Chapter 3. Battle - the ultimate human sport.

When you watch animals in the wild, what is the 'sport' you most often see? 

FIGHTING BULLS, WRESTLING DOGS, RUNNING HORSES, BIRDS FLYING INTO EACHOTHER, GOATS RAMMING HORNS?
In nature, sports seems to be an activity in preparation of only two things - SURVIVAL and MATING. 

Mating games and play fighting seem to be the only two forms of 'sport' in the wild. Often it becomes applicable to two things - a real fight or flight situation, or the acquisition of a mate. And they all actually leads only to ONE SINGLE GOAL. Survival - of the self, or the kind (species). 

Now extrapolate that to humans. The oldest known ways of proving one's superiority over another, was to demonstrate skills that would provide for a better living. Even artistic skills initially included only arts like making of stone weapons and spears. But the very first ones were demonstrations of practices that would lead to a livelihood and a safe and secure life. FIGHTING, HUNTING, FISHING, RUNNING, ARCHERY, SPEAR THROWING and so on.

The oldest records of sport in cave paintings depict exactly this. 

And when man got even more social, the only things that changed is the brutality of these demonstrations. And they named it 'SPORT'. They were still demonstrating the same capabilities, but without the severe outcomes of death, starvation or permanent damage (well, sometimes not).
These 'Sports' were practiced and developed as activities and arts, in groups and alone, directly in contact against others or by time or distance. Anything more brutal was slowly termed illegal or criminal. But these very brutal arts are still practiced in the armed forces, for situations of 'carnal sport' that nations today call BATTLE or WAR.

The ultimate athlete in the stone age was the one who could use all his physical and mental resources to survive against all odds - human, beastly and geographic. The ultimate athlete in the roman era was the olympian who showed proficiency at all physical activities - but even greater than him was the athlete known as the gladiator - who fought and survived against brutal odds. 

No athlete in all of the roman empire was more reknowned than the gladiator. Infact, not just rome, but across the world, in the history of sports, the most reknowned sport has been the martial art of the country/time. Whether its archery and swordsmanship in the time of genghis khan, or pankration in greece or wrestling in iran, or kalaripayattu in ancient india.

Today, yes, we have a zillion sports and even the olympics, and we have outlawed arenas of gladiators(apart from World Wrestling Entertainment and UFC which still make tons of money and draw audiences from all over the world). BUT still, if we were to be honest, there is no greater athlete than the one trained to survive the worst of all mankind - WAR. 

Infact, war has BRED sport all through civillization. War messengers led to marathons and parkour, archers to archery, cavalry to horse riding, naval warfare to rowing, battle formations and timed strategies to modern day contact sports like rugby and field sports like hockey and football. Not just that but even war training sessions that are simulations of real war, are called WAR GAMES. 

If you notice, it is only the wealthy who had a reason to discourage physical development who promoted inactive sports like croquet, golf and cricket - especially to their colonized parts. Infact, the minute they realised martial potential of any sport that could help in a revolution, they banned it - eg: kalaripayattu was banned in kerela(south-india) by the inaders, capoeira developed because martial arts were banned in brazil, practice of kung fu and archery was banned in certain chinese provinces. 

The crossovers between WAR/BATTLE and SPORT are obvious - whether its the colors, the strategy, the war paint, the psyche, the training, the approach. Its literally parallel.

It may be grammatically wrong to say so but at its best,
SPORT IS WAR.
and WAR IS SPORT. 

Survival may not officially be a SPORT today, but it is the one physical and mental activity worth training for. In an open survival situation - whether a war or  a street fight - The ultimate athlete would not be the one who is stronger, faster or bigger alone. Because like a true sport, it also requires mental conditioning and preparedness. A presence of mind and a general preparedness of the body in a measure that will ensure survival. and THAT, no matter what 'sports' you play or what gym routine you follow or what books you read, is worth training for. For that is what can one day truly decide whether you live or die.

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THE ADRENALINE PERSPECTIVE:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4g25d7_Afmc

ADRENALINE is the hormone that rushes through your body when you face fear or are trying to push yourself extremely hard. It is also the hormone that drives almost every major sport. It is for this reason that it becomes a key in understanding the nature of SPORT.

Adrenaline when released, triggers a unique FIGHT OR FLIGHT response. It gives the person an elevated level of activity on the CNS - either to run away and evade the fear causing situation, or to fight against it.

It gives your strength, paralyses you, alerts your senses, desensitizes you, fires up your muscular memories, numbs your injuries, and a lot more - depending on the way your body reacts - and more importantly, on the way YOU have conditioned your body.

And can there be any greater FEAR than death itself? Whether from starvation for the paleolithic hunting-gathering man or from battle for the civilized soldier or from a skirmish for the caveman? Survival is the most primal instinct of man. A creature will instinctively do everything in its capacity - physical and mental, voluntary and involuntary, to survive.

