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Hey all, It was on this day, 24 years ago, that we launched this community. Last year, at this time, I opened up public testing for a new version of KarateForums.com on modern software. We were still on our (very) old software that eventually would have led to this community breaking and simply ceasing to exist. After months of testing (between the staff and member testing periods) and years of testing behind the scenes that I had completed with @Chrispian, we migrated to our new platform over an intense 4 days culminating in an opening on September 9, 2024. Over 8 months later, it's clear to me that our combined efforts were a big success. Our slowly breaking platform is no longer breaking and, in fact, updates to the latest version of our software have been installed multiple times, helping to ensure our platform remains online and secure. All the work that @Chrispian and the folks at Invision Community did (along with my annoying insistence, ha) to ensure that passwords would work paid off. Whether you registered in 2001 or 2021, your password worked when our new site launched. It has all worked so well, and I'm grateful for your help and support. 24 years is such a long-time, and with it, there are so many people that have made a mark on this community over the years. I'd like to extend a thanks to all the members who made amazing contributions since our migration. This includes @ashworth, @aurik, @Bradlee, @bushido_man96, @Chuck, @crash, @DarthPenguin, @Drew, @Fat Cobra, @Himokiri Karate, @JazzKicker, @KarateKen, @Luther unleashed, @Montana, @Nidan Melbourne, @pandaGIRL, @Revario, @RJCKarate, @ryanryu, @sensei8, @Spartacus Maximus, @Wado Heretic, @Wastelander, @Wayofaswede, @Zaine, and others! Thank you! I celebrated today by uploading an avatar for the first time in several years, since I tried to change my old Yankees logo into something else and realized avatars were 100% broken on the old site! On that note, I'll continue to bring enhancements (mostly small, occasionally bigger than that) to this community, but the main thing I wanted to do was to get us on modern software that would be up-to-date, because that will naturally introduce new features over time, too! My ability to do things here always rests on the time I can squirrel away from chasing my toddler and other pursuits. Thank you to everyone who has made KarateForums.com a special place to be and, if you're reading this, that's probably you! This also means that next year will mark 25 years! Which is a massive milestone. Which means we now need to think about ideas to celebrate that! Please feel free to let me know if you have any. Thanks again, Patrick

Obligatory: I am not a lawyer, and you must refer to the laws in your country/region/state/locality/etc, because they can be VERY different depending on where you are. Where I live, now, use of force in self-defense is justified if the victim sincerely believes there is a credible threat to their safety or the safety of someone else. This means that, in your hypothetical scenario, use of force is justified if you sincerely feel that your safety is threatened by the aggressive man invading your personal space. Generally, deadly force is only justified to stop grievous bodily harm or death, so it would not be appropriate to, for example, stab the aggressor in this scenario, unless they were larger/stronger, supported by a group, or had a weapon of their own, and you felt that your only way to stay alive was to end their life. You may have to testify to this in court. It's also important to bear in mind that, legality aside, maiming a person or ending their life with a weapon is VERY traumatic, and you will almost certainly need mental health services after the fact. As for the techniques or weapons you use, there is generally a force continuum that should be in place in your self-defense skill set to appropriately deal with threats, because if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail, and if all you have is a firearm, everything looks like a target. People like to say "there are no rules in the streets" and "better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6," but there ARE rules--they're called "laws"--and if you end up in prison, you didn't make it home safely, which is the whole point of self-defense. The force continuum that you use is going to vary based on your training, but for me, I like to group things as follows: Low-risk threats (verbally abusive, escalating speech, shoving, etc.) - Escape and evasion, or restraint using pins and joint locks Medium-risk threats (punches, kicks, headbutts, etc.) - Escape and evasion, or strikes, throws, joint dislocations, and strangleholds to disable/knock out attacker or deescalate threat level High-risk threats (significant physical disadvantage, group violence, weapons, etc.) - Escape and evasion, or purpose-built and improvised weapons, strikes, throws, joint dislocations, and strangleholds to potentially kill or disable/knock out attacker or deescalate threat level Now, escape and evasion isn't always possible, and sometimes even when it is possible, it may not be the best course of action, such as in the case of a home invasion where you need to protect your family from the threat. Additionally, everyone's lines between those levels of threats will vary, based on a number of factors, not the least of which will be physical characteristics and level of training. The more physically gifted you are, or more well-trained you are, the more intense a threat generally needs to be for you to consider it an escalation. Someone who is 5ft tall, 100lbs, with zero training, could see a threat as high-risk that someone who is 6ft tall, 200lbs, with 10 years of training would consider to be a low-risk threat. Of course, your level of awareness is also going to come into play, because someone with a heightened sense of awareness could notice a knife in someone's pocket, or someone circling to get behind them, raising the threat level to high, while someone with a lower level of awareness might completely miss those things and mistakenly believe that they are in a low-risk situation.

