Tomahawk Training: Books, Equipment, Hands-On, & VHS/DVDs

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Oct 19, 2002
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I thought I'd start up a thread where we can post links to some various traininng sources out there for people who want to learn to use the 'hawk as a weapon. Teachers of the 'hawk as a weapon should likewise feel free to jump on here and post upcoming seminars/classes for 'hawk use.

So let's get started!

THE manuals on using the tomahawk as a weapon, our very own Dwight McLemore's books The Fighting Tomahawk and The Fighting Tomahawk, Volume II. Dwight's three-disc DVD set, The Fighting Tomahawk: The Video, is now available through Paladin Press as well.

James Keating of Comtech offers a pair (not necessarily a set, though) of instructional DVD's on fighting with the 'hawk. See here to order them through Alliance Martial Arts (scroll down to the Comtech Specificity / Train At Home Series). Here are several reviews of his first DVD, and here is the review of his second DVD.

Lynn Thompson of Cold Steel also offers a tomahawk fighting set of DVDs called The Fighting Tomahawk, though this set is much more expensive than the one above. I have talked to Mr. Keating, though, and he speaks pretty highly of it. Click here to watch a short trailer of the set. EDITED: I now have this series in my collection as well, and it is very good. I haven't done an actual review on it yet, though.

In this old thread, Andy Prisco of the American Tomahawk Company gives a rave review of Sayoc's approx. 1/2 hour (out of 2 hours total) segment on the tomahawk in their Sama Sama 2003 DVD, stating that
Andy Prisco in January 2004 said:
The segment on the DVD contains in my view, more material than any other production currently available that I know about...and I have seen most of what little material is indeed out there on the Tomahawk.
Other than his review, I have heard nothing about it, but Andy knows what he's talking about when it comes to tomahawks. EDITED: I broke down and bought this DVD just to have everything that is currently available in DVD form for tomahawk instruction in my collection. I think there is actually only about 18 minutes of useful footage with the tomahawk, but it is a VERY good 18 minutes. The instruction is mostly just the use of Sayoc's 12-move Tomahawk Template, with three improvised three-move sets at the end. However, don't let that daunt you. What's on this DVD is something every would-be tomahawk fighter should have in his repertoire as it shows the tomahawk for what it can truly be - a vicious killing weapon. My review can be found here.

Here's some training blades. An inexpensive hard plastic training tomahawk can be found here. Dwight just recently recommended the TakKnife TAK Vietnam Tomahawk as a training aid. Dwight also has corroborated with TakKnife to reproduce his McLemore/Ridge Tomahawk that is used in his upcoming tomahawk fighting DVD.

Some might find Harry McEvoy's book, Knife and Tomahawk Throwing: The Art of the Experts to be useful in learning to throw a 'hawk. I bought his first version, which is much shorter, and didn't get much from it. I can't say about this newer version though.

Here's a link to a site where an old muzzleloader wrote an article on throwing the tomahawk. It's pretty good. There's also a couple decent sites on throwing here, here, and here. A Google search will come up with a bunch of others. I remember seeing or reading a site somewhere where the author mentioned how to make a sliding target so you could practice throwing at a moving object, but can't find it at the current moment.
 
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I really like Lynn Thompson's video. While I don't work quite the same as he does, I really learned a lot from his videos
My Best
Dwight
 
That's two professionals that say Lynn's training dvds are good! I guess I have to buy them! Shame... :D
 
Hmm... it took me a couple "edit's" of my original post where I added new material to realize that it doesn't get bumped to the top when I edit, only when I post a new thread. I guess I'll start adding material as additional posts instead of just editing and bumping every time I add something new I've discovered. *shrug* :thumbup:







... unless this thread deserves a sticky... :D
 
Excellent thread FSCJedi, lot's of great information. Of course it's been a while since I've been on the Sayoc Site, and now I have to wrestle with myself over whether it's worth my wife killing me, to get their new tactical tomahawk. :eek:
 
I also liked Sayoc turn in the hawk on sama-sama 2003 DVD, as well as Jim Keating's video on the subject. Though I have not yet seen Lyn Thompson's DVDs, I have the article on the use of the hawk he once wrote and that was available for downlod for some time, but it seems to me that it is not to be found on the Internet anymore:( Newertheless, it is really informative and contains a lot of valuable advice in a short form.
In regards, of Mr. Mc Lemore's book, I am still waiting to get my hands on it, by judging by what he has done with his two bowie books, I am sure it must be excellent.
 
