Falling and Rolling

Falling and Rolling

Edgar has told our class that rolling is "advanced...to intermediate skill." Most people find falling easier to pick up. But I think, to get comfortable with the floor, take it back even further. Get on the floor every day. It is immensely helpful to the muscles to roll around on the floor, the way a dog might, using your hips and shoulders to move yourself. Let on leg fall over the other, as in a "4" shape, keeping the other leg straight and on the floor. Allow gravity to move your limbs, let your hip or shoulder move your leg or arm. Movement should originate from the center of the body, rather than the outer limbs.

To be comfortable on the floor, you must have a certain psychological mind-set. Groundwork, falls, and rolls reveal much that is hidden during standing work. Some people are more relaxed on the floor, but by and large, I'd say most people are more uncomfortable. Fear and tension will make any contact with the floor uncomfortable. Letting go of fear is a leap of faith. You have to trust that your body will protect itself. It will, if you do not interfere with natural function.

Systema falls are a skill that we all learned during our first few classes; Edgar considers it important for safety. With one hand on the back of your skull to protect it, slide into the ground, like sliding under the bedclothes, "like fabric," Edgar says. He uses a stick and slides it along the floor until it is parallel and flush, to demonstrate. I explain to newcomers that it's almost like sitting down with one leg held straight, the other bending as low as possible. Usually, we keep our legs flat and flush to the ground after we fall. This allows you to use your legs more covertly. If your legs fly up when you fall, it's tension in the lower body. Try to use a wave-like motion during the fall, to let this tension ripple rather than block movement. Kicking can be effective, but if you can kick low, it's easier to avoid your partner catching your ankle between his legs.

You shouldn't make much noise as you hit the ground. It's a soft movement. In my opinion, acquiring this soft contact with the ground is critical to Systema training. That contact with the ground must be avoided is a mental barrier. It's fear, and as long as your movements stem from a desire to avoid the floor, you'll be restricting your range of motion, acting with a plan.

If you aren't comfortable going down to the floor, have someone push or pull you from all directions. Practice on grass or sand if you are uneasy, but move to a hard surface as soon as you feel comfortable.

There are other ways to fall, forward, backwards, sideways, but obviously landing on your back is more strategic than landing on your stomach. It is also less dangerous, your back has more padding, and with the hand protecting the back of the head, and soft contact, falls are perfectly safe.

Never struggle to avoid the floor. Accept it, for the ground will always be beneath you; discomfort with going down will impede your training. Also avoid struggling with your partner, resisting going down. Slow sparring requires a certain amount of "playacting" as Arthur Sennot described it. Unlike ordinary playacting, slow sparring makes circumstances more, rather than less, realistic. A car can execute a turn at 30 mph that it cannot perform at 80. We must keep that in mind during slow sparring, and avoid thwarting our partner's confidence by being resistant where we could not do so at ordinary speeds. (I am paraphrasing Arthur's excellent article "The Slow Sparring Game of Russian Martial Art.")

So that means no speeding up, and also no stopping. A real attacker would not stop. Some people do this thinking it's making it easier for their partner. In fact it's making it more difficult, unless the exercise specifically calls for it, follow through with the attack. And do not hold yourself a few inches off the ground when an attacker moving at full speed would have knocked you cleanly down. Respect the rules of the slow sparring game, in order to get the most benefit from this excellent training tool.

Most people are comfortable with falling after a few months, however, some people are naturally relaxed and take to it right away. Naturally relaxed people have an advantage over more tense newcomers. They have one of the fundamentals down "pat." It's the hardest fundamental to train yourself into. Form, breathing, movement, these can be "learned." Relaxation has to be "felt." I do wish there was a way to mentally "relax" people but it must come from within. In my very limited experience, discomfort with the floor is usually due to fear, and this is overcome with practice.

An important part of falling is getting up again. You should aspire to rise from the floor without using your hands or even your knees. This is not as easy as it sounds. Slow squats help build the strong tendons needed to rise in this way. I can't do it, so I just try to get up using one knee. Rotating while falling, sort of spinning one leg to fall in a circular fashion, helps me to rise more easily. I also rise in circular way.

Rolling is a lot harder than falling, in my opinion. Try starting on all fours. Think of yourself as a square, and drop one corner of the square (your shoulder). Keep the arm straight and outstretched as you drop the same shoulder. Tuck your head under the opposite shoulder. The other hand can simply guide the roll, or move naturally out of the way. Don't cross the spine; if you start on your right shoulder, end up on your right side. Denis taught us to land on one side or the other, never flat on the back. It makes it faster to get up again.

If you want to change direction mid-roll, instead of crossing your spine, rotate your shoulders and hips. It's easier to learn how to do this if your partner lies on the ground, stomach down. Roll toward them, and change direction so that you land not on your back, but on your stomach, across them.

You can also practice rolling from a flat position on your stomach. Draw yourself upward, knees into chest, like an inchworm, and drop your hips over. Don't push yourself into the roll, just bring your hips up and drop them. You should be able to roll in a narrow space in this way.

Instead of thinking of it as a roll, think of just "turning yourself over" as you would in a swimming pool. Don't heave your legs over yourself, instead, move your tucked head under your armpit and just turn yourself inside out. You hardly need to put any energy into a roll; gravity does the work for you.

Once you are comfortable rolling from all fours, move to a kneel. This is no different from all fours; your feet are still on the ground, and you simply lower your upper body a bit more from a kneel.

The next stage is rolling from all fours, but with your knees off the ground, like an ape. I found this to be very scary. I have only just gotten comfortable with this. What helped me was bringing my feet and my palms close together, making an acute angle with my body, so that all I had to do was slightly elevate and drop my hips over, and gravity helped me into the roll. After that, rolling from a standing position wasn't much harder, although it's still not very smooth.

You should eventually learn to roll from a walk, or from being pushed or pulled in different directions. Edgar sometimes has us mill around and drop into a roll when he claps his hands. But I still use my knees for a roll from a dynamic position. I am very pleased with my progress; it has taken months, but it's simply a matter of getting over the fear, and that in itself is just a matter of time.