Email Question

I got this email today

Quote :

Hello Mr. Grannon,

I have been watching a lot of your movies lately and would like to personally thank you for the great information and the realistic street fighting techniques and so on.

I would like to share a story with you about an experience I had in a street brawl and see what you have to say about it. I know its kind of long but once you read it you'll get the mindset and idea of what I was going thru and could possibly tell me what I could have done better:

I'm coming out of school and theres a huge crowd forming in the parking lot. Apparently, a huge group of guys from another neighbourhood have come to my school looking for a certain few people (all of which are my mates). I walked over to see if anything was going to happen (looking back on the event I and using the knowledge received from several of your videos I realize this was my first and major mistake). I am 16 years old and my three mates are 16, 16, 18. What happened was the large group of people (who numbered between 20-30 and ranged in age between 16-22, real cowardly bastards) spotted somebody and the brawl began. I began punching one guy (remembering the proper hand technique to ensure not breaking my hand). When I saw one of my mates on the floor getting stomped out by 10 guys who were formed in a circle I ran to help him (major mistake). 5-6 guys then swarmed me (the older of the group, 19-22 yrs). They didn't know how to fight as they were doing soft blows to the head, but one of them (21) was cowardly hitting me with a metal thing wrapped around his hand. I remember being scared that if I tried to actually knock these 6 guys out that they would get even more angry and almost kill me. When I finally made a decision to hit them back the cowards left because of the principles of the school who had come out. I was left with 2-3" cut to the head, which you know would bleed like hell because of the location. I'm not a soft like school girl and I didn't even care about the cut (I didn't realize my head was cut until girls began screaming and pointing at it). I had to get 2-3 staples to my head. It feels weird because I feel ashamed that I "got my ass kicked or beatdown" as everyone at that school is so soft and opionated. I would really appreciate it if you could give me some of your wisdom and shed light on this event.

P.S. Have you ever lost a fight or been "jumped or beaten down".

~

I don't know, I think it's more like someone not explaining very well the emotional struggle he's going through.

The way it's explained, the guy and a couple of mates have walked over to an army of hostile guys who they know are looking for them. He's tried to apply stuff he's seen on Richie's excellent youtube clips, but as we know, without training them, you'll not apply them. he frozen, then flapped, then charged, then swung, then frozen again and wished he's run earlier...etc.

I think perhaps the biggest learn from this (though I think the early forum members already know this) is that watching an instructor on DVD, however good they are, and however many times you rewatch it is no substitute for dilligent training with partners.

and to answer his main question, personally I was jumped and mugged by a group about 5/6 years ago and it was a major factor in changing the way I trained. I made several stupid mistakes along the way.

I was playing poker for a living at the time and was leaving the casino at 3am after a win. I parked in a nearby street, rather that in the adjacent carpark. A money saving habit I'd got into before I realised the carpark was subsidised, but even though I'd realised the carpark was only £2 I continued to park in the street free

as I walked out of the front door, I half noticed a group of lads crossing the large main road in front of me. As I turned to head for the side street my car was in a can flew across my path. I'd obviously been noticed. my next mistake was to make an unfounded assumption that these were lads out drinking and that as long as I didn't make strong eye contact and draw the old "what the fuck you looking at?" gambit, then I'd be ok.

Instead, I heard a scuff of feet behind be as they finished the 30 metre charge they'd have made, followed by a barage of strikes on my back, neck and skull. At the time I'd been training in a kickboxing system for about 6 years that I knew was flawed, but I was a dan grade and students were relying on me to turn up and teach everyweek. I had found it hard to walk away from the club, even though I knew I wasn't properly preparing myself or my students for the street.

The one positive thing to come out of the kickboxing training was that I guarded up tightly, turned and wasn't paniced by the punches hitting my raised arms. I backed against the wall and could see through my guard and was picking a target. Obviously this all happened very fast, but we all know that in stressful situations, things slow down. I'd picked the one I was going to punch through, and run back to the casino (the car was too far to make at a sprint), when I found that the wall that I'd leaned on turned out to be a solid(ish) wooden gate. It gave way under the combined weight of me and three attackers (the fourth was stood back, looking around, rather than joining in). We collapsed through the gate which closed behind them. The situation was now me on my back being knelt on by three guys and not being visible from the street. Fight over. I was told by one of the guys kneeling on me he had a knife he'd use, though I never saw it. They went through my pockets, took the money, phone, car keys and wallet.

What happened next was that two lads went off to my find car that they'd got me to tell them the location of while two more waited outside the gate and held shut. I looked around me in vain for a leveller. a brick, stick, bit of glass, anything. when it was clear there was nothing I knew I was going to have to go for it empty handed. I burst out of the gate to find an empty street. next major mistake was that instead of heading back to the casino to get help, I headed for my car. When I got there I found all the doors open and stuff thrown about. however, due to a faulty catch, the boot was still shut. it could only be opened from inside the car from a secluded button. I saw three lads up the road, they saw me.
"You want your fuckin car keys back you cunt?" I heard.
I popped the boot where all my martial arts kit was, including a bad full of escrima sticks. If I was going to face them again, I was going to offer a lot more resistance. A new guy walked up to one side of me and asked
"What's going on mate?"
"I've been mugged by those lads and they're coming back for more." I replied.
"Sort 'em out mate." he told me.
I turned back to face the advancing bad guys. The apparent witness who'd encouraged me to have a go, turned out to be the lookout. I hadn't recognised him. I bet he couldn't believe his luck. He threw a sucker punch over my right shoulder and my eye closed and split immediated. he ran off towards his mate and they all took off.

So the main mistakes I'd made were:
Parked in the street instead of the carpark with CCTV to save £2
Saw the group of lads but didn't wait for them to pass before heading to the car
When the first shots landed on the back of my neck I didn'timmediately turn and go psycho
when I escaped from the secluded courtyard I should have gone straight to the casino.
when I was at my car I shouldn't have allowed anyone to stand behind me. Even a potential friendly witness.

I've completely changed my training since that incident and feel I've made significant progress. Infact I believe it's the best thing that ever happened to me as a martial artist. Since 2004 I've co run a new shcool with my original instructor from before the crap kickboxing club. We feel we're preparing ourselves and our students much better for incidents like this and, with the help of Richie, we hope to continue to improve.
I still drag the story out from time to time to educate my students in how not to be an idiot soft target.

Strong smell of an injuried ego

Loki wrote:

Strong smell of an injuried ego

Loki refers to the original email post

It sounds like the guy in the email is trying to say "I could of done something but didnt"....

~

Sergei wrote:

While being attacked by 5 guys, how is it possible to have all these mental decisions going on? A human would be in survival mode. Fight or flight as they say. If it was 1 attacker I could understand but not while against multiples.

thats a good point Sergei... there is a lot of "thinking" going on in this melee...

Richard Grannon wrote:

Loki wrote:

Strong smell of an injuried ego

Loki refers to the original email post

It sounds like the guy in the email is trying to say "I could of done something but didnt"....

Although I'm happy to admit that applied to me at the time too.

To use Mick coup's analogy from the recent interviews, for several years I'd been practicing with a Javelin and although I'd thrown it occassionally in small competitions I'd never REALLY thrown it hard. When the big opportunity came, I turned up late, not concentrating, dropped the javelin, then picked it up again, waived it about a bit and then dropped it again.

Over the last five years I've practiced much harder and make sure I at least throw it regularly as far as possible in practice.

As I said, best thing that ever happened to my training.