Martial Arts Research Systems

The Defensive Edge

  "In all of my training and experiences, the one area of the martial arts that frightens me the most is the knife. It is hard to convey the ugliness of the knife as a weapon. Anyone, trained, untrained , man or woman, is at a significant advantage with a knife."

 "What you will learn from this training method is what you can do when you can't run away and there is no opportunity to pick up or throw anything in the environment. These techniques are what you will use when you have absolutely no other possibilities". 

                                                                                                 -Ron Balicki

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 In the world of baseball, if you can track an object coming at you going 90 miles an hour and hit it with a stick at least half the time, you are batting .500 and are worth several million dollars a year.

 In the world of knife fighting if you are batting .500, you have been cut four times in the first three seconds of a knife fight and are as good as dead. This is the reality of  understanding defensive knife fighting and reflects the need to get your average as close to 100% as possible in order to survive a knife confrontation. Reality is the key here, as most martial artists train primarily to defend against a face to face " Hollywood " type knife attack.

In the Maphilindo (Malaysian/Philippines/Indonesian) martial arts, you train to defend against successive thrusts and slashes coming at you from all angles at the rate of three cuts per second. Most martial artists would have a hard time dealing with three empty hand attacks per second and would question the feasibility of a training method capable of developing the necessary skills to deal with high speed blade attacks.

 The key here is in the training method and this is what sets the training system developed by Ron Balicki apart from the others. Balicki's training program for defensive knife fighting is based on his law enforcement experience, extensive training in the martial arts which includes his years of training in Wing Chun under Randy Williams, 9 years of Escrima training under Guro Edgar Sulite, his Silat training in Indonesia, and his 12 years of study of the Chinese and Maphilindo martial arts under Guro Dan Inosanto. In addition Balicki has instructorships under Fred Degerberg, Surachai Sirisute (Muay Thai), and Yorinaga Nakamura ( Shoot wrestling)

 Training with edged weapons is virtually useless unless it is balanced out with significant real world experience. The problem is that unless you actively go out and seek edged weapon encounters the only place you can find to experience the reality of bladed attacks is in the prison system.

 As a prison guard, Ron Balicki got his firsthand experience dealing with edged weapons attacks on a daily basis. Walking the corridors of Cook County jail in Chicago provided him with the constant awareness that an edged weapon attack can come from any quarter at any time.

Balicki’s experience as a Cook County jail prison guard and his training in the martial arts led him to the realization that most martial artists were in  need of a comprehensive real world defensive knife training program. 

 Balicki's training method has three distinctive  elements. These elements consist of an edged weapons defensive philosophy, a progressive training method, and a series of knife training  drills that allow for creative, relaxed, and playful training.

 The first element, Balicki's edged weapons defensive  philosophy, is one of the most critical to his training method. To appreciate his philosophy you have to look at the philosophy the military has in approaching knife fighting. Their philosophy is based on having a carte blanche to kill at will. Furthermore they are actively seeking situations involving using the knife as an offensive weapon. Balicki's philosophy is the exact opposite in that avoiding any bladed encounter is the number one rule. Balicki's first rule of defensive knife tactics is this: " There can be only one winner in a knife fight and more often than not there are two losers. This means that the only time you really want to test your skills is when your tennis shoes have failed you."

 When you are in a confrontation that can cost you your life you have no excuses for not having prepared as thoroughly as possible in your training. This means that your training exploration has to encompass everything that works and that you have to thoroughly know as many offensive and defensive tactics from other systems as you can find.

 Martial artists as a group tend to focus on self defense rather than offensive tactics. So why then would a responsible martial artist train in offensive knife fighting skills ?. According to Balicki the answer is simple "You have to understand the offensive elements of all systems in order to develop defensive tactics for any offensive techniques you might encounter".

 Once you fully understand this basic philosophy you are then ready to begin the physical training progression.

 Balicki's training progression uses Filipino training methods as a foundation for the layering of skills necessary to effectively train in defensive knife work. In the Filipino arts the student is taught  first with weapons and then moves into empty hands techniques. This type of training progression is the exact opposite of most Chinese and Japanese systems  which teach the weapons only at the more advanced levels.

 One reason the Filipinos teach the weapon first is that the weapon, due to its length, tends to magnify the quality of the hand movements. If you can move the tip of a weapon at five feet of extension from your body with precision, then your empty hands will have a correspondingly high level of precision in the grappling range, which is where defensive knife work occurs.  

 The first piece of Balicki's training progression is its highly specialized foot work. This part of the progression addresses the fact that defensive blade work requires a very high level of angular mobility that can only be achieved through specialized foot work training. Balicki's footwork  consists of the forward or male triangle, the reverse or female triangle, the lateral step, the push shuffle advance and retreat, and the Humpak Paewass which provides mobility on the four corners of a square.

 If you look at Figure 1 ,you can see the lines covered by the male triangle, the female triangle, the lateral step, the push shuffle, and the Humpak  Paewass. In Figure 2 you see that the combination of all of these lines gives you the necessary mobility to deal with attacks from any angle as well as providing the positioning needed to deal with multiple attackers.

 Once you have achieved the high level of mobility developed by these footwork patterns, you can then begin to practice the next part of the progression which is the skill drills that form the third part of Balicki's training method.

 One of the most important aspects of training in the skill drills is to understand that the ultimate goal is smooth relaxed flow from technique to technique without conscious thought or any apparent pattern. Defensive knife work occurs at a combative speed that allows only for reactive movement and the progression in the skill drills is designed to build the proper mental and physical reactions to any given attack.

 Balicki's drills are broken down into 18 primary groups of techniques and has three to twelve variable drills for each group of techniques. A typical example of a variable drill would be to take a single knife slash from any of the three attack numbering systems that Balicki uses, and defend first with the left hand , then learn a defense with the right hand for the same attack and then finally to use both hands for the defense. As the student progresses the number of variables increase until the student is defending and countering continuous attacks on any line.

 The eighteen primary groups and subgroups of drills  can be classed into the following areas: Numbered striking patterns, footwork, categories of attacks, strips (disarms) and counters, strips in the grasp (while physically restrained), strip for strip (countering techniques), tussling (very close range work), flow drills with single and double knives, and knife grappling techniques.

 Flow drills are particularly important to learning knife defense. A good flow drill allows the student to train in a completely  relaxed manner and to begin to play with the techniques. This element of playfulness is critical to the student's growth.

 A typical flow drill in Balicki's progression would be to have both students with knives in the pacal

(point down)  position and have one student feed a downward attack to the collarbone. The defender would scoop the knife down and away with his knife and feed the same attack to the other student's collarbone. Once the students have continuous flow with this basic movement they would then use the same attack, counter with the scoop with the knife, elbow parry the attacker's knife with the other hand and then again attack on the same line. As this drill progresses the number of added variables would increase until each student is executing four or five techniques against each other in continuous flow.

 Balicki's philosophy, footwork, training progression and drills form a thorough foundation in reality based edged weapons self defense skills. These skills can only be developed through an intensive directed training program that takes into account all known variables and offensive systems. When your life is on the line there are no other options.

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by  Tom Meadows ,  2430 Meadow St.,  San Luis Obispo, CA, 93401 (805) 541-3572

 Author’s description: Tom Meadows is student of the Filipino and Chinese martial arts in San Luis Obispo, California.