You will fight how you train. This is the theme of Fighter's Fact Book 2: Street Fighting Essentials and when you've mastered the skills taught in the book, you will truly be ready to defend yourself in some of the most desperate situations imaginable. Nearly a dozen veteran instructors of street oriented martial arts have come together with Loren Christensen to teach you how to defend yourself against multiple attackers, violent dogs, knives, close quarter attacks, and attackers impervious to pain. Then they show you how to make your street techniques fast and explosive, and how to prepare yourself mentally to use extreme force. The skills taught here are not for the faint hearted. These are hardcore techniques intended to save your life or the life of a loved one.
Spotlight customer reviews:
Customer Rating: Summary: Absolutely Fantastic +++ Comment: This is bar none one of the best books out there for practical considerations related to fighting, if not THE best that has been produced so far. Lots of material to integrate into your routine to help you improve. Its a collection of writings from different experts on a variety of topics. Just the chapters on streetfighting and sparring for the street are worth the price, (fascinating) but there's so much more.
I've become a fan of Christensen (and also Mark Hatmaker; his books on striking are quite good too) after reading many books on martial arts by different authors. Christensen's definitely one of the best: clear, straightforward, focusing on the facts and the most important information and throwing away all the superflous stuff that often floats around out there.
This is an excellent book at a great price. Customer Rating: Summary: Not Loren's standard Comment: I bought almost all great books by the author, and many of them I have given 5 stars for their exellence. Not this one.
One has to say, that the book is not written by Christensen, but is a "compilation" of chapters written by many authors.
Unfortunately, this causes a lot of superficiality, since the chapters onyl give an overview on the matter their speak about.
The chapters have interesting subjects, like grappling, un-fighting, defens against dogs, etc...., but they are much less instructional than Loren's past books. They present and overview but lack details, techniques and drills.
Many times throughout the book reference is made to Loren's past books to find exercises, drills and practice tips.
So, good to have and to read, but for the real training, buy also they other books by the author. Customer Rating: Summary: An essential book for all fighters, martial artists, and anyone interested in self-defense! Comment: I recently finished reading, "Fighters Fact Book 2" by Loren Christensen and found it to be a very enlightening reference manual on a wide array of topics dealing with the act of self-defense. This book is a compilation of the views of not only the author, but numerous other contributing authors whom are as follows:
Lt. Col. Dave Grossman
Iain Abernethy
Rory A. Miller
Lawrence Kane
Kris Wilder
Alain Burrese
Richard Dimitri
Wim Demeere
Mark Mireles
Tim Delgman
Dan Anderson
This book covers a broad range of topics from the justified use of force to defend yourself, to various methods of training to improve your self-defense skills. There are also several sections devoted to various techniques such as; punching, kicking, elbowing, clawing, etc., as well as, grappling and weapons.
One section that I found particularly intriguing was the section on how to deal with dog attacks. This was quite a pleasant surprise to find in this book as I don't recall very seeing a book or even section devoted to the topic, with the notable exception of an old military manual that I read years ago. Loren covers a lot of very good points in this section and is actually deserving of an entire volume on its own.
I also really enjoyed Loren's section on "Justification." However, I must admit that I did have one small difference of opinion concerning his statement that, "A private citizen has a legal duty to retreat." Now I know that this is the case in some states, but not in all of them. Well over a dozen states have laws on the books that state basically to the effect that, "If you have a legal right to be there, you are under no obligation to retreat." In other words, if you are at the movie theatre with your girlfriend and you are accosted by an attacker, you are not legally required to leave the area, nor retreat from the possible attacker. Now not all states feel the same way, so it would behoove you to research the laws in the areas in which you live and play.
Lawrence Kane's sections on using the makiwara to develop punching power and the use of "shock blocks" was particularly interesting and noteworthy among sections which are all worthy of great praise for the quality of information provided within.
Since my own particular area of expertise is kicking, I really dissected the kicking section by Alain Burrese, which I found to be very practical and unbiased since his primary style of study is Hapkido. Alain covers a lot of information on various subjects needed in order to optimize your kicking skills for use in a real self-defense situation. I found all of the information in Alain's section relevant and noteworthy. However, as Alain points out on several occasions, one must seek out the advise and technical knowledge of a qualified instructor in order to learn not only how to execute your kicks, but also how to apply them.
