“I really try to stress the understanding of the principles, which promotes that self-teaching approach, which in turn promotes endless free-thinking applications – real combat is a lonely business, there’s nobody available to think for you!”
-Mick Coup – C2: Core Combatives
I entered Glen Smith’s fully-equipped Boxing and Grappling gymnasium ready for sore fists and a stiff neck. The sore fists would come from punching bare-knuckled – Mick insists on not creating weaknesses that may incur from using bag gloves or even hand-wraps, if you choose to punch on the street get used to the feeling, or use the open hand – and the stiff neck would come from looking up at the towering ex-special operations soldier, ex-doorman and current personal security operator that would be teaching me his method of personal close combat.
Having become familiarised with Mick’s philosophy on close-quarter combat that was born out of practical experience in extreme civilian and military conditions, I was about to see how he was setting about training people. Mick had left the martial arts quite a few years ago in order to become more involved in specialist security work. Such employment has taken him all over the world, often in highly volatile conditions, where fighting for his and his client’s life is all part of the job. Coming back into the martial arts scene, Mick, one of the first British Combat Association Senior Instructors, is positive that his approach to training civilians in handling real-life violence is both accessible and wholly efficient. Straightforwardness, Mick argues, is the key. He remarked to me before we began “Must warn you though it’s very simple, blink and you may miss it, and I have no intention of changing that, ever!”
It is a sound argument that I wholly support. All armed and unarmed combat systems began as very basic methods designed to promote survival in the most uncomplicated way possible; the less efficient and more complex aspects to these arts are what have been added over time, as actual combative usage lessened.
Mick is clinical and functional in his approach to training. First he had me examining underlying body mechanics in some basic striking techniques, and then striking a focus pad – heavy and hard! Then he began replicating the actions of the person I had struck, using the pad to simulate a head dramatically changing position after a strike. I quickly understood how important it is that the pad-man becomes as educated as the person striking in order to reproduce the action-reaction as thoroughly and actively as possible. Therefore pads should not be just left up to hit. The pad comes up for an instant to imitate the sudden moment an open target comes into range. Secondly the pad-man should be ready to vary the distances and to move the pads in-between shots, which mimics the actions of someone getting hit. Thirdly obstacles need to be put in the way i.e. the other pad, so that the striker understands the importance of clearing a target and continuing his onslaught. Everything is executed with angled forward movement, back and forth padwork is simply not a realistic approach to training for the street: you must learn to hunt each shot. After only a few exchanges on the pads using these drills the immediate combative relevance is obvious – even using such abstract equipment.
Striking is fundamental to inflicting the most damage to one’s enemy in the shortest space of time. Mick follows the adage of “Only grapple when you have to, but hit whenever you can.” In fact, you could say that Mick’s “boiling down” of methods present the Mixed Martial Art concept of “Grapple and Strike” at its most primal. He explained to me that he used this concept in his combination principle known as the “Repeat” where whatever tool is being used is simply repeated over and over, almost exactly the same each time, with the same limb, same target – less for the stress-restricted brain to process and therefore actually usable in real circumstances.
He has a secondary and final combination principle known as the “Reverse” where the tool, generally a punching type technique (as these are the most versatile), is employed again and once more in an alternating fashion. It’s the same tool, but with opposite limbs – a ’straight blast’ would be a good example of a reverse combination. This tends to be used as a method of countering an ‘ambush’ attack, laying down an initial volley of extremely rapid blows to regain the initiative before switching to the ‘repeat’ – a more controllable, efficient and effective tactic for finishing.
Below Mick explains why the “Repeat” is the most natural and therefore important combination to apply:
“Targets, especially the head do move when hit, and even when missed! So this is taken into account with the drills – elbows are followed by palms (not the other way around – think realistic and efficient) as the target moves back from the blows. Target doesn’t move? More elbows until it does. Target drops? Downward palms, hammerfists or secure it for knee strikes etc. The same tool is repeated until the circumstances change, then another is employed and the process continues. Trying to process different targets, different techniques and angles, different hands under intense stress is unfeasible, stick to simplicity.
All this is done in conjunction with the free hand, generally the lead, simultaneously creating openings, obstructing cover attempts, applying forward pressure etc. I term this type of confirmation tool ‘indexing’. Wherever the free hand is placed, the striking hand or elbow, or knee, can find it, repeatedly and with power – useful if you can’t see what you’re doing (blinded, dark, observing multiple assailants etc – try it! ). It acts as a point of reference that dramatically increases hit probability. You are indexing and pre-confirming the shot.
The reverse makes the body pivot in the centre, which provides less torque and leverage than pivoting on one side, plus bodyweight can’t follow the exact path of each limb – it has to go down the centre but the alternating blows emanate from off-centre, so power is less as a result.The reverse combo isn’t as tactically sound either – you are throwing shots that you hope will hit, you have no point of reference, with the repeat you are almost guaranteeing good contact with every shot. Remember the last time you were trying to tag a sparring partner skilled in ducking and weaving, or on a floor to ceiling ball – they make you just want to grab them with one hand and bang them with the other! This is a natural and instinctive thing to do, so do it!”
