‘Free Play’, or being experimental, is something that not many in the mainstream martial arts are ‘allowed’ to do.

I considered myself outside of ‘mainstream’ at the turn of the century, and I did this with James Allenby, who used to attend the Romsey club at that time. In his private Dojo (i.e. his dad’s barn), we would attack each other and see what happened. Sometimes, it was a total disaster, but now and again, it all came together, and it just felt right. It sometimes ended with an exclamation of “What just happened?” as we picked ourselves up off the floor on the other side of the room. We put this ‘on the line’ once by doing this at a demo – we just got up and attacked each other a few times. At least nothing went wrong, as sometimes happens with rehearsed routines.

I don’t do this at all now. Back then, in class, I would show a principle or basic technique and tell people to ‘go and play with it to see if it works for you and/or if you discover a new technique.’ I got some puzzled looks and the sense that all was not well. I found that students preferred being shown exactly what to do rather than being given a principle and then discovering a derived technique for themselves. This is a pity because you will remember a technique for far longer if you find it out yourself. I might try it again one day.

There were some downsides to this ‘free-play’ training because it was very easy to repeat the same techniques each time, making experimentation less likely the more this was done. However, it showed you what worked best for ‘you’ – everyone has to discover their techniques, which become favourites. The main disadvantage of engaging in continuous ‘free play’ with James Allenby was that you get used to your training partner. When it is tried against others, the timing can be a bit off, or too much force is applied, leading to accidents— nothing serious, but this is one of the reasons I don’t do this much in classes anymore.

The good thing for me was a greater awareness of my own movements and those of the opponent. This also improved my locks and throws (after the initial strikes, of course!) as I got a feeling of how the opponent’s body and limbs moved or did not move. 

Not for combat or self-protection, just for improving your martial arts. 

It can be argued that sparring is ‘experimental’ but in most clubs its treated as a competition rather than a learning experience.