business of driving used cars from Europe to Russia. In those days this business was quite risky because bandits were hanging out on the roads, hunting out such drivers. Following the old military habit, Andrei always took the time to get adjusted to each car he drove. Finally, this habit saved his life.

It happened in late fall. Andrei picked up a car in Belarus and drove across the Russian territory in Smolensk region. Up ahead he saw a Traffic Police car and a man in police uniform signaling with the black and white striped staff to pull over (this is how police officers pull over drivers in Russia). Andrei stopped the car but kept the engine running, rolled down the window and waited. The "cop" slowly approached the car, officially introduced himself and asked to see the car documents and the trunk contents.

The appearance of the "cop" did not cause any serious suspicions: bulky uniform, dusty boots, manners of a 'master' - pretty typical for a state patrol out on the road to earn some extra cash. Still something was not right. So leaving the keys in the ignition, Andrei handed the documents, got out of the car and followed the "cop" to the trunk.

The "cop" quickly glanced at the empty trunk and started to stare at Andrei's license and the car registration. Fumbling with the papers, the "cop" stated that the documents were fake and that Andrei was required to get in the back seat of the police car to figure out the details of the matter. A police captain was sitting in the driver's seat "taking a nap". Andrei already opened the backdoor when he suddenly realized that despite the dry weather, the license plates of the police car were covered with a thick layer of mud, the road patrol signs had pieces of Scotch tape on them, and the "cop" standing behind Andrei"s back for some reason put his right hand in the pocket... 

Without showing his realization, Andrei slowly started getting into the back seat, grunting and trying to imperceptibly open the opposite door. The car central lock was on. The "cop" was sitting next to Andrei to obstruct the exit. When suddenly, in one movement, Andrei swung his leg between the two front seats and sat sideways in the front passenger seat. This action was so strange that it left the "cops" baffled for a second. With his right hand Andrei unblocked the door, with his feet he pushed off against the "captain" and with his back first fell out of the car. Then he jumped on his feet and dashed to his car with all his might. From behind the bushes, the third "cop" appeared and was already running towards Andrei's car.

The two of them reached the car almost simultaneously: Andrei from the driver's side and the "cop" from the passenger's side. At that moment, Andrei did something that saved him a couple of precious seconds: he dove into the car through the open window, stretching his hands forward and was able to lock both front and back passenger doors. While the "cop" was running around the front of the car, Andrei started the engine and locked the doors on the driver's side as well. He drove off as the "cop" was trying to knife stab his neck through the open window...

At the closest patrol station, Andrei reported the incident and the fake "cops" were caught red-handed. It turned out that this gang had committed several murders.

Here is what saved my friend's life: self-control, quick thinking, and well practiced actions inside a car in a critical situation. It means that getting to know the inside space of your vehicle is time well spent. Life is full of surprises, and one needs to be ready for them.

Experience Major Komarov's reality based teachings in CAR FIGHT DVD

http://www.russianmartialart.com/catalog/default.php?cPath=22

As many of the Systema practitioners have noticed, Steps 4, 5 and 6 of Intensifying and Localizing Tension are even more difficult to do properly than the Gradual Build Up of Tension. There are great benefits to mastering that. It develops total multitasking such as the ability to do soft and precise work with one part of your body while simultaneously executing heavy work with another part of your body. For example, gently holding a child by the hand while carrying a heavy load in the other hand - without straining yourself at all. You will also notice the ability to psychologically maintain different levels of concentration and emotional requirements at the same time.

In addition to that, please note the great benefits of Burst Breathing. We constantly get tense in our everyday life, and usually are not even aware of that, however, there is one sure sign of such tension - interrupted breathing. While you are practicing these challenging drills, you force yourself to breathe through Burst Breathing, so your breathing is never interrupted and it prevents any extra tension from accumulating. So instead of over tension you gain functional muscle tension, just enough of it to carry through your task. You become a healthy person, efficient in everything you do.

