NoVA Arnis in the Park

Today's arnis, 28 Feb 2016: I continued the solidification of the florete and abaniko double action version of the cane anyos and finished walking through the kuntaw anyos x1 through x5. After that, our review continued with x sinawali, 10 count sinawali, open double sinawali (also regular double, and then doing them against each other), 8 count sinawali, and a bit of abaniko sinawali. I reminded them also of single, 4-count single, sinawali-4, pera-peral, and my spiral sinawali. We also reviewed the sumbradas [3-8-12 (six-count), 3-8-5-12-12 (box drill, 10-count, sungkiti), 3-8-12-abaniko-12 (abaniko)], paying special emphasis to the live-hand / check-hand placement and timing, especially on the 8 count. We also explored the multiple options bouncing up from defending against the 8 to do sungkiti, or open, or punyo, or 3 strikes including the 12, or...). We made sure to cover how the attacker's live/controlling hand can help the defender get into position, helping to teach and get the defender to optimize their positioning and timing. The sumbradas also gave us a chance to work sensitivity on both sides but doing them in a fashion to maintain almost constant cane contact from move to move, while at the same time still working the good live-hand contact. After all this, I gave their brains a break and had everyone do a quick review of all the standard and non-standard disarms they knew. We will be sure work them in detail again and under pressure in the coming weeks, and also the counters and counter-counters - these are great principle-teachers even though it's incredibly difficult to actually pull off a disarm if you're going for it. OTOH, if you've worked them to be natural, you can find them popping in as the opportunities present themselves, and you know how to recognize them and react if someone else wants to try to force them - then they're yours! ;-)

 

Today's arnis, 6 Mar 2016: Bigger group today with 3 new people. After warming up with cane anyos 1 and 2 and empty hand anyos x-1 and x-2, I had the new people go off and do single sinawali, while the rest of us finished with x-3, x-4, x-5, and h-4. Then we all worked on the standard disarms - the old people worked on 1-12 and the counters while the new group worked on how to hold a cane, punyo size, how to strike forehand and backhand while ensuring the "blade" side is angled right and the palm is behind the strike and then disarms 1, 4, and 3, and the empty-hand vs. cane translation. They had lots of good questions and noticed that the attacker could often do the disarm if they were blocked - kudos! Then we worked on basic 2-step footwork and live hand contact for when they practice striking on a tree/tire/whatever. Thanks to John and Dan for helping out!

 

Today's arnis, 27 March 2016: Before today's session, the gang picked out what stuff they wanted to get from me that I brought back from the Philippines. Then we started with a 9-hit spin I got from GM Rodel Dagooc last week, both closed- and open- versions. Then we worked on a short knife technique that the pekiti tirsia guys showed at the 8th FMA Festival. Then we went back to working on some basic sinawalis: pera-peral, reverse, single, combination single, and then merged combination single with trading crossada striking and then morphed on the sinawali side amongst the various single versions: combination single, single, 4-count single - nice progression and mixup there!

 

Today's arnis, 10 April 2016: We started off with some single-stick shadow striking (twirling, carrenza, whatever), then I wanted to get back to basics since I've missed so many classes of late, and since I want to be sure we're all on the same page when I'm showing stuff. So, starting at the beginning of our curriculum, we worked the 12 basic strikes, this time with an eye on treating them as a delivery method (angles, wind-up, follow-through, power, etc) rather than defining targets, talking about the path and the power for each. From there we worked block, check, and counter but rotated through three different classes of blocks (unbraced, braced, and 2-handed "dos manos"). So, for each of the twelve strikes we worked those blocks and a simple witik strike as the counter. That made 4 block-check-counter variations/responses for each attack save #5 (6 variations [really 8 but we didn't work the difference between stick-up and stick-down]) and #8 and #9 (3 variations each, leaving off controlling with the hand closest to the punyo). We briefly explored some other options for quick counter strikes, how to use the dos-manos #8 and #9 leaving the hands in-place for followups, and why the #5/#6/#7 are artificial here (it's a parry, not a block) but why you still might want to do a "brace" or a two-handed version. From there, we reviewed 3 basic blocks: sweep, roof, and shield and what they are and are not. Then we worked on the original style Cane Anyo Isa and our empty-hand Anyo X-1 from kuntaw. Lastly, I worked on some finer points of the backwards throw, including wrist and elbow angles, elbow direction, ideal setup of the wrist, and ideal injection point and angle. Fun to get back to the park class, work on basics, and start working our way up through the curriculum. To be continued next week...

