Why? Well, we've yet to hear of a violent mugging against someone in a fitness center, in his shorts and sneakers, watching himself in the mirrors.

Now that the warmer weather is here, training becomes quite different from our winter training. Through the cold winter months, we trained in heavy jackets, pants, boots, hats, and gloves. That is the reality of a street assault in the winter.

Now that we can strip down to shorts and short sleeved shirts, our mobility will certainly improve. However, we also begin to feel how unforgiving macadam and concrete is on exposed limbs and without the cushioning of winter coats.

Last month we concentrated on ground work (how NOT to be there and how to protect yourself and get up quickly if you are forced there), and we will continue to mix ground work into our training on a regular basis.

The past few weeks, we have been training gun defenses (including the importance of body language and verbal skills). We will continue to include weapon defenses (knife, stick, etc.) along with a variety of other effective defenses against "common" warm weather attacks and assaults. You are welcome to ask about a particular scenario you fear or may have encountered, and we will incorporate the appropriate actions into our training.

Along with our invigorating warm up drills (which will build your core strength and endurance), you will walk away from every class knowing ONE MORE skill in surviving an act of violence.

Krav Maga, unlike martial arts, is a very fast-progressing system. Part of its design was driven by the need to train people very quickly and very efficiently. Consequently, it typically takes a person of average physical ability perhaps only a couple of months before significant progress is achieved and noticeable.

Krav Maga was designed to benefit the average person. The system is not about sheer strength or power. As a matter of fact one of the basic tenets of Krav Maga is that one should not oppose power with power. Rather, Krav Maga blends a combination of physical skill with mental self-defense determination. Consequently, Krav Maga is more accessible to more people of either sex, shape or size than many martial art forms.

We take the best techniques and principles from already great systems and put them together to produce the most realistic, hard-core, street-oriented training possible. Typical classes contain a mix of empty hand, knife, stick, gun, groundwork, stress drills and multiple attackers.