brickshooter

A while back I watched a knife defense seminar. They gave the attacker a yellow marker to simulate a knife, then they line up "expert" defenders. One after the other, everyone was getting "marked up." Wrist grabs, double hand defense, traps, etc. all failed. One main reason was that the attacker was using multiple stabs. And some defenders were able to stop the first stab, they were unable to stop follow up stabs. The overwhelming majority of other people were unable to execute their sophisticated yet complicated knife defense while under pressure. Until they get to the last guy. The attacker starts with a direct stab to the abdomen. The defender responded with 1 basic low block. The type taught in the first day of all Karate schools. The one that no one ever uses after day one including me. Because of the impact of this low block, the attacker was momentarily stunned and unable to follow up with multiple stabs. The defender immediately punched the attacker, stunning him again. Then the defender throws the attacker to the ground with a hip throw, mounted him and pounded him with one hand while pinning the attacker's knife hand to the ground with the other hand. This was the only defender who survived the attack. It was a big eye openner for me who have for years dismissed the Karate low block as an invitation to punch me in the head. Looking back, it occurs to me that the defender probably practiced that simple worthless low block tens of thousands of times. I remember years later talking to a Krav Maga coach who explained to me that the mechanics of a knife defense shouldn't be any different than a defend verus a punch, except that timing as to be more dead on. Anyways, that was my experience. You guys can come to your own conclusion.

I'm under the impression that touraments don't get to choose matts or non matts. They only get to choose the arena. And most of the time, money decides. Since matts cost money, matted arenas will cost more. So unless it's a huge tournament where there is plenty of money to go around, most tournaments go with the lower priced wooden floor. I've never seen cement or brick. But would cringe at the thought of such tournaments. BTW, I think this is a regional issue. In the USA where there are abundant basketball gyms available for weekend rentals at rock bottom pricing, wooden floor tournaments seem to be the standard. Japanese Karate tend to share their tournament arenas with Judo arenas where matts are standards. They'd probably charge you extra to remove the matts. In Europe, there's a split.

I wouldn't take age as an excuse to not apply Kime. Guys like Kanazawa, Enoeda, Osaka were able to perform Katas in their old age without age excuses. However, I'm unsure whether the Koreans practiced Kime. A lot of the TKD guys that I've trained with in the past prefer to use raw power and body weight. And after watching them break bricks, it was hard to convinced them that they were doing it all wrong.

IMO, the sine wave could work if two opponents were to start a fight at least 10 feet apart, which would allow two full running strides before contact. But the problem is that most people don't start a fight 10 feet apart. And if they do, they don't stay 10 feet apart.

I actually do wear a white belt it very often as I often train in different styles. But I do draw the line if I had to go back to a white belf at a school that I've already trained in. Funny but I actually have 3 belts in my bag all the time. A white, brown, and black. LoL. Ya never know I guess...

Here's my own personal interpretation of Tekki Shodan opening sequence. I'm confronted by three attackers, one on the left, one one right and one in front. All three already have their hands on me while restraining me. I execute a Yoi, which pulls my left and right attacker together. They resist which creates kuzushi (unbalancing) needed for a footsweep. I then step to the right and execute a right-foot footsweep, then armbar. That is what you're seeing at the 0:15 mark. An armbar. My left hand is pulling his arm to full extension, my body is the fulcrum, and my right hand is pushing him further off balance while he has one foot in the air from my footsweep. And when he trips and falls while I'm executing this armbar, his arm will snap at the elbow. BTW, One thing that all Karate styles can agree on about the Tekki series is that it's a close-quarter kata. As such it's my opinion that there are no blocks. Any that resembles a block is actually an armbar or armlock. This explains for the low horse stances. In Judo, standing armbars and armlocks are executed in the horse stance to increase leverage and control. Also, I left out all the Japanese names for techniques since not everyone here trained under the Japanese system.

A lot of dojos I know of start you off with a white belt in an intermediate class then have you test up to the rank they think you should be at at their next scheduled testing.

Just caught the Overeem-Lesnar fight. Overeem did something that I've not seen strikers used on wrestlers. Upon stopping the takedown, Overeem immediately kneed Lesnar in the Liver. Immediate as in Overeem was waiting for the takedown attempt which openned Lesnar's arms and thereby exposed his torso. I wonder whether strikers will add this knee-to-the-liver take down defense like how they used to apply the crank & knee to the top of the head in Pride.

