Toptomcat

Samurai, samurai, samurai. We have enough information, documentaries, and movies on the samurai for someone to spend multiple lifetimes boning up on it all. Where's all the documentaries about the Chinese militaries of various eras or the history of the Southeast Asian pre-Muay Thai systems before they adopted gloves and standardized in the thirties?

'Just slapping as fast as you can' is one of the more dangerous things you can do with a sharp knife, really. Making light slap-boxing touches into life-threatening wounds is one of the principal reasons to use an edged weapon over a blunt one. That said, agreed that this is a poor defense against a trained attacker.

Literally like that, or just at that height? Because that would make for great hook defense but it seems to me that you'd get the hell jabbed out of your face if the other man has quick hands.

A better answer is that it's nobody's 'fault'- hitting people in the context of a karate class isn't a mistake that someone has to be blamed for, but a natural byproduct of the training.

This is all at one place under one instructor, at one place under multiple instructors, or at multiple places under multiple instructors? For myself I mix martial arts- various Japanese and Korean karates, some judo, a smattering of boxing and aikido, a Jeet Kune Do trick here and there- but as for practicing mixed martial arts I've only begun training the Thai kickboxing/Brazilian jujutsu duo that's often identified with MMA recently, and fairly lightly- only one day a week.

In thirty-five years of active competition in point you haven't gotten used to filthy judging? From all I hear from the old guard at my dojo you see that kind of thing in maybe one in three tournaments. Congratulations on your continued success, and good luck with your injury. It takes a lot of heart and skill to step into competition in your circumstances.

If you feel that focusing on hitting with the top two knuckles is hurting you, then don't do it. While it's about the most common advice given when the question is asked, the MA community isn't unanimous in recommending it- such luminaries as Bruce Lee and Jack Dempsey have advocated hitting with the bottom three.

By 'adaptability' in this specific case you mean that you're looking for a martial art that will let your previous training translate smoothly into their system?

something wrong if your instructor turns out to be Dracula in a karate gi =] There are some Filipino martial arts guys with a defined set of biting techniques for grappling work. Deliberate distinctions between nips, chomps, bite-and-shakes, and the like.

A little, but not that much. It means that you're pretty likely to have to perform a kata- they're pretty common in karate belt tests. (Note that I've edited my above post with a bit more information.)

It varies very widely from school to school, and if your school calls itself 'freestyle martial arts' then there's unlikely to be a centralized organization with a universal set of standards anywhere on what they expect of you. Very generally, you can expect some sort of basic competence check of what you've learned so far- definitely demonstrating the techniques you've been taught, possibly performing a kata if you do that, possibly passing some basic test of physical fitness like doing a certain number of push-ups, possibly sparring if you've gotten to it already, possibly demonstrating competence in some drill that your school favors, possibly making some other demonstration like breaking a board with a punch. It won't be exceptionally strenuous, and you can expect to pass fairly easily if you've been attending class regularly and paying attention. You should probably ask your teacher for more details.

Here you conflate 'lineage' with all aspects of martial arts that are spiritual, esoteric, or not directly related to fighting, which strikes me as an excessive generalization. It's certainly possible to be interested in learning how the traditions, philosophy, and kata of a martial art evolved without focusing unduly on lineage, much like it's possible to study history without subscribing to the Great Man theory.

Hi Jeffrey, As I am sure you expected, I am going to take exception to what you have written. First, on the general topic - I would agree that the lineage that is important is what you are taught not necessarily who taught you. And I would agree that there are some minor differenced between the 3 main Wado groups around the world - but the principles conatined within remain constant. Unfortunatley this does not apply to the Shintani Wadokai group imo. From a technical view point (literally how they move) their Karate is so far removed from mainstream Wado - its quite remarkable. So here is a case in question where Shintani trained with Otsuka but over time the satalite of Shintani Wadokai became so distant it evolved into something completely different - not a good example of Karate lineage rather an example of karate politics at their worst. Chitsu Speaking as an outsider to this particular brouhaha, how is an art evolving into something different 'an example of karate politics at their worst'? You didn't say the karate was bad, you said it was different- which in my mind puts this in the category of 'business as usual' rather than 'terrible tragedy.'