You can find related instructional material at the Systema Store

            by Vladimir Vasiliev

A human being is a complete system and for this reason we have to make our training a complete and whole system as well (thus, the Russian word for our training approach is Systema).

Many sports and martial arts assume and presuppose that the person entering the training is healthy. In fact, this is almost never the case. The physiological parameters such as heart rate, blood pressure, lung capacity, posture, mobility and strength of the joints and muscles, condition of the nervous system are rarely ideal. And even less likely is one to have stable and balanced psyche, free of fear and unnecessary emotions.

Having said that, we set out goals:

-        make training a gradual process of restoring the health that we have lost up to this point  

-        build the skills properly enhanced and supported by our own physical and psychological reserves

-        help your partner advance his health and his skills as much as your own and you will progress tremendously

Hence, you training considerations are:

1. Use Breathing as the foundation for everything you do. In class, make sure that both yours and your partner's breathing continue no matter what. Your will then be able to relax, restore your health and psychological balance (read how and why in "Let Every Breath...": http://www.russianmartialart.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=88 )

For common examples of breath interruption, imagine a runner that holds his breath on the very last stretch before the finish line or a weight lifter holding his breath on the last repetition. These athletes may achieve the result, but they do real damage to the heart, as the heart has to endure a big strain without the oxygen supply.

All Systema practitioners with at least some experience know that the best way to maintain smooth and continuous movement is by way of breathing. Holding your breath makes you interrupt the movement. If you were forced to stop moving then continuous breathing will lead you into movement again.

2. Maintain the Natural Body Position throughout all movements. Straight back and good posture keep you relaxed and balanced psychologically, help your heart, lungs and nervous system to work effectively. Smooth, calm and natural movements happen when the body is aligned properly. Alertness, attention, sensitivity, reaction time, the entire action potential is maximized and the chances of injuries are reduced. A popular example is the walk of a lion - smooth and mobile on the outside, with power, concentration, and readiness to act instantly in any direction on the inside.

Moreover, any deviation from the natural and straight body position makes it very hard for you to take strikes. And what's also important, your opponent will instinctively feel that the point of deviation is your vulnerable spot and will inevitably hit you there.

3. Flexibility physically and psychologically will be discussed in future articles.

4. Practice Striking in proper training progression (start with placing of the hands, then progress to pushes, combine all contact with breathing, etc. as we discussed in previous Newsletters). This way you avoid the common fear of hurting your own hand during punches and avoid tensing of your body. Because of this training progression you will see where to strike - where the areas of tension or restriction are on your partner. You will enable him see these areas too, you will help him heal old injuries, get rid of restrictions and fears trapped in his body by way of breathing and movement.

One goal of striking is to break the shell. It has to be done carefully, as when you are cracking an egg, you want to make enough impact to crack, but not to shatter and destroy the contents inside. Such a situation would be extremely difficult to repair. It may seem to you that some people are able to withstand punches of high intensity, but that "endurance" is built by layers of fear that thicken the shell growing towards the inside - taking away from the live and mobile space inside - the result is more injuries and loss of health.

You will soon see some incredible examples of healing, enlightening and altering strikes by the legendary Mikhail Ryabko on the new DVDs titled SUMMIT OF MASTERS.

http://www.russianmartialart.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=100

So let's try to have a wholesome approach and a finished cycle of training - from your arrival to class, build a foundation, take up activities in the proper progression, restore and support as you are advancing to the next level.

It was good to learn the basics of Systema breath-walking in the clear, clean, level environment of the Toronto Headquarters school. That way, we were able to focus easily on the nuances of stretching our breath, relaxing our movement, and the calibration and control  of fatigue - to the point that some talented people began to approach the ultimate level of "20 steps per breath" - said to be what the real Spetsnaz commandos routinely accomplish.

