There is an old Army expression I was once taught that the "Infantry loves the ground." It means that once shot at, an army afoot and in motion on a patrol or advance, learns to study the terrain and the ground they move on. Even the most simple low land or object might provide cover in an ambush. Just be shot at once and you learn to read the ground.
Also, much time is spent crawling. Crawling through streams, mud, gravel, cement, etc. A soldier begins a love/hate relationship the ground. And, after these experiences, a soldier has this realistic look at the many surfaces of the world around him and a working knowledge of what it feels like to operate down there with their gear and all sorts of weather. A person with this experience understands the difference between indoors and outdoors, and the ground and the floor and matted work out areas.
The moral of that story is crawling on soft mats and a gavel parking lot, rock and sand, is vastly different. Then what about fighting? By now we have all heard all the stories of the night one of the famous Gracie Brothers got into a scuffle in New York City and dropped to a knee to do a sport tackle and shattered his knee cap. We have also seen the youtube video of the MMA champ who was body-slammed/dropped a few short feet on the cement in a fight and was finished - in a move that on a mat or an Octagon would have been nothing but a disturbing bounce. We could go on and on if all these matted, floor-sport moves compared to real world ground encounters. Even the common stand-up takedowns and throws, if executed on the proverbial street as opposed to the matted floor, can be debilitating or deviating. Only a sheer fool at this point could not see the differences and the dangers between a mat and an asphalt street. A fool.
A fool I say? Yet enlightenment still fails to reach some practitioners. Some of these people are true-blue sports players and don't worry about it at all and that is an enlightenment. But, some don't get it. Some are block-headed enough that they will never get it. Some, affected by cult-like brainwashing, refuse to admit it. And some, understand the words and ideas, yet are mentally incapable of implementing the actual training differences - as though it were a thinking disorder (think Army Combatives). Some are inexperienced and do not know the truth. They all continue to teach sport mat fighting to people, police and soldiers who really need "ground fighting."
I am not talking about problems like ignoring the "mixed-persons world" dictum - that people come in all sizes, strengths and shapes differences (the fact that there are weight classes in the UFC and MMA) and that even the simplest moves in mat, sport wrestling often can not be done against someone much bigger. I am not even talking about the "mixed weapon world" dictum - that attackers, suspects and enemies so often carry of mix of knives, sticks and guns to use against us. Those worlds are two other vital subjects to consider, but not now. I am only dissecting here the actual ground and floor surfaces we train on and then the ones we expect to work on.
Words do have meaning, if even subliminally. So, I have decided there needs to be terms that help define the two worlds. It isn't succinct enough, or fair enough to call all submission wrestling and sport randori as "ground fighting." Most of these sport people never scrape up against the nasty ground of the real world. So when you are teaching police, or soldiers or even citizen's self defense, it is a misnomer and unfair to take them onto soft mats, dress them up in baggy gym clothes or spandex shorts or gis, and teach them "ground fighting" as self defense, defensive tactics or survival. In a way, it's like the difference between touch football and tackle football.
What then would be the best term for ground fighting when used by martial artists on mats doing MMA, Judo or Brazilian Jujitsu? You can't say mat fighting because that could mean any kind of sparring done on mats. Karate classes are conducted on mats. You can't say "ring-fighting" because that means boxing, kick boxing or "octagon " fighting.
Floor fighting? The floor. Sports people do fight on the their floors. The gym floor. The mat floor. The floor of the ring or cage. The floor of an arena. Mats go on floors. professional cages often have a floor that is a large mat and not unlike a trampoline at times. Remember when kick boxer legend Joe Lewis visited the floor of one of the early UFC fight octagons and noticed the extra bounce in the floor. He bounced up and down a bit on it and said, "no wonder nobody punches here, you can't can't get your feet planted!" or words to that effect.
But for that matter, even the hard stone tile or carpet can rip the skin right off of you. Lots of people fight for their lives inside buildings and on floor. Many people train on mats to get experience and last longer in effort to inoculate themselves against the later anticipated wear of real fighting. But sport fighters train on mats to actually fight right on mats. Its a mat world from beginning to end. The world "mat" must be added to the word floor. Using the term "Floor Fighting" alone for this disrespects those of us who have actually fought people for real on all kinds of floors.
"Mat Floor Fighting" might be the best way to differentiate reality, or real world fighting, or ground fighting versus martial arts sport fighting. The ground, even the real floor, is a harsh, porous mistress of rubble and rough surfaces, furniture and cement and asphalt. It is at the level of slamming boots and hard shoes and knees where dirty rain water, shallow ponds, pipe sludge and mud exists (need I keep naming more?).
I think it would be handy for the training world to differentiate the terms "ground-fighting" and "mat floor fighting." When you say those terms you know exactly what I mean. It might help consumers and end-users understand better what they are doing. In our world of limited time and resources, of struggling to develop succinct and applicable training methods for our citizens, cops, corrections and the military that relate directly to event-based problem-solving, we need to limit the aspects of sport martial arts, mat floor fighting. Move it over into real ground fighting.
There is so much to ground fighing. It's as big as the big outdoors and indoors too. Letting sport mat fighting be called ground fighting without proper explanation doesn't do the term justice.
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