W. Hock Hochheim

[Chili Pepper]

I am not impressed with what I know of Hockheim's certification methods; they seem to rely heavily on the certified instructor having bought a lot of Hockheim video tapes. That's all I'm saying.

Yep. My guro was a "certified" Hockheim knife expert, but I doubt he is any longer, considering his comment about him was "I have given more than enough money to that man."

[kajukine]

Wow . . . . it never dies.

Kajukine, the guy must offer something people like, but I can only evaluate what I was taught. It was terrible and it was taught badly. It wasn't taught by Hockheim, but by a "certified" instructor. I am not impressed with what I know of Hockheim's certification methods; they seem to rely heavily on the certified instructor having bought a lot of Hockheim video tapes. That's all I'm saying.

Ya, to some extent I'm sure that's true, as I'm sure that it is true of a lot of the "seminar" instructors out there.
MY personal experience has always been with Hock himself, he has always treated me well, The group I get to work with the most have some interesting characters and I love getting together with them, most are
LEO or Active and Retired Military, maybe I'm just lucky to get into a good group to train with, that's all I'm saying :new_scatt

[Kilted One]

I've attended a number of Hock's seminars and have always picked up something solid for my "tool kit". He's open to criticism and is amenable to new ideas. Jim McCann came in w/ Hock and taught some great ground and pound and escapes, thus the ground game is covered as far as Hock is concerned.

[yodo]

I think Hock's instruction is based in solid knowledge & empirical experience - also there are many ways to approach training and each person has to understand what they are looking for and the type instruction they need - there should be more instructors like W. Hock Hochheim ....
we also must be careful in our attitudes and egos when we dissect other people from a distance.

[Rambamatic]

Hairholds, which were once a staple of LE Defensive Tactics, have pretty much been (or are being) abandoned. This is for the simple reason that they are unreliable due to a variety of factors including the obvious (many people nowadays have short hair or shaved heads). Teaching a hairhold as a defense from being g&p'd while mounted is patently ridiculous.

I very much disagree, as my experience has been otherwise.

When I was younger I was attacked by a larger and more powerful kid. During the fight he managed to mount me, and while he was hitting me, I literally reached up, grabbed a handful of his hair, and pulled him down off of me. I then held him down by the hair and hit him repeatedly on the ground.

In early UFCs you saw Royce Gracie use Kimo's hair as a weapon against him. There was also a very famous instance of two fighters (whose names I can't remember), one of whom had very long hair. His opponent used his hair and got his hand so entangled in the hair that he couldn't extricate it, and ended up dragging the guy around the cage by his hair. It was not long after that the rules against hair pulling were instituted.

Now, does hair pullinng work against very short hair or shaved heads? Nope. It's not a 100% or even high percentage technique. However, IF your opponent has hair and you can use it (in a real confrontation), it can be a very effective tactic.

[Rambamatic]

I have seen a lot of Hock's videos online. I have watched two of his DVDs and I know several people that have trained with him and know him personally. Some of his material is very good, some of it is good only in principle, and some of it is total crap.

However, the real glaring problems that stand out to me are:

1. His movement stinks. Now, does that mean that he can't be a good coach and teacher? Of course not. However, his ability to personally execute what he teaches makes him look like an incompetent boob.

2. His speaking and presenting skills are really awful. As I listen to him articulate his reasoning and follow his lines of thought, I just can't but help get the impression that this guy is not nearly as smart as he thinks he is. There is an arrogance and insecurity about his demeanor, use of language, and reasoning skills that I find very off-putting.

3. He appears to be very embroiled in a lot of personal mud-slinging in regards to other guys in other styles of combatives. Right or wrong doesn't matter to me....the dick wagging and personal attacks are really lame, especially when you're teaching something as mediocre as what he does.

In general, he comes off to me as a mediocre clown with delusions of grandeur.

[mrtnira]

At the risk of being sent to Sheer Dog, again, I have a set of Hock's training manuals and I found them useful. However, "useful" is a qualifier.

My focus in study relates heavily to government sponsored systems of training in the 20th century. Those don't necessarily produce the high end combatives technicians; instead, government systems produce police or soldiers with sufficient competency in basic skills to increase the odds of survival, because they also have to train on dozens of other skills and they have to give their time to administration and other organizational requirements. The time and money constraints for training becomes self-limiting.

In Bullshido, there are a lot of peope who put much more time into hand-to-hand training than most police and militaries. It's an obvious statement, but this above average focus on specific technical development becomes the source of a lot of what I read in the various comments throughout the thread, and I did read each one. It creates a condition in which comparative examples disconnect at some point. The level of many commenters is above the techniques being presented in Hock's books.

The material I saw reminded me a lot classic 1950's-1970's military combatives training, and it was useful to me because it was clearly illustrated. However, I cannot make any remarks about their usefulness against other systems, or comparisons between instructors.

What I take Mr. Hochheim to be is someone with a military police and police background, and I accept his work as representative of that. Also, I suspect it shaped how he internalizes information and how he instructs others. I don't expect anything else from his material and use it within that context.

[streetfighter86]

hock is the real deal when it comes to weapons training. "stick,knife,gun" etc. he goes to my old karate school every so often for seminars

[Team Python]

I have seen a lot of Hock's videos online. I have watched two of his DVDs and I know several people that have trained with him and know him personally. Some of his material is very good, some of it is good only in principle, and some of it is total crap.

However, the real glaring problems that stand out to me are:

1. His movement stinks. Now, does that mean that he can't be a good coach and teacher? Of course not. However, his ability to personally execute what he teaches makes him look like an incompetent boob.

2. His speaking and presenting skills are really awful. As I listen to him articulate his reasoning and follow his lines of thought, I just can't but help get the impression that this guy is not nearly as smart as he thinks he is. There is an arrogance and insecurity about his demeanor, use of language, and reasoning skills that I find very off-putting.

3. He appears to be very embroiled in a lot of personal mud-slinging in regards to other guys in other styles of combatives. Right or wrong doesn't matter to me....the dick wagging and personal attacks are really lame, especially when you're teaching something as mediocre as what he does.

In general, he comes off to me as a mediocre clown with delusions of grandeur.

I am a member of his forum.......a lot of the members on there treat him as a God. A lot of them think their style of self defense and the way they train is the only way......oh brother.

[kempodude]

Hochheim = Big talker, little else!