While I enjoyed working with the walking/running patterns, for some reason at that time I retained my tunnel-vision struggle with pushups, which I thought would be my own personal "engine of mastery". Immediately after learning the Systema breath-walking, I mentally put it aside as not especially relevant to my interests and needs.

On the 2001 Russia training trip, Systema breath-walking and breath-running patterns were again introduced, from the ground up so to speak, by Mikhail himself and were awesomely demonstrated in action by the incomparable movement artist, Mikhail's colleague and assistant instructor,  Sergei Ozhereliev. We worked quite a bit on these patterns, both out on the soccer field at the training site and then out on the wild bluffs overlooking the Moscow river under Konstantine Komarov's fine tutelage. Yet, the practical utility of this work still failed to sink in. Call me thick... I just kept spending my own training time on those infernal pushups... (actually I still "love to hate" Systema pushups, and I work on them daily! But that is a subject for another article, or please refer to Chapter Five of LET EVERY BREATH).

In any case, even after undergoing several years of fairly intensive training by the greatest masters and commandos of the Russian Systema world, the whole breath-walk thing was a mere curiosity to me, something to tag along with when a teacher called it out but otherwise lacking any particular distinction on my personal training menu.

Now tear your brain away from Systema for a second, and let your mind's eye float across the world's biggest ocean to the world's most isolated island chain. On the northeast corner of the Big Island of Hawaii, underlain by mountainous slabs of gargantuan ancient black lava flows, perhaps the world's most beautiful tidal river creeps along the bottom of the thickly jungled Waipio Valley. The overlook site at the top of the Waipio Valley trail leads your eyes out hundreds of miles into the pure blue Pacific, effectively infinite space.

The valley trail plunges from this miniscule overlook platform for about two miles almost straight down to the jungle-veiled river far below. Technically the trail could be described as a "road", since it has some roughly broken ancient paving, and thus, although regular cars are not equal to it, 4-wheel drive vehicles can make the scary descent and the nerve-wracking re-climb - after all, there are people, in fact descendants of Hawaii's greatest ancient warrior clans, living in the jungle far below! They are mysterious but not unfriendly folks for the most part, living close to the land and in harmony with nature (apart from their 4-wheel drive Jeeps of course!) The greatest of Hawaii's ancient royalty, Kamehameha I, was born and raised in this area of the Big Island. Wild horses and mules roam the inaccessibly steep slopes on both sides.

I like exploring the Waipio Valley on foot, and so whenever I'm on the island looking after any of my business, I always make a point to stop by there and do the hike down and back up. The trail is angled at a grade well above 30 degrees along its entire length, probably 45 degrees or more for most of it. It is a beautiful and leisurely walk down to the valley floor. From the trail's mouth at the bottom, I following the somewhat snake-shaped river to its outlet at the sea, where giant waves have pounded out some of the softest sand on this, the wildest, youngest and therefore most raw of all islands in the Hawaiian chain. I would sometimes just nap or zone out gazing far to sea on that primarily raw beach for hours...

That was... going down. But night must fall... and well, now - it's time to head back!

Going back up. That was always pretty rough on me. I've never been in bad physical shape and I'm stronger and fitter than I look. But this trail is one killer beast if you are in any kind of hurry. The only way I ever knew to make it back up to the parking at the trail head (before nightfall preferably!) was to huff and puff and blast up a few hundred yards, then practically (or literally!) collapse in a red-faced, undignified heap of sweat every hundred feet or so.

So there at my frequent little rest stops at the trailside, I'd be heaving and gagging like a dying dog, looking ridiculous to any freshly crisp down-hikers, not to mention the amused stares (but also occasional friendly hang-loose hand signs) from passing local 4-wheeler drivebys. Most undignified! But those times when I was in a hurry, what else could I do? I needed to get back up the trail, and this process of brief bursts of frantic struggle, followed by humiliating exhaustive collapse, seemed to be my only ladder back. What a miserable way to wind up my hours of mystical communion with Nature! Lower than any panting, drooling canine. I wasn't even sure it was particularly good even as physical conditioning, since it just didn't feel healthy to be that exhausted.

