Systema- please come back, Wing Chun is fighting a lonely fight

[old chestnut]

Ninja-quick edit! This seems to be descending into name-calling so I'll stop here.

[It is Fake]

Aren't you the one who started by pretending to be an objective third party, saying 'oh no I'm not doing systema but I read/watch a lot about it and it's t3h d3adl33', only outing yourself as a practitioner much later?

Oh yeah, it's this thread: http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...t=36200&page=1

Let's be real you took it there with this post.

[old chestnut]

Indeed, and I don't apologise for it, because nothing has changed to alter my impression of what was going on in that thread.

[It is Fake]

Who said apologize? No one.

[battlefields]

So, Dldr, this ballistic hitting ****, your take?

[JohnKenner]

Briefly, IMO it's a very advanced martial arts/fighting pedagogy that works best as "think and move outside the box" training for people who already have extensive cross-training experience. I don't typically recommend it to martial arts newbies or to people who want quick results.

I've trained in systema for six months and reached somewhat different conclusions. At one point, there were people willing to pressure test the art. They were replaced by aikido wanna-bes who prefered camo to magic pants. All of them thinking they were learning the deadly. Sad.

[DdlR]

So, Dldr, this ballistic hitting ****, your take?

We had a whole thread on that subject back in '08: http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...04&pagenumber=

Saving myself a lot of typing, here are some of my posts from that thread:

http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1751564
http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1752309
http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1752380
http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1752666
http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1752676
http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1752752
http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1753516
http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1753668
http://www.bullshido.net/forums/show...=1#post1754398

... but obviously, you should read the whole thread for context.

[DdlR]

I've trained in systema for six months and reached somewhat different conclusions. At one point, there were people willing to pressure test the art. They were replaced by aikido wanna-bes who prefered camo to magic pants. All of them thinking they were learning the deadly. Sad.

There was a political bust-up several years ago between the then-brass and senior students who wanted to take it in the direction of heavy pressure testing. For some reason that I never caught up with, the use of MMA gloves and headgear was very controversial - seemed like a no-brainer to me.

I don't know many details, but Kevin Secours is now teaching "Combat Systema", which is probably what you have in mind as the opposite of deadly aiki-wannabes. If I was still training in the System, I'd favor that approach too; without it, it's too easy for the training to become academic.

[JingMerchant!]

There was a political bust-up several years ago between the then-brass and senior students who wanted to take it in the direction of heavy pressure testing. For some reason that I never caught up with, the use of MMA gloves and headgear was very controversial - seemed like a no-brainer to me.

I don't suppose you'd like to elaborate on this?

[DdlR]

Just that you quickly reach the limit of tolerable risk in training bare-knuckled and without head and face protection, so to me it makes perfect sense to pad up.