TMA Friday: Snake Oil Salesmen in Grappling and Chi Balls

Scenario 1:
You continually get beaten on the mat when rolling with non-Judo players/visiting other clubs. You've also been pinned and tapped out under Judo rules by players from other clubs and despite instructional time devoted to mat work at your club, you have not seen the gains necessary to compete on the mat with other players in your division. Your coach tells you, "well, in a Judo tournament you can just lift them off the ground and get a restart."

Scenario 2:
You continually get taken down at BJJ/Submission Grappling tournaments and you ask your coach why you don't train takedowns more often (in addition: you have a long-time back or knee injury that causes you to fear getting thrown). You want to compete in tournaments but do not wish to concede the 2 points for the takedown.
Your coach tells you, "Well, training takedowns causes injuries. Besides, you can just get better at pulling guard and sweeping from the bottom."

Solution to Scenario 1: Attend open mats at other clubs with players that are clearly better than you on the mat. Pick their brain. Address the positions that you are getting caught in the most frequently.

Solution to Scenario 2: Find a competent grappler with a background in a takedown-oriented style and learn grip fighting. You can out grip a fair number of other BJJ-centric competitors and induce them to pull guard without having to actually fight for the takedown.


Solution 3: Keep doing what you are doing and expect the results to change nonetheless.



In the light of day, sitting at your desk at work or on your futon, Solution 3 seems ridiculous, doesn't it?
It seems to ignore the obvious, the clear, the empirical, the rational.
Yet, we invent reasons to avoid leaving our comfort zone all the time.
We blame the rules of Judo with limited mat work for why we don't spend more time drilling mat work or rolling with non-Judo players. We blame the rules of BJJ for why it isn't worth the time to drill grip fighting or takedowns. We complain that a wrestler or a Judo player pinned us for minutes at a time. We blame the BJJ player for using submissions we don't normally drill at our club. We fall back on those rules very quickly, however, when we "lose" in training and wish to protect our pride or our vanity.

Here's a clip of the pretty thoroughly debunked/myth/fraud/charlatan/mountebank otherwise known as George Dillman:

And what happens when a practitioner tries to use Chi on a non-believer you ask?

Don't buy the snake oil.