Wastelander

Thanks to both of you! The Chinto application is one that I'm pretty proud of because it seems so simple and natural to me. Lately I have been thinking about ude gatame, which I had learned in judo but had been finding applications for in karate. In the process of doing some research on the Indo-Chinese influence on Okinawan te I came across this carving. I instantly recognized the lock, although applied from a different position, and I recognized the hand position from Chinto. That started me thinking about why that lock might be used at the beginning of that kata, and I realized that it is the only kata I know that steps backwards, and it does so into a low horse stance which indicates (to me) a grappling scenario. Being pulled backward and dropping your weight to make it harder to be thrown, then drawing the hands back to one side and breaking their grip seemed a natural start. It also occurred to me that, according to legend, Bushi Matsumura developed this kata after attempting to arrest a shipwrecked Chinese man who had been stealing from Okinawan people and being defeated (or possibly fought to a draw) by the man. I decided that, as a law enforcement officer of sorts, it would make sense for Matsumura to try and put Chinto on the ground and a suplex would have been a technique he knew to do so. Furthermore, if that had been what occurred then the defense against such a takedown would have been the first thing he learned from his encounter and it would make sense for it to be the first thing in the kata. This is, of course, all merely speculation and theory, but that was my thought process in any case.

Hello everyone, I thought I would share two short videos of two examples of my own personal bunkai--one from the kata Anaku, and one from the kata Chinto. No one taught me these applications, so if they are terrible the only person to blame is me, but I feel that they are relatively straight-forward, they work off of harnessed natural reactions and they work for me. Of course, these are simply examples of possibilities since bunkai is not set in stone and people will find different ways to apply kata based on their training backgrounds, their methodologies and their personal preferences. My training partner in these videos had never seen the applications before, and doesn't know either kata, so I was teaching him at the same time I was recording which makes it a bit clunky, and for that I apologize. Usually when I am explaining things to a group I have planned out everything I am going to say and the explanation is clear, but when working one-on-one I tend to get a little informal. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KA3ojBE7DVw&feature=youtu.be Let me know what you think! Thanks!

Hello, and welcome to the forum! First of all, you should not be trying to "win" in sparring--sparring is a live practice drill for you and your partner to both improve, not a competition. As for getting discouraged, don't be! I have been training for 6 years, so far, and I still feel terrible at sparring! Without seeing video of you sparring, it is very difficult for us to provide any feedback that might help you improve. Your sensei would be a much better person to ask. That said, if I had to guess, you are probably hesitating and that is why your sparring partners are scoring their points before you. This is common in people who are relatively new to point sparring (well, sparring in general, really), and especially when they are sparring against more experienced students. For now, don't worry so much about whether you will get hit or not, and just focus on trying to hit your partner--as I said, it's not a competition so you don't need to worry about "losing", just improving--by bursting forward (forward and at an angle is preferable to straight forward) with your attack, and try using combinations that will tend to draw their hands away from an area that you can strike to later in the combination.

On occasion I make student run kata in reverse, or spin around every time they step over in Naihanchi. I also like marking off a small space (usually about 3ft square) and make them run an entire kata without leaving that space. My sensei also likes having people do a kick every time they are in a cat stance in kata, or have them drop and do a pushup every two, three or four movements. In my old dojo we had many types of sparring that you could do, such as mawate (you have to spin before every strike in order for it to count), seiza (sparring from the knees), hands-only vs. feet-only, etc.

I don't know any, personally--I know a guy in Texas who does Aikido and BJJ, but he's in Houston. Here is a list I found of Japanese Jujutsu places in Texas: http://www.usjjf.org/clubs/texas.htm

I actually have a hard time sleeping every single night--it doesn't matter whether I train or not, I just get to lay there for at least an hour (usually more) before I finally fall asleep.

