combat intelligent athlete - cmdi · combat intelligent athlete program rodney king ©2012 ... and...

Combat Intelligent Athlete Program Rodney King ©2012

Intellectual Property of Crazy Monkey Defense & Rodney King. All Rights Reserved

COMBAT INTELLIGENT ATHLETESelf-preservation training that works with

evolution, not against it!

AN INTRODUCTION

About the Combat Intelligent Athlete Program:The Combat Intelligent Athlete (CIA) Program is Crazy Monkey Defense’s civilian self-preservation program.

CIA’s sister programs consist of,

• The Combat Intelligent Officer Program for Law Enforcement ( www.combatintelligentofficer.com ).

• The Combat Intell igent Soldier Program for the militar y (www.combatintelligentsoldier.com ).

Currently there are 4-levels in the CIA Program,

Level 1- In Level 1 CIA we deal with the outside game. Here we coach you how to deal with an aggressive opponent at a distance, including effective striking tools. This program corresponds to the ‘athletic’ work done in the CM1 Game.

Level 2 - In Level 2 CIA we mainly deal with the middle distance game. This is focused on two main areas, #rstly how to deal with someone who goes hands on at a distance (for example when someone grabs you) and secondly how to deal with someone who is striking at the mid-range (typically this will involve multiple strikes). This program corresponds to the ‘athletic’ work done in the CM2 Game.

Level 3 - Here we work mainly with the close quarter or clinch game. This program is focused on effectively controlling and manipulating the clinch range, as well as how to get into the clinch range safely. This program corresponds to the ‘athletic’ work done in the CM3 Game.

Level 4 - Here we focus on what to do if taken to the ground, how to survive the ground and how to get back to your feet safely. Level 4 also serves as an integration course, where we put all the material from CIA level 1, 2, 3 and 4 together.



http://www.combatintelligentofficer.com

http://www.combatintelligentofficer.com

http://www.combatintelligentsoldier.com

http://www.combatintelligentsoldier.com

Introduction to CIA:Ten thousand years ago, we were all hunter-gatherers. The typical conclusion amongst archeologists is that prior to state level civilizations warfare was rare1.

Prehistoric people were heralded as cooperative and peace loving — elevated to the level of the Peaceful or Noble Savage.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in his Discourse on Inequality (1754) noted,

“The !rst man who, having fenced in a piece of land, said "This is mine," and found people naïve enough to believe him, that man was the true founder of civil society. From how many crimes, wars, and murders, from how many horrors and misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind, by pulling up the stakes, or !lling up the ditch, and crying to his fellows: Beware of listening to this impostor; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itself to nobody. ”

Was Rousseau correct?

Through the pioneering work of Steven LeBlanc, Lawrence Keeley and others, they have found ample evidence to prove that warfare was very much a part of prehistoric people too. Keeley wrote a book about this, entitled War before Civilization, to drive home this point.

What does this have to do with self-preservation?

Research by Keeley and others points to an uneasy fact that primitive man was a violent creature — not the Rousseauian "noble savage" of popular mythology. By default then the need for self-preservation against other humans is as old as humankind. One can conclude that the survival of the human race on this planet over millions of years, has been the successful actualization of self-preservation strategies that succeeded in keeping all



1 The Archeology of War

of our ancestors alive. This is then more than mere chance, but must be instinctive, innate, and typically a #xed pattern of behavior in humans honed over time to successfully respond to physical danger.

Along with varied levels of warfare throughout human history, were the tools, techniques and strategies, that gave one person the survival advantage over another. Starting with bare hands, followed by crude weapons such as stone blades, to swords of the bronze age and so on, each successive stage in human development sought to leverage the instinctive innate survival imperative of their ancestors. One can conclude that the best way to both defend and attack has occupied the minds of countless warriors since time began.

Evolutionary Defense TechnologyIn the CIA we think of self-preservation in evolutionary terms. We have a saying, “that we work with evolution, not against it”.

