Chapter 22

Defensive Tactics Training

It is the third week since the academy has begun. During the first two weeks, we watched our country come under attack by members of Al-Qaeda terrorist forces, we ran and completed hundreds upon hundreds of exercises, and we watched as our bodies have begun to change and adapt to this tenuous routine of being up early and pushing ourselves beyond our capabilities. It is truly amazing what the human body is capable of accomplishing.

This morning starts off much like every morning, a brisk run coupled with twenty minutes of stretching and calisthenics and then a wonderful breakfast of watered down eggs. Yum!

This day would not end the same as the days that preceded it, however. You see, we finished our wonderful legal and constitutional law courses last Friday and so this week we move forward to one the most difficult courses that we, as recruit troopers, would ever undertake. Personally, I believe that we are starting the best part of the academy, for today we begin defensive tactics.

Basically, defensive tactics is hand-to-hand combat. Defensive tactics is a form of self-defense that is derived from various mixed martial arts. This style of fighting was developed strictly for use by the United States military and law enforcement communities. We are taught approximately sixty or so offensive, defensive, and counter moves that are essentially for use when trying to overtake a suspect in a ground fighting scenario or one on one fist fight.

Most of the moves we will be taught are arm bars, specific punches and kicks, pressure points, and other moves commonly seen in different forms of Martial Arts and UFC-style fighting. This course should be interesting and entertaining.

For anyone who is interested this block of training, it is ten to twelve hours a day for two weeks, plus an additional two hours a day for calisthenics and cardio workouts. In other words, it is going to be a very trying two weeks.

After breakfast, our class formed up in the muster area—the same as every day, except this morning after breakfast we rushed upstairs, brushed our teeth, and changed into our physical training attire, a yellow T-shirt and black shorts. Of course you also had the option of wearing a pair of gray sweat pants and a gray sweatshirt.

Standing in formation in the muster area, we waited for our instructors. For this course we would have five. Lt. Hudson arrived in the muster area to brief us on the upcoming course and the consequences of incorrectly performing a move.

“I hope that all of you did not eat too big of a meal. I do not want to see anyone throwing up on my mats.”

“SIR, YES, SIR,” the class shouted.

“We will proceed through the front doors in front of you. You will see that the floor is covered with blue mats. Before you step on the mats, you will remove your tennis shoes, leaving only your socks on your feet. Is this understood?”

“SIR, YES, SIR.”

“Break formation, report to the center of the mats.”

The class broke formation and entered into the room with the blue mats. The room was an indoor basketball court that had been converted to a make shift dojo. Blue mats lined the interior of the court with a three-foot wide section of bare flooring available for storing shoes and any other equipment a recruit may have brought down with them.

After removing our shoes and placing them on the wooden floor, we moved to the center mat and formed a circle around the instructors. I was quite impressed at the amount of other recruits with holes in their socks. I was no exception to this. Apparently, when it comes to socks, people don’t give much thought to how it may appear if their shoes are removed. I will just say mine were completely “holy.”

After we were sitting Indian style in the center of the mats, the instructors began their presentation of the techniques to be learned. Each maneuver was carefully explained and demonstrated by the staff prior to us practicing these maneuvers. Each maneuver was broken up into steps, and we did every maneuver based on a one-two-three-step routine. This gets very boring after doing the same routine twenty or thirty times in a row. As we got used to the routines, we sped the pace up until finally we were going almost full speed.

With over sixty maneuvers to learn and master and remember, we did not have much time or energy for anything else.

Lt. Hudson said, “The first maneuver you are going to learn is the escort position. From this position, you can move into an arm bar or any number of other positions.”

Sgt. Martinez added, “This position will allow you flexibility to perform a takedown or even to disengage and gain distance on the suspect if necessary.”

As with every other exercise, the steps were explained and the move practiced until we played the routine over and over in our heads. This went on day in and day out for about the first week and a half. However, on Monday of the second week, things did get a bit more interesting. You see that day started our full contact striking. Oh yes, friends, this was a glorious day. You see on this day we unleashed all of our frustration on our opponent. There were cries of pain, thuds, trips, falls, and other follies that would be laughed about in the future, but not at this moment.

“On your faces. Are you kidding me? Are you a bunch of five-year-olds on a playground? Do you think this is all fun and games?”

I am not sure which instructor yelled this, and I am not sure who was the recruit who screwed up, but the next half an hour sucked. I am sure by now you have gotten used to hearing how bad our punishment sessions were, and I am not sure how it happens, but the sessions seem to get worse and more strenuous after each screwup.

“On your backs. You are going to learn one way or the other that we are not screwing around. You are going to do flutter kicks until I get tired. Move, now.”

God, I thought the flutter kicks would never end, but they did.

“Okay, stop and roll on to your stomachs, now we are going to expend some more energy. It’s hard to screw around if your damn arms don’t move,” Sgt. Martinez stated.

I probably would have been a little more pissed off about pushing the floor earth’s core had it not been for the fact that Sgt. Martinez assisted with pushing the floor into the earth. I don’t know exactly how long we pushed that floor, but I do know my arms did not move after that.

Every tendon and muscle ached. My joints felt as if spikes had been driven into them. This really was hell on earth at this point. At this point, I think it was unanimous that we all decided not to screw off anymore.

The rest of the day was filled with more strikes and kicks.

As the day came to a close, all I could think was how nice a shower and bed would be. We haven’t gotten much downtime the past two weeks. It has been nonstop moving since we started defensive tactics. The good thing is that the time has come to prepare for the final in this course.

I say this is a good thing because we are worn down and tired. We have been beaten down, bruised, and tested. Our morale has been broken with many days of yelling and physically grueling punishment, and then it has been built back up. We had moments of emotional highs and even more lows. Now that is coming to an end.

As we are released for the day and head back up to our rooms, I think to myself that this has been one of the most difficult, yet rewarding courses that I have taken part in.

I grabbed a change of clothes out of the wooden nightstand in my room and went directly to the showers. As usual, there was a damn line. After waiting for around twenty minutes, I finally got into the shower. It was a wonderful glorious feeling. As the hot water ran down my body, I could feel the pain in my muscles ease and wave of calmness come over me.

After my nice refreshing shower, I decided to watch a little television with the rest of the guys from class. Getting to sit on the couch in the recreation room and watch WWE was very relaxing. So relaxing, in fact, that I fell asleep on the couch and woke around ten o’clock that evening, just in time for lights out. I slowly got to my feet and wandered down the hall and up the stairs to my room. Julio, my roommate, was already lying in bed.

“Hey, sleepyhead, I guess you decided your bed would be more comfortable than the couch?”

“Shut up and go to bed. I do really appreciate you checking up on me though. I can really feel the concern.”

“Hahaha.”

The next two days were filled with a review of the prior week and a half. We reviewed and practiced each move that we had learned over the course of the class. Trying to remember every step for every move and countermove was quit nerve-wracking. This review phase sent two of my classmates home.

Unfortunately, this course tends to force injuries. One of my classmates left with an unknown medical issue and the other had bruised ribs. When you are kicked, thrown to the mats—the very thin mats—and flipped, the results are quite often injuries. The intensity of our training had simply taken too much of a toll on some of us. Hell, I thoroughly enjoyed the class, but it was very physically and mentally taxing.