Toptomcat

It's impossible to learn any martial art from a Web site without leaving your house. You need a good teacher and good training partners, full stop. Find local places to learn grappling arts, don't just YouTube individual techniques and say you know judo.

he's not blocking correctly then. when being attacked Jodan by your sparring partner or whoever the proper block is jodan age uke which is to have your forearm at an angle like so http://www.3battleskarate.com/images/jodan%20age%20uke_lg.jpg when blocking Chodan the right block should ALWAYS connect with the wrist and not the hand and when counter attacking you sweep the opponents fist across their body so you have access. learn Chudan age uke correctly and you won't get hurt [/url] Yeah as Toptomcat said, you cant apply perfect blocks in full blown sparring. You just have random punches and kicks coming at you. Some people bruise, some don't. Unfortunately I'm part of the former. Got some pads sorted out so I'll see how they go tonight. Think I'll have to visit the doc soon as my right forearm is still really bruised. I haven't been for two weeks. What?! That's not true. I think it's kind of weard way to think about sparring... If you have an opponent that is "as good" as you are, you propably aren't going to manage perfectly on all the blocks, but that's just bad way to prepare to a fight. I'm not saying that good blocks can't be applied in knockdown kumite. I'm saying that they won't look much like a textbook chudan age uke, and there's certainly no 'correct' way to learn them that totally immunizes you from getting bruised arms in kumite.

If the judo school spends about equal time on standing techniques and ground techniques, I'd go for it. If it spends most of the time standing, with comparatively little attention paid to the ground, go with BJJ.

Um. While I know this contradicts the general consensus, I think this is one of those 'ask your doctor, not an Internet forum' questions.

Judo, sambo, BJJ, catch wrestling, and Greco-Roman/collegiate wrestling are all quite good and comparatively widely available. Shuai jiao, Yoshinkan aikido, Luta livre esportiva, the various Indian wrestling systems, and sumo all have valuable and interesting lessons to teach, but are very difficult to find quality instruction in unless you get very lucky. Some koryu jujutsu systems and the various internal systems of kung fu have individual schools that teach very good grappling, but you're vastly more likely to find a bad school than a good one.

This biography of Gigo Funakoshi over at a Shotokai Web site credits him with developing many of the kicks now regarded as fundamental to karate. I don't know how accurate or reliable it is, but it certainly is an interesting start. Ngo Cho...you mean Five Ancestors? That's an interesting system. Glad to have you onboard.

This sort of thing is always kind of difficult to track down precisely. My best guess for the historical introduction of the large and developed body of high kicks to karate that it currently boasts is in the transition from Okinawa to Japan and the decades following it, from 1900 to the Second World War. Gigo Funakoshi, Gichin's third son, seems to have had a large role in this particular technical development.

I don't understand your previous post: it just isn't parsing for me. Could you please rephrase it?

Exactly. There are some very reputable and effective styles that offer one-year live-in student/uchi deshi programs that take you to shodan.

...what?

Not all that good against a knife or weapon, no. The standard hook kick is not all that useful except as training for a spinning hook kick, which makes a pretty good high-risk-high-reward kick or kick counter.

The tenured wushu performers that inhabit it now, or the actual Buddhist martial monks that were there until the Cultural Revolution?

Let me enthusiastically second that- go even if someone tries to talk you out of it.

Either works, really. Orthodox boxing and most karate advocates hitting with the top two: Bruce Lee, Jack Dempsey, and a lot of other fine martial artists have advocated the bottom three. Hitting with the top two is arguably a little less natural, forcing very slightly inferior wrist alignment: hitting with the bottom three carries an increased risk of hitting with just the pinky knuckle, fracturing the metacarpal. Punch with the fist held horizontally and the top two make the most sense, punch with the fist held vertically and the bottom three often work better.

*Wince* Aikido breakfalls are great for throws that exert a lot of their energy parallel to the ground or horizontal/across- you roll and pop right back up. Aikido does a lot of those. For throws that potato-sack you downward, into the ground- like a well-done ippon seoinage or a lot of other judo techniques- an aikido breakfall will be only marginally better than no breakfall, if that. And it's very difficult to tell the two apart until you're in the air and falling in such a way that you have to break it.

Tough to find good Jeet Kune Do in most places, thou.... *reads location field* That would do it, yes. Lucky sod.

I think it may be overthinking things to say that white gis were chosen to reflect 'a certain spirit of simplicity and naturalness that is consonant with the values of the budo.' It's probably closer to the truth that they were chosen because cotton was a cheap, durable fabric, it was less expensive to leave it undyed than to bleach or dye it, and it approximated the street clothes of the day.

*Shrug* There's a very simple way to keep Silva from clowning in the ring, and that's to put him in with someone who has business being there with him. It's not an easy fix, necessarily, but it is a simple one.

Considering all the factors you've laid out for us- you're facing a vastly stronger, stockier, more experienced grappler with your only advantage being four inches in height- then yes, I can pretty much confirm that no advice any of us are going to be able to give you will make enough difference to matter. If you want to be able to outgrapple him, train grappling more: keep going to the MMA class but find something more specific in the area like BJJ, sambo, judo, or wrestling and start attending it as well. That's really the only thing that will do you a lick of good- just coming up with new strategies or techniques to try won't do anything meaningful under your current circumstances.

You ought to be able to function fine. When doing basics you're encouraged to do an identical number of reps of a technique on both sides, and kicks are pretty rare in forms if you're not studying TKD.

While I'm largely in concurrence with MMA Jim, I'd like to try to offer advice that's as good as I can for as long as I can. Are the two of you in gis or not?

I think you need to support your assertion that Machida's evasive, defensive, decision-oriented game plan is 'textbook' Muay Thai, lest things dissolve into 'nuh-uh, yuh-huh' ad infinitum. What Muay Thai-trained fighter has achieved high-level competitive success with that kind of gameplan under Thai rules, and where can I find video of their fights? If this approach is as 'textbook' as you claim, you ought to be able to name a dozen examples offhand.

You did, by bringing up the conditions which Gracie jujutsu was designed for- which was predominantly Brazilian vale tudo fights and submission grappling matches from the mid-1920s onward, not 'street fights' per se. A fine distinction, but an existant one.

Boards cost money to host, and banner ad revenue is an ever-shrinking proposition these days. Doesn't bother me a bit, they're just doing what they gotta do to keep afloat: the forum to discuss the content wouldn't be there in the first place if some attention wasn't given to the economics of it.

That's an excellent answer. Nobody should have any time for anything resembling politeness or fair play in a self-defense situation.