The only thing lineage is good for from a practical perspective is providing a good first approximation of a teacher's competence: if they were directly trained under someone you respect, then they're likely to be a good teacher as well. Importantly, before the modern era when networking became a lot easier and video of people performing kata, teaching class, and beating the snot out of each other with varying degrees of proficiency became available, that was one of the only ways of knowing that someone was competent: that they had a formidable reputation or was trained by someone who was. The big fuss over lineages is a cultural holdover from the days when that was the only game in town to determine who was trusted to supply martial arts training: the demand for a school's services stemmed directly from its reputation, so its adherents had an economic incentive to play up their lineages and trash others.

I've thought about this quite a bit. I don't think that this type of point sparing is my thing but I love the idea of competing. I may try continuous point sparing or something else that will provide a little bit contact and require a good level of endurance. I hope I never have to engage someone on the street but if I do I want my reaction to be instantaneous. I don't feel like training for stop n' start point sparring provides me with anything useful... but that is just my opinion Training for stop-and-start point competition is pointless, yes. But if a decent threshold of contact is required and it is used in moderation and as part of a larger training program, stop-and-start kumite can teach valuable lessons in distancing, openings, movement, and getting the first strike. It makes an interesting 'training game.'

'Koryu' is a term typically used to refer to Japanese martial arts that predate the Meji Restoration- from 1868 onward. Koryu Uchinadi Kenpo Jutsu having been founded after 1868 by their own admission, and incorporating many modern martial theories, the use of the term in the style's name could be held to constitute false advertising. At best it is potentially misleading.

You seem to be trying to reinvent martial arts from the ground up, starting with first principles. This is probably overambitious. Try learning more from other sources before you try to codify all you know into one grand, unifying framework.

"Thai" as in "Thailand." "Muay" I've always heard as sort of slurred halfway between 'moy' and how 'muay' looks. " [muɛ̄j tʰɑ̄j] " by the International Phonetic Alphabet.

Can you elaborate on what 'reciprocating' and 'folding' strikes are?

The words 'hyeong' 'pumsae' and 'teul' are variously used for forms/patterns in Korean. It may be that 'kata' is used because it's more universally recognized among martial artists in general, or just in frustration for the lack of standard terminology in Korean arts.

As I said earlier, if you can verify that an author is not Korean, not Japanese, and not a practitioner of a Korean martial art, then they can probably be reasonably assumed to be free of bias, or at least the kind of bias that will give you grief on this particular topic. That said, you're right in that your project seems to have problematically expanded in scope. What, exactly, do you need to do with this information? Do you need to write a book, give a speech, write a paper, write a magazine article? Knowing that might help me give you some advice on where to go from here.

Isn't it a fairly central premise of Kyokushin- and I'm paraphrasing here, but not by much- that gloves are for the weak? The whole reasoning behind the method of sparring knockdown is that it lets Kyokushinkai students spar full-contact and bare-fisted without undue risk of injury. Being barefisted is sort of a big deal philosophically- I think you may catch a lot of flak from your senpai and sensei if you want to spar with gloves unless there's something anatomically wrong with your hands. Edit- Oh, right! You're the guy who was asking about which dojo to try out. Of course you wouldn't know- you're brand new to Kyokushin! As far as bag gloves go, I've heard good things about Fairtex on the medium-low end and Hayabusa on the medium-high end, but I'm certainly no connoisseur.

Are you asking for gloves for knockdown sparring, or for more kickboxing-style sparring with significant head contact?

A sai with a kodachi? That'd be more than a little unusual because it'd be mixing historical classes of weapons, one a traditional Okinawan kobudo weapon and one a Japanese sword. It does make a certain amount of martial sense, however: there's a lot of mileage to be gotten out of the idea of a one-handed sword and an off-handed parrying weapon. It's terrain more thoroughly explored by Western than Eastern sword arts: if you're feeling particularly adventurous, you might even look into Rennisance-era main-gauche play for inspiration.

Not at all. That's one of the better descriptions of getting 'in the zone' I've seen, which is a common experience among athletes of all types, including karateka. You seem to have an ideal mindset for competition, just not stop-and-start point karate: I'd urge you to try continuous point sparring such as opposed to stop-and-start, or even knockdown or amateur kickboxing if you feel up to it.