NewEnglands_KyoSa

Rateh, that's a good one. Those fall under the category of 'toe raises' and im glad you mentioned it because there's so many variations. Weighted vests, back packs, or ankle weights are a great idea...just as long as you build up to them. Also, Rateh's drill reminded me... holding onto the rail and jumping on one leg all the way up and down is a good one too, very exhausting. Just make sure you balance it out so you work both sides.

Hi there, and welcome to the forums! For your son, whom iam assuming is a child i'd suggest a light weight uniform. I don't know what color you're looking for, but since you used the term gi, im going to assume plain white or plain black. i have used both of these retailers before and they have good quality for cheap prices. hope they help... http://www.karatedepot.com/student-karate-uniform.html http://www.martialartsmart.net/Uniforms_Karate.html

exactly. bunkai, at the very least, must make sense.

Believe it or not more stretching will help this. Its going to hurt but stretching while your in this pain will benegit your flexibilty and health. Also, the brunt of the pain is from lactic acid build up from your muscles working. You might consider going to an athletic training website and buying a roll out stick. It's like a small plastic advanced rolling pin for your body. You roll it over the muscles you've used and it helps rid of the pain causing lactic acid. It's probably like 7 to 10 bucks, and worth it, i've used them in the past and they are life savers !

I'd like to say that because bunkai are applications that they should be APPLICABLE. This simply just makes sense to me. Bunkai, unlike many other things in MAs, from what i have seen is flexible and often times in the eye of the beholder. In kempo we have a set bunkai that they teach us as we learn the form. In tang soo do, they do not teach us the bunkai, we must learn it on our own if we are smart enough to realize there is no bunkai given to us. So, bunkai should make sense because i think it's key to learning truly how to fight in our world today. It's not the be all end all, but i think it aids the learning to fight process tremendously.

From what i've heard a side snap kick is like a side blade kick, using the blade of the foot. As for TSD, we do not use the side snap, we just have a regular side kick, hitting with the heel. I'd be interested to here why it's not in the curriculum.

Congrats and welcome! But as everyone's said you need to ask your instructor what you're responsible for as we do not know your syllabus, style, or material. Best of luck to you though, keep us posted we'd be glad to hear!

Considering I'm an ex-basketball player, and current coach...i think i can lend a hand on this one! 1) wall touches- stand in a door frame on either side, not literally in it and jump up and tap the top of the frame. do it for sets of 50, 100, 150, etc or do it by minute starting with 1. if you have a gym and a basketball available to you, you can also do this with a basketball hoop. stand facing the back board on either side like you're going to take a layup, hold the basketball high above your head and touch the back board with the basketball. 2) Jump rope- Jumping rope can help greatly, and it's not just for speed and agility. Jumping rope on your toes will strengthen your calves and work out your achilles, all part of the equation for great jumping ability. 3) jumping boxes- these may not be available to you, but if you are apart of a local gym or ymca, they might be. there are boxes set at certain heights like 1ft, 2ft, 3ft, etc. and you work on swinging your arms back and jumping up on them and landing flat. there was a time when i was once at a 3 1/2 foot box! if these aren't available to you you can try sturdy chairs, park benches, etc. just be careful. 4) calf building- building up your calf muscles will help your jumping abilities greatly. to raises with ankle weights on can help build this muscle up, also if you go to your local gym they also may be able to direct you to special machines that can help you out further 5) supermans- again, if you have a basketball hoop available to you thats great. if not, you can do this one with a wall. you need a basketball, soccer ball, kick ball...something you can throw off a wall! here's how to do it with a basketball hoop... stand on one side of the key, throw the basketball off the back board and jump to the other side of the key before it gets there and catch it as you land. if you do not have a hoop available you can put lines 3 to 4 feet across from each other in front of a wall and bounce the ball off of the wall, jump as high as you can to the other line and catch the ball. keep doing this back and forth for like 30 second to 1 minute sets and increase as you go.

I like the diversity too. The diversity of comparison i call it. I was just commenting in the black belt's embroidered or not post and it's interesting to see that everyone seems to have different thoughts and opinions but they all go back to the same place. Kind of cool considering i don't know half you guys' first names, where you live, etc. This place is very intreresting, very unique, unlike anything i've been apart of in the MAs

that is interesting and very logical reasoning, tiger. i bet not many of us had thought of that. i often joke and tell my students that as we get older, and we have our black belts, our name and school name is on it for when we get lost and people can return us to where we belong. i would be a little bothered too if someone 'borrowed' my belt without asking. it's just not something i wish to share, but if it makes you feel better i leave my belt and uniform in our dressing room too from time to time.