This is very true, and hardly any self-defense/Martial Arts instructors ever address this. It is very real and it is very important to get the help if needed.

NANI!!???? They CANNOT go 100 percent!!!! I train in sambo/judo and believe me, you cannot go 100 percent. In fact BJJ fighters get tons of injuries and ground fighting can be brutal because some people cant control themselves and spaz out big time trying to power through the next move. In judo and Sambo, you have to breakfall like a million reps for very long time and have EXCELLENT conditioning, you have to be very strong and flexible to endure all the turns, twist and high impact throws. This is not something you gain just walking to a grappling gym even if its a more of a lax ground style absent of big throws and takedowns. Also you can easily pull a muscle when you are defending submission attempts and getting suddenly reversed or countered in submission exchanges and scrambles. If you train with Japanese and Russians, they take conditioning VERY SERIOUSLY and are stringent with making sure students are well trained in the basics to keep themselves safe from the chaos of grappling and the intensity that comes with it. BJJ culture has a tendency to, how do I put this, glamorise what they are offering...

Hello, Thank you for visiting KarateForums.com. We recognize one member every month as the KarateForums.com Member of the Month for their positive contributions to this community. Our honoree for February is... @ryanryu for the second time! Thank you for all of the contributions that you have made to our community over the last 15+(!) years, ryanryu. I appreciate you being a part of this community. Thanks, Patrick

OH MY GOSH... I just realized that if you look closely at the URL of this thread: https://karateforums.com/topic/52125-24-years-of-karateforumscom/ "52125" 5/21/2025. Today! That is wild! That number is simply an accumulating number that counts upward with each new topic posted here. I can't even begin to fathom the odds of that happening, like having the exact number of threads/topics here over 24 years to lead up to the day we turn 24 where the number of this topic matches the day we turn 24.

Glad to hear.

So I saw Ian yesterday at his dan grading (he was grading for nidan). I asked him about that sokusen geri -- the third time, Gushi sensei hit him hard. Of course, Ian, being the good Uechi Ryu karateka he is, kept a stolid face. Gushi leaned in and whispered, "That hurt, didn't it?" He definitely nodded. It turns out he had a bruise on that thigh visible from across the room (his mom noticed too.) Fortunately being the young guy he is, he recovered in a few days.

I don't think the Super Bowl will ever by pay-per-view. The NFL makes too much money selling the rights to the Super Bowl, and networks pay it because they can make it back in advertising.

When you are looking at matters like this, from a legal standpoint, then you have to consider what a reasonable person might do in this situation. Not necessarily consider what skills he has or doesn't have. What is a reasonable response to someone entering your space unwarranted? To push them away or strike them? If you felt fear for your safety, then yes. The key is CYA - Can You Articulate you actions after you take them. You are very focused on what actions one should or should not take in a scenario such as this, but what you should be more focused on is if you can articulate why you took the actions you took against this aggressor. I'm the same way, and it's what I teach in my Defensive Tactics sessions. Too many bad things can happen while backing up. For one, you probably aren't able to see where you are going and what you might be bumping into or tripping over while backing up. You might run yourself into a wall, limiting your movement; you might step off a curb and get hit by a car; you might trip on something and fall on your back, inviting a ground fight you may not want. These things in themselves are all dangerous, and add to it the variable of an unstable individual acting towards you in a threatening manner, and it adds up to not good all the way around. Agreed. This is the amount of stepping back I teach in DT. Drop step back into a good base, and from there, everything else should be forward or at angles.

