Here’s another re-post of an old review: “Real Fighting: Adrenaline stress conditioning through scenario-based training” by Peyton Quinn. I tweaked the review a little bit as my opinion has slightly altered over the years. I met Peyton a few times over the years and visited his training center once. He’s a great guy to talk to and he does some excellent work in teaching you to transfer your skills from the dojo to the street. Enjoy the review.
The author of this book is what can be described as a “veteran”. He has seen his share of violence during his days as a bouncer in “problem bars” and lived to tell the tale. Peyton Quinn has martial arts training in Karate, Judo and Aikido, although he does not claim to be an expert. In fact, he will expose some of the problems martial arts have in confronting violent situations.
He has produced several books and videotapes focusing on a realistic approach towards defending against violence. He currently runs a training center in Boulder, Colorado (USA).
The book starts with an example of a violent encounter during Mr. Quinn’s childhood and uses it as a starting point to explain some fundamental principles of combat strategy: Control and use of the environment, continuous attack, etc. He then goes on to explain how fear and adrenaline are essential elements in a fight and how a “bully” exploits this to his advantage. A combat mindset is different from what is necessary in a martial arts tournament and we get another couple of funny examples to illustrate the point. The chapter ends with an interesting point, namely that concepts are more important than specific techniques.
