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WATCH MY BACK GEOFF THOMPSON S U M M E R S D A L E Copyright © Geoff Thompson 2000 All rights reserved. The right of Geoff Thompson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988. No part of this book may be reproduced by any means, nor translated into a machine language, without the written permission of the publisher. Summersdale Publishers Ltd 46 West Street Chichester West Sussex PO19 1RP United Kingdom www.summersdale.com Printed and bound by Biddles Ltd, Guildford, Great Britain. ISBN 1 84024 083 0 Dedicated to my late, lovely brother Ray. God bless and rest in peace my brother. Coventry An industrial city is this Prone to lay offs and strikes Ever something amiss Likes and dislikes alike. The three spired city That inspired pity On the cap with the button The industrious glutton. Once a town of boom Now amity seems to wane I hope it’s not met its doom The work of years in vain. Violence seems to be waxing It’s worrying, frightening, taxing At times unnerving, unrelaxing, Yet still a city of beauty To work for her is my duty As with naked Godiva the same. And Peeping Tom in his shame Who’s wrought this city’s fame, But who has almost laid her lame? Who is it we can blame? Nobody is his name. Our city is not getting smaller Tourists flock to see Buildings growing taller What is, with what used to be. Cathedrals old and new The war has left its scar On the greyish, dusty hue A stoicism nought can mar. All colours, creeds and races that congregate amid The city and its faces The changing Coventry kid. Contents Preface 7 Introduction – Peter Consterdine 11 1. Early Days 12 2. A Change in Direction 31 3. The Good 35 4. The Bad and the Ugly 48 5. No Longer the Novice 75 6. Home Visit 82 7. The Art of Fighting without Fighting 96 8. Police Involvement 113 9. It’s a Knock Out 136 10. Sweet Dreams 155 11. The Man Who Couldn’t be Knocked Out 166 12. Alternative Night 173 13. A Stitch in Time 180 14. Cash Karma 183 15. Comebacks 191 16. A Robbery at Buster’s 214 17. Falling in Love 224 18. Dealing with Women 233 19. Trained Fighters and Street Fighters 250 W A T C H M Y B A C K 6 20. The Art of Deception 272 21. Humour in Adversity 279 22. Man-made Misconceptions 301 23. The Double Tap 325 24. A Night Off 349 25. David and Goliath 357 26. Pork Pies and Pot Noodles 369 27. The Adrenal Map 380 28. A Hunt for Gold 393 29. Death? 425 30. Time to Change 442 31. The Final Encounter 453 32. Last Night on the Door 464 Epilogue 469 Afterword 475 7 Preface . . . he’d underestimated me. I would make sure he paid for his mistake. Whenever anyone underestimates me I always know the fight is mine. Their weakness makes them unprepared and gives me a window for the first shot. I train for the first shot – it’s all I need. He was still holding the bottle of champagne by the neck. I made a mental note – I didn’t want to be wearing it, it just wasn’t my colour. We stood close together as I talked, too close really, so I tucked my chin down as a defence against a possible head butt, forcing me to roll my eyes upwards to see his face. I got right to the point. ‘Look, I’ve never met you before and you come into my club when I’m working and talk to me like I’m a piece of shit. If you do it again we’re gonna be fighting.’ He was square on and badly positioned to launch an attack. ‘Oh yeah,’ he said, lining me up. ‘Sure.’ He moved his left leg slightly back and prepared me for the champagne supernova. But he was a fucking amateur and hid his line-up badly. I noticed immediately, it stood out like a hard-on. It might have worked on the part timers, the lads that liked a fight at the weekend, but I was a veteran in these matters: seven days a week, it was my job to notice when maniacs were trying to hit me with a bottle. I had maybe two seconds in which to make my move before he made his. No decisions to be made, too late for that. Hesitation is the biggest killer in nightclub fighting. The decision had been made for me ten minutes earlier when he told me that I sucked cocks, it was just a matter of putting my game plan into action. Not too P R E F A C E W A T C H M Y B A C K 8 detailed a plan, no complications, no equations, no grapple with morality or peer pressure, just bang him. That’s it. All this bollocks about karate or kung-fu, about this range or that range, bridging the gap, setting up, weakening them with a kick – there’s no need, just hit the fuckers . . . very hard! Time was tight and a single mistake could mean drip-food or worse. I played the game right back and simultaneously moved my right leg, giving myself a small, compact forty-five degree stance, hiding the movement with, ‘That’s all I’m saying.’ Bang! A right cross, slightly hooked, hit just above his jawbone as his left hand lifted the champagne bottle towards me. The contact was high so he didn’t go right out. Sometimes that’s how it works, when the adrenalin is racing, targeting is often off, and you only have to be millimetres out to miss the KO. It did catch him hard though; he reeled back like he’d been run- over. His body hit a forty-five degree angle going backwards and for a second I thought he was in sleepsville, but no, he back-peddled rapidly, trying to regain his composure. He was a hardy fucker. Usually when you hit them that hard they have themselves a little hibernation. Not this fella. He tried to stay up and fight but it was too late, he was mine. Like I said, I only need one shot. I followed with a rapid-fire five-punch combination, slicing open both eyebrows and breaking his nose. Oozes of blood flicked through the air and splattered my white shirt. And me with no condom, too. He covered his bloodied face trying to capture what was left of his nose. As he cowered over I grabbed his white, stained shirt by the shoulders and pulled him face first into the carpet – he was 9 gone. His sugar pedestal melted all around him by the rain of my attack. He kept his face covered, so I axe-kicked his back, many times. Too many. He was a big man to take over, but I had no intentions of letting him back up again, not this night. Kevin, who had been close by watching my back, stepped in and stopped me. A small crowd of onlookers had gathered. They whispered excitedly. I liked this bit, especially at a new club. Suddenly I was not the soft ‘what’s he doing here’ doorman they all mistook me for. I was a man to be feared. I felt good about the adulation, the back-pats and the line of free Buds on the bar like winner cups. I felt good as the endorphins raced around my blood in a celebratory lap of honour. I felt good that I had survived. The blood on my shirt was my badge; I was proud to wear it for the rest of the night. Deep down though, right in the very bowels of my mind, there was an aching realisation that with every blow I threw in anger and fear I was becoming more and more like the bastard on the floor in front of me swimming in his own blood and snot. Mr T’s girlfriend was running around him like a headless chicken. Collecting her man’s blood and what was left of his face in a small cotton hanky that seemed inadequate amidst such mayhem, screaming at me, shouting at the other doorman, wailing for an ambulance and the police: it was all so undignified. I didn’t give a monkey’s fuck. I was on a high. The worm had turned – control of my fear was my greatest ally, his overconfidence my greatest asset. He’d trodden on a small, insignificant mound of earth and was blown to pieces. It was a fucking landmine. He should have known. P R E F A C E W A T C H M Y B A C K 10 Later, many years on, I shared a beer with the guy. He still had the scars to prove I’d been there and we laughed about our first meeting. He admitted it was his fault and as the second beer passed his tonsils he said, ‘I just picked on the wrong guy, that’s all’. 11 Introduction Watch My Back is not simply a book about violence and not a book about martial arts, although it is written by a successful martial artist and a man who has made violence his profession. Rather, it is a book about coping with fear in an environment which is a culture dish for modern society – today’s nightclubs. The seemingly mindless violence that certain individuals are prepared to inflict on others is not restricted only to nightly venues in Coventry, but can now be found daily on our streets and even the average man from those streets will find something in this book which may at some time prove life saving. Not ‘quick fix’ physical techniques, but attitude, which in certain circumstances may be all that will see him through. For martial artists this book will be a bitter but honest pill to swallow. What they follow as an art is seldom practical when needed and it may be safer for them to face that fact and their fears from the safety of these covers than to put themselves in the situations faced by its author. This book is a true tale of modern violence and its containment, lightened by the very necessary vein of humour never far below the surface of every chapter. Peter Consterdine, 7th Dan Joint Chief Instructor British Combat Association W A T C H M Y B A C K 12 Chapter 1 Early Days Before I recount my experiences, I think it is best that I tell you a little of my early days. It might help you, the reader, to understand how a man such as myself ended up working as a nightclub doorman. I was born in Coventry, Tile Hill actually, in 1960 to Josephine and Kenneth Thompson. I was one of four children, three boys – myself, Ray and Garry – and a girl, Marie-Jo. We were all lucky enough to have enjoyed a sound upbringing with a lovely Irish mum and a great English dad. I went to St Peter’s and Paul’s Junior School and later on to Cardinal Wiseman Comprehensive. All my early life, certainly from the age of eleven, I was plagued by the fear of fighting and confrontations. I don’t really know why this should be. My mum reckons I’d inherited her nerves and that it was just my way. She always reminds me that whilst I was a very sensitive kid, I was also a bit of a boy too. Whatever the reason, my mind felt weak and constantly under attack from fears too powerful to fight. Doubtless I was not on my own in this respect, but at the time I felt I was, so I could take no solace from this. What I found to my distaste, what really hurt, was not being scared, it was the thought of having to live under the dominion of fear for the rest of my life. Many times during these cruel years I found myself sneaking out of the back door at school to avoid my would-be antagonists 13 waiting for me at the front, then running off to the