Teaching Pressure Tests (diary entry)

03.11.2023 I arrived in Denmark to begin a weekend of teaching different services for Hostlebro Taekwondo Klub. Tonight we dedicated an hour or so to teaching a select number of teachers and senior students how to teach pressure testing concepts to children and adults. I was delighted that we were also joined by Jan Drachman and Henriette Vinther Toft who made it over from Hinnerup Karate.  We established the following simple principles behind self-protection and martial arts pressure-testing:

• In order to establish any level of competence, where a student wishes to able to apply their skills to real-life situations they need to pressure test

• Pressure testing provides various attributes but its purpose is to see how an individual copes under pressure

• There must be a core pass/fail component - anything else is a pressure "ordeal" and not really a test

• Failing in training is an important lesson that must be understood

After a warm-up of awareness walking and tactical escape drills, we began with cornering and evasion exercises. Immediately the student is being tested whether he can get away from another individual and escape from a corner. This moved onto other catching games that scaled up to the Predator versus Prey pressure tests. Here we can layer in many different tests that are applicable to real life.  They range from handling verbal engagements, protecting personal space, pre-emptive striking, recruiting help from bystanders, anti-grappling, multiple attack/multiple defence and tactical escape. We finished with an exercise for taking the back of an attacker. We scaled up the resistance from an individual first swinging and then eventually aiming to get a headlock whilst the defender move around to the back.   https://clubbchimera.com/services/