Spodo Komodo

I love the setup for season 5 - ambiguous honour, betrayal, loose ends and another returning character. Seriously though, CK should be a blueprint for how to approach much loved movie franchises that people grew up with. It is obviously written by a team that know and love the canon.

I'll be happy if they bring back Stingray from season 2.

Many dojos encourage black belts to start to develop their own kata. I have one of my own which concentrates on my own weaknesses, mainly round and side kicks, with a few trickier combination techniques thrown in for punctuation. It makes you think about how karate has become "yours" and is a great creative outlet.

The Dogi is really just Japanese formal underwear so it is a bit like runners wearing a singlet and shorts. I bought a very expensive Japanese underwear set for my Iaido training once, a white jacket and trousers to go under uwagi and hakama. When they came they had the description "karate gi" on the tag and were identical to a karate gi I had purchased elsewhere for about 75% of the price! As for a new suit, in a hot climate (I assume you feel fairly warm in California) an 8-10oz suit will probably be good. I think you can get fabrics like clima-cool over in the US, they don't sell them in the UK for obvious reasons. If you do a lot of grappling then you might want to go up a weight to 12oz at some point. The heavier weights will make you sweat but when you get up the belts your techniques will make the heavier gi "snap" with every punch and kick. It sounds good and makes you feel like you are in a Bruce Lee movie. EDIT - just realised I'm a bit late on this one, oh well! The BJJ gi is generally a softer weave to prevent mat-rash, it wicks sweat away from the skin well but you will never get it to snap like 14oz cotton canvas. You may also find it cut a little restrictively in the crotch, BJJ rarely calls for a side kick at head level.

I train barefoot at home, mainly because I never wear shoes unless I have to pass my front gate. If I have a cut on my feet I find that the local sports supplier (Decathlon) sell cheapo school pumps, like a kung-fu slipper but with a better sole. Those do the trick without losing the feel of the ground.

They were never big in the UK, but I do collect Sun Soccer Cards. These were the football equivalent of tea cards that came in packets of PG Tips tea in the 60s/70s and featured technology, history and natural subjects. The cards were about 1"x2" and featured a sometimes less than accurate portrait of a famous UK or international soccer player rendered in ink and wash. A short biography was on the back and there were 1000 in the set. I have about two-thirds of them. They were nowhere near the production quality of US baseball cards but they have a certain naive charm and they are cheap as chips. There are no rarities and you can still get a dozen for a pound. I have a few UK hockey cards issued by the Nottingham Panthers and Sheffield Steelers in the 80s but they never caught on. Ice hockey remains small in the UK due to the lack of ice rinks, despite us breaking into the top tier of world hockey occasionally. It's a shame really because I love Ice Hockey but I rarely get to see a game, it is often sold out. US football cards were briefly available in the UK when Channel 4 started showing selected NFL games, Topps made them I think. My friend managed to get a full set of Miami Dolphins but I never got more than a handful of my beloved Denver Broncos. The packs seemed stacked in favour of east coast teams all the time. The nearest UK equivalent of US sports cards is definitely the Panini World Cup/Euro sticker collection of which I have quite a few. These have the added attraction of being swappable over the whole of Europe, all the text being in the album rather than on the sticker.

I trained in both Aikido and Karate for a while. I went from 8th to 4th kyu in Yoshinkan Aikido while I went from 3rd to 1st kyu in Wado Ryu Karate. Eventually I felt that I had to give up one or the other and I found Karate to be the art that suited me the best. I found several incompatibilities but the one that hampered me the most was resistance to techniques. In my Karate training we were encouraged to dig a punch in if the opponent was hesitant and not to just fall over, even in prearranged paired work such as Ohyo Kumite. If a technique couldn't bring down a resisting opponent then it wasn't executed properly. In Aikido I was constantly warned to "go with it or you will end up with broken wrists". I have no doubt that if someone who really knew how to do it tried they could break my wrists but what usually happened was we both fell in a heap. Unfortuately, wanting to be a team player at Aikido started to leak back into my Karate and I began to roll with the throws there which just annoyed everyone who thought I was putting it on. To some extent they were right, what I was doing was right for Aikido but very much against the spirit of Karate. In the end I figured out that they belonged to two very different dojo cultures and packed in the Aikido, I am more of a punchy, grapply kind of guy and I got that at Karate. However, a more grounded Aikido club and a less practical Karate club might be a closer pairing. All I can say is that the only way to find out is to give it a go but examine everything, question everything.

