Many can tell stories of Blauer. Avoid.
I owned tapes of his back in the day and I think he made up a lot of stuff while camera was rolling. I ordered his Level 1 tape back in the day and it was just seminar and had 10% or so of the actual requirements on it. I e-mail and he acted shocked that this was the case. Meanwhile people I know had already e-mailed him and he feigned being shocked in those e-mails too. I think I might still have the e-mails.
He had anger issues, I remember one video that he was filming live in a park, he just started barking at this guy i the park that he thought was making too much noise. Quite a few people who have trained with him have told stories of insecurity, anger, etc.
Over complicates things and makes up fancy acronyms to sell products. Noone needs 50 videos on street self-defense. Is there good stuff? Certainly. But you have to be willing to wade through hours of verbiage and acronyms to distill it all.
Plus he admitted years ago as never have being been in a fight or self-defense situation.
he used to look scared shitless interviewing the fighters backstage at the UFC. The sniping between the Blauer camp and the Franco/Quinn/MacYoung camps was always entertaining as they all frantically scrambled for the same slice of the market share pie. Not as good as the iron palm feud between Flyin Brian Gray and Jim "the cocoNUT" Lacy, of course. Entertaining nonetheless.
Hotsteppa,
Good post! You're probably right! He did say some good things that made sense. However, there is a lot of verbiage and pseudo-scientific non-sense. Hopefully, most of us are discerning enough to take in the good and throw out the bad!
de braco -he used to look scared shitless interviewing the fighters backstage at the UFC. The sniping between the Blauer camp and the Franco/Quinn/MacYoung camps was always entertaining as they all frantically scrambled for the same slice of the market share pie. Not as good as the iron palm feud between Flyin Brian Gray and Jim "the cocoNUT" Lacy, of course. Entertaining nonetheless.
I found the Quinn stuff much more practical for the average person, and rooted in real martial arts. I think all of them over-sensationalized their exploits to sell books and tapes. Every "street" encounter the Macyoung would describe was made too seem like a life or death encounter. He has some good strategies, but I know a couple people that attended his seminars and were not impressed at all with his technical skill. one of them went to Quinn's padded attacker workshops and found it to be one of the best training experiences.
But I remember all the internet debates between and about these guys.
Take what is useful.
If anyone needs advanced level tactics don't worry I got you covered. When I was first married I bought the 7 tape VHS set of Tim Larkin target focused training for $700+ when I really didn't have 700 to waste. I'll be on the seminar circuit soon....
onyx2002 -If anyone needs advanced level tactics don't worry I got you covered. When I was first married I bought the 7 tape VHS set of Tim Larkin target focused training for $700+ when I really didn't have 700 to waste. I'll be on the seminar circuit soon....
Let me ask you... a friend took his weekend course.It was a small fortune.
Basically he told me that he was told to "hit through" targets, full force. They did a lot of slow motion work and a lot of predictive response type training a la Kung Fu san Soo ("If I hit a guy like this, he will respond like this" kind of stuff.)
Does that sound about right...?
Blauer is SPEAR....
Thats some gay as Mcdojo shit that no sane person would spend a penny on.
SPEAR is just a silat entry.....LOL!
Doesn't Blauer do Crossfit combat seminars and workshops for Crossfit gyms all over? Those semianrs are packed to the building capacity I hEar
I attended two seminars with him a few years ago. Found it pretty interesting but mostly theoretical and psychology stuff rather than technique.
onyx2002 -If anyone needs advanced level tactics don't worry I got you covered. When I was first married I bought the 7 tape VHS set of Tim Larkin target focused training for $700+ when I really didn't have 700 to waste. I'll be on the seminar circuit soon....
There's a blast from the past. Larkin used to work for Jerry Peterson(the man who could out Rorion, Rorion.)at the S.C.A.R.S institute/academy, so he learned from the master of kung fu san soo. That was a great feud also, Jerry/Tim/S.C.A.R.S vs Lew Hicks of S.A.F.T.A/Flailing giant Baby Huey fame and Frank "Hoochie" Cucci.
shen -onyx2002 -If anyone needs advanced level tactics don't worry I got you covered. When I was first married I bought the 7 tape VHS set of Tim Larkin target focused training for $700+ when I really didn't have 700 to waste. I'll be on the seminar circuit soon....
Let me ask you... a friend took his weekend course.It was a small fortune.
Basically he told me that he was told to "hit through" targets, full force. They did a lot of slow motion work and a lot of predictive response type training a la Kung Fu san Soo ("If I hit a guy like this, he will respond like this" kind of stuff.)
Does that sound about right...?
Full apologises for making anyone chase down this rabitt hole.
In my defense Tim has a great way of packaging his stuff so that it doesn't seem like TMA especially with his background experience.
