Sifu Anthony Iglesias of the Syracuse Wing Chun Academy had an idea.  He wanted to create a brief but substantive self-defense course that could be taken in a single day or pair of days by both casual students and enrolled membership alike.  In fact, he wanted all of his current long-term students to take the class -- not just one-time seminar attendees.

"Six Gates" refers, among other things, to a drill done in Wing Chun Kung Fu in which the student protects herself from strikes launched at high, middle, and low lines from either direction by simultaneously counterattacking and striking the incoming limb(s).  Taking his inspiration from this, the program Sifu Iglesias created is a "combatives" course called Six Gates Defense.  Drawing from his extensive Western Boxing background as well as Kung Fu styles (Wing Chun, White Crane, et al) and even some Aikido and Karate, Sifu Iglesias has created a program he believes to be both easily and quickly learned by any student.

The principles of the program are drawn directly from Wing Chun (as you would expect).  These include protection and awareness of the body's centerline, using both hands at the same time, refusing to fight force with force (meaning not trying to "muscle through" a technique straight on), striking in an efficient and linear fashion, targeting pressure points and nerves, fighting on and moving to the opponent's blind side when possible, developing "touch-go" reflexes that train the student to react to offered force, staying close (infighting), and developing the proper mental attitude for aggressive and realistic self-defense.

Following the Six Gates Defense curriculum, students first learn a very basic guard stance -- a "fence," of sorts, that involves placing the hands up in a palm-open, "keep your distance" position that guards the head and (to a lesser degree) the centerline of the body.  From this position they learn the basics of moving forward, back, to the sides, and at diagonals from a standing, bent-knee position.  Sifu Iglesias emphasizes natural movement above everything, capitalizing on the natural tendencies of an individual confronted by a threat.

Basic Six Gates Defense guard stance.

Basic punching, drawn primarily from Western Boxing, follows.  I will say from the outset that I liked this facet of the SGD curriculum least -- because I despise horizontal punching and consider it dangerous to the hand.  Still, I could see perfectly Sifu Iglesias' point.  People instinctively punch horizontally more often than not, at least judging from most of the new Wing Chun Kung Fu students' brief difficulty adapting to the vertical "sun fist" that is Wing Chun's primary punching tool.

The SWCA's senior student, Don (right)
teaches the author a valuable lesson
about necks and elbows.

Punching techniques covered included jabs, crosses, uppercuts, and combinations of these.  Students also learn to use elbow strikes and hammerfists, tools I prefer and which I found far preferable to the horizontal punches.

Sifu Iglesias benefits from extensive experience as a boxer.

Blocking and counterattacking an incoming punch.

No discussion of realistic self-defense is complete without at least some treatment of groundfighting.  Wing Chun Kung Fu is alternatively promoted as focusing on "anti-grappling" (thus refusing to play the dangerous street game of fighting on the ground) and excoriated as too weak where grappling skills are concerned.  Sifu Iglesias chose to focus on a few effective and simple techniques designed to counter incoming attacks (while the defender is on the ground and the attacker is not) and to neutralize ground grapples (such as side and top mounts) in order to regain one's feet.  Some of the techniques involved rolling up the attacker's lower body in a way that would actually do injury to the attacker in real scenarios.

Sifu Iglesias (bottom) begins to counter a grapple.

Because the focus of the SGD curriculum is "real life" threats, weapons are also covered.  These include basic knife defenses, firearms counters at close range (including handguns and longarms), and defenses against clubs and bats.  This material was, for obvious reasons, popular with most of the students.  I found it on target, too (though Sifu Iglesias and I spoke at length about whether the knife attacks were what one should realistically expect).

The SWCA's senior student, Don (right)
teaches the author a yet another valuable
lesson, this time about knives and knees.

Sifu Iglesias rightly pointed out in teaching handgun disarms, for example, that one should grasp and redirect the weapon, not the hand or the wrist of the weapon-bearing limb.  It is, after all, the barrel of the weapon that you seek to move off line.  Mindfulness of where "innocent bystanders" might be was also covered.

The attacker gets too close with his handgun...

...Enabling the defender to turn and push it off line.  This must be
done extremely quickly and is incredibly dangerous.

On the whole I found the Six Gates Defense program worthwhile.  It covered all the basics and bases of physical self-defense in modern times and would be a great way to give people without previous experience at least something with which they could defend themselves (though the individual's drive and willingness to fight back viciously will always be the deciding factors).

Of course, Sifu Iglesias hopes that the average student does not stop after taking this single course.  He would prefer that those who begin their "martial arts" experience with such a seminar would go on to become long-term students, learning physical and mental principles that will serve them well for the rest of their lives.