My first fight.... explained.

First i will tell you about me & my situation. Im 16 years old, (please dont jump to assumptions yet) Alot stronger than your average 16 year old. (i can bench more than 200lbs) and am pretty built for my height. My fight with someone my age. The guy i shal call X. Is 16 also. Smaller in stature. but is "experienced" as gets in lots of fights.

Im not going into what happened before but the situation is. Me + him on the beach. he has 2 friend with him. Similar build to him. And i ahve 1 friend with me. Him a bit smaller than me.

Before my fight i came here and read some stuff and tried to get "clued up" because i was aware the fight was going to happen. As the guy was after me.

This is how the events unfolded:

. He walked up to me. Started shouting abuse. followed by a slight push. (i remained calm and told him im not after a fight and i suggest he leave unless he wants to get hurt)
. when i saw him walking towards me i picked up sand and put it in my pocket (he didnt see)
. After he pushed me, i got the sand threw it in his face. Then one strike to the face and he was crouching holding his eyes.
. A nee to the head put him on the floor.
. This was followed by a kick to the face.


We then just looked at his friends, who were in shock. Not sure if they were going to start. but we just walked off slowly.

Oppinions on events: i know i could have taken the guy in a fair 1v1 fight. as my size. But was aware of him telling his "friends" that he would bring a knife. So i coulding take the risk?

i waited till he pushed me first.but didnt let him get first strike.

Over people around said he was the provoker and said they would testify for me. The "attacker" went to hospital & is allegidly going to press charges.

I dont want to talk about how the events led up to the fight because the were irrelavant. as far as u have to know. he has always been the agressor. Before the fight i showed reluctace to fight which i think he took as a sign as a weakness so pursued the fight.

Oppinions on how to handle it better ? Was the kick to the face too much? i have atleast 5 non friends who witnessed this. i got there names and numbers and they are willing to say he provoked me.

Oh boy.. Andy, first thing why did you feel the need to fight, those are such extreme measures to take. Surfing this forum is for people to share MA information and technique not for instructing 16 year old boys to kick other boys in the face. Yes the kick to the face was to much.After you Ninja'd him with your sand blast wasn't that enough? Now your going to have to go to court and will obviously have some type of assault record...congradulations. You kids! [IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/frown.gif[/IMG]

I'm not a lawyer, but from the sound of things you may want to get one.

You knew a fight was coming, and prepared for it, but made no effort to leave the area or talk the other guy out of fighting you. This is likely to be viewed as "mutual combat", which may leave you liable both civilly and criminally speaking.

Even if what happened is viewed as self defense, you are obligated to stop your attack if it becomes clear the attacker is no longer a threat. Depending on how things go, a jury may feel that your last kick on a downed opponent was not necessary, exposing you again to civil liability. In other words, even though the other guy is (apparently) a jerk, and even though he (apparently) "started it", and even though in another time the legal system would have likely been reluctant to get involved, if this guy decides to press charges you are likely to be found guilty of assault and battery and then further likely to be sued for said jerk's medical expenses and other damages. Welcome to the wonderful world of "street fighting", tough guy!

[IMG]http://www.fightingarts.com/forums/ubb/smile.gif[/IMG]

You can hope that his parents will see this as "what kids do" and tell their son to take his lumps and learn his lesson, but that would unfortunately be a rarity in our modern world. You might consider calling to see how he's doing, apologize for the fight, and attempt to settle your differences for good. This may derail any pending legal action. Good luck.

Next time... well, if you're reading this and you have a functioning brain maybe you will try very, very hard to make sure there is no next time. Unfortunately the days of a good, honest fist fight are long gone. Then again, throwing sand in someone's face violates the "old code" anyway. There is precious little honor these days... (IMHO, and all that)

Here's the thing: if you didn't want to fight him, didn't intend to fight him, and tried to avoid the fight, then why did you first load your pockets with sand?

In Florida a man was attacked by four thugs with long criminal records while he was getting into his car. Before the attack the man noticed that these guys were approaching him and pulled out a knife from his glove box, of course, he didn't show it to them. When he was attacked he carved them up really good and in my opinion defended himself as best he could. The jury, on the other hand, found that by pulling the knife when he recognized danger instead of running away while he had the chance this gentleman had actually premeditated an attack. He was sent to prison.

I'm not saying you are going to go to jail; just that I wouldn't go around telling people that you put the sand in your pocket in anticipation of a fight. You should consult an attorney if possible. I know that when I was a teenager I got into lots of crazy stuff and had to utilize the services of a few places in NYC that offer free legal counsel to kids. Maybe you could find something like that near you.

As for what you should have done? Hindsight is twenty-twenty, right? The knee to the head and kick to the face sounds like it might have been excessive. Then again, your an inexperienced fighter right? And at the time you were probably feeling a lot of different emotions, not the least of which would have been fear, so who else but you can say for sure. The only rule I'd go by is that If you had to really think about it, before you did it, then it was probably excessive.

In any event I'd be sure to keep an eye out in case this guy tries to get revenge.

Stupid crap happens all the time, learn as much as you can from it and move on.

Nice job with the sand, although you probably should not have even showed up in the first place.

maybe thats all true and you probally sholdent have been at the beach if you knew he was gonna go their to fight you but since you were already tehre and the fight was enevitable you actually did the right thing... i am sure that everyone o this board knows that some schmuck like that wont back down.. wont listen to the whole i don;t want to fight speech... there were three all together.. the sand idea was perfect.. it worked and it allowed you to make an example out of him so that his friends would be too afriad to fight....

tips for the future, don't get into fights purposely, just don't start them, but be sure as hell ready to finish them... you can't think about the cops when your life is on the line.. better to do jail time then to die right there or spend those months in a hospital

Once on the ground a attacker is pretty much viewed as defeated unless he gets back up or draws a weapon. The kick while he was down is whats going to hurt you. The sand may be considered a weapon. Id bring up the knife in court and tell them that you were afraid for your life, and that you had no intention of fighting him but came upon him by chance.