Honestly, I'm just a karateka, because that's what I decided to call myself. I currently train in Shorin-Ryu, and have been training in it nearly as long as I trained in Shuri-Ryu, so aspects of both are present in my karate. In addition, I actively trained in judo for 4 years and now incorporate that into my karate. Every now and then I have also done seminars for things like escrima, Krav Maga, and Muay Thai and I have taken aspects of those that I have learned and incorporated them into my karate. Periodically I train with people from other arts, and the things I learn from them I also incorporate into my karate. Because of these things, I can't call my self a "Shorin-Ryu stylist" because if I demonstrated my karate next to someone who had only done Shorin-Ryu, I would look quite different. I can't call my self a "Shuri-Ryu stylist" or even a "judoka" for the same reason. In all actuality, unless you are training specifically for style purity, you will most likely develop your own style of whatever martial art you practice. If I were to pass along my personal method of practicing karate, I could call it Shorin-Ryu since that it what I hold the highest rank in, but it isn't REALLY Shorin-Ryu, in the strictest sense.

We have two patches--a dojo patch and a style patch. Some people just do one or the other, but if you want to have both then you are supposed to put the style patch on the left breast and the dojo patch on the left upper sleeve. In Shuri-Ryu, however, the dojo patch went on the left breast and the style patch went on the left lower sleeve, and in that dojo we also got patches for passing tests in weapons and the instructors and assistant instructors had patches designating them as such, and those patches went on the right upper sleeve. Oh, and if you passed the tests for all 6 weapons in the system you earned the "Tasshi" title in kobudo, which got you an additional patch for the right lower sleeve. Everybody has different ways of doing things with their uniforms. Personally, I have been going toward the "less is more" side of things lately, but I don't fault people who use a lot of patches as long as they actually designate something. I don't like the BJJ uniforms covered in all kinds of patches that serve no purpose, for example.

I like my hemp gi from Datsusara (dsgear.com) and before I got that I just used a cheap Chinese judogi I found on eBay. Mizuno is extremely popular in judo, and many BJJ people also use them, and I know that Atama is a popular brand as well.

We work both thigh kicks and shin blocks, and to answer Dobbersky's question we train the shin block toes up, but I usually end up with my foot at an angle rather than up or down when I actually do them. I LOVE thigh kicks--they work really well in combinations and drop people who don't train for them pretty quickly. Ev mentioned doing a hook kick to the sciatic nerve, which is actually something I've been playing with but haven't done to anybody in sparring yet. It's kind of amusing how people who do not train for leg kicks (or at all) have no idea how effective they can be. My previous instructor actually told a story once about when he and a group of other American karateka were traveling around Asia to train and spar, and they ended up sparring with some guys in Thailand who smashed their legs. The story went that the karateka had never trained for thigh kicks and didn't really think anything of it when they started getting kicked there so they never bothered to block them because, "hey, they're just kicking me in the legs." When they sat down between rounds, though, they discovered that after a while they couldn't stand back up from their seat because the muscles in their legs knotted so badly. After hearing that story, though, it always made me wonder why we hardly ever worked thigh kicks at that dojo

I have found that this tends to be the case for MANY high level judo coaches--one of my instructors used it to win almost every competition he ever entered (he calls it the "big gun"). In any case, I trained in judo regularly for about 4 years, although now I just integrate it into my karate training. For self defense, I like deashi barrai, osoto gari, koshi guruma (although I tend to turn this into harai goshi if I need an extra boost of power), and a side-step uchi-mata. That's like four-and-a-half throws for self defense

It depends on how you normally train, what you will be competing in and how tough the competition will be. I generally try to practice my kata and spar enough on a regular basis that I do not really do anything special to prepare for tournaments, but competition also isn't really important to me. We have the kids on our Tournament Team meet up once a week (in addition to their normal classes) for 6 weeks to prepare for tournaments, generally, just so they can get extra practice in and also practice how to bow in, announce, get scores, etc.

I would like to help you, but I've never heard of shiho-empi-uchi. It means "four corners elbow strike", so perhaps it is an elbow striking drill for working a variety of strikes rather than a specific technique? I did a quick search on both YouTube and Google and came up with nothing definitive, so I suspect you will most likely need to ask your instructor what it is (which is always the best course of action, anyway). I'm a little concerned you are being graded without being conversant with YOUR syllabus! I know that some schools grade on a schedule and everyone tests together, ready or not--that was the way my previous dojo was. It really isn't so bad, so long as you understand that you definitely stand the chance of not passing.