 

Today's arnis, 17 April 2016: started with a bit of review for baston anyo isa (original and with florete and pilantik add-ins), kuntaw anyos x-isa and x-dalawa, and original baston anyo dalawa. Then we went through working the 3 strengths of blocks (unbraced, braced, and dos manos) versus incoming strikes, and then moved on to some striking styles as part of block-check-counter with stepping movements - banda-y-banda, pabilog, punyo, and tusok. For a bit of nostalgia, I threw in some of the old sincoterros from the Eric Alexander days. We also worked sinawali 10, working up from 4-corners and advanced single (3-ct) sinawalis. Finally, since we're still working up from basics, I covered the first 5 standard disarms, emphasizing our specific details for optimal positioning and effect.

 

Today's arnis, 23 April 2016: Quick warmup with some 1- and 2- cane spinning or shadow boxing, then we moved on to reviewing the details on disarms 1-5 again, but this time working them against both a right hand and a left hand coming in. Once I got their left-hand recognition and coordination going, then we worked on some basic LvR tapi-tapi, concentrating on footwork and correct pressure to be sure to teach the passenger opportunity recognition and flow under pressure. And it was a very nice surprise to see Tom joining us again!

We work LvR for a few major reasons: to teach the passenger side how to react to left-hand attacks and to right-hand live-hands, to teach drivers to have an active/smart/alive right hand, to teach drivers how to use the left if they must or if an opportunity presents itself, to teach asymmetric technique interplay, and finally, to take advantage of what the Professor taught me as a lefty himself (what he developed with his dominant hand was optimized by his extensive experience, so we also convert to drive using those inserts on the right side as well).

 

Today's arnis, 8 May 2016: Warmed up with trapping hands, then worked both closed-parry and open-parry flows. Some funny confusing moments when thinking of closing or opening your first-contact and then meshing that with whether that closes them off or opens them up all while thinking of closed or open stance and perhaps using your palm or the back of your hand to parry. We mostly got it straightened out and also did trapping hands with elbow-to-the fist insertions and with gunting insertions. Lots more to do on that so we'll be sure to get back to working all of that back in regularly. From there we went to 6-count redonda twirling against a partner's canes held in a 'V', then went to 6-count 1-2-across (like heaven 6), then went to a pop-back 1-2-across-1 (like inserting a crossing hit just before the last count of redonda with the same stick). Then some double sinawali before moving on to 2 focus-mitt drills based upon double sinawali (the first 4 moves anyway), both courtesy of Master Jeff Espinous from last weekend's Remembrance Camp. The first was a basic, elbow-shield centric set: L shield (or duck), L elbow drop shield, L hook, R augmented shield, R pass down and across and L post to their R pad, R cross, L hook, R downward elbow cross. The second was: R hook, R elbow drop shield, L hook, R elbow shield w/ L shoulder post, R hooks arm down into L elbow gunting to bicep/forearm, L cross hammer to R mitt, R cross to same mitt, L hook, R downward elbow cross. Fun stuff and lots of work needed! It's also way harder without actual focus mitts!

 

Today's arnis, 15 May 2016: Started off with cross-body parry type trapping hands, then moved on to two sinawalis that I think were new to most: 8-count sinawali (8 on each side), and a 6-count-on-each side sinawali that built off the first 4 counts of the 8-count just to show linkages and insertions and keep from getting too programmed. From there we reviewed some shadow sparring / twirling combinations. After that we worked some Astig Balintawak basics with the 5 declaws - the first 3 are getting much smoother. Great job on this nice windy day, folks!