This approach can be broken down into three main components,

Evolution; a gradual process in which something changes into a different and usually more complex or better form.



“As the head trainer for one of the US Army Special Forces Groups I have always looked for functional systems that either condition operators and instill the warrior spirit and combat related attributes or those that have direct technical application to the mission sets needed ‘down range’. To find a system that has both is a rare find and something that I immediately recognized in the Crazy Monkey Defense’s (CMD) Combat Intelligent Soldier (CIS) Program as something we NEEDED to add to our foundation of base skills.”

‘DD’- US Army Special Forces

Defense; the action of defending from or resisting attack.

Technology; the practical application of knowledge.

Evolutionary Defense Technology (EDT), is a term I created and sits at the heart of the Combat intelligent Athlete Program taught within the Crazy Monkey Defense Program. EDT is the search for the practical application of evolutionary survival knowledge in the service of defending oneself agains other human beings who seek to hurt us.

My argument is that at the deepest level of the human psyche, lie innate survival movement patterns. This along with adrenaline and other survival induced hormones, adds a unique mix of ‘survival imperatives’ long honed over millions of years since the #rst humans walked upon this earth. The most successful warriors in history, were able to tap into this prehistoric survival knowledge, and bring it to life, often on the battle#eld.

Today, the average person in the modern world no longer trust his evolutionary survival knowledge. Not only does he have little or no outlet to test and challenge it — arti#cial stress, such as at work, which constantly activates ancient survival responses, often has to be suppressed at all costs. After all even if someone wanted to hit their boss,



“The unarmed combatives system Rodney has put together is ideal for military purposes. Having used it myself while deployed to Iraq in altercations with local nationals, I can testify to its effectiveness firsthand. This system solves the glaring issue with the current Army combatives program by focusing on techniques that keep the fight standing, fully able to be executed by a soldier in full combat gear. No unnecessary fluff to be found here; just an amazingly simple and effective defense against oncoming strikes, the proper way to fire back with power, ground escapes from a striking perspective (no “rolling around” with full gear on), and the latest in close quarters clinch techniques, ensuring that the soldier will be able to effectively neutralize the threat according to the appropriate escalation of force. I highly endorse this methodology.”

Nathan Wagar, former Team Leader with 1-327th IN, 101st Airborne

doing so would cost them their job. Surrounded by arti#cially induced stress, threats that are not really life and death, has unfortunately caused many people to no longer trust their survival instincts.

The consequences of this is evident in any martial art school around the world. Most people #rst entering a martial art school look completely uneasy in their body. They lack coordination, don't trust their emotions (or how they will be expressed), and tend to experience a bipolar embodied state, that %uctuates between over aggressiveness, and hyper-vigilance. The emotional roller coaster ride is so overwhelming for most people, that they invariable quit martial arts once put under any kind of #ght stress such as in sparring.

The objective then of CIA’s Evolutionary Defense Technology approach, is to help a client once again trust his or her instinct to survive. EDT seeks to re-awaken a persons evolutionary imperative to survive an interpersonal aggressive act.

This is achieved in the following ways,

1. Creating a safe place for a people to get back in touch with their evolutionary warrior. An environment free from ego, hyper-competitiveness and bravado, which often lead to people putting on a ‘ Tough Guise’. The ‘ Tough Guise’ obstructs the necessary acknowledgement, and symbolic working through of emotional content, such as fear, apprehension and aggression, in order to successfully, and most importantly to awaken in a healthy way, ancient primitive survival mechanisms buried deep inside all of us.

2. Coaching that takes place from organic survival movement patterns in response to physical danger. It is my belief that successful self-preservation training, can only be built off innate survival movement patterns. In the CIA our primary focus is not only to help clients how to uncover these innate survival movements or what we call organic survival movement patterns, but then in turn how to successfully use them in a self-preservation situation.



3. Finally we seek to develop the correct mindset that compliments the organic survival movement patterns and strategies we have taught to the client.

This is where I take a divergent approach to the typical mindset used by most reality based self defense systems.

