Product Description

The first of its kind - an illustrated guide to the hottest new fitness trend from a top expert in the field. Increasingly popular as a self-defence method and fitness program, Krav Maga is the Israeli military's renowned method for fending off attackers. Based on the principles of doing minimal harm and enhancing our natural instincts for self-protection, anyone can master its moves - regardless of strength, size, age or gender. In this excellent beginner's guide David Khan presents the basic techniques and principles. Topics include: Anticipating an attack; Understanding the bodies vulnerable targets; Mastering essential defence techniques, and more

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #14573 in Books
• Published on: 2005-02-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 208 pages

About the Author
David Khan was named "Top Fitness Guru" by New York Magazine in January 2004 He sits on the board of the Israeli Krav Maga Association He is founder and director of the Krav Maga programme in America He is a graduate of Princeton University and lives in New York City

Customer Reviews

Superb introduction
As a UK military close combat instructor, I cannot recommend this book highly enough! If you are serious about self-defence, and these days you should be, then you could do a lot worse than start here. David Kahn is a well-known (in the US) practitioner of the art of Krav Maga. The International Krav Maga Association has a good website to help you find local instructors for other countries.

The book gives a nice little history of how the art came to be, and the reasoning behind it. This is not an "ancient art", although it draws on theories and practices of many other fighting arts, and converts and updates them for realistic situations. Krav Maga is essentially a "street" combat system, not a demonstration system. It's not a pretty art, it's designed to get you out of a situation the quickest way possible - which by necessity means the most direct and most effective, most often the most violent approach. If you think you can't do this, then you are already a victim - you have to be prepared to take a fight as far as it needs to be taken - until the aggressor is unable to carry on, or you can be away on your toes!

This book will give you an idea of how to defend yourself, but needs to be backed up with formal training (you will not be able to devote full power training to the techniques unless you are in a properly supervised environment). Saying that, the twelve week programme contained in the book is good enough to get you to a basic level of conditioning and awareness. The best two techniques can be learnt and applied in 5 minutes, as Kahn explains - gouge the eyes, attack the groin, run away! There is no shame in running away if it lets you live another day!

In summary, this is a great book - it details the basic moves for the entry-level practitioner of Krav Maga, and the twelve week programme will get you to a level at which you should be able to defend yourself - it also gets you extremely fit! I would also recommend attending local classes - this is a growing system, with more instructors being trained all the time. Buy this book, devote some time to it, and hope that you never have to apply any of the techniques for real!

The very best Krav Maga book you can buy!
A truly inspirational book!

Easily the best book of this genre.

Whole heartedly recommended to anyone wishing to learn Krav Maga.

Having been training in Krav Maga for a while now this book is a true motivational and reference aid. Incredibly well written and all moves are explained in easy-to-understand instructions, more importantly you`ll retain what you learn.

I would definitely classify this book as a must-buy item if you wish to learn or would like to improve in Krav Maga.

Consider other Krav Maga books but only AFTER you buy this one.

Well worthy of a 5 star review!!

Refreshingly good.
Initially I was very sceptical about this book, it being in my nature to be distrustful of these sorts of things. However, I had the good fortune to find a copy on a shelf in a bookshop and decided to leaf through it to see if it was worthwhile.

It really is a great book. The only disappointment thus far is that there are no diagrams of the strike points, when there are diagrams showing most of the strikes themselves, and the fighting stances. Overall, though, an excellent read.

NB: Though this is an excellent book, IN NO WAY DOES THIS BOOK REPLACE THE NEED FOR REGULAR TRAINING WITH A PROFESSIONAL KRAV MAGA INSTRUCTOR. Don't ever forget that.