SAMBO
- (Contributor: Alex
Levitas)
Intro:
SAMBO is an acronym of Russian words "SAMozaschita Bez
Orujiya" - "Self-Defence Without Weapon".
Origin: Russia
History:
SAMBO was created in the 1930's. Official recognition
of new art was in 1938. At first it was named
"free-style wrestling", then "free wrestling," and in
1946 was renamed "SAMBO." This system is
compilation of techniques from a number of martial arts
including Japanese and Chinese martial arts; national
martial arts of USSR area natives (Georgians, Armenians,
Mongols, Russians etc.); French
wrestling and other arts. At the time of the 2nd world
war the system was widely "tested" by the Soviet army.
"Special" techniques were added at the time, for example
fighting in cells, quick-and-quiet sentry killing, and
so on. Because of the number of criminals in the Soviet
army at that time (during WWII each prisoner was
"invited" to the front with each year at the front worth
two or so years of their sentence) SAMBO experts
acquired many lessons on criminal street fighting, and a
number of these techniques were included in SAMBO.
SAMBO continues to accept new techniques and modify old
ones.
Description:
Today, SAMBO is built from 3 parts:
the sportive part (Olympic sport), the self-defense
part, and the special or combat part.
The sportive part is similar to Judo but with some
differences in allowed techniques. SAMBO allows leg
locks were Judo does not, but Judo allows choking but
SAMBO does not. There are somewhat more techniques in
SAMBO than in Judo.
The self-defense part of SAMBO is similar in form to
Aikijujutsu because it is intended to be entirely
defensive. The founder of SAMBO said this about the
self-defense part:
"We give defensive weapons to citizens. Some people
say that this kind of martial art may be learned by
criminals or hooligans and used against citizens. Don't
worry! This art does not include even one attacking
technique! If a hooligan will learn, he will be able to
apply it only against another hooligan who will attack
him, but never against a citizen."
There are many specific techniques for defending
specific attacks, including escaping from grips and
chokes, defenses against punches and kicks, defenses
against weapons (knife, stick etc.), and
floor-fighting. The self-defense part of SAMBO is based
on body movements and locks with a few punches and
kicks. The object is to allow defense but not to injure
the opponent more than necessary because this part was
created for citizens. In the former Soviet Union the
law was that if you injure your opponent more than
needed in a self-defense situation you could receive a 5
year prison term. Some of the self-defense techniques
are based on sportive SAMBO.
The third part - combat SAMBO - was created for the army
and police.
It is a very severe, and dangerous system. If the idea
of sportive SAMBO is "Take points and win," and the idea
of the self-defence part is "Don't allow to attacker
injure you," the idea of combat SAMBO is "Survive, and
if someone hinders you - injure or kill him." Combat
SAMBO includes sportive and self-defence techniques, but
uses them in different ways. For example, sportive
SAMBO uses the traditional shoulder throw of Judo and
Jujutsu. In combative SAMBO the throw is done with the
opponents arm rotated up and locked at the elbow, and
can be done to throw the opponent on his head. If the
opponent attempts to counter by lowering his center of
gravity and pulling backwards (as is taught in sportive
SAMBO) the arm will be broken.
Combative SAMBO teaches shoulder throw counters that
might be able to deal with a locked arm like kicking out
the opponents knee and pulling back by the hair or eye
sockets.
In addition to modified sportive and self-defence
techniques, combat SAMBO includes kicks, punches,
"dangerous throwing" (throws that can't be include into
sportive part because they cause injury), locks on the
spine, things that are prohibited in sportive wrestling
(biting, for example), many "sadistic dirty things,"
working against weapons (with or without a weapon of
your own), tricks like putting your coat on your
opponents head (works nicely), floor fighting (very
strong), fighting in closed space (small room, pit,
stairs), quick-and-quiet sentry killing, and so forth.
Students also learn strategy and tactics of fighting
alone or in groups against single or multiple
opponents. SAMBO is less popular today in Russia
because the influx of oriental martial arts in recent
years. But, the development of SAMBO has continued and
elements of it are incorporated into other
modern combat systems.
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