When we talk about practical applications it is crucial to define the context in which the applications may happen. If this context has to do with personal defense, then it is only common sense to say that we have to really take into account the situations in which these kinds of assaults happen and the kind of attacks what we may have to face. Don’t you think so?
One has to know that there won’t be just one strike, it will most likely be an attack that will happen by surprise, and our attacker will try to initiate the aggression from that position or situation, which will guarantee him the most advantage possible. One has also to be aware of the kind of attacks that are more common in the different violent aggressions that we may have to face, to be able to train against them, and that is the topic for this post.
1. The name (what a name!)
Habitual Acts of Physical Violence (HAPV from now on). What a name, isn’t it? No, don’t look at me that way, I didn’t come up with it. The first time I heard this term was in an article by Jesse-san in which he mentioned it as one of his pillars or base concepts in order to develop a framework for bunkai (分解), that is, the study or literally analysis/breakdown of kata applications.
HAPV theory was postulated by Patrick McCarthy as a way of getting close to a series of two people drills based on the most common attacks within a physical aggression that a person may suffer in the context of civil self-defense.
2. Alright… it’s a nice name… now what?
The theory is quite alright, but how can I introduce this into my bunkai practice? Can it be introduced? Of course. Let us take 5 of these ‘most common’ attacks as an example:
- Linear kicks
- Angled kicks
- Linear punches
- Circular punches
- Single hand grab of lapel/wrist/hair
A good use of this information in training for personal defense would be to search for and use effectively applications from one or more kata to cover my needs in this context, that is, that enable me to defend against this particular types of attacks. Nothing weird so far, right? The practice of these applications is not so far from some of the kata applications that may be seen.
Well, all this changes when we start to introduce other kind of attacks which are also as common as the ones in the previous list, such as pulls with one or two hands from the front, from the back, grabbing the testicles, strangling from the back, etc.. The work on this kind of attacks is less common, and nevertheless, HAPV theory tells us they are as common as the others.
Wrapping up…
Any personal defense system that intends to be functional has to focus and work on these types of attacks since they are the ones we are most likely to face in a real situation of physical aggression. Working on attacks that are not as common, or which chances of happening in a real situation are almost non-existent is a massive time loss in the context of self-defense.
If we talk about practical applications of kata it is necessary to define the following: practical for what? If the answer is: to try to make it out of a physical aggression uninjured (that is, within a context of personal defense) then working on a kata application that deals with an oi tsuki chudan (linear punch with the advancing side aimed at the chest) which starts at a very long distance is completely WRONG, for all the reasons mentioned above.
Let me say that one more time, it would be wrong in the context of self-defense training. This does not mean that such an application does not have a place in other karate areas (sports bunkai, for instance) within the huge martial ocean that is Karate.
Referencias
Allen, A. (2017). Practical Applications of Uke Waza. [Artículo en Línea]. Consultado el día 10 de enero en la World Wide Web:
https://www.iainabernethy.co.uk/article/practical-applications-uke-waza-andy-allen
Enkamp, J. (2018). The Bunkai Blueprint: A Simple Framework for Applying the Kata of Karate in Practical Self-Defense. [Artículo en Línea]. Consultado el día 14 de junio de 2017 en la World Wide Web:
http://www.karatebyjesse.com/bunkai-blueprint-kata-framework/
McCarthy, P. (2005). HAPV-theory. [Artículo en Línea]. Consultado el día 15 de junio de 2017 en la World Wide Web:
http://www.koryu-uchinadi.org/KU_HAPV.pdf
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