Most RBSD systems use killer instinct and aggression, in conjunction with technique to beat an attacker. There is a belief that this mindset and embodied state of being aggressive is necessary in order to successfully #ght off an attacker. I on the other hand believe that feelings attached to thinking patterns, that are then understood as an emotion such as aggression, is not only counter productive, but down right dangerous for most people to use in self-preservation. While aggression can be fuel used to win a ‘#ght’ the consequences when it does not work can be detrimental.

When someone cannot overwhelm their opponent with brute aggression, or what is typically referred to as ‘killer instinct’, the failure of that strategy, often results in counter emotions being triggered. These could include such emotions as fear, apprehension, and psychological states such as self-doubt, and negative self talk.

It is important to understand that we all have feelings and sensations, however a feeling only becomes an ‘emotion’ once we interpret it as such.



“Rodney King is probably one of the most realistic instructors who is not only knowledgeable on fighting but also on the intricacies of the mind’s thoughts, perceptions and motivations. Rodney is an innovator, a seminar leader and way above many of his peers in the martial arts. How has he done this? Through hard work, dedication, a knack for sifting through the fallacies to come up with gold.I highly recommend Rodney’s products, teachings, and anything else that he has to offer. I have trained in the martial arts for forty years. I served 14 yrs in the US Army, Executive Protection around the world, and I am now a law enforcement officer. I was a Muay Thai boxing champion in Thailand before it become famous here in the States. I have a 9th Degree Black Belt in Karate, Master certifications in Ving Tsun, BJJ, Sombo, etc. You deserve the best that Rodney has to offer.”

Michael Quijano (Mountain View, USA)

For example, I may sense butter%ies in my stomach, an elevated heart rate, and tingling in my hands before going on stage to to talk to a group of people I have never met before. I may interpret those feelings and sensations as excitement, while someone else in the same situation may interpret those feelings and sensations as utter fear.

Many people use an aggressive mindset, which serves as a way to heighten the chemical #ght response already going on in the body even further (adrenaline etc al.). This is often used as a way to overcome the feelings and sensations they may be labeling as fear. However it is important to note that this will invariably raise survival heart rates and will likely result in over arousal taking place. The consequences is that a person using such a strategy could run out of gas before #nishing the #ght, or over arouse themselves to the degree that all their motor programs begin to fail them, thereby #nding that they can no longer executive the necessary techniques to survive.

The ‘mind set’ we want a client to develop in CIA training — or in other words how we want them to relate to how they are feeling and what they are sensing — is a Zen like quality. When the mind is ‘embodied’ it is poised, focused and grounded in both defense and attack. The fact remains in a #ght, even if someone could switch off their rational ‘thinking mind’ the body would still go through the process of invoking its survival mechanisms. The thinking mind then, the part in each of us that labels feelings and sensations, which ultimately becomes recognized as an emotion, is not directly required in order to survive a physical encounter.

The thinking mind is there to interpret the feelings and sensations for us, so we can be conscious of the danger (but you have likely had the experience of reacting to danger instinctively, only to re%ect on it later). Depending on your personal history you may interpret these feelings and or sensations incorrectly. Returning to the example earlier there really is no reason to feel such intense overwhelming fear of speaking in public, it is irrational, but yet many people interpret that experience in that way.

This goes to show that the body and the primitive structures of the brain, — that part of the mind responsible for the instinct to survive, which we



have relatively no conscious control over—will do what it needs to do in order to secure our survival (even if that threat to our survival is imagined). Whenever you perceive a threat, imminent or imagined, your limbic system immediately responds via your autonomic nervous system. Autonomic means you have little or no control over it. Your biological imperative to survive, and the subsequent hormonal changes in your body, along with elevated heart rate etc, is automatic, it will happen regardless if you want it to or not.

Recognizing this is important as it %ies in the face of conventional RBSD wisdom, that one needs to ‘get aggressive’ in ‘ones head’ to survive a physical encounter. This could not be further from the truth.

