“If I threw someone at 100 percent, I could kill them.”

So says Michael S. Augsburger, an eighth-degree black belt in Hapkido who teaches a self-defense course at NIU. Augsburger established the class as a freshman at NIU in 1979. It was the first martial arts group on campus.

The group was established to spread awareness of martial arts as well as to provide a means for students to learn to protect themselves.

Augsburger teaches his students a variety of holds and moves that potentially could protect them from an attack.

-He teaches students how to coordinate their own power and the power of the potential attacker.

“It’s more like insurance, voluntary insurance for yourself,” Augsburger said.

Several students have used the training to defend against attackers. One woman, after just one session of training, was able to defend herself against a robber at a convenience store.

Augsburger said he once was held up in Chicago by an attacker. Although he didn’t say much about the situation, he smiled and playfully asked, “I’m still here, right?”

Each training session starts with a mandatory 30-plus minutes of stretching. Some of the stretches include the splits and an exercise where the students lie face down, palms up, while breathing slowly.

Augsburger insists the exercises are for safety. As a student, he said, he was trained improperly and hurt himself a few times.

“Years ago, I blew out my knee,” Augsburger said.

This was before he started training with his current master, a 10th-degree black belt and one of the most powerful Hapkido masters in the world.

Augsburger’s family consists of martial arts students; his father-in-law even doubles as his master. He met his wife, an NIU art student, during the course many years ago.

After warm-up exercises, Augsburger hands out padded targets for the students to beat. He instructs his students as to how they should attack the stuffed paddles, such as with “two punches, two roundhouses and three spinning hook kicks.”

From there, his students practice locks and punch blocking, while others put on pads and spar.

Augsburger said students who take the course generally enjoy practice locks the most. The locks, which can be as simple as gripping someone’s wrist in a specific way, can put one student in complete physical control of the other.

Many of the students taking the course (which can be taken for one credit hour or just by showing up) enjoy the course’s benefits, including increased flexibility and range.