Here is the video that might give you an idea of what your buddy was talking about. Start at around 3:40.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc8sgHmbnDw
The real snake oil part of it all is the use of true real principles and then exptrapolating them way beyond anything that resembles reality. The classic starting point is idea that when you step on a nail or something sharp your body has a reflex reaction that bypasses the thinking part of your brain and causes your foot to automatically lift. In a fighitng context they take this to mean that each 'target' on your body when struck will produce a response everytime. You get hit in the groin you automatically hunch over, you get hit in the throat so you fly backwards with throat crushed. Now that we have shown you theses targets and the reactions you can controll your opponent like a puppet simply striking 'target' after 'target'.
Also by putting your full body weight into the strikes you can break legs, clavicles, skulls etc. When it is explained over a few hours you really start to think you are getting this great shortcut and learning the true devestating techniques. The puches and kicks all look more 'real' because they don't resemble the TMA stuff we are taught to laugh at.
Now that I think about it my body would be in better shape if I had stuck with the VHS tapes and skipped the 8 years of bjj.
de braco -onyx2002 -If anyone needs advanced level tactics don't worry I got you covered. When I was first married I bought the 7 tape VHS set of Tim Larkin target focused training for $700+ when I really didn't have 700 to waste. I'll be on the seminar circuit soon....
There's a blast from the past. Larkin used to work for Jerry Peterson(the man who could out Rorion, Rorion.)at the S.C.A.R.S institute/academy, so he learned from the master of kung fu san soo. That was a great feud also, Jerry/Tim/S.C.A.R.S vs Lew Hicks of S.A.F.T.A/Flailing giant Baby Huey fame and Frank "Hoochie" Cucci.
Nice that's always a great trip down memory lane, now about this Matt Furey character, I;ve been thinking of joining his inner circle program...
de braco -Wasn't Cucci legit though ? I remember him having a few nhb fightsonyx2002 -If anyone needs advanced level tactics don't worry I got you covered. When I was first married I bought the 7 tape VHS set of Tim Larkin target focused training for $700+ when I really didn't have 700 to waste. I'll be on the seminar circuit soon....
There's a blast from the past. Larkin used to work for Jerry Peterson(the man who could out Rorion, Rorion.)at the S.C.A.R.S institute/academy, so he learned from the master of kung fu san soo. That was a great feud also, Jerry/Tim/S.C.A.R.S vs Lew Hicks of S.A.F.T.A/Flailing giant Baby Huey fame and Frank "Hoochie" Cucci.
AlphaTardTravisFan -de braco -Wasn't Cucci legit though ? I remember him having a few nhb fightsonyx2002 -If anyone needs advanced level tactics don't worry I got you covered. When I was first married I bought the 7 tape VHS set of Tim Larkin target focused training for $700+ when I really didn't have 700 to waste. I'll be on the seminar circuit soon....
There's a blast from the past. Larkin used to work for Jerry Peterson(the man who could out Rorion, Rorion.)at the S.C.A.R.S institute/academy, so he learned from the master of kung fu san soo. That was a great feud also, Jerry/Tim/S.C.A.R.S vs Lew Hicks of S.A.F.T.A/Flailing giant Baby Huey fame and Frank "Hoochie" Cucci.
Yeah, Cucci was legit. He was a former Navy Seal, who was well-versed in Muay That, Filipno/JKD stuff, Silat and all that before it was cool. Also a BJJer.
Cucci is legit, much more legit than the typical straight blastin, rediculous trappin, 2 inch punchin JKD moonie. He was actually a SEAL, and did a set of "SEAL H2H Combat" tapes for panther, which earned him the wrath of Peterson. Peterson's ad copy always mocked him for his "combat" tour guarding an airport in Panama, during "Operation Just Cause."
this was from early 96'. Nick Starks also fought on this card.
I found Blauer's articles interesting back in the day.
I have a friend who trained with him and was one of his affilates for a time - I remember him saying that Tony is your best friend when you've just handed him a check, and at any other time he can't be bothered.
And having seen a couple of his tapes, I will confirm that it looked like someone set up an 80's camera on a tripod in the back of the room during a class, didn't focus, check sound levels or edit, and then sold the tape for hundreds of dollars.
One of my buddies posted that he was taking his SPEAR class this week and what a joke it was.
I went through it about 8 years ago. I found somethings useful, but for the most part it was a waist of time.
Speaking of which look up R.A.D. (Rape Agression Defense) this class is a joke. A training partner of mine was sent to it by his department so he could instruct people in the community. Easily the most worthless stuff out there.
http://www.rad-systems.com/rad_package.html
The whole reality based training stuff if filled with snakes.
he did sell some pretty rad armor for full contact training. The small circle people also used to harp at him saying Wally Jay invented the "SPEAR". Which is also rediculous, since it's just practicing forward inertial movements off the flinch