So if Sport refers to 'a competitive physical activity based in physical athleticism or physical dexterity.' And adrenaline is the key hormone influencing these two factors biologically, we can say that since facing, surviving , fighting or fleeing the fear of death from an opponent raises it to the highest levels, it must be the greatest sport of all - aka: BATTLE.

(ofcourse this does not comply by the strict modern definition of sport which includes the fact that no participant must get hurt - but we are going down to the stripped basis. So we'll consider the older definition of sport.)

Whether its in the battlefield or in the jungle, ages ago or even today, in an arena or on the streets. By challenging survival, BATTLE is the greatest ADRENALINE exciter of all.

WHAT ABOUT NON ADRENALINE DEPENDANT SPORTS LIKE ARCHERY?
For the answer to this, you'll again have to go back to the initial notes on the history of sports. Archery evolved as a sport directly from hunting (for survival) and battle (again for survival). And whether through war or hunger, the fear of death is again the best known manipulator of adrenaline. So though the sport today may not depend on directly harnessing adrenaline, its origins still do.

[Note: Actually, this evolution of concentration dependant sports that have directly grown from the battlefield is quite interesting. Both archery and shooting require a drop in heart rate and intense control which is the opposite of the usual effect of adrenaline. So to keep calm in these situations, people had to learn to counteract adrenaline by teaching the mind to control it. It is simpler to understand that when you know that archers use valium and other depressants before competitions to make them steadier. (i'll cover it in detail on the chapter on weapon skills). So though it originated driven by adrenaline, it has evolved into a sport that is defined by controlling adrenaline.]

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REAL LIFE - REAL SPORT
On the playground, we have the luxury of rules and divisions. Age groups, weight classes, pro and novice categories, gender, region, one on one or tag team or teams etc. But in real life, when challenged in the battlefield or in a streetfight, there are none of these safety lines. Your size doesn't matter, your speed doesn't matter, your training doesn't matter - or all of  it matters - DEPENDING on how you make the most of it. Its not just your body, but also the conditioning and presence of your mind. And that is what makes survival skills, general preparedness and combat readiness the most essential of all skills in the sport of battle. 

That is what makes being BattleReady being the closest you can be to a universal athlete. 

And that is what I'm aiming for. 

The 'Kaccha Limbu' phenomenon

The Ugly Duckling story makes an apt parallel for the Kaccha limbu Phenomenon.

Chapter 1. The 'Kaccha Limbu' phenomenon
Universal flaws in the educational and social systems that contribute to unjustly classifying kids as jocks and wimps - and suggested measures to overcome them.

'Sometimes being the problem helps you understand the problem better.'

If you went to school in India as I did, you must have noticed the practice of calling the weaker, smaller kids 'kaccha limbus' (raw lemons) during a game - they are the ones picked last on any team, not allowed to bat or bowl but just to field in a game of cricket or just pushed somewhere into the background in a game of football. I, myself grew up as a 'kaccha limbu'. No doubt about it that i was bad at sports among the people of my class/batch (but that has multiple reasons to which we shall get to soon) but to make matters worse, I had too many ideals - especially against lying. So I was generally the boy nobody wanted on their team because if i got out, i would walk off the crease even if the game was rigged by putting our own umpire and i was given not out - and if i was made the umpire while my team bats, I would call fair and not cheat - and in a bunch of kids obsessed with winning over sportsmanship, that's way too much idealism. This put me away from teamsports on the whole and i found myself liking martial arts, swimming, trekking, rifle shooting and games/sports which do not need groups. And yet almost all through school i was never a great athlete. ALMOST.
and that is where the key lies.
Towards the end of my school life and into college, I improved phenomenally in sports and as an athlete - i won a sprint for the first time when i was 14, i hit a six among my school mates for the first time at 14, i won swimming and judo competitions at 15-16, i kicked serious ass at volleyball in college - and even today, at 27 i'm fitter, faster, stronger than most people my age. Infact, i'd even say that most people my age and size cant even accomplish half the physical feats i can.
What happened? Where did the kaccha limbu go? Was there some kind of miracle that occurred as i hit teenage and beyond?

It is something I noticed all through school but couldn't find the right words to put it across - until  Malcolm Gladwell pointed it out in the best ways possible. In his book Outliers, Malcolm points out that the difference in the academic year and the actual year results in an unfair advantage to people born in certain months. Since motor development is extremely rapid in the early years even a difference of few months can make a huge difference. The kids that are in the same class but are older by a few months are with a magnanimous advantage over the smaller kids. These kids are better at sports and many activities than the younger kids - but they are not seen as younger and older, but as the same age! And in India, since the academic year starts in JUNE-JULY Me being born in June put me up for a direct disadvantage against kids born earlier that year (march-april predominantly). And kids born post july-august would go on to the next years batch way older in their own batch and yet percieved to be of the same age. Add to that the fact that there were kids who had flunked certain classes and were later on in my class - years older than any of us (these were the unquestioned jocks - stronger, taller and always at the head of any game). 

On top of that, i was born blue, had a leg fracture at age 2 that left me bed ridden for 6 months and had a genetic predisposition towards low bone density. My motor function development was not just slow - it was RETARDED to say the least. 