I also liked Sayoc turn in the hawk on sama-sama 2003 DVD, as well as Jim Keating's video on the subject. Though I have not yet seen Lyn Thompson's DVDs, I have the article on the use of the hawk he once wrote and that was available for downlod for some time, but it seems to me that it is not to be found on the Internet anymore:( Newertheless, it is really informative and contains a lot of valuable advice in a short form.
In regards, of Mr. Mc Lemore's book, I am still waiting to get my hands on it, by judging by what he has done with his two bowie books, I am sure it must be excellent.
Hetman, is that article in pdf format? Can you email it to me?
 
Hetman, is that article in pdf format? Can you email it to me?

I have that file. It's a 286kb pdf. Here's a link to download it-

http://rapidshare.de/files/35006144/tomahawks.pdf.html

If you haven't used rapidshare before here's how it works; click on the button that says "Free" and then wait for the clock to countdown, and the download will start when you fill in the numbers/letters in the picture that appears.
 
I have that file. It's a 286kb pdf. Here's a link to download it-

http://rapidshare.de/files/35006144/tomahawks.pdf.html

If you haven't used rapidshare before here's how it works; click on the button that says "Free" and then wait for the clock to countdown, and the download will start when you fill in the numbers/letters in the picture that appears.
Thanks Jay.Mac! I didn't realize it but I have already read that article (and printed it off and stashed it in my copy of Dwight's book). Haha. It's pretty good at introducing a new person to fighting with the tomahawk, and really does a good job at listing the pros and cons of using one. Other than that, I find it's instructional material lacking. However, it is just a 6 page article, so I can't be to hard on it. Haha.
 
awesome thread jedi:thumbup:

i agree with everything you said about the keating tomahawk tape. i need to get lynn's set as i really like his spear fighting he put on one of his proof dvds

btw i believe keating is using a cold steel vietnam hawk and not a atc vtac in the video;)
 
witchhunter said:
awesome thread jedi:thumbup:
Thanks for the thumbs up! I just know how hard it was for me to find all of this stuff, so I thought I'd consolidate it all and put it in one thread that people can reference.
witchhunter said:
i agree with everything you said about the keating tomahawk tape. i need to get lynn's set as i really like his spear fighting he put on one of his proof dvds
I really like Keating's first tape. I hope he puts the second one on dvd sometime soon so I can buy it. I don't carry around a vhs player with me! haha. I'm saving up right now for Lynn's set. Dwight McLemore speaks highly of it, so that's enough in my book to buy it.
witchhunter said:
btw i believe keating is using a cold steel vietnam hawk and not a atc vtac in the video;)
You know, I don't remember him saying what kind of vietnam tomahawk he was using, so I probably just assumed it was an ATC because they were still making the wooden handled LaGana's at the time this video was filmed.
 
Just checked all the links in my first post to make sure they were still operating. Had to update a few of them, but they're all current now! Train on! :thumbup:
 
Just edited the original post and am bumping this to the top for anyone who might be interested in learning to use the tomahawk as a weapon.

For the DVD sets that I haven't had a chance to review yet, I'll try to get on that within the next week or so.

:thumbup:
 
I would like a place where Ican download the vids from a P2P site but where the guys actually get paid for it. It is kind of a pain to order stuff across the border especially around X Mass. Sometimes Knife fighting type DVD's can also take a lot longer due to over zealous
customs agents.
 
Original post edited to include the link to my review of Keating's second DVD and the Sayoc Sama Sama '03 tomahawk segment.

:thumbup:
 
Now that the search function has been disabled (if only temporarily), it might be pretty hard for browsers of this forum to find some of the info listed in this thread once it falls too far back in the pages. I wonder if perhaps now might be a good time to make this thread a sticky, if only until the search goes back up?

Mods?
 
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