There was a small group of what looked like Kung Fu students doing forms in the park this morning. I found a spot a way off to do my kata practice and we shared a friendly wave.

Its like malaria, you think you are ok for a few years and then bam! You find yourself side-kicking lamp-posts on your walk home and collecting your chocolate bar from the vending machine in horse-riding stance. I tend to wander away from training due to life circumstances, moving away for a job, looking after family or nursing a serious injury. Inertia stops me from going back for a few years and I tend to have other things to fill my time but eventually I need to do something active and once you have done martial arts, the gym is a poor substitute.

Some Wado Ryu clubs in the UK are extremely technical. Move a foot twice instead of once or fail to exit a technique properly and you start to rack up the faults. You can know a kata inside out but if you land unsteadily from a jump or are a bit slow to kiai you could well be on course to fail. I think part of it comes from a need to be better than the McDojos that undoubtedly still exist but all the very technical clubs I have trained with tend to have low or no grading fees so it really is just a matter of taking notes and trying harder next time. I have only trained with a couple of Shotokan clubs and they tended towards the position of only putting people forward for grading if they are well past the required standard. Nobody fails but some don't get to grade for a long time. In the end I suppose it depends whether failure or frustration feels worse.

One thing I would add is to get something to strike against. If you have access to a heavy bag or even a kick-shield and a post to strap it to then use it to practice your strikes against. The striking surface will give you a little feedback and allow you to tune your movements for power and efficiency if you really examine your technique rather than just flail at the target. It isn't as good as a teacher but it is better than nothing. I learned what little Bo technique I have from meeting with a teacher for a day every six months so the rest of the time I was practicing kata and striking the bag. You can also video yourself and just see what you look like, always save your first video to check progress against though .

Thanks chaps.

Interesting bo kata, very heavy on striking which would make a non-tapered bo the best choice I suppose.

The very best get cancelled after season 1... Constantine... I started watching Bosch but got a bit bogged down and just left it during season 1, might have to give it another go when I have no other series on the go.

Wow, thanks! I've not been around for a while due to looking after my father who had terminal cancer. Now he has passed I need to lose weight, get fit and get back into the dojo. KarateForums has always been the most sensible, calm and supportive MA forum I have been on so I am glad to be back.

I have been going through my DVD collection, so far I have watched: half a dozen of the Zatoichi films (Shintaro Katsu) Takeshi Kitano's Zatoichi Blind Fury Black Belt Iron Monkey 18 Bronze Men Born Invincible The Babycart Series (Lone Wolf & Cub) And the Goodies episode Eckythump which is 30 minutes of the finest martial arts ever. One man died from just watching it (google it!)

Punch someone in the face and all they learn is that you are not to be trusted. They then go on to distrust other people in case they get a punch in the face and eventually you get a sick society based on mutual mistrust. Teach someone to fish and they can teach someone else to fish and eventually everyone is chilling out on the bankside and getting a barbecue started. Teach a man to punch a fish in the face though, then he won't need expensive tackle and bait...

I am hoping to get back into the dojo later this year if I can get my chronic fatigue under control. If not then my only real regret would be allowing myself to be pushed into grading for 1st Dan too early. It created a rift between me and some of the older, more traditionally minded members of the club and eventually led me to quit Karate for several years. Happiest memory, too many to choose from but I will always remember the first time I really "felt" a kata. I was practicing Naifanchi for a local competition and everything just clicked. It became almost effortless and my training buddy said it looked sharper than anything I had done before. Unfortunately I didn't repeat the experience in the competition but still managed to come away with a medal so it wasn't too far off. I was never a sporty person before dropping into martial arts almost by accident so without Karate I would never have experienced the euphoric feeling that a well-executed technique can bring.

