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The Rough n Tumble Guard Pass, Part 1: The 3 Strategies by Mark Hatmaker

  Four Things Before We Plunge On Thing 1 : Strikers do not flag on the word “Guard Pass” and assume, “ Me, I’m no fan of the hyper-complexities of grappling, I’ll skip this.” I urge you to read on, The Rough n Tumble Guard Pass has you in mind. The Goal of Rough n Tumble Guard Passing is to kybosh, bypass, nullify a grappler’s tactics. It asks you, the Fighter, to avoid or tear to shreds the spider’s web that can be the deep game of a damn fine guard. Thing 2 : Grapplers do not think I discredit our Noble Cadre. I am one of you. Me? I have a deep abiding love for the devilish minutia of a good guard game. [We will spend several volumes of The 1,312 Submissions Project playing with some of these puzzle pieces.] Here, our goal is fast, efficient, effective. Striker or grappler, anti-guard skills are a must . Thing 3 : I use the recent vernacular of “Guard” as opposed to some of the early nomenclature of Bottom Scissors, Leg Scissors, Leg Riding, etc. simply because guar
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Rough ‘N’ Tumble History: Fire-Fighters [Literally] by Mark Hatmaker

  Fighting, to a firefighter in the early US was literal in two senses of the word. A)   You fought fires and… B)    You were often a fighter expected to literally “fight” other human beings at the scene of the conflagration. Let’s turn back the clock to early America when practically all dwellings were made of wood, patched with pitch, illuminated with open flames or rickety vessels of coal oil. Let’s add cigarettes and cigars and pipes and a lucifer [striking match] in most every hand. Let’s add open flames being the primary source of warmth. With all of these additions I think we might see just how dangerous early incarnations of the firefighting job were. Now about that fighting other humans bit of the early job description. Let’s have a look at the why. In the early days of the firefighting game the “fire departments” were, shall we say, competitive. They earned according to the number of fires doused. This quota incentive led to a few nefarious practices, among
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Tactical Realities of “Illegal” Fighting by Mark Hatmaker

Let us talk about the strategic realities that manifested in the curious times where sport and illegal activity joined hands across the aisle. A time when boxing/combination-fighting was mighty popular but also very illegal. A time before seconds could negotiate for ring sizes, rope tension, ring surface, dimensions of rosin boxes, “ Who enters the ring first,” “Who gets the sun in his corner,” “Let me inspect that glove ,” and the myriad details that have come to riddle the negotiations of modern era boxing and MMA. There was a class of fighting that existed outside the illegal [at the time] boxing of the early fistic era. A class of fighting that was even illegaler, to coin a clumsy word. If early “illegal” boxing was far looser in rules and more admitting of tactics than the modern era [which it was] this twin class of illegal activity was more so. Where this early “illegal” boxing admitted just the bare-fist, but… those self-same fists wielded in manners a bit less orthodox
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Boombattle 1: “Hard Times” to Barge-Fighting by Mark Hatmaker

The following is the first volume of top tier Boombattle combinations--fists, elbows, lowline kicks, shift-offense, twist-defense, trigger-fighting, and more. All strategies and tactics you would find in the era of Depression America. Culled from cup fights, illegal barge fights, barroom set-tos, hobo railyard scrums and the like. See the 1975 film  Hard Times  for a fine fictional take on the era. All will be demonstrated via focus pads, but all drills transform lickety-split to sparring, street, heavy bag or shadow work for the solo training vacation times. 72 Rounds of Drilling These are Hard Combinations from Hard Men who Lived in Hard Times. For a glimpse from a man who boxed in some of these melees, a man who rode the rails, a man who knew these men, here’s a young Louis L ’Amour on the subject. [Yep, that Louis L ‘Amour of Western novel fame.] “ At the time there were at least twenty good fighters for every one there is now, it was about the only way a young man co
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Calculating Lifetime Reserve: Mortality Mathematics by Mark Hatmaker

[Originally offered as "Can You Afford the Time to Read This? Can You Afford Not To ." By request, I offer these two pieces as a whole. Those who find this approach to life soul-resonating may find Part 3, " Lifetime Asymmetry " of like value.] How old are you? Me? I’m 58, be 59 in 3 weeks. Convert your age into months. Me? 696 months and 3 weeks. The average lifespan of the adult male in the US is 74.8 years, for women it is 76.3. That’s 897 months and 912 months respectively. The average human lifespan is less than 1,000 months. [And that’s assuming we make it that long. There Are NO Guarantees.] If you are a male and are 38 years old or older, you have already used up over half of your average lifespan reserve. 39 or older if you are female. Subtract your current lived months from your average lifespan months to get your lifespan reserve. Me? That’s 201 months remaining. You have slept for an approximate 1/3 rd of your life. You will cont
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The Bloody Reality of Indian Summer by Mark Hatmaker

  “ In such colonial warfare all were soldiers because all lived on the battlefield .”-Daniel J. Boorstin, Historian and author of the Bancroft Prize winning trilogy The Americans. The early American mind, the rough hewn frontier rough n tumble mindset was one diametrically opposed to open field, fair play “warfare” tactics, a culture less steeped in the sportive affections of Mother England and the Continent. The orderly rules of warfare described by men such as Grotius in his De jure belli ac pacis [ On the Law of War and Peace ] or even in the combat games that followed an early “sense of fair play” such as the boxing rules laid down by Broughton and later the Marquis of Queensberry, well, these did not hold in the New World. This passion for orderliness in sport and war was practically non-existent in the new realties of the New World. War in Early America simply did not follow the “ rules .” Combat sport in the New World was equally as “ free and wild .” Indigenous
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GARRISON FIGHTING by Mark Hatmaker

  A few stats. ·         93% of UFC matches utilize the cage for striking, control, or takedown assistance. ·         Well over 90%. What’s that? The percentage according to a Law Enforcement survey of scuffles from control-to-cuffing that also place obstacles [from curbs to cars to walls, etc.] as being part of the combat environment. ·         An analysis of over 250 firsthand accounts of Eastern Frontier Early American Warfare [settlers vs. Indigenous population] that took place inside cabins or garrisons shows that 202 of these accounts mention the construct of the cabin/garrison itself as being part of the melee. From the true Frontier rough n tumble realties of garrison survival, to modern law enforcement interactions, to the current incarnation of combat sports—the “ Pressed Upright ” environment is not only a large part of the combat picture, it is a statistical likelihood. The Puzzle of Ignoring the Reality A loose survey of martial arts instructional training [and
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