I would like to help you, but I've never heard of shiho-empi-uchi. It means "four corners elbow strike", so perhaps it is an elbow striking drill for working a variety of strikes rather than a specific technique? I did a quick search on both YouTube and Google and came up with nothing definitive, so I suspect you will most likely need to ask your instructor what it is (which is always the best course of action, anyway).

No problem, I'm glad I could be of assistance!

The stances are quite different as they tend to be higher and more natural. You will also have to relearn some kata--the Pinan/Heian series are done differently, in particular, but I don't know what kata you know beyond those. Overall, I think you will also find Shorin-Ryu to be a bit more fluid and circular than you are used to, as well. We actually had a Shotokan black belt visit our dojo last night and these were the things he found difficult to adjust to.

Looks like everybody had a good time and the tournament went well! Thanks for sharing, Ev!

Do you want to train a second martial art for effectiveness or for art? If effectiveness, then judo or jujutsu. If art then I would say probably aikido.

I go to the dojo 3 days a week for about 3 hours at a time, but I do at least some kihon or kata practice on my own every day, as well as doing research and writing out my own thoughts on karate.

That is yama-uke (mountain receiving technique--it looks like the shape of a mountain, so it's easy to remember) and I do a slightly different version of Seiunchin ( ) but it does have that in it after a push. I use it to break down someone's grips on my neck, shirt or arms and pull them down into hiza-geri (I know there isn't a hiza-geri in the kata, but I am of the school of thought that neko-ashi-dachi signifies that you should be using the lead leg for something). The motion does not necessarily have to be done with both hands, at least not for my application for it since how you use it depends on how they grab you. Since that version goes straight into fist-to-palm yoi, you can always grab their face and smash it with your fist in case smashing it with your knee didn't work.

Basically, karate camps are intended to give you long periods of serious training where you are away from all of your normal distractions--how the camps are run depends upon the person running them. Shorin-Ryu karate camps tend to be a little less hardcore than that --Hanshi Perry's camp, for example, is in the woods down South and everyone stays in cabins overnight and more-or-less trains from sunrise to dinner time. Lots of kata, bunkai and kihon! My sensei loves that camp but I haven't gotten the chance to attend, myself.

What he meant was, did you tell the Kyokushin people that you have a background in Go-Kan-Ryu? The reason that he asked was because most people who do not do GKR believe that GKR is not good, and if you had told the Kyokushin folks that you are a GKR student they may have decided that you were also not good, which might be why you had the experience that you did. It is a little harsh, but it is certainly a possibility.

I'm out of state without my webcam at the moment, but I'm hoping to be on around 3pm PST periodically once I return.

http://i50.tinypic.com/5zjd3o.jpg Sometimes you have a need for certain training equipment, but don't have the funds to acquire professionally made gear. That was the case with these "blockers" that I made with some PVC pipe, foam pool noodle, contact cement, duct tape, and cloth tape. It was a very simple process--cut the 1" PVC pipe to the desired length, put a small amount of contact cement on it, slide the foam pool noodle onto the pipe, leaving enough pipe left at one end for a handle, then cut the foam off about 2" or 3" past the end of the pipe and use contact cement to fill the hole in the end of the noodle with extra foam. I could have left it that way, but discovered that the foam tended to tear when I grabbed and pulled on it, so I broke out the duct tape. After I wrapped the foam, I decided that the PVC was too slippery and would generate too much static, so I wrapped it with some athletic tape. I already had all of these things sitting around at home, with the exception of the pool noodle, which I purchased at a 99 cent store. After I took this picture, I put a PVC cap on the ends of the handles, too, but you get the idea. All told, each blocker probably cost me about $2 to make, and they may not be pretty but they do work quite well for conditioning and blocking drills!

shuto uke is knife hand block, however shuto uchi is knife hand strike - they are different as a block comes from a different part of the body moving in a certain way that is different from the strike which comes from another place to ensure maximum damage I respectfully disagree, actually. In your style it may be important to perform them differently, but in my dojo we do not make the same distinction during kihon practice or kata. In the air, a shuto is a shuto--it only becomes a shuto-uke if we are actually using it to receive a technique, and it only becomes a shuto-uchi if we are actually using it to strike. We generally call it shuto-uke for simplicity's sake when beginners or people from other styles are around, but the more advanced students tend to just call it a shuto unless we are actually applying it as an uke or uchi at that moment.