The rational ‘thinking mind’ came way after the more primitive survival mind. What is then needed is to use the thinking mind in a constructive way — a way that leverages our survival instincts — but at the same time also gets out of the way of our survival instinct so it can do what it has been designed to do, to help us survive.

CMD Working with a persons evolutionary, instinctive responses to physical danger, not against it!

It is always interesting evaluating the movement patterns that are taught in martial arts. There are many techniques and especially #ghting stances that stimulate what I cal l ‘n o n - o rga n i c ’ m ove m e n t patterns. These are movement patterns that the body actually does not like— speci#cally in a survival sense. To be more precise many movement patterns that are taught in martial arts are not instinctive. They %y in the face of what the body would naturally do in order to secure



its safety — if just left alone to do what it has been programmed to do over millions of years of evolution.

When I talk about organic movement patterns, I am really using it as a short hand for movement patterns or more precisely motor programs driven by the nervous system that are,

1. evolutionary (designed on purpose).

2. and instinctive (to be used on purpose to achieve a speci#c outcome).

All organisms that live on this planet at some point had to overcome obstacles to their survivability. We generally do not argue the fact that the animal species we witness today have evolved through natural selection, developing as they have speci#c traits that have enabled them to survive over tens of thousands of years — while some of their nearest cousins bit the dust early.

Human beings are no different. We can see clues to these evolutionary adaptations when a human being is placed under immense stress and or danger, starting with the physiological changes in their body. We can also see these clues when we look at two people in a #ght. More speci#cally if we witness two ‘untrained’ people in a #ght, one will clearly see instinctive responses, based on evolutionary adaptations to survive physical danger (if you know what to look for of course).

I call these organic survival responses because they are ‘got to’ instinctive positions the body will place itself in, which in most instances will be totally unconscious to the person doing them (unless of course they have trained them or been taught to recognize them as such). In other words training can make them conscious. Unfortunately more often than not, people are taught movement patterns that are not organic, thereby overriding the trust they should have in their instinctive survival movement patterns.

Organic survival responses are most notable in defense, attack, in posturing and submissiveness. We could say that these are the four postures or archetypal embodied survival states that people will #nd



themselves in when faced with interpersonal human aggression (variations on these of course do occur).

Following are a few examples of organic instinctive survival reactions (this is not an exhaustive list);

Organic survival responses in defense:

1. extended hands to keep the opponent away. Often with head leaning back and weight on back foot. Referred to commonly as the %inch response.

2. turning head away and presenting the side of the body to make a smaller target. Could be considered an over stimulated %inch response.

3. 1 and 2 can often go together.

4. hands covering face in protection.

5. eyes become less open and head drops to protect chin/wind pipe.

6. often 4 and 5 go together.

7. under extreme pressure, entire back turns, covering of head and cowering/submissive action. Sometimes referred to as turning tail.

8. Reaching in to grab or hold onto the opponent.

9. Defensive pushing action.

10. Emotional response often goes to stomach.

Organic survival responses in attack:

1. striking action continues; forward body movement, every strike as hard as the last. A need to square up to face the opponent.

2. a tendency to place one-foot forward and the other back to establish balance and base.

3. an opening up of strikes, forward action, sometimes swinging.



4. eyes wide open to see more.

5. emotional response goes to chest.

Organic survival responses in posturing:

1. chest expansion to look bigger and to get more oxygen, especially while posturing. Back and forward motions.

2. aggressive body posturing to scare off an opponent.

3. loud vocal gestures to scare off an opponent.

Organic survival responses in submissiveness:

1. Use of body posture to talk an aggressive opponent down, pleading or crying.

2. Softer vocal gestures to calm an aggressive opponent down.

3. under extreme pressure, entire back turns, covering of head and cowering/submissive action. Sometimes referred to as turning tail.

4. Running.

When I developed the CIA Program I took these and many other organic instinctive survival actions into consideration.