But help was waiting in the wings! On my next trip to Hawaii following the Russia training experience, I once again headed down the Waipio Trail one fine (but very hot!) day. I knew the price I would have to pay, but felt it worthwhile. After vegetating along the beach at the river mouth for a while, it was time to turn back. As I snaked along the river toward the trail's valley bottom entrance, mentally fortifying myself for the long haul back up, anticipating the honks from the locals, the pitying and somewhat appalled glances from the down-hikers, it suddenly occurred to me - Hey, do I really have to suffer that much...  isn't it possible to try Systema walking on this Ultimate Challenge? Call me Einstein but I had never thought to actually try out the Systema breath-walking thing in "real life", I had thought of it as nothing but a gym exercise.

Taking my first steps up the trail, I resolved to ROAD TEST Systema breath-walking for the first time. Trailhead or bust! I set the dual goals:

(a)    To walk continuously to the top, at a brisk, uniform pace, without any rest stop.

(b)   To be able to recover my normal breath in 2 minutes or less once at the top.

From my description so far, it should be evident how impossibly ambitious these goals were. If you've ever made this particular hike (in your pre-Systema days) you KNOW how impossibly ambitious these goals were! But still I thought, ok Systema, if you are the real deal you are gonna do some WORK for me now, or I'm going to know the reason why.

I paused to recall every nuance that my trainers in this work, from Vladimir through Mikhail through Sergei, had emphasized - calm mind, inhalation via nose, exhalation through the mouth,  relaxed shoulders and upper body, relaxed hips, evenly smooth footwork (on a 45 degree grade!)... all exactly as eventually (years later) presented in "Let Every Breath" book and the "Systema Breathing" DVD. As I set my first step onto the incline, I re-affirmed my two Prime Directives - NO STOPPING UNTIL THE TOP, and NO PANTING AT THE TOP. Hate to say it, but I was very very doubtful it could be done...

I began with one step per breath action (inhale or exhale). I started feeling exhausted... darn it's no good... suddenly I realized my shoulders were tense. Without stopping the climb or the breath pattern, I breathed out through my shoulders which immediately relaxed them. Score one point - the fatigue IMMEDIATLEY lessened. But I was running out of breath... why? Systema has a spirit of self-inquiry. At the recent Summit of Masters, the teachers emphasized to us that Systema training is not competition with others, it is learning to use your own body as a laboratory. I hadn't yet heard it summarized so nicely, but even at that early stage I kind of understood this about the training. Apply what works within what you've been taught.

In that spirit, and nearing the point where I'd have to break my vow with a rest stop, I realized I had one basic "dial" I could turn, one fundamental control - the count. How many steps per breath action would be the perfect fit to this trail, this heat, this person, this situation? For some reason 1 step per breath action wasn't a fit to that particular grade. I tried lengthening my breath into 4 steps per action. No, that rhythm could not be maintained. I tried 3 steps... better! How about 2?... Yes! That was it! I felt exactly as you would in driving a manual transmission car when at first you misjudge the slope, but then you catch the exact match of gear-to-grade... click! Smooth... 2 steps per action (2 steps per ever inhale, 2 steps per every exhale) turned out to be the perfect match to that particular trail. 

My upward cruise was then most enjoyable. I was just enjoying the view, for the first time on this trail's ascent, as though I was riding a sky-tram. We all love our Systema training, but I'm ashamed to say how "surprised" I was when it worked like a dream in real life. I had enough excess breath capacity to cheerily hail the downhikers I passed - and I got actual cheers and that "Hang Loose" hand sign from the occasional local 4-wheel drivebys, signaling RESPECT now, rather than PITY! It was a totally enjoyable high. As I hiked through different subsections of the trail, I varied my step count down and up a bit, finding that my body could function pretty much exactly like a small manual transmission car - just gauge the situation and shift accordingly, no strain at all. I found I could easily calibrate physical effort and speed against each other, without ever losing my breath.