sanctuary of short-sightedness and ignorance, only to wake up the next morning with fear and worry ever-growing at the thought of having to go back to school and face the ‘enemy’ again, often having to go under the protective wing of my dad. I vividly remember one Christmas morning sitting in my bedroom alone and crying, worrying about going back to school in two weeks’ time, and the misery that would then ensue. My elder brother Garry came in and asked me what was wrong. I shrugged my shoulders, too ashamed to admit my weakness. My whole childhood was marred by such incidents: these sad, scared, worried feelings came and went at will – I was, I felt, at the mercy of my own mind. Hope came on the horizon in the guise of the martial arts. Bruce Lee took on all celluloid comers and held no fear. He became my mentor and I enthusiastically, though not convincingly, mimicked him along with thousands of other protégés of the late great. High on the inspiration, I started a martial arts class, aikido, in my bid to build confidence. Life was my bully and I needed an arsenal to defend myself. Unfortunately my efforts had the opposite effect. If I thought the bullying was a problem I was in for a shock when I started aikido; my real problems were about to begin. At first it was great. I was eleven years old and the teacher – a very big man in his late twenties – took an instant shine to me. I became the class pet so when he asked me and a few other students to stay over at the centre one night, to help fix some of the damaged training mats, I was dead keen. I asked permission from my mum and dad. They were a little cautious. E A R L Y D A Y S W A T C H M Y B A C K 14 I didn’t really know why at the time, but they were, so my dad came down to the centre to check it out. After meeting my instructor he said ‘no problem’. He was impressed, ‘you’ll be fine’ he assured me. I didn’t need assuring as much as he did. When I got to the club that night there were no mats to fix and the other lads who had been invited didn’t turn up. I should have seen the danger signs, but at eleven you don’t, you just trust. And anyway, there must have been another thirty people sleeping over that night, no need for alarm. It seemed a bit strange, but for a kid my age it was still an adventure so I wasn’t that bothered. I’d have a good laugh and a late night. I would really enjoy myself. My joy was to be short lived. It was in the middle of the night that it started. The abuse, the invasion of my body by the cold hands of paedophilia. I was drenched in fear. By the morning I was still crying and still shaking. The colour drained out of my young life. A dark depression swallowed me and turned my world a stormy grey. Like a blackmailer the memory shadowed me for many years. My hero, the man I adored and trusted, the man I aspired to be, my role model, let me down. Actually, he smashed my world apart. In the morning my eyes were swollen from a night of sobbing. I was so frightened, so desperately scared. I didn’t know where to turn. When he jokingly asked me why I was so quiet, I said: ‘Someone touched me in the night’. The smile fell off his face. He suggested that my experience was a bad dream and that I shouldn’t tell anyone or he’d get into trouble. He didn’t need to tell me not to blab. I had no intention of telling a soul. I was so ashamed, so very ashamed – though I didn’t quite know why. Just the thought of others knowing 15 about my misfortune filled me with absolute dread. It became an obsession to keep it hidden and one day to seek my revenge. It was my secret. My confidence plummeted to an all-time low. Mum and dad, blissfully unaware of what had happened, kept asking why I had given up aikido when I was doing so well. I made up some excuse about being fed up with it and just hoped that they didn’t ask again. I wish now, of course, that I’d told them. They are such lovely parents and I know they would have handled it very gently. As it was, my bottle went and I decided to keep it to myself. That was the end of my career in aikido. It would be many years before I found the courage to try another martial art. And even then I was very nervous around adults. One day, I vowed, I’d meet this man again and I’d be in a position to hurt him like he had hurt me. Later, many years on, providence placed him back into my world and I had the chance to face him down, only this time under different circumstances. So, my first shot at the martial arts blew up in my face like a faulty firework. It knocked the wind right out of my sails and for years after I never went near a martial arts class. It was only when Ian, one of my very good friends, said he knew the instructor at the local Shotokan club and that he was going along to train, that I plucked up the courage to try again. Believing the crap of celluloid martial arts was my first and biggest misconception in the martial arts. It took ten long years of experimenting and soul searching before I could finally admit to myself that ‘real fighting’ wasn’t like that. Anyway, I plodded on with the karate, conscientiously learning technique E A R L Y D A Y S

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Most books are stored in the elastic cloud where traffic is expensive. For this reason, we have a limit on daily download.