If we look closely at the defensive hand positioning for example in the Crazy Monkey Defense Program and how it is used, it is clearly an organic-defensive movement pattern. As noted earlier one of the organic survival responses in defense is for a person to attempt to cover their face with their hands/arms.



Therefore CIA is built off already existing instinctive motor programs. These are inherent and already pre-programed in every person before they were ever taught how to #ght.

All we are doing now in the CIA Program is to work with evolution and not against it.

This why the tag line of Crazy Monkey Defense’s CIA program is,

Self-preservation that works with evolution, not against it!

The truth about close-range interpersonal aggression

When someone is physically attacked it can often be the most traumatic event that person had experienced in their life.

Lt. Col Grossman #rst introduced the concept of the Universal Human phobia. Everyone has a phobia; it could be snakes for you or spiders for me. But 98% of all of us shares a common phobia that of a close range interpersonal aggressions by another human being.

Most of us will spend a lifetime bouncing off each other in life, without every getting into a real life and death physical altercation with one another. But when it does happen, it devastates us.

If one is not careful the experience of been physically attacked can easily destroy you on a psychological level, as well as heightening your stress, which can stay with you for a very long time. Most reality based martial art systems use this knowledge to sell their unhealthy kill-or-be-killed systems.

The stress associated with possibly being attacked or the stress built off of a previous attack on a person can be literally debilitating. This is why I believe it is important for a person to develop real con#dence in their



ability to defend themselves, while at the same time ensuring that they understand the psychology and biology of self-preservation. This is always done by keeping perspective and a healthy mindset. Not everyone is out to get us and as mentioned earlier most of us will spend a lifetime bouncing off each other without ever getting in each others way.

Most importantly and this is the mission of CIA is to offer self-preservation training that is kept healthy.

When I say kept healthy I mean this on a psychological level. You can train hard and real, but still keep the mindset healthy. So many reality based self defense instructors build their entire marketing campaign around using peoples natural fears of been attacked to sell their program. This is not what CIA is about.

CIA is about correct education about the realities of self-preservation. It is honestly teaching people what will happen to them psychologically and psychologically in a #ght.

To this end CIA’s coaching philosophy is built on teaching a person how to ACT;

Achievement certainty: We coach our clients techniques that maximize achievement certainty, through honoring evolutionary survival instincts and how in turn those very same survival instincts affect physiology. When someone has maximum certainty of success, it maintains their con#dence in their ability to maintain high levels of survivability.

Conservation of energy: We coach our clients in techniques, both physical and mental, that minimize the physical and mental energy costs of a survival performance. In addition a minimal outlay of physical or mental energy allows for the skills been taught and used to be applicable in any environment.

Time expediency: All training is taught with the concept of minimizing the time used. Reaction and response time or simplicity in application of technique is imperative. In addition the quicker a person can get the ‘#ght’ over with, and exit to safety is the key to successfully surviving an interpersonal attack. However we acknowledge that some survival



situations cannot be overcome quickly, in these instances clients are taught to return to Conservation of energy and rely on their sparring experience they gained in training Crazy Monkey Defense.

ABOUT RODNEY KING

Over the last decade, Rodney has worked with Army Special Forces on developing a performance mindset for the battle#eld. He has taught Law Enforcement Officers both in the United State and in Canada on how to protect themselves when all else fails.

Creator of the world famous modern martial arts program Crazy Monkey Defense, Rodney has gone on to develop the Combat Intelligent Athlete program, built of his years of doorman experience, as a military hand-to-hand combat instructor and surviving the streets of Johannesburg.

For more information on the Combat Intelligent Athlete Program (or it’s sister programs, Combat Intelligent Soldier and Combat Intelligent Officer), and for seminar and workshops enquiries, please contact Rodney directly at:

[email protected]



http://www.combatintelligentsoldier.com/

http://www.combatintelligentsoldier.com/

http://www.combatintelligentofficer.com/




mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

combat intelligent athlete - cmdi · combat intelligent athlete program rodney king ©2012 ... and...

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