RW

Thought so. I guess in the old times, back in ancient Japan a fake sensei would be receiving a visit from a number of real senseis in the area and he would be forced to show that he actually knows a martial art. For some reason this bothers me a lot. It is one thing to learn Heian Nidan, knowing that it's a "real" kata that has a long tradition, and that karateka around the world know what it is (even though individual schools may have different ways to perform it), it's another thing to learn a kata called "the stripe of the firey tiger of the himalaya" made up by some grifter who fancies himself "9th Dan in Hadoken Ryu Karate". It just feels... dishonest. Plus, imagine learning self defense from a dude or old man who has never thrown a punch in a realistic situation and his biggest fight was him vs a bag of nachos.... someone will get hurt because he trusted what this guy taught him.

I was thinking about this, and this was exactly my point but I didn't articulate it well in my original post - can some random dude really just open a dojo and claim to be a "new martial art" or "a karate school" or "a kempo school" or a "taekwondo school" when in reality it has no affiliation to any club or organization out there and/or its kata/forms are all made up?

ah, kempo is a mess. The "original" hawaiian kempo got brought to the states by different students of William "Thunderbolt" Chow. Each one modified the art and made it "their art". Their students also modified the art and made it "a new art". Ed Parker made "American Kempo Karate", Adriano Emperado made "Kajukenbo", Nick Cerio made "Nick Cerio's Kempo", Bruce Juchnik carried the torch of Kosho Ryu and Fred Villari made Shaolin Kempo. Each of these guys had dojos that later splintered off, like, Villari's school splintered into 3 or 4 different school systems that all claim to teach "shaolin kempo karate" but none of them share most of their katas.

This is a complex topic, I am not quite sure how to put it into words, but I'll do my best. 1) If you belong to a mainstream branch of a traditional martial art, say, Kyokushin Karate, theoretically all schools that are legit kyokushin are connected to a main regulating body, correct? (not sure, that's my question). Would "kyokushin karate of Fayettesville, CA" (totally made up name, and if it exists it's accidental, I just made up the name) be regulated or somehow supervised, controlled or influence by the "main" kyokushin association, which I assume is in Japan, how does it work? 2) How does it work for less mainstream branches of some arts? For example I had a friend in high school who practiced "karate". What karate? He'd proudly tell me "karate-do". I was curious about the stuff he was learning, and he had weird katas I had never heard about such as "yoso no kata", and then he had katas with familiar names, such as pinan nidan, but when looking at them I was surprised to see they had little resemblance to the "real" pinan nidan practiced at real (mainstream) schools such as shotokan or shito ryu. My friend's dojo was affiliated to the "american karate black belt association" and the "national black belt league", whatever that's worth for. My friend's dojo closed last month and.... there are no other dojos of the same "style", no one acknowledges his black belt, and it's like he studied a made up style... it's disturbing. Was it a made up style? Does it mean he is not really a black belt, or even worse, a real karate practioner? 3) Some entire martial arts seem a bit... unregulated? Take shaolin kempo karate.... I don't think there is a regulating body for it! I don't think two schools have the same curriculum: that's right, "joe's 3 tigers academy" (made up name) has a different set of kata to "mike's rising dragon kempo karate studio" (again, made up name). Maybe joe's "system" has 3 (or 6) dojos, and mike's school has 2 dojos, but that's it. Both are supposed to be the same art but the katas are TOTALLY different. Adding insult to injury, some of these schools change their curriculum very often. That's right, "kata dragon fist of fury" and "drunken monkey set 2" may be radically different for a guy who learned it from Joe himself directly in 2009 to someone who learned it in 2010. Are these even real schools? When inevitably joe's or mike's closes, will all of these practitioners will stop being kempo practitioners and will they no longer be black belts, or they're "fake" black belts? 4) So, regarding points # 2 and # 3 above, what keeps John Doe from opening "his own karate/kung fu/kempo/whatever school" and just make up stuff as he goes? could anyone get away with this? This is all a stark contrast to BJJ. Walk into any BJJ dojo and pretend to be a black belt and you're in for a world of fear and pain for daring to do that, no matter the school, system or geography

Thanks! Nope, that would have been my first choice, there's nothing like the real thing... By any chance, RW, did you take a look at the link I provided?? yup! I will order a "Quiet Punch Home Boxing Punching Bag"

Os! Here's to another 19 years

Thanks! Nope, that would have been my first choice, there's nothing like the real thing...

I haven't been able to go to the Muay Thai gym for a while, thanks to COVID. While I can practice Kata for my kempo stuff, I am itching to do some muay thai stuff and hit the heavy bag, which is obviously not possible now. I am doing shadow boxing, but it really want to hit the heavy bag. So here goes, what can I do? I'd buy a wave master, but they take too much space and too heavy to move around on a daily basis. What can I buy or build on my own?

I think the name of the video is misleading. These are not forms. This is simply a video demonstrating the different Muay Boran moves. It's the MB equivalent to this karate video: This is more like a Muay Boran form: Muay Boran is the ancestor of Muay Thai, and MT has no forms.

Did you decide to do it? Or not? Yup! I'll do it.

boxing and sambo? wouldn't the lack of kicks be a hole in the fighter's game?

YAY!!! Osu

Thanks!!!! My decision is made, I appreciate the input

hahaha someone is on edge!!! No, I am doing it to support my dojo. I can practice on my own. And I do practice on my own. My dojo is closed right now because of state "stay at home' regulations in effect, and they are trying to still get some fees by using video training. I am curious as to whether give it a shot. I don't get why you're so upset at this. May I suggest you do some makiwara training until your anger is purged?

