The Ultimate Guide To Reality-Based Self-Defense

The Ultimate Guide To Reality-Based Self-Defense by the editors of Black Belt magazine is a collection of articles from the martial art magazine that focus on reality based self-defense. I found it to be a good collection of articles that focused on some different elements of defending oneself.

Obviously I liked some articles better than others, with Kelly McCann’s at the top of the list. However, I enjoy reading different instructor’s thoughts and opinions to see how others train to make me better. Even if I read something, or see something, that I don’t agree with, I learn something.

This book contains the following articles:

10 Commandments of Reality-Based Fighting: Step-by-Step Instructions for Transforming Yourself Into a Skilled Street Fighter parts 1 & 2 by Richard Ryan.

Assessing The Battlefield: Developing the Observational Skills You Need for Reality-Based Self-Defense By Sammy Franco.

Competition vs. Destruction: Reality Fighting’s Cardinal Rule – Train Your Brain by Tim Larkin and Chris Ranck-Buhr.

The Spear: Tony Blauer’s Latest Discovery May Turn the Martial Arts World Upside Down parts 1 & 2 by Robert W. Young.

Stand And Fight: Studying the Way MMA Fighters Scramble to Their Feet in the Cage Can Make You a Better Self-Defense Practitioner by Stephan Kesting.

The X-Factor: How to Introduce Spontaneity and Unpredictability Into Your Reality-Based Self-Defense Training by Ari Kandel.

Virtual Reality: Enhance Your Street Survivability With Tony Blauer’s Cutting-Edge Self-Defense Drill by Dr. Eric Cobb.

Ground Survival: Essential Component of Reality-Based Personal Protection by Jim Wagner.

Distract, Disable And Destroy: Combat Hapkido’s Low-Line Kicking Guarantees Supremacy on the Street by Floyd Burk.

Combat In The Real World: Self-Defense Secrets From Security Expert Kelly McCann parts 1 & 2 by Robert W. Young.

The Criminal Mind: Know Your Enemy by Ernest Emerson.

Will Your Weapons Defense Get You Killed: Reality-Based Fighter Shows You the Right Way to Neutralize a Knife or Gun Attack by E. Lawrence.

Gun Grabbing: The Israeli System of Haganah Teaches State-of-the-Art Handgun Disarms by Randy S. Proto.

The Ultimate Threat: Krav Maga’s State-of-the-Art Methods for Neutralizing Gun Attacks by John Whitman.

Ultimate Knife Defense: Haganah Survival Skills for Beating the Blade by Mike Lee Kanarek.

Bleeding Edge: Martial Blade Concepts (MBC) Represents the State-of-the-Art in Knife Fighting parts 1 & 2 by Michael Janich.

Thou Shalt Not Kill: The Truth Behind the Use of Deadly Force in Self-Defense by Frank Gannon.

If you are familiar with Black Belt magazine, you know what to expect from these articles that make up this book. You may have even read some of them before if you are a frequent reader of the magazine. If you enjoy the magazine and the topics above, you will most likely enjoy this book.  You know, as magazine articles, there isn’t a lot of depth in any of these, but they do present some good ideas and allow you to learn a little about what these authors/instructors teach.

Because the book contains a collection of articles, one can easily skip around and read the articles one is interested in and skip others. Coming from magazine articles, naturally this book also contains plenty of photographs to illustrate points and techniques from the articles as well as sidebars.

It is a good book for what it is: a collection of magazine articles on self-defense.

You can check it out at amazon: