November 2009 Archives

Sparring is one of the most important aspects of training in the Philippine Combat Arts of eskrima, kali, or arnis. You do not learn to fight just by watching movies, reading books, practicing forms, hitting the air, or memorizing scenarios. You learn to fight, by fighting. Would you trust your brand new car to your teenage child, without your supervision, if they had only taken the written portion of their driver's test, and had never even driven one mile?

Traditional Escrima training, consisted of the student playing with their instructor, someone who was already an experienced eskrimador. In other words, the student would try and defend himself against his instructor's attack, and if he had progressed enough in his arnis training, maybe attack as well. Or more succinctly, they would spar.

Now just like you would not expect your teenage child to be fine to handle nascar with just a short read of a car manual, sparring at the Philippine Combat Arts Club is not just a man test, where we throw a novice to the wolves. Instead, our coaches emphasize a progressive sparring program, that builds students up in the skill and ability in fighting, so that when they do finally engage in more intense sparring, they will be more than prepared to hold their own.

Sparring also helps instruct a student in the true and traditional practice of the Philippine Combat Arts. Traditionally an eskrimador did not teach by asking his students to blindly parrot movements and memorize patterns, but instead he would teach a student the strategy of fighting. Learning your basics, is like giving you hammer and nails, but sparring is where you learn to use your hammer and nails to build a house.

We emphasize many different aspects of sparring in our club, to help student progress to ever increasing skill ability. From light contact, heavily ruled sparring, to heavy contact no rule sparring. We tailor the sparring experience to the students. From padded stick sparring, hitting with 100% power with armor, to light contact hard stick sparring with no armor, to heavy contact hard stick sparring with minimal armor. Each scenario gives students a different aspect of fighting, and allows a more experienced eskrimador to share with them the benefits of their experience in arnis.

Everyone comes to the Philippine Combat Arts, particularly here in the United States, for various reasons. Some, are looking for an excuse to get outside the house, meet new people, and maybe get a little exercise. Others, are looking to be the baddest mamajama since Jason Bourne. And still others are just looking for a traditional expression of the Philippine Combat Arts.

Well, for whatever reason you decide to try out a training session, only one thing will keep you coming back and help you improve at these arts, and that is love of the art. Now, love the art, doesnt mean you have to sell your instructor your first born child, wash his car using only circular wiping motions, worship a picture of some old asian dude you've never met while meditating on the secrets of the universe. No, love of the art means you love the practice of the art, whether it be at the cheer of some paid instructor, in the privacy of your own home, or to the dismay of every other person at the bus stop.

If you talk to alot of elders in the Philipines, they will often refer to the practice of arnis or escrima, not as fighting, training, but play. They will say they play eskrima, or they play arnis, or they play kali. If they wish to spar with you, they may ask you to play. This method of reference shows something other than the difficulty of learning a foreign language, instead it shows the true joy of the practice of the art.

It is not work to practice, it is not something you need to be forced to do, have hammered into you, or do at the last minute. Instead to love the practice of eskrima, kali, or arnis is joy, something that if only you didnt have that pesky day job, that need to have food every now and then, that you would just constantly do.

So if you ever stop by a session, and wonder why we dont yell at our members. Why we dont bark like a drill sargent, make them do more calistenics than a new recruit in basic training, make people chase carrots (e.g. ranks), its because what we seek to promote, arent phony tough guys, people seeking to have yet another rank to throw in their cacaphony of various martial arts belts, or technique hunters, instead we seek to show people the love of this eclectic art that is the Philippine Combat Arts.