Kali Knife and Kali Knife drills in Kali Sikaran

Kali knife training is called DAGA in the Kali Sikaran Program. It's a very important part of the training and definitely essential to have survival skills for selfdefence. And the Kali knife is a well known aspect in the Filipino martial arts overall.

But there's a lot of confusions and misunderstandings about tactics and training methods all around so we'll try to explain the approach we have in Kali Sikaran International.

What do you know about Kali Knife training?

There are several training methods we use in Kali Sikaran and it's important to understand the purpose of them. The practitioner have to build a foundation with principle based techniques. These techniques will be improved by improving mechanics, positions and structure. Later on in the progression it's also important to understand the attackers perspective. It's not that anybody can predict how an attacker will act but there are some essentials that needs to be learnt. Another important part in Kali knife training is sparring and drills when the student is ready for that.

Why do drills when learning Kali knife in Kali Sikaran

To learn Kali knife or anything for that matter you need repetitions, lot's of them. It is said that you need 2000 or more repetitions to build a major motor muscle skilled reflex. And the more complex the technique becomes the more repetitions you have to add. The goal is to make it as simple as possible but as complex as it has to be to solve the problem. A common misunderstanding is that it's some kind of goal to make Kali complex just to make it cool. It's not the goal in Kali Sikaran!

The primary goal with a drill is to do multiple repetitions and build the reflexes in a more dynamic environment. Later on it can be pushed to failure and give the practitioner experience to react to the circumstances rather then just doing the drill properly. Eventually that will prepare the student for testing the skills in more challenging scenarios, sparring and situations.

Check out the video below to see an example of techniques that becomes a drill.