RingoSo recently I’ve been branching out in my fighting. This past year I came close to increasing SCA attendance by an order of magnitude. I’ve started taking BJJ classes*. I’m about to go play at my first boffer larp this weekend. As I’ve started practicing these new (or returning to old) forms one thing has been consistent. Better fighters fighting down to me. And I fucking hate it.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying I can handle these cats on their best game. I 100% cannot. I’m also aware that if they were to just trounce me as hard as they could each time I wouldn’t learn anything. I recognize that you have be within a certain skill range of an opponent to learn from your loss. Otherwise you never pick up what mistake you’re making or what advantages they are using.
Still though I can’t fucking stand getting fought with kid gloves. A huge part of my growth as a fighter and a person comes through constant self analysis and attempts to have an honest accurate picture of myself. It’s hard as fuck to know where you are and what’s happening if you aren’t facing realistic challenges. I can’t tell if that block is actually good enough or if a shot could land in a real fight. I don’t have confidence in my ability to survive a submission attempt or in my escape cause I don’t know if they just let me or not.
For a guy like me who relies on criticism and the recognition of flaws to form an accurate picture of himself its torture to “succeed” at something and not know if it was a real success or not. I will admit, part of this is definitely my pride. There is this arrogant part of me that for some reason, despite all evidence and multiple repeated experiments, that believes I’m better than everyone at everything. Oh you’ve been practicing this skill I just heard of for your whole life and are top 10 in the world? I can beat you at it.
Its fucked. And I know that. Pride is a tricky master. Still that bit is there and I can’t deny it. I know I should eat it and be humble. I know that I can’t grow without people taking the time to work with me. I know I have to walk before I can run and I know that I’m not ready for the high levels. Still sucks.
The worst part? I fucking do it when bringing up fighters in Steel Fighting. When I teach at The Hall I often find myself having to pull back to give people the space to try new things. I will throw the same shot or combo 10 times in a row to teach the block. I don’t try to win because you can’t win practice. What sucks about that? I know that the success they find there will eventually transfer over but they might not transfer yet. I also have seen so many fighters get cock strong thinking they are now hot shit because they are doing well against a higher level fighter. When that happens you may eventually need to bring out the beat stick and humble they ass, because they stop listening, they start trying stuff that only works when because you aren’t on your A game, Or they start trying to teach things they don’t know yet.
In the end I get it. Because at a certain point it doesn’t really do my much good to smash a new fighter and similarly I know it doesn’t help the guys training me to smash me. I have to be good enough to provide some sort of challenge for it to help either/both of us. And it still bothers me.
There is one type of fighting down I don’t mind though. When the higher level fighter is working a specific technique and thus leaving openings they might not and not taking advantage of having the upper hand as much. Sometimes when sparring I want to work on a specific aspect of my game; a combo, a single strike, a stance, footwork, a throw, positioning, whatever. When I do this I get caught alot more, fall alot more, in general get beat up alot more, but it helps me learn that technique in a real environment. It also means I’m trying as hard as I can to get the thing off, so the person I’m fighting is still getting a real test. All their blocks are working and attacks are really landing. I’m not doing lazy defense or attacks waiting for them to pick it up, I’m just focusing on something else. I will still attempt to block and attack if its in service of the technique I’m working so it provides a much better avenue for self analysis. It’s pretty easy to tell when someone is working on one thing and one thing only, which helps you keep an idea of why your shit is working but also lets you know that if you catch someone in that same position it will still work.
I know objectively though that that can’t be the only way to work between higher and lower levels. For one thing, sometimes the gap is so big that even that isn’t enough to really help either party. For another as the lower fighter I know I learn better then the upper fighter takes the time to work with me on a specific aspect or coaches me through it. I hope the same is true when I’m the upper fighter, but I’ve never coached myself so I don’t know. In the end this isn’t really trying to say anything should be changed, I just wanted to vent my frustrations at being back at the beginning of training and how annoying it is building that initial foundation.
Thanks for reading and I’ll see you in the lists.
*Side note, if you are in Southern NH or North eastern Mass, I’m fucking loving my training at New England Top Team. While my experience in traditional martial arts is limited, this is everything I would look for in a fight gym if trying to fight a place to train Steel. The community is excellent and uplifting while still challenging you. The instructors, particularly the head coach Ray, are knowledgeable, passionate, and still constantly working on learning and improving. There is a constant mix of drilling, application, and live sparring. They push each other to go compete and there is an atmosphere of hunger, while still being welcoming to a more casual practitioner as long as they are also willing to work. They look to exemplify Deeds not Words and really that’s all I need. So if you’re thinking of picking up BJJ, Kickboxing, or MMA, give it a look.