Well said DWx. Personally, the whole white belt thing. I honestly think it would be kind of cool, in a twisted kind of way. I think to wear a white belt and have the skills of a black belt is enough for me. To be the best white belt, the white belt that beats the black belts, i think that would be a cool lesson...look, im not wearing my own belt, im not even displaying my own rank but hey...my skills and wisdom and abilities are still here. I think lesson it comes down to, if a brand new white belt is born to be an amazing, humble, skilled black belt then what's it matter if they wear a white belt the whole time, you know? But yes, good post. The symbolism, the true meaning, and the actual literal sense of the black belt are all startly different things, and it gets even more different and specialized to each style and each person, that, i think, is the remarkable part!

yea one of our black belts took my instructor down and ripped a patch off his sleeve. ironically enough just days before we broke away from the organization that was on the patch he was wearing!

I think the shape they would be in would be a bigger benefit than the average person, for obvious reasons. Also i think the cardiovascular endurance like bushido said helps. Actually i know it helps, because in a real street fight, full force, full adrenaline pumping i believe an average person is slotted to be able to fight for 20-30 seconds and a hardcore athlete and in-shape Martial artist is slotted to be able to fight for 30-40 seconds. I think those are the stats though, i'd have to check with my instructor. I think it might be less for some reason. Like i said, i'll check.

We do some in both of my schools and both have a quick strike and a jujitsu coming first, making the sweep effective.

Hahah, that's one of the cutest things i've ever seen....Kid's: Don't try that at home!

From what is sounds like, you have more than made up your mind. TMA doesn't seem like the path for you. And taking that into consideration, maybe something more sport oriented and less traditional may make you happier, maybe a nice Muy Thai, BJJ, MMA...something more contemporary you know? Do your own thing, and see how it works. Just don't be afraid to see out help. Because like many others said, the odds of any of us being able to do something like that completely on our own is very slim. Good luck, i hope this works out.

It's funny because we just had a baseball center with batting cages put in next to our dojo, literally right over the wall...there they are. It's funny because we've never had any foot traffic before, so we didn't know what to expect. Here's what we've noticed...the kids that walk by with their bats and gloves walk by and drool and have that..."that's SO cool" face on. Every mother than walks by, puts a hand on their son or daughters back and pushes them towards the baseball center as soon as she sees him/her drooling. Every father that walks by, the second he sees one of the black belts or one of the adults he puffs out his chest and swaggers into the baseball center with that look of "i can SO take you...all." Funny how certain people may think, well im too old for that, maybe they're thinking...im better than that, i can take them.

You know i think superfoot still does seminars and whatnot. I'd be real interested to attend, but i bet it's real real pricy. My instructor has a picture of him fighting with superfoot, of course superfoot has his foot at the top of my instructor's head but it's still a darn good picture. Lucky duck.

Dobbersky, I've always been meaning to do that, I just don't want my head master to walk in and kill me! Maybe i'll give it a shot, i'll be interested to see how it goes. Bushido, It is no big deal. But it's interesting to see how other people wear theirs, think of theirs, what they think of other styles. What they think "over the top is", and what isn't enough. In terms of rank, yea, no big deal. But in terms of opinion, im intersted. Everyone who's made shodan/cho dan has made the journey but all of ours has been different.

We used to have that classic striking points chart in our dojo that shows the front and back of the body. I think they should just copy a chart like that put legal areas in blue illegal in red. Just to help with illegal and legal areas, again helping out those with lesser english capabilites. Now as for strikes allowed you'd still have to look to a rule book again but that chart just popped into my mind for things like this. I think it would just be easier to get fighters to look at too.

It's great. I might be going to the parade tomorrow...could get a little crazy...our accents aren't the only things that are our of control! (Cue the Standells )

No actually. Fortunately all of the instructors i've had have been very fair if not harder on 'their own'. One of my instructors owned the school and his son was in it, and he didn't get special treatment, in fact it took him 8 years to get his black belt. One of my other instructors owned his own school and his daughter was testing for black belt and on the night of her test she was sick with a 103 temperature and she asked him if she could just not show and do it later. He said no, everyone is required to show and test no matter what. You miss it you can try again in 6 months. I've had siblings and kids i mentor in my class and i treat them no differently, maybe harder at times. Is it fair to treat them a little harder? Maybe not, but they know it's coming and if they end up staying for the long haul it makes them all the more tough. I haven't seen extremes in either direction though.

For most healthy active individuals under the age of 30 7-8 hours is sufficient for those over the age or 30 6-7 is normal and should 'last through the day' so to speak. Unless you have a sleeping disorder, you should be able to determine where you are in the spectrum all on your own. Experiment getting "X" amount of sleep one night and then say "X" plus 1hr on the other. Getting drowsy during the age could be due to changes in anything that's usually the 'norm' for you, age, eating habits, anything almost. Remember one important thing is also that too much sleep could make you drowsy. You just need to determine what's comfortable for you and your schedule.

Its just hard for martial artists to watch such great symbolism be thrown around like a chew toy for a dog, that's all. Nobody's going to go to the government and have Jackie Chan recall all his materials. Just some things plainly look bad, that's all.

No need to wallow but one MUST remember.