 

Today's arnis, 22 May 2016: Lots of folks out today, but we still went through some twirling/shadow-sparring variations, then trapping hands, a little empty-hand single sinawali with insertions for the kids, then did some focus-mitt work a la Master Espinous, working elbow blocking, checking, crosses, hooks, elbow strikes - panantukan basics.

 

Today's arnis, 29 May 2016: We started off warming up with trapping hands, worked up to some elbow and gunting insertions, and then started working it against quick jabs to time the jabs. Once they started getting a feel for that, we went on to timing a shuffle-in entry to set up the diving throw (whether or not the full trapping hand sequence landed - as long as they don't eat the jab, that's all I was trying to optimize the timing on). After that we went into pendulum free flow "sparring" (single stick and also stick and dagger) - back and forth stepping with alternating attacks and defenses, each person defending then attacking, repeating ad infinitum, stressing the relaxed flow and adaptability over "winning" for the purposes of the drill. Since that was kind of a relaxed warm-up, random sumbrada of sorts, we went from there to the sungkiti sumbrada (aka 10-count, or box-drill, made up of trading the following strikes and associated blocks: 12,3,8,5,12, and repeat. blocks are roof, sweep, cutting, stick-down parry, shield), eventually trying variations with left-versus-right and randomly switching between 6-count and 10-count sumbrada. Then we did what can be thought of as an empty-hand sumbrada, also called the 1-2 drill or empty-hand tapi-tapi (roundhouse punch, then inside trapping hands to backfist, catch and roll to back smash, then turn waist to block, check and roundhouse punch on that side. rinse and repeat). We worked it faster and faster and explored some of the mechanics and timing that make it fun and interesting, stressing some ways to get conditioning and targeting in as well (such as palm-heel spearing the incoming forearm or bicep on the roundhouse punch or also sticky-slapping it). We then had them build up to randomly working in some of the standard target changes (replace the roundhouse punch with an overhead hammerfist or with an uppercut). To save sore shoulders, some of us also did the drill left-handed versus left-hand. Lastly, we had them work contact-locks and throws - inserted randomly ANY time contact is made; either person can use it to insert a quick lock or throw inside the drill, or breaking the drill altogether. After winding down, we also had a quick discussion on alternative elbow delivery drills and methods. Fun class with some good skills and drills! Next week - the (post)Spring FMA Thing, all-day FMA training in the park, from 10am-7pm or so. Mabuhay ang FMA!

 

Today's arnis, 12 Jun 2016: I was out of town at the Bruce Chiu's Arnis International's summer camp, the Summer Stick Slam 2016, in Statesboro, GA. While I was away, after starting with trapping hands and some variations/injects, Dr. John Paulson covered some more LvR tapi-tapi, with details and cross-feeds and injects. He also had folks work both the 6-count sumbrada and the box drill (10-ct or sungkiti sumbrada). Good stuff!

 

Today's Arnis, 19 Jun 2016: We started with some shadow striking / spinning since I was pretty stiff and slow. From there I shared a neat flow and adaptation (block side) drill that Guro Chad Bailey shared at last weekend's Summer Stick Slam, in which partners trade #12 strikes back and forth and the parry'ing person randomly chooses one of 4 methods (shield/kasilagang, roof/payong, or left or right sungkiti/slice passes), all the while moving, circling, angling, and closing. From there, I added an additional random step where after parrying, the return attack can either be the expected #12 or it can be a #6 or #7 poke, and if it's a poke, the response is block, check, counterstrike to a tapi-tapi block which is then fed to another #12 strike to start over. This ended up working really well and kind of "crossed the streams" to get people really discombobulated, but then they were able to get it and really moving and mixing it up. I was going to add some other random elements, but decided to give them a break, so we worked on the first 5 standard disarms and counters, paying attention to details and implications, including likelihood of being able to pull either off and what you really get out of such training. I also pointed out how understanding the counters helps make the disarms better. Fun day, and finally with some sun!