I never stopped until the top. And the second part of my goal never materialized as a problem to solve. Because I had never lost my breath, there was nothing to recover.

I believe that anybody who knows Systema breath-walking method, even the rawest beginner, to Systema training can easily win over anybody, simply by getting them out on a long, steep hill or cliff trail and challenging them to make it to the top smoothly, continuously and enjoyably. As they begin to fade and gasp after their first few hundred feet, just teach them what I've outlined above (as also instructed in "Let Every Breath").

I understand that to many people, especially serious military types who routinely hump dozens of miles over hilly terrain carrying hundreds of pounds under intense life-and-death combat pressure, this is not much to speak of. But those great people have written their own experiences elsewhere for our benefit. This is only my own experience, an average guy faced with a small but interesting learning curve... but as I comfortably overlooked the mysteriously brooding late afternoon Pacific from high above the Valley, I could only conclude to myself, categorically and unequivocally, that:

Systema Breathing Pays Hard Cash!

The following is an extract from Chapter Seven of LET EVERY BREATH...

"Start your inhale slowly walking in a normal posture, and stay relaxed. To coordinate breathing, begin with a simple pattern of 1-step per every complete inhale, and 1-step for your complete exhale. Try to keep a precise alignment of steps with breath cycles. This might feel a bit robotic at first, but just relax, loosen up. Take natural steps and start enjoying yourself: 1-step-inhale; 1-step-exhale; 1-step-inhale; 1-step-exhale,..., etc. Count your steps as you go.

Then move to 2-steps for inhale (one single, smooth inhale continuously over 2 steps), followed by 2-steps for exhale (a single smooth exhale distributed over 2 steps). If your training area is small, you may wish to walk in a circle for the work described in this section. After a few circles, move up to 3-steps per (single, continuous) inhale, 3-steps per exhale. After a few circles at 3-count, you may then move on smoothly to 4, 5, 6 up to 7 steps or more. At each count, try to do approximately the same number of circles, for symmetry. Naturally, you will begin to step somewhat quicker on the higher breath counts, but try to stay relaxed, even, and calm-minded throughout. It is also possible to perform the same patterns with a light jog or run. After reaching your peak count (for example, 8-steps per inhale action, 8-steps per exhale action), you should wind back down sequentially to 7-steps, 6, etc. until you finish with 1-step per inhale, 1-step per exhale. This kind of slow buildup to a peak intensity, followed by working gradually back down to the starting point is called a pyramid sequence...

When you feel comfortable with the basic pyramid pattern, you can try more challenging variations..."

For more exciting details, read LET EVERY BREATH:

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or better yet, get the whole Systema Breathing Package which includes LET EVERY BREATH and the accompanying SYSTEMA BREATHING DVD:

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Learn to apply proper breathing to every single activity of your life... you will be amazed at the results!

And here is what happened. It took place on a summer evening in a park near a nightclub. My friends and I were running across the park to see a movie. My shoelace came undone and I had to stop for a moment. And then I saw that an old man was walking along a side alley (he seemed like an old man to me at the time, now I think he was not more than 60). He was skinny and small, his back very straight and his hair all gray. Just taking a walk, hands behind his back. Light jacket and cloth-cap on, a war medal ribbon on the jacket. You could see the man was just relaxing in the park. All of a sudden, two big ugly thugs, half-drunk walked up to him. Sleeveless shirts on, full of tattoos and gold rings, typical repeat offenders with a long record. They blocked the old man's path and told him: "hey oldie, let's have your light".

