Clubb Chimera Martial Arts : CCMA

Juniors

The junior class focused on agility. The initial warm-up is always led by a different child each week. Warm-ups, as always, were specific for self defence hard skills and Mixed Martial Arts development. Specific agility and footwork exercises were added on to promote the lesson’s theme. By virtue of their size children have a single advantage over a larger antagonist in the respect that, with quick thinking, they can employ successful evasion tactics. Footwork although limited in direct self defence training application has beneficial results in the attribute skills of Muay Thai, Western Boxing, Wrestling and Submission Grappling. After obstacle drills the children performed the following activities:

• Mirror Catch-up – One student mirrors his opponent and tries to keep up with him using side, forwards and backwards footwork, low grappling stances, sprawls and touching low targets. Taken from the World Combat Arts list of functional fitness drills.
• Crazy Baby – One student moves around on their backside (butterfly guard) trying to ward-off an opponent moving forward on their hands and knees. Taken from World Combat Arts list of functional fitness drills.
• Touch the Head (ground) – one student remains on their back using their hands and feet to ward off an opponent trying to make contact with their head. Taken from World Combat Arts list of functional fitness drills.
• Strategy One versus Strategy Two – Three head-guard adorned students prowl the mats for victims. The “victims” form plans to best keep away or aid each other in event of being attacked. The head guards represent S2 – a strategy for closing distance and permitted only to grapple. They only have to hold their victim for three uninterrupted seconds to eliminate them from the game. The “victims” are S1 – the priority strategy focusing on awareness, evasion, escape, striking and pushing. This is a staple CCMA activity from which all raw individual techniques are derived.
• Mixed Martial Arts sparring – Controlled and monitored free sparring permitting punching, kicking, clinching, takedowns, groundwork and submissions.

The fourth tenet of discipline was address again during training. Rather than giving a lecture on controlling one’s emotions and practicing diligently the children were shown some simple delaying tactics and breathing exercises in-between activities and at the very end.

The lesson was finished with a discussion on the effects and dynamics of a group. The children put forward suggestions regarding the change of a person’s behaviour when they joined a group. Roles in a group were also discussed, along with preserving one’s individuality. This tied in with the S1 versus S2 training, where group activity in its crudest form was expressed.

Suggested further reading for parents: “Superpowers for Parents” by Dr. Stephen Briers.

Seniors

Continuing on from the work covered in the December workshop the students focused completely on the development of the hook strike and circular movement. This included and ended with an updated version of the high percentage method warm-up drill.

·        Gypsy Game – derived from the Keysi Fighting Method. This activity has two student linked together by one hand. They are then instructed to strike, parry and cover with their one free hand whilst being put in different positions. They fight from standing, kneeling, on their backsides, on their backs at opposite ends and on their backs at the same end. The restrictive movement isolates hooking, looping and circular hand strikes from different positions whilst also promoting a strong defence.

·        Single S1 versus S2 pressure drill with a restriction to the S1s only being permitted to use hooks, uppercuts and circular hand strikes. This gave the students an opportunity to research different angles from different ranges to deliver the hooks against a grappler. This type of drill is a staple of CCMA training used to draw raw individual techniques in a high intensity situation.

·        S1 versus two S2s pressure drill with S1s still only being permitted to use circular hand and arm strikes. The goal for this particular drill was adjusted. Rather than having a normal sparring environment, the S1s started with their backs to the wall and were given the target of escaping across a certain line behind the two opposing S2s. Circular footwork was found to be efficient by most students in this particular drill.

·         Hooks and uppercut to the focus mitts from the fence – pre-emptive striking.

·        Hooks and uppercuts to the focus mitts from kneeling

·        Hooks and uppercut to the focus mitts from seated

·        Hooks and uppercuts to the focus mitts from the back

·        Proactive transitional pad drill for circular hand striking. Built off a boxing flash pad drill, CCMA students are trained to strike targets when they appear and are in range and to keep striking until the target is covered by the coaching student. Feedback is then added from the coaching student who learns to find openings as the working student strikes. Verbal commands are kept down to a minimum and the students discovered ways to prompt different ranges i.e. transitioning from standing to the ground and back again without verbally telling their partner.

·        Mixed Martial Arts free sparring. This provided an opportunity for a student to integrate hooks in with other tactics such as straight hand strikes, kicks, grappling in a non-compliant environment.

·        Restrictive hook strikes from the wall to the pad. This is a method taken from my experience training in Geoff Thompson’s private group back in 2005/6 that adds extra restriction in the way a student throws a hook at close range. It will now be included along with the range transitions – hooking from kneeling, seated and back – in the standard CCMA warm-up.

The class finished with a warm-down and stretch along with a discussion on the logical fallacy argument of “Appeals”. This is an illogical argument that is quite common in the martial arts community (and the world at large) that tries to validate something purely on the basis that it is either old, known as an “Appeal to Tradition”, or new, an “Appeal to Novelty”. CCMA is constantly reviewing, testing, updating and encouraging its members to research material objectively and with a sceptical mind to ensure that training never becomes narrow-minded, ideological or stagnant. We embrace methods both new and old, but not on any other basis than that they are proving to be the most efficient. This goes for all three stages of our hierarchy of training: specific, attribute and functional fitness. A new article in the Martial Arts Scepticism series will focus on this particular logical fallacy argument.