Mountain Brook Police Officer Matt Sulenski said that, when it comes to staying safe, it’s best to be aware of your surroundings, and he has built a class to teach members of the public how to do that.
People participating in the six-week Situational Awareness Course will meet each Tuesday beginning Jan. 15 to take part in lectures and training led by Mountain Brook officers to hone skills in safety, situational awareness and self-defense.
“The way I geared this is that it’s not going to turn everybody into a ninja,” Sulenski said. “What I’m trying to give them are simple basic techniques to get away from a bad situation.”
The course will have something for everyone, he added.
“There is a portion of the curriculum that’s going to cover sexual assault and rape, but it’s not just necessarily for women,” he said.
There will be lessons that older women and men will find just as helpful as young women who are going off to college and want to be better prepared to avoid danger or defend themselves.
“The majority of people are just not aware of what’s going on around them or what to look for and how not to be a victim,” he said.
What makes this course more effective, in Sulenski’s eyes, is its length. There are built-in reviews for participants to refresh their memories about what they have learned previously in the course.
“I could do this in one big class – one long day – but what happens typically when you go to something like that is … you get taught 12 different techniques. Then, two days later you remember two things,” Sulenski said.
By breaking up each of the lessons and building in review time, Sulenski hopes participants graduate from the course with a bit more knowledge. That being said, he also suggests that anything is better than nothing when it comes to safety.
Martial Arts for Defense
His go-to suggestion for people looking to learn how to defend themselves is to take up martial arts.
It can be as easy as taking a taekwondo class at the YMCA, if that’s all you have access to, he said. But a class that includes actual fight training is preferable.
Brazilian jiu-jitsu is his favorite, and Muay Thai is a close second.
“The more you do something, the less stressful it becomes for you,” he said. “So, if you’ve never been in a physical confrontation before, well, in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, you’re gonna. But they’re going to put you through it in a safe class environment.”
When he is training police officers, Sulenski said, there is a lot of force-on-force training. Newer officers may enter the training nervous, with high heart rates and generally feeling uncomfortable. The more training they go through, the less stressful the fight becomes.
In a high-stress, dangerous situation, adrenaline does kick in, but so does nasal constriction, auditory exclusion, tunnel vision and many other things that impair your situational awareness.
“If you’ve never been hit, then the first time that it happens it’s a shock and you’re not prepared. You don’t know what it’s like. You don’t know what to do,” he said.
By conditioning your body to those stressors in a safe environment, you can physically be better prepared to decide when it’s time to fight or how best to remove yourself from a bad situation.
Later in the course, Sulenski said, officers will set up stress exercises to give participants a glimpse of how those stressors affect their ability to fight.
Participants also will learn basic skills in fighting: how to strike, where to strike, how to use punches and kicks and more.
Lectures will cover topics that include conditioning yourself to be more aware while approaching your car in a parking lot or while at gas stations or in restaurants and other public places.
Sulenski said people tend to think “I’ll never be in this situation,” or “It wouldn’t ever happen to me,” but that’s not necessarily true.
“It’s my personal belief that everybody should have some sort of basic knowledge when it comes to defending yourself,” he said.
When you are mentally aware in any situation, you are better able to sense those gut feelings that tell you something is wrong. Those gut feelings are something to trust, he said.
“If something looks funky or feels funky, listen to that,” Sulenski said.
“When you’re walking to the car, have your keys in your hand,” he added. “Don’t be looking on your phone. Look at what’s around you and the things surrounding your vehicle.
“Unlock the car. You get in. Lock the doors. Put the keys in the ignition and seat belts on and you go. Don’t be just sitting there.”
Future Classes Possible
Though the course is full, a growing wait list has called Mountain Brook Police Chief Ted Cook to add an additional course, which will be held on Thursday evenings from April 4 to May 9. According to Cook, he has already booked at least five participants for the spring course.
“This is something I could see us making a yearly thing,” Sulenski said. “Every year we’ve got people that are going to be going off to college, and local residents need it too.”
Not only does this program benefit the public, it’s something that the training officers involved enjoy doing. For Sulenski, who trains officers as well, it is gratifying to teach anyone a new skill.
“I really enjoy watching someone go from having a zero skill set in an area to building up their skill set, becoming proficient and then really learning something new and feeling like they got something good out of this. They can say, ‘I feel better prepared for my life.’”
For more information about the class and to register, email [email protected].