Senior citizens learn art of self-defense

NORTH BEND, Ore. (AP) — Looking far younger than her 70 years, Ann Fillmore crouches barefoot in the grass, demonstrating aikido stick fighting techniques.

Her long bamboo cane whirls through the air, jabbing, smacking, attacking an invisible target from all directions.

Gathered behind her, her silver-haired pupils lightly grip their own canes, mimicking Fillmore's movements.

"You are much faster than you think you are," Fillmore tells her students.

She glides among them, demonstrating the wrist slap, which fends off a knife-wielding attacker by targeting 'the most sensitive part of the hand." Then the gut jab, the chin smack, the ankle sweep.

Sticks whirl and whoosh around the yard behind the North Bend Senior Center.

The moves are important. But even if the seniors never master a martial art, Fillmore said her 10-week class will empower her students to prevent attacks.

After all, the best time to fend off an attack is before it happens, Fillmore said.

The seniors leave her class with confidence, readiness and walking forward, she said.

"I like feeling like I have power," Lori Benn, 51, said after Tuesday's class. "That physical empowerment."

Fillmore's class combines tai chi with the Japanese art of aikido stick fighting. Most of her students are women, and most are senior citizens.

At the beginning of every 10-week course, new students may appear frail and shaky. They stumble through the tai chi movements. But over time, their cores strengthen, their bodies learn balance, and then, suddenly, they can do it. The stumbling stops, confidence builds.

"The confidence is astounding," she said. "It is more than the common term 'self-confidence.' It is physical confidence."

Still, she tells the women to remain aware, especially if they are attacked. Remember to scream. Yell for help and fight with all your might.

"Women tend to be silent when attacked," Fillmore said. "It is cross-cultural. With women it very often turns out that unless they're defending children, they won't hit back."

It won't happen during this class, but Fillmore recommends finding a way to physically hit something with the sticks — a punching bag, an old rug — so the students know how it feels when the stick hits an object.

Fillmore began studying martial arts in her 30s. A car crash had destroyed her inner ears at age 21, and she wanted to train herself to be balanced and strong.

She has been teaching the art to seniors in the Coos Bay area for nearly a decade and doesn't intend to stop.

"I love with the seniors when it suddenly clicks," Fillmore said. 'I love it. I just love it."

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Information from: The World, http://www.theworldlink.com

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press