Lee Morrison -The Shredder
Salepage : Lee Morrison -The Shredder
One of the best modern combative seminars I’ve attended in a long time was held at the Tokei martial arts center on Tooley Street in London. Richard Dimitri, a Canadian instructor, hosted an excellent presentation of the Shredder, a close quarter conceptual tool that would be a useful addition to anyone’s combative arsenal. This seminar was part of Senshido’s UK tour, and it drew a large number of experienced instructors and trainees. The seminar began at 11 a.m., and we were treated to a goldmine of useful information and functional drills over the next five hours. The Shredder is a concept tool designed to override the startle/flinch mechanism, which is the body’s hardwired natural response to a physical attack. This flinch response is an immediate reflex to any indication of a physical assault and is activated by the Amygdala, an almond-shaped threat detector located in the brain. (For more information, see our review of Dennis Martin’s 2nd International seminar.) The Shredder avoids this mechanism by using a spontaneous assault of gross motor movements that, according to Richard, are launched on a quarter beat, attacking vital areas of the face and throat, making the attack virtually impossible to stop or intercept. This method of attack is extremely invasive in nature and psychologically disruptive, instilling primal fear in the recipient by transforming the potential aggressor from predator to prey. This concept is also consistent with Senshido’s five physical retaliation principles, which are, in no particular order, as follows: economy of motion, non-telegraphic movement, opportunity striking, tactile sensitivity, and primary target acquisition. Richard went on to discuss the principles of de-escalation from a natural position in depth. He demonstrated this with some of the best role-playing I’ve ever witnessed. Emphasizing important points of non-static use of the hands as you control space, as well as body shifting and moving, allowing you to actively scan your environment while interfering with the position of your potential aggressor. As a result, he is unable to prepare for his attack. At this point, I must say that Richard’s ability to present information was absolutely outstanding. Richard is a funny man who teaches with demonstrative passion, making you want to listen. This is a critical component of teaching and is primarily based on NLP. A good instructor must be able to change voice tonality as well as present demonstrative visual demonstrations in order to appeal to everyone’s learning curve.
Assuming that talking the situation down had failed, we moved on to the Shredder’s dynamics. Those of us whose game plan calls for ballistic pre-emptive strikes may find the concept of simply closing and grabbing the face and head jarring. However, once you see how effective this can be, you will understand how the Shredder can complement your game. You can shred ahead of time and then strike off that as a follow-up with no pull back or time delay; this is known as worming. Alternatively, you could strike first, then clinch and shred from there. You could simply continue to incorporate shredding and striking as the opportunity presented itself, using tactile sensitivity as you rip, tear, and gouge at the eyes, nose, ears, and throat.
Demonstration:
Our first physical encounter with the Shredder came in the form of a partner drill in which you turn to the person next to you and grab their head with one hand while vigorously rubbing all over their face with an abrupt motion of your open free hand. You’re keeping your hand flat and getting a sense of how intrusive and horrible it is for someone to anchor onto your head and mess with your face. Imagine how much more vicious the attack would be if it was accompanied by clawed fingers and a ripping and tearing motion.
Drill number one:
We paired up for our first drill, with one person acting as an aggressor by using aggressive role play, while the other tries to talk him down and control space with the fence. You take hold of your partner’s face/head in one explosive motion from a very close position at the first opportunity, with no indication of movement before the hands are on the target. (Closest weapon to nearest target) The shred is immediate from here. There is no technically correct way to shred; simply take the head and face and simulate by driving the nose across the face while ripping at the throat/ears, gouging and thumbing the eyes, and mash into the vitals in a constant and continuous motion. Consider the blades of a blender to get the idea. This is a pure gross motor movement that has existed since the beginning of time. Just look at two women fighting in a clip from one of Jerry Springer’s old shows. This was typically a ballistic clash followed by two combatants scratching at each other’s eyes and faces while ripping each other’s hair out, giving you an idea of this primal instinct. The Shredder has developed this concept into a non-reciprocal functional combative method. The clawed figuration of the hands distinguishes it from how it should be used in real life and this replication drill. Which, where possible, we all tried to avoid, though there were still plenty of scratch marks visible afterward despite this precaution.
CQC
Joe Hubbard, the instructor, gets on board.
The Shredder, as a tool, is capable of inflicting significant damage in a short period of time. Wherever possible, the amount of force used should be proportional to the threat. Understand that if you take out your opponent early in the fight, you can have great success with striking, as most of you reading this will already know from similar experience. However, I tend to agree with Richard when he says that grounding, torque, and distance are required for punching or striking to work. If we end up in a vertical clinch with an aggressor, we lose access to all three of these factors. Personally, I train and teach to make striking with our most close quarter weapons from the clinch as functional as possible. Controlling and dominating from the clinch will make you more adept in this range and, to some extent, allow you to maintain the three previously mentioned factors. So I’ll always train that way for myself, but the Shredder is also extremely effective. In fact, I believe that shredding the opponent up from a vertical clinch is the best option available, especially if the grapple goes to the ground.
Here
We can see how the Shredder can be used on the ground by simply maintaining
apply pressure to the target and continue shredding until the
opportunity to flee
Drill number two:
The next drill required both partners to engage in a mutual clinch. This time, one person shreds while the other tries to stop him. This was my favorite aspect of this training method: all of the drills were alive. Under the pressure of the acid test, you strive from the start to apply the shred on a non-compliant partner. This drill progressed to both sides attacking and defending simultaneously. The goal is to shred without being shredded. This enables you to develop the necessary attributes through tactile sensitivity in order to avoid his attack while delivering your own. It’s the same thing as simulating biting and gouging during scenario work. If you don’t train it, it will beat you.
