Going through an Attacker (Part 1) - Reduction

If you think you are going to be able to defeat all of the attackers in front of you, then you have just found the necessary ingredient to experience a world of hurt. What you should be trying to do is ensure that you don’t get overwhelmed by the group. A lot of people get lost in the futility of trying to defeat some or all of the group members and don’t give enough consideration to the possibilities that spring forth from the ability to accelerate through the group.

The ability to accelerate through multiple opponents will enable the individual to get to the exit in the shortest amount of time. When it’s done well it can shred the group’s intentions, even high functioning groups. Most people never experience what they can do when fully energised because they never move fast enough, their body cannot hold together under  resistance encountered while they are accelerating, or they want to slow down and battle it out with one of the attackers. You spend only one moment on an attacker because that is how fast you are moving, but you need a particular skill-set to stop you getting stalled on the resistance from the group.

One of the rules of fighting multiple attackers is you don’t try to go around attackers or in between two attackers as this allows the rest of the group to measure your actions more effectively. By accelerating through an opponent you become ‘invisible’ for that moment to the rest of the group. To their eyes you merge for a moment with one of their fellow attacker’s and this makes it more difficult for them to either measure your speed, track you, or anticipate your progression, especially with the limited time spent per opponent. If you try to run around people or get stuck on one attacker, you will be a clear target and your chosen direction readily identified by the rest of the attackers. By moving through attackers you also leave them in your wake as human debris that helps prevent other attackers getting you from behind.

If you attempt to strike an opponent, you do so at the expense of your acceleration. If you lose acceleration then your chances of being taken down by the group will increase. Do you think you are going to move through the attackers, taking them out one by one with strikes or something similar? To be honest I have heard it all before and the only response I have is to tell people to test it in a higher functioning group and prepare for some pain and disappointment.

In order to maintain acceleration you have to be good at moving through an opponent. One of the strategies you can develop to achieve this, is called reduction. Reduction is not meant to defeat the opponent; it is more a way to reduce the attacker’s resistance by delaying their defensive reaction and to also affect their intentions. This is a small target approach that reduces the options for the attacker to resist and find solutions. Your approaching height will be below the opponent’s chest, bending the attacker’s vision downward.

Reduction is a combination of skills and not a technique so you cannot just copy a shape. The trap for anyone trying to describe it in detail is that it’s not technical and since it takes place under accelerated movement, the exponent is in real time and ‘darkness’ so you don’t really know exactly what you did. The effect on the opponent and freedom from resistance are the key elements to focus on.

Reduction needs to be executed with the intention to accelerate fully. Any hesitation will put you in direct confrontation with resistance. To stop and fight resistance splits your attention and your survival relies on how fast you can affect not only one opponent, but all opponents in a progressive way.

The size of the effect depends on how small the target appears to the opponent and how fast you approached. The opponent is driven to a reaction unwillingly in preparation of a large impact i.e. they stiffen or “panel” their body for the anticipated impact. The opponent’s defences are now at their lowest when their body is fully panelled where the muscle systems lock up.

The panel is really the last bastion of resistance put up by the opponent. As seen in the diagram below, the opponent could be seen as a triangular panel standing on end. It is wide on the top and narrows to a point near the ground, the zone of lowest resistance.

The grey regions are representations of low resistance areas or holes in an opponent’s panel. The frontal view indicates that the lower half of the panel is an area of low resistance or a gap that allows you to move through the person in an accelerated state. The diagram also breaks the vertical plan into three levels of attack ranging from high resistance (top) to low resistance (bottom). The top of the triangle is the area of highest reactivity which produces the greatest chances of resistance.

Logically there is another zone of low resistance directly behind the opponent, so it stands to reason that you don’t want to get stuck in front of them. You need to get past the opponent in a moment of time to get to the low resistance areas. Reduction is not a half hearted process; you have to create a large effect on your opponent so that you can remain free to move forward.
 
As always with group work, train safely and under the supervision of a qualified instructor