Now imagine a game in this class of percieved 'equals'. me and a bunch of kids who were typically june-july born or were obese were the last ones allowed to play any game - so our motor functions did not get any better any faster but infact was stunted even further. ( The only place where we were all equal was in the morning Physical training class where we were all made to go through the same drills uniformly.) Not allowed to bat/bowl, not allowed to play ahead, not passed the ball even when playing - it was a very frustrating scenario - not just for me, but for every kid who was in that situation of being labelled a 'kacchha limbu'. 
On the other hand, the kids who were admitted to school a year late or were flunkies who had stayed back a year were considered the 'gifted' ones - they got to play leads at every game, the coaches preferred them, they were the prima donnas. They just got better and better every year owing to the amount of preferential treatment and practice they got! And this gets worse - with time i also came across coaches who were willing to change their birth year on record so that they could compete with younger kids while being much older to earn trophies for the school/club/state. 
Infact, i actually looked back at the school record of the 'best athlete' every year during my tenure in school and noticed that 90% of them were students who were plainly one year older to the rest of the students when the award was given. So only the 10% of that list were truly genetically gifted/hardworking sportsmen who had earned that award on righteous merit and not owing to a fallacy of the system. And i admire those guys! i met a few of them recently and they are still athletic for their age - some of them even being sportsmen even today. Those are real sportsmen/athletes.
And where are most of those 'prima donnas' today? most of them have big belly paunches and don't play any sport, have mediocre levels of athleticism and are just full of air of memories of the time they were great athletes. Their performance at even their most favored sport has gone below their plateau of averageness, let alone peak. 

What Happened to the STAR athletes? How did some 'kaccha limbus' catch up to them so fast and so suddenly? Here's what happened: 
Till early school set in, the older kids had an advantage over the other kids due to their developed motor system and thanks to the system, that advantage kept growing in their favor all the way upto teenage. Talent didn't truly count for shit. But once teenage set in, the field was sort of levelled - the differential in the development of motor capabilities started levelling out or reaching a plateau - Talent became key. Yet, the years of preferrential treatment and extra practice that the 'jocks' got still kept them in the lead. At this juncture, some 'kaccha limbus' that still didn't give up, started picking up faster and faster. By the first two teen years, the playround was almost levelled in therms of motor capabilities - the only other factors being PRACTICE and TRAINING and muscular development. By 18, the field is actually levelled but the 'jocks' who are still practicing are still often ahead in the game, but not by much, at times due to higher muscular development from years of training. and as it starts moving towards 25 - the age where the body's developmental peak is reached and plateaued, the field is but anyone's field. AND THAT IS WHERE TALENT, SHEER WILL POWER AND EFFORT HAS THE CAPABILITY TO OVERCOME EVERYTHING ELSE.

The Kaccha Limbu that has talent and keeps on training and developing his skills eventually at this point is most likely surpass the jock who was always ahead of him.

Look around you and you'll see a million examples of this phenomenon. 
When you have such a flawed schooling system, would you change it or take advantage of it?

On a systemic level, we would have to match our academic year with the regular year or make sure that kids are admitted to school on ages actually appropriate for their class - especially for sports. infact, for sports and games in early classes, the division of age should be 3 monthly - 6 monthly - annually in growing grades respectively. 

But expecting a system to improve is too much, especially in a country like india. So let me just suggest ways to beat the system and keep your child at par with his actual development: 

Delayed School Admission:
If we can't change the system, i suggest we don't hurry ourselves into putting our kids to school according to the academic year. A school year wasted is not really wasted, its rather invested in improving the kids mental an motor functions. So if your kid is born in jun-july-august- don't be in a hurry to put him/her into school, take your time and send him/her to school in another year. This way the bias would be in your kids favour. 

Playgroup Different from School Group:
Well this wasn't possible for me in a hostel, but let your kid have a playgroup of kids actually his own age or younger from time to time. it will help build his motor functions and self esteem in a big way. 
When i was in school, i realised that every time i went back to school after a vacation, i actually got better at sports - as back home, i played with my younger cousins and friends, putting me at an advantage. When i went back into my group of playing with the 'grown ups' i carried a few of the benefits from my vacation over. 

Use Science, its available:
If your kid actually has a physical condition that delays or disrupts his motor functioning, pay heed to it and take professional help. A little help at a young age makes a huge difference at a later age. Its like a growing snowball. for eg: if your child has flat feet, get orthopedic insoles or he would grow up thinking he is a naturally bad runner/athlete where as the actual problem would be that his feet have pronated from being uncorrected for so many years. (as in my case). If your kid has dietary problems, fix them by visiting a good nutritionist. These are small pebbles that later turn into boulders.

PS: and for parents who are in a hurry to put their kids to school just because their neighbour/relative's child is also in school - i'll kick you in the face. Don't ruin your kids life - he/she would have a double whammy - not just with this flawed system we have in place but also against your clearly misplaced and comparative expectations.