No, it isn't true for every kata due to the changing nature of kata over the centuries. You would be hard pushed just to defend yourself with the contents of (I only have Wado Ryu examples, sorry!) Naifanchi or Rohai but the longer, older kata such as Kushanku or Jion, possibly. From my own dabbling in Kung Fu, the form seems to have been a way of teaching the main points of a style, more of a catalogue than an imaginary fight. Those forms tend to be quite long and not overly repetitive. When karate came along it seems to have adopted a hybrid approach, keeping traditional forms but also supplementing them with the kind of forms found in Ju-Jutsu and other native arts which seem to drill a particular technique in several different ways. I was told many times that each kata is a complete fighting system but I have never found it held up to scrutiny, after all if it were true then why bother with the other dozen or more kata that most Karate Ryu have.

I quite like Pinan Sandan but I can see why people don't, it is the first kata that has moves which, to quote a student "don't look like karate". I think once you get into the context and bunkai of Pinan Sandan it begins to look more sensible but to the student meeting it for the first time it is neither graceful nor classic punchy-kicky style. My favourite kata are: 1. Naifanchi - I love this kata, it can be powerful and graceful and you can practice it in a corridor. 2. Pinan Godan - nice powerful moves, short and punchy. 3. Bassai - interesting twists on familiar combinations from other kata. 4. Seishan - full of contrasts, so unlike anything else. 5. Wanshu - (the version with the maegeri in each of the main combinations) the constant contraction-expansion combinations makes this kata fizz with energy. The only kata I dread is Kushanku but only because: 1. I sometimes drift off into one of the Pinan kata by mistake. 2. The drop in the second half aggravates my dodgy knee. On a good day it is a great kata but I have messed it up so many times I am apprehensive about it even twenty years after first learning it.

From a British perspective everything in the list pretty much applies here but I would add a couple of things. The first is the de-alienation of eastern cultures through takeaway food. In the late 60s - early 70s Chinese restaurants would make their way into the heart of pretty much every community, re-igniting the British love of all things far-eastern. 1970s TV - before the 80s boom we had Japanese television series of Chinese classics such as Monkey and The Water Margin. Even Inspector Clouseau vs his faithful sidekick Kato or Hong Kong Phooey had a lasting impact on the psyche of British youth.

Lightsaber fighting is very sought-after by hipster Jedi at the moment. Even my local gym has a few shinai covered in a UV fluorescent wrap for twirling around while executing kung-faux moves and generally being annoying.

I only really know about Wado Ryu and Shotokan but within those Ryu the Pinan/Heian kata tend not to deviate too much. Maybe a step here or a block exchanged for a punch there but they are relatively new. Older kata such as Kushanku/Kanku (I think that's the Shotokan equivalent) may differ more and even have several forms within a single tradition. Are we talking the same rough shape with a few differences in stance and a few punches and block swapped out or does it look like a different kata entirely? PS Pinan Nidan and Pinan Shodan are sometimes named the other way round to preserve the numbering in the name since what is traditionally the second kata (Nidan) is usually taught first. Hah! Beat me to the PS JR!

The series is on ordinary Youtube in the UK, just watched the first three. Not bad, good enough to keep watching.

My main challenge at the moment is an erratic thyroid so I have piled on the pounds and some days I barely have the energy to lift a pencil. This has kept me out of the Dojo for nearly two years now and I am pretty fed up but I am hoping to return to training as soon as I can tie my belt without losing half my name in the knot. I just practice kata daily and keep hitting the bag for as long as I can stand. Some days that is half an hour or more, others two or three minutes before I am exhausted. I also have weird hip sockets so I can send a front kick as high as I want but side and round kicks are limited to lower rib height unless I dislocate at least one leg. This makes kicks to the side painful if I am not careful but since I make up for lack of height with a decent amount of power it hasn't been too much of a problem. That's the great thing about martial arts, they can be adapted to pretty much any limitation as long as you have some basic motor functions.