Another noteworthy section is Richard Dimitri's philosophical look at hand-to-hand combat. Although I have read similar bodies of text before concerning this subject, Dimitri explains it in a very easy to understand and straightforward manner which should get the reader to really sit down and take note of the possible ramifications of his or her decision to use force. Although I don't personally agree with his statement of, "Avoid killing at all costs," I do understand somewhat where his mindset is on this subject and the ideal that he is trying to get across to the reader. In a perfect world, everyone involved in the violence business would be, out of business. Unfortunately, that isn't the case and it doesn't look to promising that it is going to change anytime soon.
Loren's section on the various uses for working out with the heavy bag was a nice little gem all to itself. Although there were no real defined training routines in this section, there was a lot of good information on how to train with the bag and by utilizing the information Loren provides in this section, you should be able to set up several different training routines on your own to fit your own particular style, experience and training methods.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who seriously wants to improve their own personal ability to fight and fight to the best of their abilities when confronted with the need to do so. Although ideally fighting should be a last resort, realistically it often is the first and only option you have other than becoming a victim. As the old saying goes, "Train for the worst and hope for the best." Customer Rating: Summary: Excellent Book Comment: Loren does a wonderful job again, this book tells you what you need to know to defend yourself in an easy to follow manner, it even goes into detail on how to survive/fend off a dog attack. I highly recommend this book to anyone in martial arts. Customer Rating: Summary: An outstanding resource for serious martial artists! Comment: I wrote a couple of chapters for this book so I may be a little biased, but I firmly believe that it is an outstanding resource for serious practitioners of the fighting arts. I know the author and several of the other contributors as well. They are all veteran martial artists, folks with real street skills and hard won experience as well as the ability to communicate what they have learned effectively. It's rare to find a collaboration of this quality. It's rarer still for a sequel to outshine the original, but that's exactly what you'll find in this outstanding tome. Loren's writing and editing skills shine through. You'll find solid information with great photos and illustrations to help you make the most of it right away. Really good stuff!
Here's the back cover text:
You will fight how you train. This is the theme of Fighter's Fact Book 2: Street Fighting Essentials and when you've mastered the skills taught in the book, you will truly be ready to defend yourself in some of the most desperate situations imaginable.
Nearly a dozen veteran instructors of street oriented martial arts have come together with Loren Christensen to teach you how to defend yourself against multiple attackers, violent dogs, knives, close quarter attacks, and attackers impervious to pain. Then they show you how to make your street techniques fast and explosive, and how to prepare yourself mentally to use extreme force. The skills taught here are not for the faint hearted. These are hardcore techniques intended to save your life or the life of a loved one.
In addition to Loren Christensen's no-nonsense instruction on justified use of extreme tactics, fighting wounded, attacking the eyes and neck, surviving a dog attack and using the mini-flashlight to ward off an attacker, you'll get expert insight from:
** Lt. Col. Dave Grossman: Army Special Forces, psychologist - on conditioning the mind
** Iain Abernethy: England's leading exponent of applied karate - on street sparring
** Rory A. Miller: corrections officer, tactical team trainer - on in-fighting
** Kris Wilder: multiple black belt holder & international competitor - on punching power
** Lawrence Kane: martial artist and football stadium security supervisor - on shock blocks
** Alain Burrese: hapkido expert, and former bouncer and bodyguard - on kicking skill
** Wim Demeere: Belgian full-contact fighter and personal trainer - on street sanshou
** Richard Dimitri: veteran fighter and popular trainer - on using The Shredder
** Mark Mireles: LA cop, twice Medal of Valor recipient - on chokes and clinching
** Tim Delgman: 9th-degree jujitsu black belt - on throws for the street
** Dan Anderson: karate champion and arnis master - on fighting with single stick
"I was most pleased that my friends agreed to contribute to this book. I was pleased for my own selfish reason in that I would get to learn from them, as I have so often before. And I was pleased that their contribution, based on their experiences on the street, would make this book the highly informative one it is." - Loren W. Christensen (from the Introduction).
Lawrence Kane
Author of Surviving Armed Assaults, The Way of Kata, and Martial Arts Instruction