 

Spring FMA Thing, 5 Jun 2016 (sorry, forgot to put this in earlier, so it's out of order now): Thanks again to all who made it out today for the 2nd Annual Spring FMA Thing! Despite the threat of rainstorms and possible flooding, there were still 19 hardy souls braving the elements and enjoying some great FMA sharing. I led off with some empty-hand work: trapping hands with some insertions for whole body power, leading into the 1-2 drill (aka empty hand tapi-tapi) with contact insertions as well. Then Matt Wagner instructed on concepts for managing situations before they become altercations, including distance management, pre-aggression tells, and non-escalatory contact. From there Andrew Maddox jumped in with quite a few single stick and pad drills covering cane striking combos with empty hand work and kicks. Carl Minkel went on from there to work layered flow drills with random insertions, including strikes, disarms, Tapi-Tapi basics, and some pekiti tirsia insertions too. I did another session to share a fast ice pick grip vs hammer grip knife vs knife drill and also two versions of a RvR single stick drill that I only saw Professor Presas do once, in Texas back in the mid-90's. After that, Erik Harris finished things off with some Indonesian/Chinese body mechanics and nifty applications to go with them. All nifty stuff, and everyone seemed to have a great time - in fact, we skipped lunch and ended up working straight through until 4 pm when we decided we were all winding down and called it a day. Thanks very much to those who brought the pastries and the tangerines to add to the water and other snacks I brought! I think we'll definitely have to do this again next year, if not sooner! Maraming salamat po!!

 

Today's arnis, 26 Jun 2016: After a bit of loosening up with random carrenza flow, we jumped right into striking style followups against random attack feeds, taking time to flow, check/shove, and really pick targets. At the end of each I had them punctuate things with a full power finishing strike. We worked piguro-de-otso, banda-y-banda, rompida, taas-baba, abaniko double-action, tusok-tusok, and punyo-punyo. The followup finisher strike worked out nicely! From there we started working some simple sparring drills, including something I called the crab drill that I got an idea from PG Craig Mason about - not his exact drill, but oh well. I had folks pair up, one with two sticks held vertical in front but separated about 1.5-2 shoulder widths apart and the other with a single stick, then I had the 2-stick person feed the reaction drill by moving sideways randomly one way or another, at which time the other person was to move in the same direction and strike the vertical stick that was on the side moved towards. Next variation was to do the same feed, but strike the other vertical stick. Last variation was to first strike the same side stick and then the other stick. From there we did another PG Craig reaction drill to prime automatic striking after parrying: 2-stick person feeds #12 strikes so that the defender parries with a roof block and instantaneously strike down onto the other stick that the feeder simply keeps in front held horizontally. Note: be careful that the striker's stick/hand is out of the way first (either by recoiling or by having their #12 strike follow through) or you'll smack their hand really hard - don't ask me how I know. From there, we went to sparring with padded sticks, fencing masks, and lacrosse gloves. Everybody went at least 2 rounds and all had loads of fun. For most, it was the first ever time sparring that way - we definitely need to do it more, but it was good to see what did come out from all the previous training.

 

Today's arnis, 24 Jul 2016: We started off with a brief bouncing of ideas for what I should do next week in Michigan at the Unity Camp for my two 45-min sessions - hopefully folks will have fun with it anyway. After that we warmed up with redonda twirling against two sticks held out, adding pop-over strikes, pop-unders, and eventually playing with the rhythm so that no sticks are left just hanging there until their turn - if you sneak in simultaneous strikes then each stick is always either striking or chambering with at least one always striking. Fun coordination and timing-morphing drill. Enentually, the idea is to get a good flow of strikes while having no discernable rhythm and making strikes happen in between the other sticks motions. From there we went to some single-stick flow training that's a lot like a random sumbrada - each person parries (or really destroys the incoming limb/hand/etc) in incoming attack and then delivers their own attack, which the opponent just destroys and returns fire again, ad infinitum. We went slow (1/4 to 1/2 speed) and specifically didn't allow cane-on-cane contact so that the sequence was always destroy what they give you and then follow up with a finisher, back and forth. We added checks and body-disrupting stiff-arm shoves, and then we added kicks and off-hand punches in addition to the possibility of cane strike finishers. This generated lots of good play and promoted good body movement and timing because the actual stick contact to wrists/elbows/hands/etc kept the drill under control and folks moving smoothly, so that timing, positioning, and setups became the key, not speed. After that, we did a double-stick version of the same thing and concentrated solely on cane finishers, but we stressed the idea that the finisher could be applied with either stick after you also destroyed the incoming limb with either stick, so there were only 4 combinations to worry about. In addition to stressing good footwork and positioning, this also stressed the idea of not tying yourself up with your own sticks. The two-stick version can be thought of as the application of sinawalis, albeit random sinawalis, with pokes and punyos also inserted - fun stuff! Lastly, we took a blast from the past and worked with the thumb trap opportunities from empty-hand single sinawali. On the high contact, we started with the thumb-grab trap and hit to the head to make them block, then added the pull-back double-trap and hit the face, then added two more pull-back double-trap transfers with palms to the face, and finishing with the behind the neck hook and then body-clenching pull-into-the-face punch that the Professor loved so much! ;-) We also worked a "jail" entry and a body-shock elbow lock entry. From the low thumb grab trap, we worked compress elbow (arm bar), single lock, chicken head lock, and reverse wrist lock to come-along. Much fun and rejoicing was had by all.