This method of “indexing” is used in conjunction with Mick’s “Repeat” with brutal effect and efficiency. As I fired off a heavy strike with my rear hand, the leading hand would already be on its way to secure and confirm the incoming blow. Once I had struck my target rear-handed, the lead would maintain contact, pressing, gripping, securing, exposing the target and obstructing the defensive reacting limb, and the rear hand would strike again and again:
“Anything worth hitting once is worth hitting twice, and anything worth hitting at all is worth hitting hard!”
A point Mick constantly emphasised was to use the most suitable tool for the given distance, angle and target. For example, a close range target may be okay for a punch, but the elbow is perhaps more accessible and applicable, and vice versa. However, it is important to remember that broad principles are to be thought of in place of specific techniques. Mick groups all the most effective principles into three basic categories, which he terms the “Big Three”:
“I focus the basic physical skill-set around high-impact tools addressing fundamental requirements, not just my favourite shots. I want to keep the list short, selecting according to need, not want, keeping everything generic and versatile. Such criteria leads to a handful of core tools, namely; high-line strikes to the front (like punching), off-line strikes to the side/rear (like an outer hammer blow) and low-line strikes to the front (similar to a Thai round kick) – these pretty much give you all you need physically!After more than a few altercations these are the tools that had the most ticks next to them, so they get priority all day long. Substituting the elbow for the hand and the knee for the shin gives the short-range version for each, and each can be thrown (fired!) in an almost infinite variation of delivery angles using the exact same principles of motion and weight transference.I term these core tools ‘The Big Three’ and drill them to death, through every conceivable angle and from all positions, but all the time stressing the concept of the shot in its basic state. Obviously there is more – gouging, headbutting and stamping for example et al, but these are more like ‘luxury’ items; the ‘Big Three’ are the necessities! However, the palm, fist, elbow etc. is only the attachment screwed onto the machine. Like using a power drill: same device, different applications! This helps you not to obsess about the detail, more about the result and makes everything more instinctive. The direction and the body movement is key, but, most of all, the purpose and the target. Very rarely is there a ‘clean shot’. Usually what you do is as a result of what they are doing. Even in the ‘interview’ type scenarios, their body position dictates what tools can be applied – but opportunities can be fleeting and conscious thought concerning what to do is way to slow to be effective.”
During my time going through these various drills it struck me how much of this concept is based on Mick’s military background. The idea of having a limited bare essential number of tactics is explored in detail in one of the pre-interview articles Mick sent me titled “The List”. In this article Mick explains that as a young soldier he was advised by a senior colleague not to overload his Bergan (the rucksacks soldiers use to carry their supplies and equipment) with non-essential items. A list is made of each item carried in the field and a tick is noted next to an item if it is used. After several outings, anything without several ticks is binned. Better to have fewer tools that are more versatile in real usage. However, the comparison does not stop there. As Mick is well aware, most unarmed combat systems can be traced back to weapon arts of a certain time. He carries this methodology through to the firearms of today and applies it to his Core Combatives methodology, explaining how the tactics he uses in unarmed combat are pretty much exactly what he was taught in firearms training:
“These are very similar concepts to snap or instinctive shooting, techniques where you learn to use the weapon as an extension of your eyes. Whatever presents itself as a target can be engaged immediately. This is achieved by keeping the skill-set small and by high levels of repetition training to create a muscle memory, a conditioned response to opportunity.”
Mick’s language in the following passage further illustrates the emphasis on his thinking of placing strikes in the same manner as one would shoot:
“I aim to fire off very short bursts of repeated shots – such as a palm strike or punch – assess – then do it again, or switch to another shot if the target changes for any reason and keep going until the threat no-longer exists.”
Throughout our session I was constantly pressed for feedback – always encouraging my questioning and confirmation of the accessibility of the material he presented. This is the nature of his teaching. Much like I have tried to do with Clubb Chimera Martial Arts, Mick is very strong on not making his methods stylized and wants them to be as reachable to the average person as possible. He regularly enforced the notion that his training methods must be built on natural human instincts and responses. In a self-defence culture where terms like “muscle memory” and expressions like “you fight how you train” are banded around like cheap catchphrases, Mick is unswerving in his principles and offers this advice:
“If you really are serious about preparing for the real thing, get rid of the training rituals that will get you hurt when they become habit – don’t hand training knives back to the ‘enemy’ – throw them on the floor to be retrieved carefully, don’t help people up off the floor after a finish – best they find a safe way to get up themselves, and don’t stop hitting the pads just because he’s against the training-room wall – that’s his problem!“Learn to make, take and maintain advantage, practice with pressure – both as an active and reactive student. If you’re holding an impact shield, get it against your body and put your feet as normal – practice withstanding a blow as much as the other guy is giving it.“Bollocks to Bushido, Chivalry and the Geneva Convention, if the ‘enemy’ doesn’t follow your ‘code’ then what use is it? The end result – your safety – justifies and defines the means. Don’t win the moral battle by losing the physical one.”
I found the whole system very natural and relevant. Mick’s philosophy provides another light to add to the very few, which are beginning to the lead way back to the “reality” aspect a great deal of self-protection courses have strayed away from in recent years.
Next Issue: Building the Machine – Conditioning for Core Combatives
