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J W

Aug 27, 2021, 3:04 PM (18 hours ago)

to me

Dear James,

Greetings and salutations! I hope all is well with you. I'm sorry to hear of your persistent eye pains. May the heavens speedily grant you comfort and relief!

Like I found in one of your books, I am moving out of the city and into the Redneck Riviera (C!@#$%^&* County) at the behest of my wife. In our new living arrangement, I might not be able to hang my heavy bag. So, I got to thinking: would training on a freestanding Century Martial Arts Bob Torso Bag be a better choice than training on any other freestanding bag? I recall reading in "On Combat" and "On Killing" by Dave Grossman that some research studies found US soldiers achieved higher rates of fire when rifle training transitioned from bullseye targets to human silhouettes. Could that be true in the stick fighting combat space? Of course, those bags have been around for twenty years and you could tell me if they are worth the hype or considered gay and unnecessary by serious practitioners. This consideration for new equipment is also born out of the fact that I don't have many people to spar with. And your book "Twerps..." promises that fighters can make great gains through solo training.

That's all I have for now. I'm am eagerly anticipating seeing you in the fall.

Until then, take care of yourself.

Sincerely,

JW

Thank you so much for your well-wishes, Sir. The eye has bestowed the gift of weather prediction, as i do better than the local TV news station.

JW, excellent question, for you address another aspect of False Modern Polarity from the innocent perspective of rationality. This is usually discussed as an either or situation. I have extensive training experience with both types of free-standing bags.

For developing speed, power, level changing, combinations and stamina punching and striking with a stick, the bag is the best option, bar none. Further, striking Bob in the head or face with a stick will destroy his fragile facial structure. Lee Dinatele, a 100 pound, Vietnam vet, knocked a hole in Jimmy Frederick's Bob with a light stick and said to me, "Jeeze, don't let Charles hit Bob or his head will be rolling on the floor."

Bob has three specific training uses, for which the articulated torso without arms is ideal:

-Checking with the empty hand while navigating around him and striking lightly [fanning or slashing or smashing] with the stick to the head and slashing with power to the body. The exposed shoulder is your checking target and the arm positions will have to be imagined.

the best free-standing bags I have used was the one Charles and i can be seen training on with the stick in 2015 on the Modern Agonistics video feed [see tag above] under that tag on this site. The other one that was best for punching, is Vinay's bag, which Lynn posted a picture of between him and i after a training session two years ago. With the bag, you want the fattest and tallest one you can get. They are not that heavy and are safer on your wrists when punching than a hanging bag. With stick, they benefit you just as much as a hanging bag and remind you not to step too close as your foot will hit the base. The hanging bag develops the habit of placing the puncher's foot between the feet of his target, which is not good. This goes double with stick work, too, as you must avoid the clinch while using a weapon against a larger aggressor or a group, which are your only legal excuses for using the stick.

-Bare-knuckle and open hand striking will help target your combinations learned on the bag in a more specific way. When doing bare-knuckle work on Bob always move with each punch combination. The face has a realistic human feel and will help you gauge what you could deliver with your fists without damage and is why a stick punches holes in the face, just like a human face fails on contact with bats and ax handles. Open hand blows should target the skull, and fists the face, neck and ear.

-Knife work should be done almost exclusively on Bob. The articulated dummy maps your targets, and more importantly, you can do highline stabs to the neck with blunts without hurting your wrist. Stabbing his body can still injure your wrist, so wrap the wrist before practicing on him with training blades. Your go to move would be a stab right under the heart on his left, followed by an eviscerating slice across from the lung-spleen area and out through the liver. The checking hand can be used on both shoulders as you navigate close rage knife drills representing you cutting your way out of a pack-attack or grapple. I would also use the hand umbrella and rolled magazine on Bob.

Obviously, having both free-standing bags is ideal.

If there is only room for one, then you can roll one to the corner and roll out the other. Or, you can use the same pedestal to mount the bag and dummy in alternation.

These bags tend to be too short on the lower notch and unstable—after years of use on the upper notch, meaning they can slide down the pedestal to the bottom notch or even the child-height base. I suggest using duct tape at the base of the bag to keep it from sliding down to the lower notch, which sometimes happens while hooking and slapping.

Ideally, get both of these pieces and use them to set up 2-on-1 scenarios for your weapon use, and for unarmed egress drills, as attacks on you by individuals will be the most rare, and by twos and threes the most common.

Also, checking the aggressor's shin with low-line foot stomps, and even doing knee stomps, can be practiced on the base.

Good training, JW.

See you when the leaves fall.