Drill number three:
The progression now was for your partner to attack you with whatever they wanted, kicking, striking/punching, and grappling were all acceptable, while your goal was to try to read your partner’s attack cue and respond by getting the head and shredding him up. This allowed us to integrate the shred with striking, grappling, and whatever else came out under the pressure of scenario replication, and to be fair, this concept worked very well in the arena of noncompliance.
The way Dimitri presented his instruction and then put it under pressure by calling out one of the biggest and strongest looking guys in the crowd, who was in this case a very capable striker and grappler, and telling him to attack him with anything he wanted as hard as he could impressed me the most. How many teachers have you seen do that? This will give you an idea of Dimitri’s ability and belief in himself and his material. Needless to say, his opponent was dispatched quickly with his shred, and despite the fact that it went to the ground, Richard was dominant throughout.
I also like how the physical drills were interspersed with a lot of information about all aspects of combat in general. Richard taught using personal experiences and real-life documented incidents. He discussed how a variety of factors could influence how you respond in a live altercation. The time of day, the conditions of your surroundings, and how you physically feel are all factors to consider. How you react to a problem after you’ve just left the gym after a good training session that has left you feeling alive, confident, and ready for anything is vastly different from how you react at 5 a.m. when someone has kicked your door in and attacked you in your bed as you’re wiping the sleep from your eyes. He also discussed the consequences of violence. Too many people are all too eager to respond physically without considering the consequences of their actions. Again, Richard provided real-life examples, such as the Russian martial arts expert who was walking with his wife in New York City when they were approached at gunpoint by two teenagers, a 19-year-old boy and an 18-year-old girl. Instead of assessing the situation and threat, the Russian so-called expert used a flamboyant technique of kicking the gun out of the boy’s hand, which worked by all accounts, and then proceeded to beat the shit out of him. Ignoring the girl, she pulled out her own gun and blew the guy’s brains out. This is a classic case of underestimating the threat. Another example was the football jock who beat up a little Filipino guy with the help of his friends, only to come out of the cinema hand in hand with his girl friend, completely oblivious to the fact that the same Filipino guy had just clocked him and proceeded to creep up behind the pair of them with a knife in his hand before stabbing both of them rapidly and repeatedly in an act of vengeance. The jock lived, but his girlfriend died as a result of something he did 7 months before.
Of course, where there are no alternatives and we must now become physical in order to increase our chances of survival, we must take our aggressor apart as quickly and clinically as possible. Understand, however, that there is no gratification in violence. At best, you will stun and flee, but in the worst-case scenario, you will have to deal with the victim of your justified assault, or what’s left of him, assuming you are not the one who has been victimized, as well as the aftermath of adrenaline, witnesses, possible police involvement, not to mention the courts and any guilt that you may have. The bottom line is that the consequences of violence are always negative, they are ugly and horrible, but they are better than the alternative of finding yourself in a hospital with a drip in your arm or worse, in an open casket at the local funeral parlor. If it’s you or them, make it them, but whenever possible, seek avoidance and escape.
Drill number four:
We then addressed the knife issue. Richard stated, as I have on numerous occasions, that there is no guaranteed method for dealing with an edged weapon attack while unarmed. So we looked at what options we had and how we could use the Shredder in this situation. We began in a mutual clinch, with one of us concealing a training knife somewhere on his body. The agreement was simple: look for any indication that your partner is attempting to access the weapon and work to prevent him from doing so. In some cases, you’ll trap the weapon-wielding limb with your free hand and shred him with whatever comes out. In another case, the knife is coming at you too fast for you to grab the arm; in this case, you’ll just have to try to get away from the bearer’s weapon side and drag him into a position from which you can shred. This inevitably resulted in both of you collapsing (not ideal) and making the best of a bad situation. Here, the success rate for me and my partner Simon was about fifty-fifty, so we tried for damage limitation, and as you can see, my training partner Simon Alpin caught one in the struggle from the training folder we were using. I thought I was doing well when I grabbed my partner’s knife hand, shredded with the other, and dragged him to the ground, only to look down and see Simon slicing and dicing the back of my knee and Achilles tendon, nasty, go figure. There are no guarantees, as he stated.
Simon’s combat wound
Drill number five:
The final drill of the day demonstrated the first in a series of drills for dealing with multiple attackers, in this case three people grouped together to simulate a two-on-one scenario. The key point here is positioning, with the goal of keeping both opponents in a line by controlling the closest to you by shredding his clinched head as you zone to relocate position in order to avoid the other guy. Then, as the second opponent approaches, shove his mate into him and flee or engage. Everything is very simple, with plenty of room for advancement.
The day came to a close with a Q&A session with Richard and a photo opportunity. This was a fitting end to a fantastic day. There were a lot of nice people there, so it was a great chance to network and share. In terms of the Shredder’s validity, I believe it is an excellent concept that is simple to learn and retain. It works well under duress and is especially beneficial to women and in a horizontal grappling situation. It works well with hard skill striking and would be a great addition to anyone’s support system. For those of you who still remain a little sceptical, my suggestion to you is that you take off the blinkers and attend a seminar in order to gain a thorough grasp of this concept, apply it under pressure then make your judgement. I’m confident you’ll be pleasantly surprised.
