Unified Fighting Systems

33 years ago today, I walked out of the insurance office in Westminster, London and into the unknown world of self-employment.
Thank you for all the support you've given me over more than three decades. It's been wild. And we continue.
What is the biggest lesson I've learned over those years? As demonstrated here, kick lower.

Some UFS students aren't quite 'there', but we love them all the same. Feel a bit 'odd'? You'll fit right in.

Many of you won’t know this, but in 1994 (and into 1995), David Tomney travelled around the world for a whole 12 months. This was before he was ‘grappling Dave’ as we know him, he was ‘kicking Dave’ back then. During those 12 months part of the trip took him to Thailand and he trained in some of the Thai boxing gyms out there. He has said, on a number of occasions, that they were hard sessions but also incredibly hot. One of the things he observed that during a session that might last 2 hours, the local Thai fighters found a way to conserve energy. They trained hard but they didn’t train like maniacs when the weather was at its hottest. Perhaps something to learn from there.
About the same time that Dave was in Thailand, I was in the Philippines, for the World Stick--fighting Championships. As you can imagine, it was hot. This was August after all. The Filipino approach was similar to the Thais. Conserve energy. We had a training session with Grandmaster Ondo Carbunay of the Lapunti system. This consisted of training on the beach under the baking sun. As they say, the sun is different in the tropics. None of us suffered,
Except one.
Glynn Daniels partook in some sunbathing. This alabaster white Englishman turned a shade of red that Captain Scarlet would be proud of. Even when we warned him (we could see him changing colour), Glynn lay there a bit longer. As a result, he didn’t have the best of tournaments in 1994. His time would come later.
It is experiences like these that will determine the pace of the classes under this latest British heatwave. There might be some higher tempo training, but it will come later in the class. There will be lots of technical training and that fits in perfectly for those seeking your next grade.
But what I have found every year, is that some people just like to be uncommon amongst uncommon people and I’m sure we’ll see that this week as well.
See you in class.
Andy

Are you a fan of the heat? I'm not. Once it goes over 25C I feel uncomfortable. Above 30C and I'm really not happy. That one time (4 years ago) when it hit 40C. I couldn't move that day. And yet tomorrow we'll be in the low 20s. Hooray.
As we know, all things will pass.
Tonight we'll do what we did on Sunday. Start with the technical stuff and perhaps finish sweaty. For the kickboxing class, it will have colled down to about 24C. It will feel balmy after the heat of the day.
So, I hope you're like me and have fans on either side of you, looking not to descend into a puddle of sweat.
Roll on cooler days.

Until it gets to 38C, the answer is 'no'. But I made this just for fun.

We all know that today is a warm day, so my question is, do you prefer sweaty sessions or technical learning sessions on days like today? Or a bit of both?

It's another bank holiday coming up and this one will a warm one. No matter, we will be open and I'd prefer to see the place busy than quiet. Remember, when it gets hot, we don't have to grapple or punch and kick: we can do Eskrima. Always lots to learn.
Thursday, 6pm to 6.30pm (juniors): 5 - 11 years
UFS class (adults): 6.40pm to 7.55pm
Kickboxing: 8pm to 9pm