That's an awesome training experience, @aurik. You are right about doing the same things from someone else's perspective; it helps you to see the same things in a different light and brings on new thoughts and methods of doing things. Sometimes you don't need to learn something different, just the same thing differently, to open avenues of growth. It's really cool how he pulled Zach aside to work with him. Awesome for him.

5/19/2025 Aikido: 10:30 - 11:00 am. Video review and visualization study. Started out reviewing all 6th kyu material, picking out little odds and ends on each one. 6th kyu shomenuchi kokyunage: I need to focus on the spacing on the entry; I think there is a little more spacing than when doing iriminage. Once I enter, I need to pull uke into that 'buddy drop' position and make sure my center is dropped when I do that. Hopefully my center is lowered the whole time, but as I step in, I find myself at times "stepping up" to uke, rising a little. From the buddy drop position (where their head is pulled to my chest and they are off-balance), I can do the drop-step to front stance and then turn my hips through to the front stance the other way to throw.

Awesome news, Bob!

Glad it hear it! Keep up the good fight

I don't see anything wrong with it. None of us are obligated to watch sports.

I'm surprised too that someone brought back a post after 21 years. But it is a good discussion that has changed over the years, and I don't think any of the people that posted on it originally are active anymore. But I they were, it would have been good to get their perspective on how their training has changed since then. Now the classes I attend when I can; typically are between a 7 and 8 pm start with a finish usually being just after 9 pm. Everyone is different when it comes to ideal times to train anything; from studying to physical exercise. But @ryanryu has a point though; that for some like him if it is too late in the day, then they feel like a zombie the following day. So when I was working my warehouse job; it was hard to justify a late session, when it would be usually a 30 min - 1 hour drive home from the dojo that i'd be at. So 9 pm finish, get home at around 9:45-10 (+/-), shower, eat something small then go to bed at 11. Then having to be up at 5:45 am for a 6 am departure the following morning. It was just not safe, as I went from an early riser (regardless of how late I went to bed) and being effective throughout the day to being evening person with an earlier bed time. In other words, my physical activity that were planned were often best done on weekends or between 6-8:30 pm. Which allowed me to have time to do what I needed afterwards, and still talk to people at home.

that is great news, prayers for you to keep seeing a rapid and complete full recovery

I’ve unearthed this one from the vault because I’ve been training at all sorts of times lately. How has this changed for you all over the years? Right now I train from 8-9pm, which is a sweet spot for me in terms of being late but not too late. I also insert a midday session when I can – pre-lunch is my best training, but more often I train a few hours after lunch, in the midafternoon lull when my energy is lowest. The workout will pep me up, but I’ve never felt that to be high quality training. Finally, I usually do a brief stretch and warm-up session in the morning, but I have never expanded this into a serious training session in the morning. I don’t know how well this would work for me, given my commute and work schedule. I know one thing that did not work was a previous dojo I trained at that held class from 830-10pm. I could never calm down enough after class to fall asleep before midnight and would always end up being a zombie the next day. The old chain has some interesting comments about what to train at which times… I’ve come across these ideas before and I’ll see if I can dig up the book I had on it. I don’t put much weight into the idea that certain kata are better trained in the morning or evening, mainly because most of us don’t get to choose our training times that freely.

Saw my new Oncologist, Dr. Imran Ahmed, MD, at 8:15am. Key results: A) PSA 0.05 **No concerns!! B) Testosterone 235 **Goal is 276!! Dr.Ahmed says there’s no concerns that this number increased by 160 in 4 months; to be expected and this number will level out!! Dr. Ahmed was very pleased with EVERYTHING!! My kidneys are doing much better, my diabetes is nearly GONE, my weight is dropping, and my cancer is STILL in complete remission!! My next appointment with Dr. Ahmed is September 19, 2025 at 8am.

Great for you, @KarateKen and @JazzKicker! I agree that the prevalence in society seems to be to take any chance to celebrate as an opportunity to indulge in alcohol. As a non-drinker as well, I just have to remember what could happen if I do drink, and I'm more than happy turning things down.

