AIT - Philosophy - DELTA - Distance

DELTA stands for Distance, Equilibrium, Leverage, Timing and Acceleration and represents the 5 key physical skill areas. These 5 areas make up the areas where you should focus your skills & drills training. If you master these 5 skills then you have mastered the physical aspects of the martial arts or the ‘physics’. Once you have mastered them then everything including your understanding of how to use the laws of combat and the FLITE strategies. It means that your understanding of the martial arts will extend well beyond the merely physical combat skills, they will permeate you’re your whole life and you will see the tremendous benefits that the martial arts can bring.

Let’s look a little more closely at what each skill represents:

• Distance – distance deals with the proximity of you to your target and other words we will use are; space, gap, range, reach and length, all dealing with the space between you and your opponent. The law of proximity says ‘the fighter who controls the distance is the fighter who controls the fight’ and this should give you a sense of the tremendous importance of distance control.
• Equilibrium – equilibrium deals with balance and our ability to maintain a strong yet mobile position which allows us to attack and defend. To lose our balance is to lose our ability to attack and defend and therefore puts us at the mercy of our foe. The law of balance says ‘with good balance we can achieve anything, but without it we can achieve nothing that lasts’.
• Leverage – leverage is our ability to create power or force. It is what puts power into our punches and kicks without using much energy. Our energy is limited and must be conserved because we never know how long a fight may last. If we lose our energy through tiredness we become an easy target an all our strategies and techniques are wasted. The law of leverage says ‘create more with less’
• Timing – Timing is the ability to act at the right moment and involves concepts such as the beat. We must be able to control our timing so that we can maximise the effectiveness of our attacks and defences. Timing comes through massive repetition which brings us an almost intuitive understanding of when to act for the best result. The law of timing says ‘timing is the greater part of all success’
• Acceleration – acceleration means speed, pace and velocity and is our physically ability to be able to move faster than our opponent. Speed is built through a combination of the other 4 DELTA skills; through being better timed, more aligned, balanced and distance. Distance and timing are very closely linked and the law of distance says ‘the control of speed is the greater part of all success’

In the next chapters we will break down these 5 concepts into more meaningful terms but you must remain very aware of these concepts; the laws behind them and the strategies they are involved in.