daga' (sword and knife), 'pangamut' (empty

hands), 'panuntukan' (boxing), 'panadiakan'

(kicking) and 'dumog' (Filipino wrestling).
Lee developed JKD, meaning 'Way of the
Intercepting Fist', in the 1960s and 1970s.
During its development, Lee drew heavily
on the influences of Wing Chun, western
Boxing, Fencing, Wrestling, Judo, La Boxe
Francaise (Savate) and other arts. Later,
Kali featured heavily in JKD training due
to the influence oflnosanto. The JKD concept relies on minimal movement with maximum effect and is separated into several
ranges of fighting including kicking, punching, trapping and grappling.
JKD specialises in simultaneous parrying
and punching with fluid motions, which allows a practitioner to attack while at the
same time defending. Throughout the development of JKD, Lee always advised his students to absorb what ideas are useful and
discard those that are not. This still holds
true today and the unique style focuses on
directness and simplicity, discarding extraneous or unnecessary movements.
A modern environment
Silat classes at the Academy also include
the techniques of Maphilindo Silat, a style
designed and developed by Inosanto having
trained with many Silat masters from
Malaysia, the Philippines and Indonesia.
The word 'Maphilindo' is a composite of
these three countries. One of the main differences to traditional Silat is that
Maphilindo was designed to suit a modern
environment and works from a Kickboxing
structure, blending easily with JKD and
Kali.
Silat practice includes many effective manipulation techniques such as arm drags,
head turns, leg sweeps, knee compressions,
arm breaks and chokes, allowing the practitioner to manipulate and destroy parts of an
opponent's body in a minimal period of time.
This is done by entering an opponent's
space, creating maximum damage with
rapid hand, elbow, knee and nerve strikes
and finally off-balancing the attacker and
finishing with any number of takedowns.
This is all achieved through flowing from
one range to another with a smooth transition through a series of techniques. Silat is
geared toward rapidly ending any confrontation and is designed to deal with multiple opponents.
'Adapt to any situation'
The main principle that links the martial
arts, which De Luca teaches, is the principle
of fighting range, with each range having its
own inherent strengths, weaknesses and associated subtleties. ''Whether using
weapons or empty hands, our students
learn to transition between long, medium
and close range allowing them to adapt to
any situation," De Luca explained.

Italian native Simon De Luca (left), who now runs the recently opened Martial Arts & Boxing Academy (MABA) in
Dublin, performs a knife defence application with his student Sean Barry.

This applies equally to fighting with

weapons and without; for example in the
case of empty hands: long range deals with
the fundamentals of Kickboxing; medium
range deals with closing the distance using
tools form the signature trapping of Wing
Chun and JKD and various methods to pass
the opponents guard, and close range deals
with clinching, grappling, 'panatukan'
(sometimes called 'Filipino dirty boxing')
and Filipino unbalancing and wrestling
techniques (dumog) as well of the ground
workofMMA.
A typical class at MABA includes both
weapons and empty hands training as well
as conditioning and pad work. "In each class
we try to cover all the fighting ranges as
well as the fundamentals of timing, footwork and sensitivity and draws on all the
martial arts discussed here," De Luca
added. "Importantly, the system is taught
such that the skills developed using the
stick and knife translate directly to empty
hand and vice versa."
A relatively minor place
Whil!Nhe martial arts of the Philippines
and Indonesia discussed here have traditionally occupied a relatively minor place on
the Irish martial arts landscape, it's safe to
say there has been a huge upsurge in interest over recent years. In this part of the
world, Kali and Silat were for many years
considered esoteric and even exotic, while
now they enjoy far more mainstream appeal. DeLuca says that there are several
reasons for this.
"The use of Kali and Silat in recent
movies has generated interest among the
curious. In the case of Kali, the excellent
display of practical fighting skills in the

Bourne trilogy of films, which were choreographed by Kali practitioner Jeff Imada,
went a long way to increase interest in the
FMA."
De Luca continued: ''More recently, the
surprise cinema hit, 'The Raid', has lead to
an upsurge in interest in Pencak Silat. In
addition, the proliferation of martial arts
clips on YouTube has allowed people to research more niche disciplines before committing to a particular style. Today's
martial artists are to a certain extent more
discerning and are open to looking outside
th~ more well established martial arts in
Ireland."
De Luca concluded; ''This has lead to the
emergence of many alternative martial arts
paths, with Kali, Silat and JKD befitting
from this increased interest." Now with the
addition of DeLuca's MABA, he hopes that
the arts of Kali, Silat and JKD will continue
to go from strength to strength in this country."

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