Uechi-Ryu originates from Pangai-Noon kung fu; when Kanbun Uechi (the founder) trained in China, he learned 3 kata: sanchin, seisan, and sanseiryu. In terms of modern day Uechi-Ryu, these kata are now required at white belt, black belt (shodan), and yondan. I would not say that "sanchin" is a beginner's kata, though. It *is* the foundation of our style. You can learn the basics of Sanchin fairly quickly, but we train it everyday, and we are tested on it at every level, from kukyu to judan. One of our sayings is "all is in Sanchin", or "always return to Sanchin". We can always describe a stance or kamae by "start with Sanchin, and then do this". It isn't so much a beginner kata for us; it is the foundation of our style. After Kanbun Uechi passed and his son Kanei took the reins, he realized that the leap in required understanding from Sanchin to Seisan was too great for many students to handle. Therefore, he and some of his senior students created 3 new kata: Kanshiwa, Kanshu, and Seichin. These "bridging kata" each introduce a small set of concepts which are then assembled into Seisan. Each kata adds a few new techniques to a student's repertoire. Therefore, when a student starts to learn, say, Seichin, there are only 3 new techniques they haven't already seen. Likewise, Seisan only introduces 3 new techniques as well. Once a student earns his black belt rank, there is still quite a gulf in understanding from Seisan to Sanseiryu. Therefore, Kanei introduced two additional bridging kata; Seiryu and Kanchin. Again, each of these kata only introduces 2 or 3 new techniques. And once the student is proficient in Kanchin, there is really only one new technique introduced in the final kata of the system (sanseiryu). However, Sanseiryu is a very long kata, and involves moving in eight directions, instead of just four. So trying to learn new techniques AND learning the movement patterns would most likely be considered overwhelming (I don't yet know Sanseiryu). So to circle back to the original question, in Uechi-Ryu, the kata are sequenced such that each kata introduces a new set of techniques, and each kata builds on the knowledge of previous kata. For example, Sanchin introduces the basic stance, fundamental posture, fundamental striking techniques. Kanshiwa introduces the idea of stepping off the line of attack, receiving and countering a strike, and a few other things. One thing that is fundamental in Uechi-Ryu is also that anything you learn at one rank/kata level is supposed to be performed at *all* of your kata. For example, at shodan, students are expected to start using hip pivoting to generate power. This is expected to be included in *all* of their kata.

The time spent doing things that are unrelated and not specific to martial arts varies wildly from one instructor/dojo to another. It also depends on how much time there is for one session. Currently the sessions are 2 1/2hours to 3hrs on 4 evenings per week. Quite common for a dojo in Okinawa/Japan, but this is much longer than the average dojo elsewhere apparently. Moat of that time is spent doing karate things. Only about 20-30min is used for general training involving traditional weights and the usual body weight exercises(push-ups, etc…). Correct technique and how to do these is explicitly taught, but it is something emphasized as “out of dojo training”. It is expected that everyone practices this and kihon as much as possible, like “homework”

understandable, and agreeable to an extent. but its more conditioning and fitness than targeted "strength" training. theres room for improvement or "steps" if you will, in any art. when training do you want just technique, or are speed drills also taught?. (or other coordination or such drills / practices)... as ryanryu stated above, a full time dojo owner really has no reason to not have a certification. i first, naturally, got my CPR cert. (should be a requirement), and then a personal trainer certification, followed by a senior P.T certification. a dojo i taught at for a while had quite a few high school wrestlers, cheerleaders, even a few ballroom dance instructors, even had the kicker for the local pro football team. so i wanted to know as much as possible that would benefit / interest everyone who participated.... i understand, especially with more traditional styles the desire to stay to the roots. as ive stated before, i came from a more sport oriented background. just throwing ideas out there to see what others think.

Great point. Strongman and Crossfit competitors, for example, will "kiai" at certain parts of their routine. I suppose that nearly everyone at one time or another of their lives, whether it be deliberate or accidental, will "kiai" whenever they feel necessary to exert themselves in both body and vocally. A release, so to speak.

some of the best examples of good “kiai” isn’t even from martial arts. Tennis and baseball has great ones depending on the player. So does weightlifting.There was even some issue with certain athletes being given “warnings” because supposedly it isn’t sportsman like to do what they thought was just some over-agressive posturing.