"Energy-based" martial art called Empty Force (EFO)

[Epiquinn]

There's a school of martial arts in Finland that teaches that any assault can be deflected without even touching the attacker. It's called Empty Force, or EFO for short. The teacher, Jukka Lampila, is a former Aikido black belt and also works as an "energy healer". Videos of their training can be viewed here. I suggest you watch a little of them first.

Recently, Lampila held a training seminar in Spain, in which skeptics were invited to test whether EFO really works. This is the result:


The video has gained some notoriety on websites focused on martial arts, such as Bullshido.com. I'm not personally disturbed by the fact that grown-up people gather together and knock each other out with Jedi tricks, but what worries me is the fact that they actually sell this art as a form of self-defence that works and will get you out of life threatening situations. If they said it was just for spirituality or harmony, or whatever, without any suggestion that it could be applied in reality, that would be fine by me.

Needless to say, Lampila and his school are probably going to brush this off with some excuse and continue their business as usual.

 

[ldmitruk]

The video was quite good. I'd like to the practitioners of EFO (Extremely Fake Omnipotence) go head to head with a boxer, judoist, karateka, etc. It would be real interesting to see what the outcome would be.

 

[Aught3]

Looks like faith healing. The person 'attacking' understands that everyone watching expects them to fall, so they do.

 

[Visaki]

Saw that on the local "Paholaisen asianajaja" (Devils advocate) blog. Reminded me of this:



I have to wonder if Jukka Lampila would put his health where his mouth is and go a round with Anton Kuivanen or Tom Niinimäki?

 

[Aught3]

^ ^ ^ That guy seems to have more of an excuse. It's quite an impressive display to have all those students flop at your feet with a wave of your hand. Plus, not only is he willing to put his money where his mouth is, he's also willing to put his mouth where his mouth is. To get punched. Several times.

 

[Epiquinn]

Lampila released some of his school's own footage from the seminar. It seems certain "outtakes" didn't make the final cut. Someone could point out kindly this presumably honest mistake, if comments were enabled for the video.

 

[Dragan Glas]

Greetings,

I'd agree that these sort of claims for "soft" style Aikido - which is more akin to Tai Ch'i as "meditation in motion" - is irresponsible.

The only form of Aikido that's practical for self-defence is Yoshinkan.

This is an earlier "hard" style - unlike the later "soft" styles - which is taught to the Japanese riot police (they do a one-year crash course in it to get a black belt).

Bear in mind that even Yoshinkan videos are for demonstration purposes only - real fights are, of course, different - but the techniques can be used successfully. They're done slowly in demos because if these techniques were applied at speed, the "attacker" would have their arms or wrists broken.

As with all martial arts, and particularly Aikido, the secret is technique and the speed at which it's applied.

Here's a demo of Yoshinkan Aikido:



Kindest regards,

James

 

[Subduction Zone]

I have had years of martial arts training and have even taken courses by people who took classes from George Dillman before he went off the deep end.

My hypothesis is that these instructors, that do have some abilities, get too impressed with their own talent. They can apply their real techniques to students, and as they teach their students if they do not comply they get taken down a bit more roughly. As they "learn" they no when to anticipate pain and will pass out on cue. Joint locks, nerve points and other techniques have one thing in common. They all hurt when applied. Students quickly learn to yield when a technique is correctly applied. This can have some drawbacks. They can also learn to yield when they are not correctly applied or in extreme cases they yield when no technique is applied at all.

But there is a reason that instructors always used their students when doing demonstrations. Strangers might resist, even to the point of hurting themselves. I had an instructor that learned the hard way. At one demonstration he asked for a volunteer from the audience for a simple wrist take down. A rather strong individual came up and he could tell by his attitude that he was going to resist. So he made sure that he applied the technique correctly and strongly. The man resisted and his wrist was broken as a result. It was an expensive mistake.

The problem for these instructors is that they can drink their own Kool-Aid and believe that they actually have these no touch capabilities.

Reality can be a very harsh taskmaster.