http://kravmaga-centrallondon.co.uk/blog/2012/07/a-proper-punch-up-some-lessons/
Copy below of McGill's Blog re a recent incident
A PROPER PUNCH UP- SOME LESSONS
An interesting tale from a friend and student of mine, with a few good lessons for all of us.
He was out drinking with a mate who wearing the shirt of a certain football team. This shirt offended 3 members of the Travelling community, an argument ensued and my guy’s mate precipitated a fight. They all stepped outside and the mate with the football shirt ran off. The leader of the Travellers took his shirt off and started to move around on his toes giving the clear impression that he know what he was doing; my guy, who is an experienced martial artist and fighter but is also 60 years old, decided against going toe-to-toe with this guy so when the fight ensued he took the Traveller down quickly. Rather than quickly finish the guy and get away, he begun taking a little too much vengeance out on the guy’s face and at too much length…he took a kick in the head from one of the Traveller’s mates, this put him on the floor and this second traveller came in with a stomp to the head. When he came in with a second stomp my guy did a technique that luckily enough we’d covered in class a few days earlier, turning to the side wrapping his lower arm around the outside of the Traveller’s supporting leg and hitting the inside of his knee with the other forearm; this took him down with a screwed up leg.
By this time my guy was a bit dozey from having had 2 kicks in the head, Traveller 1 was recovering from the take down and facial pounding, Traveller 2 had a bad limp and Traveller 3 wisely wanted none of it. After the ritual exchange of threats and insults no more blows were exchanged and all went home hurt apart from Traveller 3.
Lessons:
Be careful with your choice of mates
Football shirts - avoid, especially controversial teams. There should be a law banning men over a certain age wearing replica shirts anyway as they never look good.
Takedowns: good in certain situations but if more than one guy involved or potentially involved make sure it debilitates the guy, avoids you going to the floor as well and take the chance to get away quickly rather than enjoy the moment beating up on the guy’s face.
There is a good chance that you will end up on the floor sometime in a row and despite the popularity of MMA and BJJ, the chances are still high that the guy will aim to kick the hell out of you rather than stick on an arm-lock; learn how to handle this and to get up quickly and safely.
Fighting is a nasty, messy business that is best to be avoided when possible. In this situation my guy and the first 2 Travellers got pretty badly hurt, my guy’s friend lost respect by starting a fight with his runaway gob then running away, and Traveller 3 may be questioned by his mates re his non-participation. So no winners, only survivors; it could have been a lot worse for my guy and he did well to come out relatively unharmed against 3 much younger guys but it would have been a whole lot better to have avoided that situation completely – but hats off to the crazy old bastard anyway.
He was out drinking with a mate who wearing the shirt of a certain football team. This shirt offended 3 members of the Travelling community, an argument ensued and my guy’s mate precipitated a fight. They all stepped outside and the mate with the football shirt ran off. The leader of the Travellers took his shirt off and started to move around on his toes giving the clear impression that he know what he was doing; my guy, who is an experienced martial artist and fighter but is also 60 years old, decided against going toe-to-toe with this guy so when the fight ensued he took the Traveller down quickly. Rather than quickly finish the guy and get away, he begun taking a little too much vengeance out on the guy’s face and at too much length…he took a kick in the head from one of the Traveller’s mates, this put him on the floor and this second traveller came in with a stomp to the head. When he came in with a second stomp my guy did a technique that luckily enough we’d covered in class a few days earlier, turning to the side wrapping his lower arm around the outside of the Traveller’s supporting leg and hitting the inside of his knee with the other forearm; this took him down with a screwed up leg.
By this time my guy was a bit dozey from having had 2 kicks in the head, Traveller 1 was recovering from the take down and facial pounding, Traveller 2 had a bad limp and Traveller 3 wisely wanted none of it. After the ritual exchange of threats and insults no more blows were exchanged and all went home hurt apart from Traveller 3.
Lessons:
Be careful with your choice of mates
Football shirts - avoid, especially controversial teams. There should be a law banning men over a certain age wearing replica shirts anyway as they never look good.
Takedowns: good in certain situations but if more than one guy involved or potentially involved make sure it debilitates the guy, avoids you going to the floor as well and take the chance to get away quickly rather than enjoy the moment beating up on the guy’s face.
There is a good chance that you will end up on the floor sometime in a row and despite the popularity of MMA and BJJ, the chances are still high that the guy will aim to kick the hell out of you rather than stick on an arm-lock; learn how to handle this and to get up quickly and safely.
Fighting is a nasty, messy business that is best to be avoided when possible. In this situation my guy and the first 2 Travellers got pretty badly hurt, my guy’s friend lost respect by starting a fight with his runaway gob then running away, and Traveller 3 may be questioned by his mates re his non-participation. So no winners, only survivors; it could have been a lot worse for my guy and he did well to come out relatively unharmed against 3 much younger guys but it would have been a whole lot better to have avoided that situation completely – but hats off to the crazy old bastard anyway.
