You may have seen the articles about Geoff Ho, martial arts expert/journalist: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...-stabbed-terrorists-bridge-isis-a7772191.html Not much information on him - the amount of times I've seen written and trained not to engage a knife attacker, let alone 2! I can confidently say I would not have done this myself, partly because my training against bladed attacks has been fairly minimal in my 20+ years of Martial arts training. As most of us know, when fuelled with adrenaline our judgement of our actions are different to what we say when our head is clear of biological chemicals. I read plenty of times on here from the more experienced weapon trainers how the odds weight heavily against in this scenario - Do you feel you would be inclined to engage in such a scenario? I certainly wish him the best in his recovery and I believe the motivation for his actions can be praised as a hero putting his life at risk to help others.
There is a deep part of me that wants to know I would react as I am supposed to, to swarm the terrorists. There is also a shameful part of me that knows I'd probably freeze up for a good few seconds before I did anything. I hope I'd do the right thing, like the officer who tackled all three of the terrorists. I just hope I can be that brave.
It's hard to tell, a mix of training background and personality. From my experience I am a lot more aggressive in real self defence over training, which had occasionally got me in worse outcome than in training scenario. In situations a mentally prepare to be more refrained, which I think could lead to freezing in extreme circumstances. I wonder of the members here who deal with those situations regularly are able to anticipate their natural reaction in a controlled manner.
Past behavior indicates future performance so you definitely have an idea of what you would do as often as not - I have little to no doubt I would get involved based on previous experience, but put my wife and child with me and even that dynamic might change
I don't know how I'd react in that situation and I'm humbled by stories like this one and by the actions of the police officers who stepped in during the attack Probably as martial artists we assume some responsibility to protect those around us within the boundaries of the law To that end I do think that there's value in training against weapons rather that only having the option to run. Naturally there must be a reality check when training these kind of things so that you can come up with the best approach for the situation
Yes, because otherwise, what was the point of all our practice? (sigh) There are certainly days when I would jump in, but there are other days when I wouldn't. I don't know. Really sad story, though. :cry:
From what I understand Geoff Ho didn't understand the severity of the situation when he stepped in. Thought he was helping a bouncer with a couple of aggressive punters. Maybe didn't even know blades were in play. "Ozzy" in this story is the brother of a friend of mine and that brings things far to close to home. I think he reacts as many would. http://www.ladbible.com/more/uk-hero-doorman-saves-lives-by-throwing-bottles-and-glasses-at-terrorists-20170605?c=1496657255781 Initially he runs away and then realises he could help people so goes back. Takes major guts to go against that initial instinct and go back in. Much respect to him to do that AND admit that his first instinct was to save himself.
You know that the officer in question was noted as a rugby player. As others have said, experience in just getting the job done despite adversity, goes a long way. Both men are to be congratulated, as well as number of others (e.g. the Romanian baker who hit a terrorist and protected a group of people etc). Don't believe for a second that the adrenal dump causing a temporary freeze is anything about you mate. I like to think any of us would stand up if called. It's easy to specualte about what we would or would not do. Really just be pleased that so many were able to help until the authorities got things sorted. LFD
The bravery those two police officers displayed is hard to imagine. Three on one, unarmed (or effectively so), They had to know that jumping in/standing their ground meant that they were going to get hurt and very possibly killed. It really is leaping on a grenade levels of courage.
I think psychologically I'd have an easier time throwing myself into a 1-vs-3 fight than I would diving on top of a grenade. I think that is because while intellectually I can recognize there is pretty much no way I'm coming out a winner in that 1-vs-3 fight, in reality I don't understand that as well as I think I understand what would happen if I dove on a grenade. Maybe it has to do with control? Diving on a grenade, there is pretty much nothing I can do to control the outcome. Diving into a 1 vs 3 fight, even with basically no chance of a good outcome, at least I have a lot of things I can control. The grenade... you are just done, right then, no ifs ands or buts.
Massive credit to the police also. I believe many forget that they are just people, and with only moderate amount of training for these scenarios amongst all the other work they are bombarded with. Ozzy is a great credit also, a good use of the surroundings as weapons to create distance, which is essentially against a knife.
