Bending the Attack

If you have to deal with multiple opponents then you will need to affect the group to a degree that will allow you to escape. Think of a rocket trying to escape earth’s gravity into orbit; if there is not enough juice then it will fall back to earth.

The best way to affect the group is to affect their measurement of your actions. If you were to attempt to move through a group of attackers by going between attackers then this will allow them to more easily measure you, and calculate how they can intercept your intended trajectory. Aiming at visual gaps only allows the attackers to measure your progress and pounce on you in seconds.

An important rule to live by for fighting multiple attackers is that you are only allowed to deal with one attacker at a time in the shortest amount of time. At no time are you allowed to split your attention to any other flanking attacker when accelerating at the chosen safe zone. Your defence from the attackers coming at you from the side (on you flanks) is acceleration at the immediate attacker.

If you look at the diagram below, you have one individual represented by the dots with A and B and seven opponents. The individual starts at position A and accelerates through an attacker, avoiding the two attackers on either side through sheer acceleration and comes out to position B. The individual then has to continue their acceleration if they are to outpace the next lot of incoming attacks. Going through an attacker provides you with momentary invisibility to the incoming attackers that are ahead of you in your line of progression i.e. it affects their measurement and makes it much harder for them to time your actions and intercept you.

Bending the opponent’s attack, stops the attackers coming in from the side (those flanking you) or from behind to grab you and take you to ground. If you are not bending the opponent’s attack, you are not moving fast enough. You have to be ahead of where the attacker thinks they are going to intercept you if you are to bend their attack. The flanking attacks should be running into the ‘debris’ from your accelerated progression.

Even under high acceleration you can train the ability to see safe zones ahead. In survival situations, we see much less of the world so that we aren’t distracted by non-relevant data, from the task of getting to safety. However, you still see enough of the world to navigate safely. All you need is sufficient snap shots to take account of the changing world ahead to see your path. The path is the line of progression where you know you should be able to stay safe from the ever changing battle field.

The concept of future time is the ability to recognise safe zones as the real world changes around you. When you run down a steep incline, you have to continually make split second decisions about your direction, taking in the surface at a glance, looking for tree branches to slow you down, looking for spots to place your feet, etc. The brain does lots of calculations in fractions of a second and keeps doing them. Safe zones are momentary, you predict them and they disappear as you reach them. It’s not quite the same as for a group attack but it’s the closest analogy I can come up with.

As always with group work, train safely and under the supervision of a qualified instructor