You have your choice of two different partners to work on techniques:
A) The strongman. In every technique he’ll resist you the entire way through. You sometimes have to struggle to get out of wrist grabs and, just as often as not, you’ll fail in your attempts. If you can break free and/or drop him to the ground, you know that you can do your techniques. But you also lose valuable practicetime when first learning something because you have to struggle so much just to fail.
B) The weakling. He’ll lightly grab your wrist and will quite often lose his grip all on his own before you’ve actually completed your breakaway. He’ll go anywhere you want him which leads to increased repetitions in your technique when practicing. But, you’ll never be fully sure if you’ve learned the proper technique because it’s just so easy to do.
If you had to choose one and only one partner, who would it be?
You’ve pre-supposed the answer. To work on the techniques, I would have to pick the “weakling”. One does not have to do the practicing at full force and strength; that isn’t even good practicing, because as you noted you spend all your time working to get beyond the failure. Plus, when this happened to me, I had to work really hard to overcome the previously-instilled terror of a big man gripping me too hard and hurting me. I’m in martial arts after ending an abusive marraige.
I had bruises all over my wrists, from being gripped to hard (he was proving a point that I couldn’t break out if he knew what I was going to do to try). I gave serious thought to just saying, “Let’s try that again.” and breaking his thumb the next time, or kicking in his knee. Practice is practice, not a chance to intimidate and bully.
Karma pays, however. Later in the session, I caught him in the groin with an elbow strike. Completely by accident, but I didn’t hear anything about ‘no need to apologize, I should have been expecting it’ that time.
I’ve found the best solution is to drill about a hundred times ‘easy way’, then you may just ask the “weakling”, “Could you grip a bit more firmly and resist my break for a few repititions? I want to make sure I know how it works, please?”
Works great, and your partner doesn’t get upset. Also, giving him a hand off the mat, and complimenting his techniques (deservedly only), will make things smoother between the two of you.
Politeness works, even in the martial arts. That’s why it is taught concurrent with the physical techniques.
Rotation is best, but if you must choose, I’d recommend the strong guy (as long as he’s not a jerk and actually hurting you). Aside from forcing you to learn to do the technique under adverse conditions, it keeps you humble. Arrogance is the downfall of a lot of martial artists when they get into fights–they get overconfident, and then they run into opponents that their favorite techniques just don’t work on.
I’m the strong guy, BTW, as well as being slippery. If you want to hang on to me, you’d better make sure your technique is right. Speaking from experience, the best way to break away from a strongman is to distract him–he has to concentrate on resisting. Even a light (non-bruising) kick in the shins will shift his attention away from his hold, allowing you to break free. Learn to improvise around your techniques.
Oh, and remember: Headlocks don’t work well on guys with no neck.
Oh, they rotate through all right. I’m just asking if you had to pick one as a permanent partner, who would it be.
I like knowing that I’m doing the technique right. It’s especially fulfilling to do it correctly on him the first time. But, overall, it’s incredibly frustrating. My goal isn’t just to do it correctly but to do it correctly (almost) by instinct. I can’t do that without repitition and having to break free that often from a tight grab hurts. When I can’t do it correctly, what am I learning? I don’t know if it’s because I’m not doing the technique the right way or what? I have nothing to base it on because I’ve never done it before!
Then again, working with the weakling means you’ll almost never know if you’re doing it right. They’re still too timid to grab you tight and hold on throughout the movement. They’ll move a certain direction not because you forced them but because that’s how they’re supposed to go at that particular time. What do you learn there?
I’m not saying I’m the perfect middle ground. I have no idea where I lie on the spectrum. I’m just saying I have no idea what I prefer. Probably the weakling.
Oh, they rotate through all right. I’m just asking if you had to pick one as a permanent partner, who would it be.
I like knowing that I’m doing the technique right. It’s especially fulfilling to do it correctly on him the first time. But, overall, it’s incredibly frustrating. My goal isn’t just to do it correctly but to do it correctly (almost) by instinct. I can’t do that without repitition and having to break free that often from a tight grab hurts. When I can’t do it correctly, what am I learning? I don’t know if it’s because I’m not doing the technique the right way or what? I have nothing to base it on because I’ve never done it before!
Then again, working with the weakling means you’ll almost never know if you’re doing it right. They’re still too timid to grab you tight and hold on throughout the movement. They’ll move a certain direction not because you forced them but because that’s how they’re supposed to go at that particular time. What do you learn there?
I’m not saying I’m the perfect middle ground. I have no idea where I lie on the spectrum. I’m just saying I have no idea what I prefer. Probably the weakling.
You can generally talk us brutes into going with the flow until you absorb the mechanics of the move, you know. In fact, when I train alone with one of my (somewhat scrawnier) friends, we cycle the resistance. For the first few reps, I just go along with the move–more like dance than fighting. Then I firm it up for a few reps to make sure he’s still doing the technique properly–if it still works consistently, we go back to the dance. That way, he doesn’t let the technique slip, then practice the faulty version long enough for it to settle in. He does the same for me, but he has to work harder on the firm resistance parts.
I suggest whichever you can get to accommodate you more. If you can get the weakling to gradually increase his resistance to your technique over the course of the repetitions, go for weakling. If you can convince the strongman not to use his full strength to counter every technique, go for the strongman.
However, assuming that neither will change (significantly), I would pick the strongman. Against a weakling, you’ll learn a new technique faster, because you don’t have to fight him every step of the way (however, as others have noted, you may lack confidence in the technique, which is just as important as the technique itself). If you’re trying to improve a technique you already know, the strongman would be better, since it will be obvious what works, and what doesn’t. Remember, practice doesn’t make perfect – perfect practice does.
Politeness works, even in the martial arts. That’s why it is taught concurrent with the physical techniques.