What Makes Krav Maga So Effective?

Unlike most martial arts and self-defense systems, Krav Maga is not defined by its techniques. Karate, Tae Kwon Do, and Judo have syllabuses that define what they are by the techniques they teach e.g., the basic Kodokan Judo Syllabus, comprises of forty identifiable and distinct throws, organized into five sets etc. Krav Maga is a system that is founded on heuristics, concepts, and principles etc. This is because violence can change over time, in a way that a Judo bout, or Karate match really doesn’t – the format of Judo matches has changed little in substance since the days of Jigaro Kano, its founder. However, where real-life violence is concerned, things change e.g., whilst it may have been possible to grab the barrel of a rifle in the 1940’s, with a modern weapon it is likely to be much too hot to do so; this has meant techniques have had to evolve, develop. and change, however these solutions do so according to concepts and principles which they have to adhere to. It’s this adherence to a set of “rules”, which define what Krav Maga is and also isn’t i.e., not everything that says it is Krav Maga, is necessarily Krav Maga. If you are interested in reading more about the ideas behind Krav Maga click here.

When a sports combat fighter steps into the ring/cage or onto the mats to compete, there are three things they have been and are aware of: 1. They knew that they would be fighting on this particular day and time,2. They know the rules as to how the winner of their fight will be decided and, 3. They know exactly when the fight will start, because a referee will signal the start of the fight. In non-consensual encounters that involve violence, none of these three things are present, and if they are it’s because it’s a pre-arranged conflict that you could/should have avoided. This means that however aware you are that there is the potential for violence, you will experience a degree of surprise when you’re attacked. The body already has many natural defenses it uses to protect itself, such as the “startle” reflex which sees us raise our arms, and duck our head when our fear system picks up fast movements e.g., most of us have flinched when a ball is thrown at us unexpectedly etc. Krav Maga techniques utilize the body’s natural defenses and works with them.

Looking closer at the flinch/startle reflex we can see that it is triggered anytime, something (whatever it is), comes towards us quickly e.g., we flinch when flying insects fly towards us, and try to swat them away, or when something is thrown at us unexpectedly etc. this demonstrates that we are reacting to movement, rather than recognizing and identifying exactly what it is that is coming towards us. This means that when caught unprepared we will react to a knife slash in the same way as we would a large swinging punch i.e., both our coming towards our head/face in an arcing trajectory etc. Because of this all of Krav Maga’s blocks that work against punches are effective against knife attacks. Not only does this mean that knife defenses work with our natural instincts, but it also means that a Krav Maga practitioner doesn’t have to learn two different blocking systems i.e., one to deal with knife attacks another to deal with punches etc.

Krav Maga assumes that when you’re attacked, you will be caught by surprise, you will quickly become tired and exhausted, and you will soon lose the space and time that allows you to perform techniques optimally. Because of this Krav Maga techniques and solutions are able to work and be effective even when they are not able to be performed perfectly. Under the pressure and stress of real-life violence, it is unlikely that you will be found at your best. In most cases people perform at their worst rather than their best, even when they have undergone training. However, somebody performing at their worst “trained” self, is significantly better than their “untrained” self, i.e., Krav Maga training raises an individual’s ability to deal with violence considerably. Krav Maga techniques have redundancy built into them so that even when they aren’t performed perfectly, they will work. In many cases even performing them 50% correctly, will result in a 100% solution.

An essential fighting skill is that of threat recognition i.e., if you are unable to recognize the threat/danger you will not be able to respond effectively. Krav Maga techniques initially use instinctive responses to initiate a defense e.g., if you are strangled or choked your hands will automatically come up to try and pull the attacker’s arm or hands away etc. Krav Maga uses the response that if something is a life-threatening attack, the response and focus should be on dealing with the attack itself rather than the attacker e.g., if you are being choked or strangled your first response should be on making sure that you pull the offending arm/hands away from your neck, so you can ensure that you can breathe etc. Only after you have made yourself say you should you start to think about dealing with the attacker.

Non-life-threatening attacks are those which in and of themselves are not dangerous or injurious e.g., if somebody grabs your wrist, or your lapel etc., this action causes little or no harm. What is dangerous in the attack that follows e.g., somebody may grab your lapels in order to headbutt you etc. the first attack – the lapel grab - doesn’t necessarily need to be defended, however the second one – the headbutt – does. One way to “defend” against the second attack is to prevent it from being made i.e., interrupt the sequence etc. An effective way to do this is to immediately attack the attacker, when grabbed. This now puts them behind the curve and forces them to respond to your attack(s), rather than continuing with their headbutt etc.

Everyone knows about the need for 10 000 – perfect – repetitions of a movement or technique etc., in order to gain mastery of it/perfect it. This is why most martial arts take so long to learn; there’s a lot of very different techniques that must be repeatedly practiced before they can be properly executed. When you consider real-life violence, where an individual must be able to defend themselves when standing, when on the ground, against single and multiple assailants, against attacks and threats that could be unarmed or armed (knife, stick, gun etc.), this constitutes a large number of potential attacks that must be trained against. Krav Maga techniques are based off of a few common movements e.g., defenses against punches, kicks, and gun and knife threats to the front, all use one particular body movement to defend against them. This means that when you are practicing with dealing with a front kick to the body, you are also practicing the body movement used to deal with gun and knife threats. This means that the 10 000 repetitions needed to perfect a technique is reached much sooner.

Krav Maga is not about winning fights but about surviving violence. There are two reasons people fight: either because of ego, or due to survival. There is only one legitimate reason to fight and that is when you have no other choice but to i.e., survival. If you assume that the individual you are dealing with is armed, has friends who can assist them, and knows how to fight (three legitimate assumptions), your goal hould always be that of disengagement i.e., getting away from violent encounters as soon as it’s possible. If you have no choice but to engage physically with somebody(s), then the goal should be to do so in order to create an opportunity to disengage rather than stay engaged in order to “win” the fight.