I got very scared for the old man. I was thinking that now they would hurt a war veteran, ignoring his age and his medals, he did not even measure up to their shoulder level. But I could see the man was not concerned at all, he came right up to the muggers, looked up at them very closely and said: "Guys, didn't your mother ever teach you to respect the elders?" Suddenly he raised his right hand so quickly that I could not even see what happened. Then I saw one of the thugs grasping at his own throat with both hands, his mouth wide open and falling down onto his knees. The old man then moved his left hand and the other mugger bent in half holding onto his groin and moaning. The old man stood there for a while observing the situation and then said quietly but very clearly: "if I come across you one more time I will kill you both". Next he placed his hands behind his back again and continued his walk.

It was highly unusual that these two did not even rush after the old man. They recuperated only a few minutes later, and distressed, made their way out of the park. This surprised me as well, because the 'tradition' was for the one beaten up in a fight to shout and threaten, especially if one was a criminal. Those would never get humbled, but would always go to the end. I ran down the alley to take a closer look at the old man, but I could not find him.

I caught up to my friends and they were also impressed with the story. We could not explain it at the time. This was different from all the skills we knew, all the scraps we saw and experienced, all the street and knife fights. What was different first and foremost was the total calmness and confidence in the actions of the old man. As if he was just opening a bottle of beer.

Years later, when I was analyzing the incident, I got reconfirmed in the understanding that the key in a confrontation is the psychological condition. But how does one overcome the natural fear? I could not understand it then. This fight was for many years a great and unattainable example for me. The effectiveness, simplicity and utilizing the situation to such an extent is only possible given full calmness, confidence and control over fear. It was all there. I saw it with my own eyes. This was my first encounter with true mastery, and my first realization that the skill lives not in the body but in the psyche, in the spirit. Such a person can be killed, but cannot be defeated.

The basis of any confrontation is timing, precision and simplicity. And the foundation of this trio is calm and even psyche, clean and steady spirit. How does one attain that? There are many ways - through the body to the psyche, or the other way around and then back; or straight to the spirit. Each person chooses his own way. But in order to choose one, you should learn what they are, try them and test yourself. This will be a part of our training program when we meet in August 2006. Each of the instructors will present a variety of ways. Each of the participants will 'choose the sword to fit his hand', and get a chance to test and understand oneself.

THE WATER

Surviving the Waves of Panic 

by Konstantin Komarov

This happened a very long time ago when I was just starting to learn the techniques of working under water. I put on the wetsuit and prepared the supplies for my work, but miscalculated the weight of the load.Moreover, I took an almost empty oxygen tank because the volume of work seemed to be minimal.To make things worse, I grossly broke the rules (I was too conceited at the time) and did not tie the signal rope.So, equipped in this way, I put on the fins and headed to the middle of the river.

I was swimming quickly and at an angle to the current, trying to keep the depth.I suddenly realized I was being pushed to the bottom.I began kicking harder with my fins in order to come up. I accelerated, but couldn\'t get higher.I added more speed, but it was all useless - I was losing my strength.By the time I realized what was happening, I was on the bottom, about 12 meters (36 feet) deep and about 50 meters (150 feet) from the shore.I lost my orientation.It was dark.There was no grass on the bottom of the river, so I could not tell the direction of the current nor tell where the shore was.I looked to see how much air I had left, and saw that the arrow was pointing to the middle of the red zone -- that meant 5 to 7 minutes of calm breathing.Then fear rolled onto me.

Not just fear - TERROR.

It suddenly seemed that the air was barely going through the tube, and I was starting to suffocate.The water was compressing me harder.In other words, I was almost in a panic.I looked up and saw the faint light of the sky.  I so desperately wished to live that only one thought stayed in my head - SWIM UP!  I feverishly started beating my arms and legs and went straight up.It took me 40 seconds to cover the depth of 12 meters.  My legs were in a spasm.  The top of my head was already on the surface, but I could not look up.I had no strength to lift the facemask out of the water.  With a final effort, I looked up, caught a glimpse of some object against the sky,

... and dropped like a rock back to the bottom.