 

Today's arnis, 7 Aug 2016: I warmed up with some shadow boxing until Jim arrived, and then Jim and I reviewed the 4 standard modern arnis sinawalis and then went on to variations including different chambers and leads, prefixes, inserts, and suffixes (LLL starting with L hand on right side, pera-peral as a prefix, insert an extra strike in double sinawali to end up with a mix of single and double sinawalis, 2 witiks before double sinawali, etc, etc). When others showed up we moved on to the pass-through drill with canes, feeding random 1,2,8,9 strikes with 2 canes feeding vs. 1 cane responding. Then we moved on to the same feeds for the flow drill (gunting or passing into the weapon), including sticks, knives, and empty-hand versions. For the knife version, I added a quick-as-possible poke right after the gunting (same count), and for the empty-hand version we made sure to switch and put more emphasis on the "off" hands (for most, this would mean passing with the right and doing the gunting strike with the left). We also quickly reviewed some trapping hands (aka de cadena), and then spent the rest of the class working applications including: 2-count responses, "1-count" responses, striking high or low, inside applications (forearm throw, inside armbar, taiji throw, stomach-elbow lock, wrist lock to elbow smash), and outside applications (armbar, outside forearm throw, body-shock elbow lock, diving throw [and counter], wrist lock to elbow smash) - just tip of the iceberg, so we'll continue to work in more applications later.

 

Today's arnis, 14 Aug 2016: Only 5 of us on this hot day, after some warmup carrenzas we went through the modern arnis anyos 1 through 3 with illustrative applications for the less obvious moves and then did cane anyos 1 through 4. From there we checked progress on LvR tapi-tapi and then worked on details for the rolling punyos, especially concentrating on entries, exits, but also looking at some insertions for strikes, disarms, throws, and hand changes. We also looked on the outside punyo to the head followed by trap and hit, including several followup finishing opportunities (punch, cradling punch, throw, cane-hits, etc). Paulson and I also worked a lot on some of the other LvR insertions and blendings. Good times!

 

Today's arnis: 30 July 2016 (whole weekend): The Modern Arnis Unity Camp, in Detroit Michigan

