Street Krav Maga with Branimir Tudjan

 Street Krav Maga

Street Krav Maga: Combat Essentials for Real-World Self-Defense with Branimir Tudjan is a solid instructional DVD set on the basics of this Israeli self-defense system. The program is produced by Paladin Press and was shot in their studios. Production values are high, with good instruction in the studio mixed with more “live” shots that illustrate points in outside settings. There are also review sections at the end of instruction with subtitles of the main points to remember on the screen. Tudjan has a lot of intensity which comes across in his teachings. He’s not a big guy, but he can definitely take care of himself. He teaches a wealth of good information for self-defense in this program.

Disc 1

I like that Tudjan starts the program with a short introduction of himself and then his three rules, which are prevention or avoidance, de-escalation and finally fight to win. Tudjan provides simple explanations of his rules, but they are important considerations. Immediately after the short introduction several combat fitness drills are taught. These are good for helping you stay in shape and warming up for training. The nice thing about these is that they not only develop fitness and toughen you up, but they also work on skills that transfer to training and self-defense.

After these drills, the basics of Stances are illustrated. Since this is a complete basic curriculum course, Stance is a good place to start. Once Stance is covered, instruction proceeds to the fundamental strikes (jab, cross, hook, uppercut, elbow strike, headbutt, pad work and punching drills). He teaches the basic strikes and encourages the viewer to practice them from all the various stances. One much be able to throw a strike from any position. I also like that he mentions you can throw some of those with an open hand too, like I teach in Streetfighting Essentials.  (also from Paladin Press)  Next come the fundamental kicks (Haganah kick, groin kick, low kick, and knee kick). Haganah means defense, so it is the straight defense kick, which is a type of front kick. I also liked how Tudjan pointed out that the groin kick is not a 100% technique (no technique is), and may not stop the fight, but to train with it anyway. The low kick he teaches is a round house type kick to the knee. For using the knees, he provided good instruction with some important tips. He ends the kicking section with an explanation and demonstration that Krav Maga does have high kicks, but for street self-defense, the low kicks are the most practical and effective.

The final twenty minutes of the first disc focuses on combatives drills. These include the 15 second drill, the 3 positions drill, ground and pound drill, fighting for the pad drill, and holding the medicine ball drill. These drills will raise your heart rate, get you in shape, and help you develop the explosiveness needed for actual street encounters. I’ve always said one of the big benefits of Krav Maga is the intensity in which they train, and this shows it. The first disc is 93 minutes long.

Disc 2

The second disc focuses on defenses to specific kinds of attacks. The first series of defenses are from choking attacks and include front choke release, dynamic front choke release, side choke release, dynamic rear choke release, necktie side choke release, and strangulation release. Tudjan points out that you don’t want to allow someone to grab you, but if they do, he provides responses to defend yourself from such attacks. His responses are simple, direct, brutal, and effective, just as self-dense needs to be.

He takes the same approach with the various bear hug defenses he shows. These include bear hug hands free release and variation, bear hug arms pinned release and variation, side bear hug arms free release, side bear hug arms pinned release, rear bear hug arms free release and variation, and the rear bear hug arms pinned release and variation. While you never want someone to grab you with a bear hug, these defenses will give you a way to defend if someone does get a hold of you.

The other situations or attacks on this DVD are defense against tackle attempt and variation, one handed shirt grab defense, two-handed shirt grab defense and variation, shirt grab from behind defense, headbutt defense and two variations, arms pinned defense and defense while seated. This disc is 101 minutes long and provides good responses to the various attacks featured in the program. One can use the same concepts and techniques to defend against variations of the described attacks, making what was learned here applicable to more than what was shown.

Disc 3

The first part of the third disc focuses on ground defenses. The defenses taught include kicking while on the ground, defense against a kick to the head, front choke release (mounted), front choke release (in your guard), ground side choke release, arms pinned on the ground release, and the guillotine choke on the ground release. This is not a ground fighting or BJJ program, it is Krav Maga. Tudjan says you don’t want to be on the ground in a real fight, and that is something I agree with. However, you must know what to do if you do go down. This program provides good instruction on some defensive basics for several of the situations you may find yourself in if the fight goes to the ground.

The program then provides instruction on some ground offensive techniques. These include maintaining the mount, clearing your opponent’s guard, the arm bar, the figure-4 lock, side position basics, figure-4 lock from side position, rear naked choke, mount combination drill, arm release drill, and ground sparring. Again, this is not a complete ground fighting program, but rather a few ground techniques to allow you to survive on the ground in real situations. With that in mind, it is a very good introduction to this range of fighting. The program concludes with several defenses against punches and kicks. Like everything else in this program, they are simple, direct and brutally effective. The third disc is 88 minutes long.

This is not the entire Krav Maga curriculum, nor does this program provide everything a person will want to learn and train in to protect oneself. However, what this program does provide is a very good basic program from the Krav Maga curriculum focusing on real street self-defense. Tudjan does a good job of instructing and demonstrating and Paladin Press did a great job of filming, editing, and providing menus to easily find the portion you wish to review and train with. I recommend this DVD set to anyone wanting solid basic self-defense instruction, and to everyone training in Krav Maga.

You can order Street Krav Maga: Combat Essentials for Real-World Self-Defense with Branimir Tudjan here!  It is one of the DVDs I recommend and carry.