I was lying at the river bottom powerless, panting as if I had just sprinted a race.My body was spent, but my head cleared.  I began to calm myself down, to control my breath, and think.  I remembered what exactly I saw above water and it was a section of a bridge.  I fell straight to the bottom without turning, and thus was able to identify the direction of the shore in relation to the bridge.  There was still air in the tank, but the arrow was pointing to zero.

I tried to unbuckle my load and the oxygen tank, but I couldn\'t.  It turned out later that the belt buckle got hooked to the tank attachment and got jammed.  I decided not to waste time with the equipment.I took off the fins and started to move quickly in the direction I chose - toward the shore.  I was not swimming, but moving as heavy divers do - pushing off with the feet and assisting with the arms - gliding above the bottom.

Fortunately, I picked the direction well.The oxygen indicator was not set precisely, so there was still a tiny bit of air left.I dragged my last inhale out of the tank when the top of my head was close to the surface.  I had to cover the last few meters jumping high and gulping air with my mouth.  I crawled to shore with my arms and legs shaking - dead tired but happy because I was alive.  For about half a year later, I had dreams of laying on the bottom, in the dark, running out of breath with water pushing down on me.I would wake up in terror.

As a result of this \"adventure\", I made a few important conclusions for the rest of my life:

In the SYSTEMA HAND to HAND film, there is a drill where the two opponents are approaching each other and evading contact.  It is a very useful exercise to learn free and smooth movements and to identify the moment when you feel discomfort or fear.

To expand on this practice, here is another good drill from Vladimir\'s class.  It will help you to further overcome your own psychological obstacles, your pride and your fear.

Starting Position:

Stand facing your partner, about 5 meters (15 feet) apart. 

Drill:

1. Your partner takes one step towards you, with any strike (arm or leg) directed right at you.  You make a step forward and at the same time move away from the line of his strike.

2. Your partner steps forward again with a completely different strike.  You again move away from the line of the strike with another step forward.

3. Your partner steps forward again with another type of strike.  You make the last step forward, evading the strike, and take your partner  down.

There should be no pre-arranging of strikes or takedowns.  Be ready for any movement of the arm or leg and make sure that you both move forward towards each other every step.

You can progress this drill by gradually increasing the size of your steps, the speed of your movements, by shortening the starting distance and taking down your partner on the second step, and then on the first step.

Benefits:

This simple and fun drill helps you feel comfortable while closing distance.  It expands your zone of comfort.  Because you gradually progress from the \"safe\" to the \"dangerous\" zone, from the easy to the difficult position, you can gradually overcome your fear of contact. 

As we grow up, we have less and less physical interactions and physical contacts.  We develop a fear of contact.  The body becomes tense in anticipation of contact - even with people we know. 

In this drill, we are overcoming this fear by deliberately stepping forward towards a potential threat.  In a common sparring position within striking distance, both partners are usually afraid - one to miss a strike, and one to hit his partner.  Whereas, in this drill, you start at a further distance (15 feet apart) and there is no stress or fear of contact because you know you have time to react.  You are giving your psyche a chance to adapt and gradually training it to be more stable.   

You are learning to move your feet continuously and not freeze.  You are combining footwork with bodywork in a real, dynamic situation.  You will notice that if you freeze or hesitate, you will not get away from Strike 2.

**Combine this drill with those in SYSTEMA HAND to HAND (DVD or video), and learn to stay three steps ahead of your fear.

SYSTEMA HAND to HAND is one of the most important film of Vladimir Vasiliev\'s entire film collection!  Read more about it at:  http://www.russianmartialart.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=64

You will discover the lost secrets of SYSTEMA - and learn every fundamental principle and dozens of supporting drills to gain total control of any empty hand attack. You\'ll get 2 and a half hours of great explanations with non-stop action...

But that\'s not all you get!  This production also includes a BONUS segment on DEFENSE FROM CHAIN.