Great feedback! Do you think you could teach a student a new kata over video? I know this is usually a bad idea, I'd never think about it, but these COVID times are a (temporary) game changer. I am wondering whether to go for it or whether I'd just be wasting my money To the above bold type... Yes; as a LiveStream, like Skype. As long as I can see said student, and I can provide immediate feedback, and said student will make any and all suggested corrections/feedback, and so on and so forth. I believe that if the instructor CAN teach, then no matter the venue, the student can greatly benefit from any given venue. Still, I'm not a staunch proponent of this type of teaching model; face to face is my preferred choice. absolutely. I'd only recur to this to support my dojo and keep paying my fee but still getting something out of it

Why start with kyokushin and then transition to muay thai? Both are striking arts, but since we're talking MMA here, the kata, punches with hikite, movements like age uke or nukite won't really transition to MT or MMA. Other than that, I agree, sort of. I think someone going into MMA who can't train MMA from the start in this hypothetical could go for Muay Thai (striking), wrestling (ground control, takedowns) and BJJ (submissions). Once they have a very solid base in those they can dab into Karate to add unpredictability and what the **** factor to their striking, and Judo to add more variety to their takedowns with Judo throws.

Great feedback! Do you think you could teach a student a new kata over video? I know this is usually a bad idea, I'd never think about it, but these COVID times are a (temporary) game changer. I am wondering whether to go for it or whether I'd just be wasting my money

I'd suggest you avoid this pitfall: Many modern kempo schools here in the US (american kempo, shaolin kempo, kenpo (with N), etc seem to be very laissez-fare. They change their own katas several times a year (yes, your kata XYZ may be revisited and changed after a couple months) and they even change advice - in the 90s they'd have told you to kick with the instep, now they tell you to kick with the shin like in muay thai, now they're trying to teach people to check kicks like they do in MMA but they don't really know how to, etc. Make sure your curriculum looks well thought out and not like you're just making stuff up, like so many kempo schools out there. I know kempo is not karate, or it sort of is, but this pitfall applies to any modern style that doesn't quite adhere to very traditional methods (e.g. "Mas Oyama taught this kata like this, so it will stay like this")

What a fascinating concept. I am not saying this is a bad idea at all. Hey, for all we know you're going to create the new Kyokushin, or whatever. I just want to try to poke holes into your idea, NOT to make you doubt, but to make you think of the hard questions now (sooner) rather than later when it's more urgent to answer them. 1) Why would anyone train your new style rather than a very well established traditional style such as Shotokan, or a more practicality-oriented style such as Kudo? 2) When the guy who created Shaolin Kempo did so, he received A LOT of criticism, because of two things: 1) He gave himself rank in his new style (I am not sure how this is supposed to work) and 2) He modified some traditional katas for his new system and karate people said he had no authority to do so. How would you deal with said criticisms? What would you do differently? 3) Have you defined your market? Kids' parents won't care if you are a direct pupil of Gichin Funakoshi himself or if you left a strip mall generic "karate" school with a brown belt and now you opened your dojo, as long as he can leave junior there and learn some discipline, maybe. Then on the other extreme you have some people who will ask you about your lineage, qualifications and all sorts of hard questions, for example, what are the 72 shaolin skills and how did you incorporate them to your karate? Then you have many kinds of people in-between those two. Who is your target market? 4) A bit similar to # 3 above - are you going to be sport karate oriented? fitness oriented? self defense oriented? 5) How are you going to develop the curriculum? Last but not least, how will you stay connected to the broader world of martial arts? For example Joe's shotokan school may be affiliated to a shotokan organization out there, or maybe JKA or something. TKD schools are sometimes affiliated to the kukkiwon, etc. How do you play to stay sharp yourself and to keep updating your skills? How will you keep your school from being a silo to other schools? This could be a really cool thing, we may be witnessing the birth of a new style, I just thought I'd ask some hard questions now to get your mind going and make it smoother for you once you actually start getting this going, shall you decide to do it.

So my school has always had an... interesting model, where there are group classes (your regular classes, like in any other dojo) and then every student gets a personal lesson a week just him/her and the instructor. With COVID most students have left the dojo I go to, but they're using video streaming classes now to try to retain students. It's a really silly concept, it's like WEEEEEE LET'S ALL DO PUSH UPS FROM OUR HOMES! WEEEEE! NOW LET'S DO CRUNCHES!!!! I actually had to stop going to class BEFORE the virus, so I was never in a "just keep paying to the school despite the virus to support them", I had already suspended my membership before all this. I have been considering going back to the school, just to help them out. I don't intend to do the stupid WEEEE! CALISTHENICS FROM WORK EVERYONE!!! stuff, it's just too silly. Plus I can do calisthenics from home on my own, anyway. But my personal lesson, that's an interesting concept. I don't really have the space, but I could try moving a couple things and turning my computer's webcam on and try to learn new kata from my sensei, virtually. In theory this sounds.... doable? What do you think? Would you do this?

very informative posts guys ,thanks

I recall from my childhood that one of my friends did karate, but a different style than mine, sadly I never asked him what his style was. Yes, I am sure it was karate, his Gi said so Anyway, I recall his school's headmaster had a black belt with a red stripe across it (like this: https://www.macho.com/black-belt-with-red-stripe ), while the guy right below him rank wise had a belt like that but it was black and white instead of black and red. What style has belts like this? I've always been intrigued...

the prospect of a broken shin haunts me, yeah. For some reason I wasn't afraid of breaking something back when I was kicking with my instep

Time to keep you posted!! I can now kick muay thai style well... with my left leg For some reason doing it with my right leg is harder. I'm getting better, but I am not quite there yet with my right side. It's funny, I am right handed, but for martial arts or sports I definitely favor my left side.

you guys are awesome, this is so motivating. Thanks for your great advice!