Move on.

If I remember correctly In the Machida/Ortiz fight the the knee land on Tito's right side. Thus socking the liver if Nog hit the same spot again the liver was hit. Now if you've never took a good liver shot you are missing the experince of the body trying to shut down to protect its self. Or two he is getting soft in the body and can't take the shots anymore. I've been hit in the liver before. Oddly enough, it was painful. And I thought I was going to crap in my pants. I lost bodily control and actually thought I was going to be pasted on youtube as the crappy guy. But Tito was hit on his left side. I wrote right rib cage by mistake as though I was facing him. his liver is on located on the right side of his body. The only thing I could think of is that he had his ribs factured and it didn't heal properly leaving him a weak spot.

Whilst we're on the subject of Tito - It's sad to see his demise. I think he grabbed a lucky sub against Ryan Bader then two back-to-back losses and all that after 5 years without a win makes us remember him for the wrong reasons. Time to give up now Tito before you get hurt. I wonder what is the condition of Tito's right rib cage. Machida kneed him there a couple of fights ago and he went down. In his last fight, I think that Tito was hit in the same spot and went limp. In this fight, Little Nog was aiming for the same spot. But Nog was punching with his weaker hand since Nog is a southpaw. The look on Tito's face was interesting. That's the most pain I've seen any fighter display in years.

It was Tito Ortiz who once said "it's going to be hard to submit me when you're eating my elbows."

I saw the entire fight. Jones was getting hammered in the 1st round when trying to exchange strikes. You can tell that they weren't even in the same league. Jone's strikes weren't even making contact with blocks, he was hitting air. And Machida clearly hurted Jones with a punch to the head & kicks to the body. By the end of the round, Jone's corner told him to calm down several times as they sense Jones panicking. In the 2nd round, Jones took Machida down almost with ease. Jones has too much leverage because of his height, upperbody strenght and wrestling skills. Later Jones caught Machida on the chin, then was all over him. And ended the fight with a standing strangulation. Machida's Karate was sound. But he didn't have enough leverage and strength to handle Jone's wrestling skills. Wrestlers really know how to maximize the use of their body weight. I was actually surprised at the ineffectiveness of Jones striking.

I don't know about others, but I have to really focus and feel for the tap. Otherwise, I'll accidentally go too far. So if I were to slip up because of fatigue, I'm sure that I'll accidentally break rather than let go.

Let's not dismiss MMA as "just a sport" just yet. Let's look at what the sport has shown over the years. First, that grappling is a range that many arts ignore, to their own peril. Any decent collegiate wrestler can take you to the ground, break your arm, choke you unconscious and KILL you if you don''t know how to defend takedowns or get back to your feet. Remember that a tapout means "please stop before you dstroy my limb or neck." So, for a self-defense minded person, to ignore grappling is to bury your head in the sand. Case in point: chuck Liddel is known as a knockout artist. He is also a great grappler. If not for his ability to use grappling skill to keep the fight standing, he'd be known as that guy that keeps getting taken down and tapped out. There also tends to be an attitude from the MMA crowd that traditional martail arts are not combatively efficient. This stems from their lack of experience with weapons. Aikijutsu is not much use against a boxer, but it is awesome against someone swinging a ball bat at your skull. What I'm getting at is that you have a good view on using what works, just don't let the style-specific sycophants ruin your view of any art. If you can stay objective, most arts have something to offer. Are you sure about this? Seems to me that collegiant wrestling don't teach these techniques. This is the realm of the Judo/BJJ folks. I only wrestled high school.

Most other styles avoid the bob. The reason is that you put your head half way to your opponent's knee and feet. Your reaction time is now cut in half. So you better have world class timing and vision to avoid those attacks since they have only to travel 1/2 way to reach your head. MT folks even take it to an extreme. They actually stand on their back leg sort of like a modified cat stance. And they do it to avoid the other guy's knee. If you're under boxing rules, then you need to take your left and and right hand, put them together and cover your chin. Then lower your elbows to protect your ribs. Then bob and weave. Don't be a hot dog and think that you can't be hit with fancy bob and weave. Bob and weave is only one layer of defense. You need multiple layers of defense in case one fails. There are several youtube videos of Mike Tyson training. That's how you should bob and weave.

