In 1969, Loren Christensen, an accomplished sparring competitor in karate tournaments, began duty as a military policeman in one of the roughest cities in the world-Saigon, Vietnam. It was the opportunity of a lifetime for a martial artist to test his skill and see what did and did not work in a real fight. After only one week of patrolling the streets, getting into a half-dozen or more confrontations every night, Christensen realized he had to scrap everything he'd ever learned from controlled karate tournaments in order to survive his tour of duty.

Christensen learned the hard wav that the concepts of competition karate--move around, sneak in, and tag a point--could get him seriously hurt or killed. He learned that real fights were explosive and far more violent than karate sparring matches. When he returned home in 1970, he quit training in sport karate and devoted himself to making his training as realistic as possible.

Anything Goes is a distillation of the physical, mental, and philosophical adjustments a martial artist must make in order to survive the violence of a real fight.

Christensen exposes the weaknesses of popular hand techniques and kicks commonly used in sparring competition, and shows what will work to stop a determined opponent. He covers areas of self-defense that go beyond safe but unrealistic tournament guidelines, including grappling, vulnerable targets, and using the environment as a weapon. Finally, Christensen offers training tips and sparring drills that will sharpen the skills necessary to come out on top of any physical confrontation.

Traditional karate tournaments are governed by many rules. In a streetfight, there is only one rule: anything goes!