A lot of Systema can't be seen and has to be felt. I was pretty sceptical about it at first myself, so I went to observe a training session, where I was sold after feeling a punch on the chest that rocked me clear to the arches of my feet.
zefff: You're right about a lot of Systema guys applying certain things out of context. This has in part to do with the rather bombastic marketing of Systema, particularly in the West, and the kind of people that attracts. That said, the UK crowd tend to be a pretty no-nonsense, hard-training, street-tough lot. One of my instructors came from there, and another of my training partners trained with that crowd until moving to Australia.
The no-touch and psychology work commonly seen on videos is mostly party tricks done by people with the requisite level of skill to make it work. The basis of Systema is grounded in human mechanics, psychology and physiology and its fundaments are acquired, as with any martial art, through a lot of hard work.
You're also right that Systema isn't a method focused on duelling per se, as the idea is in fact to avoid duelling. Conscious adherence to this philosophy does lead to awkward one-on-one sparring at times, though the System is really so open-ended that all it takes to apply its concepts to one-on-one duelling is a little experience and enough maturity to realise the difference between understanding abstract concept and simply duplicating masterful movements, which is no different from rote learning technique - supposedly verboten in the System.
Demetry Furman of the Toronto HQ, for instance, was training for amateur vale tudo at the same time that he picked up Systema and successfully applied the concepts to clinch the 1996 Sport Jujitsu championship in his weight class. Scott Sonnon - international sambo champion and much sought-after conditioning coach to vale tudo fighters - and his RMAX system of conditioning and Softwork combat is perhaps an even better example of the athletic and duelling applications of Systema.
Having trained for almost four years now, I too personally carry the concepts of Systema into every other form of combative training that I do, whether athletic or tactical, and usually without conscious thought. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it was the missing link in my training that opened up all other options to me. My fighting can look like anything it has to or I want it to, but the engine under the hood is inevitably the conceptual core I built from training in Systema.
dscott: As I recall, Dave Cohen repeatedly extended personal invitations to you to go to his school for an open-mat night to have your doubts cleared up and questions addressed. Did you ever take him up on that?
My advice to any honest doubters is to attend a class or open-mat day conducted by any of the old-guard instructors (PM or email me for details) and feel for yourself with your body what often can't be seen with your eyes.
Last edited by Wilhelm von Wänkenstein : 02-26-2008 at 06:33 AM.
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