Asocial Violence, Target Focused Training with Mike Allen
Reprinted from Griffith Shukan News, Thursday, 7th February 2008 ,Gary Weigh, Feb 2008
Wow, if you missed last Saturday’s workshop on Target Focused Training (TFT) for asocial violence you missed a great day. The morning and afternoon sessions were hosted by Mike Allen, an experienced aikidoka and martial artist from Sydney, ably assisted by Andrew Sunter Sensei. We invited both Mike and Andrew to come to Brisbane for the weekend to present this very confronting workshop. Many of you already know Andrew from previous visits and seminars. He is based in Sydney and is a very senior Aikido practitioner with his own dojo. Mike and Andrew trained in Aikido together for many years.
... Last year I had the privilege of attending one of Mike’s seminars at Andrew Sunters Sydney dojo. Mike has been training martial arts for not-quite 30 years and is a recognized instructor in Kempo, Aikido and Yang Mian. In real life he is also a practicing physiotherapist. Recently he has been studying a system called target focused training, which he regards as 'the pointy end of the stick' for personal protection. I believe it embodies many aikido principles, but with the gloves off. Mike sensei is an approachable and articulate instructor with a genuine interest in sharing this method in a safe environment.
For me the introduction to the reality of 'Asocial violence' was quite confronting. It was good to learn more about how our bodies and minds can and do respond as a way of being prepared for such a situation. When coupled together with some of the tools Mike presents I think this rounds out our understanding of Aikido in the realm of Personal Protection. It nicely complements the methods that Catherine Sensei will present later in February and will help prepare us even better as we continue to develop our Personal Protection workshops for the community. D.James
The day started with Andrew Sensei teaching our Aikikids class. It was great fun to watch and I’m sure the kids had a wonderful time. Andrew certainly did.
Then we got down to the more serious stuff - Target Focused Training (TFT) - a systematic way of dealing with asocial violence. Asocial violence means those extreme forms of violence where there is no social context at all, only clear intent from the attacker to kill or maim. Mike led us step by step through this system of very direct and sometimes lethal responses to be used in those extremely rare situations where the only choices are to act or die (e.g. stabbing, shooting, rape etc.). It was very brutal in nature and quite confronting to all of us who are accustomed to civilized society. Although it was difficult at first, strangely enough we all got more used to it after an hour or so.
TFT involves inflicting serial injuries (one after another) by attacking the eyes, throat, groin, ankles, fingers and other joints and liver, spleen and kidneys of someone whose sole intention is to kill or maim. The art of TFT is to focus on the nearest target that presents itself, get in close and strike it. After each strike and resultant injury, a new target tends to be exposed because of the way the opponent’s body reacts to the previous injury and pain. For example, striking the throat (trachea) causes the head and upper body to go back and hands go protectively to the throat thus exposing the groin (and vice versa). So the idea is to strike target after target and inflict injury after injury until the attacker is so injured that the attack is stopped. We learnt how to break the ankle (and other joints) from a standing position and how to break the ankle by rolling on it if caught on the ground with the attacker standing over us. We learnt the lethal nature of attacking the throat and breaking the trachea. We had to be careful practicing these techniques. There were no second chances if we made a mistake or the attack went too fast or too far.
Throughout the practice, we had to make real contact but we did it all in slow motion and the contact was light. It was the way to simulate partial reality without anyone getting hurt. We had to be very careful and uke would grunt or similar sound when enough contact was made. We actually had to get the feeling of getting our thumb into our partner’s eye to get the right reaction from them (i.e. turn their head away and hands to the eyes). Attacking the groin was a little uncomfortable for everyone at first, boys and girls alike. As with all other striking techniques, we had to strike into the groin to get the right reaction from our partners (i.e. back arched, bottom out and head up exposing the throat) to know that we had executed the strike effectively. In the end we all just concentrated on understanding how to strike the area to inflict most damage. It was interesting to find out that the most effective way to strike the groin and throat is not exactly what some of us expected.
Towards the end of the class, we learnt how to deal with group attacks. The idea is to penetrate and injure one attacker and move to the outside of the group where they could be dealt with one at a time in a line rather than in a circular formation. All in all we did a lot of wrestling around on the ground together and everyone was exhausted at the end of three and a half hours or more. It is good to have the knowledge and some practice but, given the brutal nature of what we learnt I hope I never have to use it. However, I will be ever so grateful that I was taught these skills if I am ever stuck in a life and death situation.
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