IMO, gloves protect the hand and prevent serious head trauma. Boxing punches are generally delivered in a natural arc. Gloves & wraps protect the hand from boxers break. However, gloves also act as a pad, protecting the head from catastrophic trauma when the puncher's hand doesn't break upon impact. I've personally witnessed a fist fight after a local baseball game where a 135lbs. guy whom I've always thought to be an average Karate guy punched his 180lb. attacker in the face and broke the guy's cheekbone with a single punch. The 135lb guy had conditioned knuckles.

I have to throw in my 2 cents here. This is an especially irksome issue for me. It appears that eveyone likes to "point west" when it comes to the watering down of styles. I don't think this is the case. Many westerners that brought an MA back, or start their own schools, are doing so under the premises taught to them by their eastern counterparts. They use ideas given to them by their eastern counterparts. If one wants to begin pointing to the watering down of arts like Karate, then I would have to say it has just as much to do with ideas from the east as it does from the west. It is true that western business models are a bit differnet than those in the east. You can't expect too many students to enroll in a class where they can expect to be beaten on for over an hour and a half per class, three nights per week. Not good business. Sure, you will probably end up with some good MAists there, physically, but likely not too many. Things have changed since the 50s and 60s, but overall, I think training has advanced and gotten better since that time. Likewise, the more people who get into something, get exposed to it, and go on to do their own thing with, you end up with some that aren't focusing on the same things the others are; it is possible to get less than stellar quality of instruction. And this is sad. But, all too often, the bad ones draw our focus, and then we assume there is more bad than good out there, when its just the bad that sticks out more. Either the bad sticks out more. Or it's exploited by competitor martial arts. Let's face it, it is a highly competitive business environment out there.

That's not really my point. My point is that you can take a person with no training, put him or her in a boxing or BJJ regiment for 6 months. And they can reasonably defend themself with what they learned. You can't do that with TKD or Karate. At 6 months, the TKD/Karate student is barely grasping its concept. Barely.

Montana and Tallgeese, How long did it take you guys to learn TKD punching to the point where you can reasonably defend yourself in a fight versus a person of the same weight and athleticism?

This is true. However, if your purpose is to fight in mixed martial arts, why would you want to spend hours learning gi grips? Also, traditional Judo will not give you any experience with striking in a clinch. True. I missed reading his later post where he stated that he wanted to compete in MMA. He should head straight to the MMA gyms then, where he can get both wrestling and BJJ training.

Judo matches up with Shotokan very well. As a Shotokan guy, you're going to use alot of momentum to generate knock out power. Notice that when you attacks fail, you often end up body slamming into your opponent at full speed. As rediculous as it feels, this accidental running into your opponent is most beneficial to a judoka as you're able to close the distance without getting hit + the momentum is used to unbalance your opponent and set him up for a throw.

The truth is that kicking is the most difficult skill to learn. And that is what TKD gives. Boxing is one of the easiet skill to learn. Grappling is also incredibly innate. Hence, the TKD guys are among those who can make the transition to MMA the easiest.

This is a good post. I notice that many instructors fail to teach application. Instead they teach only techniques. For example, they teach the low stances. But they don't tell students when to use them. Consequently, students believe that they're supposed to be in a low stance all of the time. Incorrect. The low stance is used when on unstable grounds, which may include grass, dirt, wet floor, sand or ice which is very common in the real world. But if you're on even ground like the ring, then you use a high stance to be mobile. You only use a low stance when striking to maximize power, then prop back up to a high stance to regain that mobility. The low stance is also used when fighting in a clinch or to defend a throw. Well... what I just posted isn't commonly taught. Studends get tons of instructions on where to point the toes, where to point the knees, sliding the feet. And zero instruction on actual application. In the East, students will wait patiently because they're interested in perfection (hint, it's why they called it an "Art"). Here in the West, students are more interested in application rather than perfection. We want self-defense. But all we get is "Art."

There'll always be that friction between a Korean and Japanese in lieu of their colonial past. Doesn't have to be Karate vs. TKD. A fist fight can result duing a discussion on the origins of Sushi, noodles, golf ... anything.