The term ‘masterclass’ gets thrown around so often that when I signed up for Zeev Cohen’s Carnage master class, I admittedly felt quite ambivalent not least because I’m told Zeev has a reputation of really pushing his students.
Upon entering Harlow’s sports hall, filled with eager and somewhat nervous looking students from an array of Krav Maga clubs from various parts of the UK, I expelled a sigh of relief that I was reminded this isn’t grading. I’m here to learn and have fun.
The warm up predominantly worked on strengthening our core and agility – exercises we often do in our classes. After we had broken a good sweat we were introduced to Zeev who made every demonstration look ridiculously easy. His clarity of instruction and passion was evident.
Zeev ran us through various drills, from working on different distances to 360 defences against the knife. The highlight was when we incorporated our knowledge by working on headlocks and ground fighting. Getting to train with people of different sizes and levels was an insightful experience.
What was a pleasant surprise to me was the endurance level of KML students in comparison to the other clubs’ students. Whilst the session was 4 hours, the intensity level of the drills was almost identical to what we do on an average Thursday combat class.
So what made this a masterclass? To be reminded of how the essence of Krav Maga is one’s mental determination to keep going.
- Dion