Indigenous Ability

As the pandemic lockdown whiles on I have offered in dribs and drabs a few bits of functional knot-tying or rope/line-handling. These little mini-asides are meant to be eye-trivia for the bored or possible spurs to, “ Hell, I got time on my hands I’ll give this tip a go .” At the top end, there may even be, “ WTF! I really needed that tip when…oh, I’ll be ready next time.” Knot-tying, rope-handling, marlinspike seamanship, whatever you want to call the practice is, to my mind, more than just “That Old Man really likes tying knots.” [BTW-I do.] It serves a dual functional purpose to my mind. The First Purpose: The Convincing Argument Broad Based Survival & Functional Utility Able use of rope, cordage, lines, vines et cetera, next to the ability to build the variety of useful fires is THE most universal skill in many survival, extreme sport, outdoor domains. I capitalized the THE for factual emphasis, not mere preference. Where do we see the absolute...

Those of us who train weapons, whether that weapon be firearm, tactical folder, escrima stick, pepper-spray, or Viking battle-axe likely spend most of our time en garde, at port arms, or “Weapon-Ready.” In other words, our tool of choice is un-holstered, un-sheathed, un-pocketed, un-pursed, un-quivered and ready to go. Our training is often drill-based or duel patterned, meaning all of the preliminaries have been assumed. Fake-words have been had, weapons are in hand, now we click the sticks 1-8, adjust the paper-target up or down range, slash-one/thrust-four for reps, or apply the centurion’s gladius to the post ad naseum. But… …in the New World, [Frontier America] a premium was placed not only prowess with a weapon at-the-ready but also speed of weapon acquisition and how quickly that weapon could be engaged tactically. In other words, we are not merely talking fast-draw, we are talking fast-draw and do the job. Let us not assume the fast draw is mere stuff ...

Let’s talk real world, rubber meets road altercation. Zero room for sport-fighting or choreography here. In the “Fight or Flight” dictum we always counsel flight. Run. Get the hell out of wherever you are as quickly as possible. Some, will read the “flee no matter what” advice and cock an eyebrow asking “ Always run? Even if they have a gun?” You are right to be skeptical, after all, a gun does seem to be the great equalizer, able to inflict grievous harm upon us even at a distance. So, what do we do when we encounter a gun? Sorry to be the proverbial broken record but…you run. Let me offer the following information to make your choice to run, no matter what, a bit more confident.   Ÿ   Under 5% of armed robbers utilizing a firearm fire the weapon--those are good odds to run. Repeat—Under 5%. A percentage point of somewhere in the neighborhood of 95+% do not fire the brandished weapon. Ÿ   Those who do fire the guns are not armed robbers bu...

In the empty-hand realm of combat true ambidexterity is a rare bird. Marvelous Marvin Hagler took great pains to develop facility both as an orthodox fighter and as a southpaw, but we could easily see where he stacked his chips when the heat was high.  Seeking ambidexterity is a worthy goal, but one that has opportunity-costs. That is, the time put into developing the off-hand [off-foot for kicking, or off-side for grappling] means that is time we no longer have for moving the competency needle further towards mastery on our “good” side. We should always make that opportunity cost/cost-to-benefit analysis in our training as there are only so many hours in the day, and precious few per week dedicated to training itself. With actual training time at a premium do we want so-so returns or better-than-average? This is not an argument against empty-hand ambidexterity, not at all, just one of time-utility and, well, a jaded eye towards reality. If we are to make t...

For those not in the know… James Albert Keating: Master at Arms - Astonishingly good with all small weapons. A graduate of the ESI Bodyguard academy. A knife designer of note. A writer of poem, prose and storied tale. Four books to his name so far. Currently residing on a large Arabian horse ranch in the mountains of Oregon. Keating is the owner and operator of the Comtech Training Studio known worldwide as home to a vast array of fighters, fencers and fast guns. Keating has operated the training hall since 1972 when he first began teaching publicly. James Keating has trained in various combative systems since age 10. Just shy of being sixty years of hard work in the martial arts and tactical fields. His 2018 season of training seminars looks as strong as one of his hand made Bowie knives. His beliefs are as follows: " We advance together into the unknown future with the strength of our abilities sustaining us through thick and thin. Skill banishes fear. Skill is the secret, ...