IS TIM LARKIN FOR REAL OR IS IT JUST THE SAME B.S.?

When an instructor is born full grown I am naturally suspicious. What I mean by born full grown is an instructor who seemingly appears on the scene without any verifiable lineage in any prior system other than the system he has claimed to invent. There are many examples of these types of instructors and there are some glaring consistencies in the inconsistency of their collective stories. Rather than go the route of establishing the validity of Tim Larkin's history and credentials, I have chosen to take a look at the material he is teaching, the way it is being taught and the pros and cons of both.

Tim Larkin is on the cover of Black Belt Magazine this month and in fact he has been named 2011 Instructor of the Year. Larkin is the creator of Target Focus Training (TFT) a fighting system that according to Larkin "Fills in the gaps that exist in most combat sports and martial arts". Larkin himself claims to have been competing in combat sports since the age of 4. "I've been involved in combat sports since I was about four years old, and various martial arts and combat sports throughout my grade school and high school. Sports background is basically football, basketball, water polo. I went to University with the goal of getting out into a Special Operations unit. So I went through Navy Seal training and did real well with that."

So this battle hardened former sailor has created “the most devastatingly powerful, scientifically-proven self defense system in the world today.”

A closer examination of his system exposes some very well reasoned approaches and some horrifc tactical approaches and worst of all, training methodoligies that are not at realistic at all.

Larkin's approach to knife defense is the focal point of this critique. In the BB article Larkin, while discussing knife defenses said "In reality, people punch with knives. People who survive a knifing say they never saw the blade. They felt they were being punched. That stat told us we had to alter the type of training we were doing with knives. It's why we teach you to injure the other person rather than try to control the knife. It's better to take out the man, to put him in a nonfunctional state."

The first part of the statement is true. People do punch with knives and most victims of a knife attack neither see the knife nor do they feel the knife plunge into their flesh. So in this I am in total agreement with Larkin. However the second part of the statement is problematic for me. To focus solely on injuring the attacker with negating or addressing the threat posed by the weapon is ridiculous and incredibly dangerous. It is imperative that the delivery system for the weapon gets neutralized while damage is being done to the assailant. It doesn't matter how hard you strike or where you strike your attacker, if you don't simultaneously control the delivery system for the weapon.

To assume that one strike to a sensitive area on the attacker's body is going to do enough damage that renders him completely powerless is absurd. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. This is a scientific law. So striking the groin of a person who is armed with a knife is going to cause some sort of reaction. Controlling the delivery system for the weapon, in this case the knife arm, is extremely important especially when you consider that the aforementioned response is completely unpredictable.

A further look at TFT reveals some significant issues from a tactical standpoint. It is clear that Larkin teaches his students to focus on damaging the assailant without regard for controlling the weapon the assailant is holding. This is flawed on so many levels. I believe though that the root of this problem is found in two areas.First I am not sure that Larkin is what he claims to be. I have significant doubts about his qualifications and actual background in combat systems either sport or reality based.

Secondly the fact that neither Larkin himself or his students train at combat speed. Everything they do is done at a speed that is so slow all of their defenses work everytime against a predetermined attack. The problem with training in this manner should be obvious. Any reality based training that does not include an element of the unknown, an exterior stress and a non compliant attacker must be viewed skeptically. How can the students deal with the reality of the unknown and the stress of a real attack when their training is not indicative of these harsh realities.

This is a critical point. In previous writings I have pointed to traditional martial arts as being the biggest offenders in this regard. They very rarely if ever train at combat speed vs an unknown attacker. They do forms and Kata instead or heavily choreograph their attacks so that the student gets a false sense of security and goes into the world unprepared. This is extremely concerning when you add firearms and edged weapons to the mix. All of the scientific jargon in the world does not replace sound principles. Claiming to have been a Navy Seal, super soldier or Jack Bauer is not enough to validate a system. Technical apptitude and tactical implementation are the cornerstones of any good system. Combat Speed is the final exam and really is the heart of the system. What happens when the attack is unknown and the attacker does not comply? This is the only method we can truly critique any system. In my professional opinion Tim Larkin and TFT fall way short of being considered a legitimately sound self defense system.