Earlier this summer, Master Bill Barker held the Modern Arnis Unity Camp 2016 in Detroit, Michigan, from 29-31 July, to celebrate Modern Arnis unity 15 years after Professor Remy A. Presas’ passing. The event was headlined by Modern Arnis luminaries GM Datu Tim Hartman, GM Datu Dieter Knüttel, GM Dan Anderson, Master Jaye Spiro, and Master Rich Parsons, with over 150+ years combined FMA experience. They each taught two 90-minute sessions covering a ton of great material. Attendees came from all over the US and even Canada, from Texas to Ontario and in between. The energy was great and participants seem to revel in the idea of so many senior students of Professor Presas coming together and sharing their modern arnis paths. Master Parsons started things off with some Buot Balintawak basics, emphasizing the connection between balintawak and Professor Presas’ tapi-tapi, and his later session built upon his first session to develop some solid foundation work that can be integrated into tapi-tapi. GM Knüttel’s two sessions included some fine points of applying joint locks and also finer points of tapi-tapi applications - both with an eye on how to make them really work at speed and when challenged. GM Hartman started off with 2-hand empty-hand applications of various sinawalis using focus mitts, later building upon that to progress into more involved and varied panantukan-style focus mitt drills. Master Spiro’s first regaled us with some nostalgia about Professor and his camps and worked us into groups for reviewing the various Modern Arnis anyos and showing our own interpretations of their applications. Her second session covered classic Presas knife work and drills that were done at so many camps in the past. GM Anderson started out working various cane sparring drills, including timing and distance work for effective point scoring, and later shared how all of the Professor’s drills were inherently related - all involved effective countering. He showed how all the drills could overlap and interlace seamlessly, from sumbradas to tapi-tapi to the flow drill and on and on. Besides these 5 amazing headliners, the camp also featured two guest Modern Arnis instructors, Guro Enoch Carlton and Guro Dr. Tye Botting. Guro Carlton covered sinawali boxing with footwork and variations, and later continued with trapping hands with flow and elbow variations. Dr. Botting covered an old Professor right vs right drill similar to both tapi-tapi and sumbrada progressed to random single stick flow, and his second session covered sinawali variations (including his personal “spiral” sinawali), sinawali inserts, prefixes, and suffixes, progressing to random double stick flow. On the last evening, Master Barker held a picnic-style banquet and encouraged folks to hang out and share stories of training back in the day. Old friendships were renewed and many new friendships were made, and all enjoyed the open sharing of the wide spectrum of material that makes up Modern Arnis. Mabuhay ang Modern Arnis!

 

Today's arnis: 28 Aug 2016 (whole weekend): The WMAA Instructors' Camp in Buffalo NY

The World Modern Arnis Alliance held its annual Instructors Training Camp from 26-28 August, 2016, in Buffalo, NY, and many senior instructors started a couple days earlier. Participants came in from Florida to Ohio to Canada, representing 2 countries and at least 7 states. The focus this year was on core material and refining the curriculum using a refreshing mix of classroom discussion and training on the mats. Some of the pre-camp training included the WMAA Tomahawk and Single Stick instruction modules in addition to cross-weapon translation of techniques and variations of striking patterns for stick, short and long sharp thrusting weapons, staves, and double stick. The multi-day event covered everything from single and double cane material, to tomahawks, to knives, to empty-hand, panantukan translation of sinawalis, forms, applications, and much more. On the last day before folks left the event, we got in a fair bit of sparring, both padded and live-stick. But even beyond training, there were many opportunities for camaraderie and fun, including dinners out, bonfire discussions, and a field trip to have lunch at the Riverworks alongside the river through downtown Buffalo. A nice surprise was running across the renowned Chai Sirisute and his crew doing a seminar at the same place. With the approach and depth and breadth of material in addition to the feeling of family and the commitment to the art of Modern Arnis going forward, many felt this was the best Instructors Camp yet. I would definitely recommend making one if you get the chance!

 

Today's arnis: 4 Sep 2016: I had Guro Paulson start the class going with the four modern arnis baston anyos and also the first old modern arnis empty hand anyo. Then I walked them through Anyo X1 for retention and learning. We then went through the 9 striking series for solo baston (asterisk with a center-punch strike at the end), emphasizing the connection with striking styles: 1st pair is downward figure 8, 2nd pair is banda y banda, 3rd pair is upward figure 8, 4th pair is rompida, then 9th strike is a straight-in hammer style strike. Then we used the knives to work the thrusting sequence 9 counts, including footwork. Finishing up, we did some of the Professor's old knife responses and disarms against incoming pokes, knife at throat, and knife at back, concentrating on attributes rather than as formulaic techniques. Lastly, we did his 5-6-7 poking set working up one at a time first with disarm against 5, then jam, then disarm against 6, then jam, then disarm against 7, eventually working into a give-and-take set with escalating challenging of timing as they got better and better. Fun times!

As a reminder, next week will be tomahawk work!