In nearly all instances, crime prevention methods are preferable to physical defense. However, in certain situations learning a fighting style can be helpful and perhaps, even vital. An attacker still has the odds of winning a fight for multiple reasons, but the most obvious is that this isn’t their “first dance.” For the victim, it may be a once in a lifetime experience. So just remember…fighting is a last resort. Here are some more of my personal suggestions about ways you can prevent becoming a victim of violent crime.

Choosing a style
Anyone can get a business license and start a martial arts studio. Shop around for competent instructors with outstanding credentials and alliances to accredited international associations. Here’s a hilarious example of what you can get if you don’t choose your instructors carefully.

Avoid all amateurish classes “taught by” a supposedly empowered former victim that are going to teach you that stomping on an attacker’s foot and kicking them in the groin is incapacitating. From having been the recipient of groin kicks while making arrests, I can tell you first hand that they are tactics that need to be followed by efficient techniques. They are only distractions, very painful distractions from which your attacker will likely recover and continue their assault with more prejudice. Here’s a few things that a fighting style needs to accomplish in an attack:

1. Create distance: If you can get them away from you, their ability to cause harm with their hands or contact weapons (knives, sticks, pipes, crowbars etc) diminishes.

2. Absorb or divert an attack: If a fighting style focuses more on offense than defense, you may have problems using it during an attack where offense is possible only after defending oneself against an initial assault.

3. Implement gross motor skills: When you’re attacked and your heart rate rises from 70 beats per minute to 150 beats per minute in a matter of seconds, hands tend to shake and committing to fine motor skills will be very difficult.

4. Cause incapacitating pain: If they can’t walk, they can’t fight, if they can barely see they can’t fight, they can’t use a limb against you if you have rendered it useless, and they can’t fight if they are unconscious.

5. Cause fear: More than likely they will never fear you personally. However, if you display knowledge of self-defense techniques, fear of injury (which can become evidence for law enforcement), or capture may make them move on to easier prey.

Likely to work during an attack
Many styles will work in an attack. If you’re looking for one to study, here’s two little known styles that you should consider.

Wing Chun
There is much speculation about the origin of Wing Chun but here are some basics. A nun named Ng Moi met a young woman named Wing Chun. It was the 1600s or 1700s, a time when sexual assault was prevalent. Wing Chun had a creepy admirer and wanted to learn to defend herself. She learned a few styles of Kung Fu from Ng Moi and perfected them into a style designed specifically to defeat a bigger and stronger opponent with swift hands and feet powered by centrifugal force and hip thrusts. She ultimately challenged the admirer defeating him. Wing Chun would later teach her style of Kung Fu to her husband and he named it after her.

Centuries later a young Chinese male destined for fame mastered a Wing Chun technique where he would place his fist within a couple of inches of his opponent’s chest and use a quick strike powered by hip movement to knock them off of their feet. His name was Lee Jun Fan, but we all knew him as Bruce Lee. Some would argue that it’s a Gung Fu technique but I disagree.

Pros
-Some of the best techniques to harness power. Trying to be “Mr. Macho,” I once let a 14-year-old Wing Chun student punch me at mid torso. I learned a valuable lesson…little knuckles followed by lots of power cause significant damage.
-Techniques enable practitioners to make efficient strikes while evading their opponent’s legs and arms.

Cons
-Some instructors base the techniques on traditional static movements showing too much concern for the aesthetics and beauty of the art. The creator is believed to have shaped the style purely for self-defense with little concern for beauty.

Krav Maga
While other fighting styles focus on the beauty of the art or winning the fight, Krav Maga has only one focus…survival. This makes it my personal favorite for warding off an attack. I also feel that this style has been proven more in modern times than other arts. There are many life saving accounts from Israeli Military personnel. My former Krav Maga instructor was a huge advocate of what I call the “Nike defense.” Implementing a brutal defensive technique then getting away from an attacker.

Pros
-A favored technique by some of the most highly-skilled soldiers in the world
-Has a focus on dealing with armed subjects
-Teaches many techniques for dealing with multiple subjects
-Teaches many ground techniques

Cons
-The only cons can be within the instructor. I personally feel that my former instructor taught his students that dangerous situations would all end perfectly. For example, he would teach knife defense techniques. He claimed that a person could implement the technique without injury. I believe that this is improper mental preparation. If you defend yourself against a knife-wielding attacker with your bare hands, you can survive or even defeat the attacker, but you’ll probably be cut and it’s easier to fight through an injury if you’re aware it could happen.

I am not by no means a martial arts expert, however I have had the unfortunate experiences of being in physical struggles and fights with dozens of violent criminals. It’s my opinion that the above listed fighting styles are likely to help you survive an encounter with a violent attacker. There are many venues throughout the Las Vegas Valley that teach these styles.

Other self-defense resource topics:
Prevention versus Self-Defense: Prevention is nearly always going to be the best option, here are some tips about methods and strategies to avoid situations where self-defense weapons would be necessary.

Self-defense: Tools of the trade: Personal safety weapons and their pros and cons.