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Israeli Fighting Plan New Hot Fitness Trend
Pity the bad guy who assaults one of Tom Johnson's students.
Tom Johnson, instructor of Krav Maga, right, teaches self-defense Techniques from fire arms to the students at the studio of Innovative Martial Arts, 3005 S. Parker Rd., on Thursday.
Since February 1999, about 100 men and women have come to Johnson's Aurora studio, Innovative Martial Arts, to get down and dirty about self-defense. They're studying Krav Maga (krahv mug-GAH), the official fighting system of the Israeli army and the unofficial latest trend in American fitness.
"It's a fighting class, a self-defense class, but designed in a way that's very fast-paced, very energized," Johnson explains. "Most of my students are here for self-defense, and as a byproduct, they get very fit. Some are in the class for the fitness aspect, and as a byproduct, they get self-defense."
Battle-tested in the Middle East through decades of conflict, Krav Maga came to the United States in 1981 with Darren Levine, a deputy district attorney in Los Angeles who trained in Israel with the system's founder. It since has been embraced by law enforcement agencies and martial artists who appreciate its no-nonsense approach; many Krav Maga centers also offer fitness classes that set the system's kicks, punches and other movements to music.
Levine's Krav Maga Worldwide Enterprises in Los Angeles is the American headquarters for the movement. A training center there has 1,800 members; nationwide, more than 40 other locations - mostly martial arts schools - offer some form of Krav Maga, including two in Colorado. A hundred more are set to open in the next year.
"It's definitely becoming more popular," says Christina Barnett, who with husband Chet owns the Krav Maga Official Training Center and ATA Black Belt Academy in Fort Collins. "A lot of our students will begin as fitness students and then move into Krav Maga (self-defense) classes."
Lynn Rice was hesitant about starting Krav Maga, though she was already taking aerobic kick-boxing from Johnson as a conditioning tool.
"There is a little more physical contact, and I was wary about that," says the 35-year-old Aurora woman. "But now I'm hooked on it It's helped my self-confidence. I feel I know how to handle myself in certain situations."
Aggressive Krav Maga workouts reflect the method's emphasis on real-world fighting, though protective gear prevents injury. Students in Johnson's fast-paced, hour-long classes go after each other with rubber knives, wrestle for control of fake guns, yell at and jostle one other, and throw elbows, knees, kicks and punches until their limbs feel like lead.
Johnson - who holds black belts in three tae kwon do based martial arts - keeps them in motion with a drill sergeant's passion: "I want you to bury the knife in your partner's stomach!" he commands. "If you're not trying to really get them, we're wasting our time!"
The exercises simulate real-life conflicts in which adrenaline, fear and fatigue all play a part. In experienced Krav Maga students, a quick, forceful response to threat becomes nearly instinctual. If escape is not possible, they learn to do everything they can to avoid getting hurt - and to keep striking back until the threat is eliminated.
"We do stress drills, fatigue drills that teach you to keep going even though you're exhausted, even though you're scared," Johnson says. "We deal with the elements that are going to occur in a fight, the intangibles."
Unlike other martial arts, Krav Maga lacks a spiritual component - unless you count the fighting spirit, which, as Johnson points out, "is 100 percent cultivated" in the form.
"Other martial arts have a lot of tradition, respect, honor - and that's great," he says. "But to prepare for a real fight you have to take those things away, because they're not going to exist."
Remember that "Raiders of the Lost Ark" scene in which Indiana Jones responds to the artistic moves of a sword-wielding assailant by pulling a gun and shooting him dead? Not pretty, but powerful.
"This stuff is a real practical street self-defense," says Krav Maga student Shane Anthony, who also holds a black belt in kick boxing. "This is not a quest for spirituality. This is a down and dirty defense system designed to protect you and people around you from crime and violent assault on the street."
A freelance television news photographer, Anthony has been in the middle of some hairy situations. "Things happen quickly in the real world," he says. "If you are threatened or assaulted, if someone pulls a weapon on you, you are going to immediately resort to whatever your training level is."
For Krav Maga students, that training is about survival.
"It's not fancy at all," Johnson says, "but I find beauty in function."
DenverPost.com, Tuesday, July 31, 2001
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