Coup de vitesse

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Coup de vitesse is a fictional martial art that is practiced by Honor Harrington in the Honorverse, a series of books by David Weber.

Coup de vitesse is a fusion of several western and oriental martial arts, developed primarily as a hard style where emphasis is placed on offense sometimes at the expense of defense, resulting in a very brutal and effective style.

Coup de vitesse lacks the elegance of judo or aikido. It is an offensive, hard style which borrows from every martial art, from savate to t'ai chi, and distills them all down into sheer brutality.

Practitioners of Coup de vitesse use belts to indicate ranks. As of War of Honor, Honor Harrington is ranked 8th level black belt, (the highest rank is 9th) and often uses her skills to dispatch enemies that underestimate her. Those with 9th level black belts are simply referred to as "Master Grade".

Coup de vitesse can be roughly translated from French as speed hitting.

Coup de vitesse may be similar to Krav Maga^{[citation needed]}.