iolair

OK, first ... eat a bigger breakfast. Yes, you did hear right. Starting the day with a proper meal is the best way to get your metabolism going, your energy levels will be higher and you'll burn more calories through the day. Also include a mid-morning snack to stave off hunger, even if its just something small. Beef is NOT the best choice of protein when you're dieting, as it's quite high in fat. Fish, chicken breast, soya, lentils or turkey are all better choices. I think the diet you've planned is too minimal to keep up long enough for the amount of weight loss you're talking about (maximum safe loss is about 2lbs a week - any more than that and you're probably losing muscle as well as fat). You also probably wouldn't have enough energy to keep up your training. What is your current, "normal" diet like?

I just eat regularly, usually around 07:10 10:50 (breaktime at school - I teach) 12:50 16:00 19:00 works for me, with planned snacks I don't usually feel the need to grab anything extra....

In the year 1625 England and Spain were at war and Peeke was serving in an English naval squadron, under the command of the Earl of Essex, which was attacking a Spanish naval stronghold. After heavy and accurate bombardment the English captured the fortress, whereupon, they sent forces ashore to carry the attack inland. In the wake of the English landings sailors were sent ashore to forage for food. Richard Peeke, of Tavistock in Devon, was among them. Unwisely he foraged alone and paid the price for his mistake when he was attacked by a patrol of spanish musketers. After a furious fight, during which Peeke was wounded twice, he was captured and taken in chains to Cales ( Cadiz ). from there he was transfered to Xeres where he was put on trial. Present at his trial, which in reality was a miitary interrogation, were four Dukes, four Marquesses, and four Earls. After much questioning Peeke was asked if he thought that the Spanish soldiers present would prove such 'hennes' as the English when they landed in England the following yeare. " "No" replied Peeke. "They would prove to be pullets or chickens." Peeke's insolent reply brought forth an angry response from the Spaniards. "Darst thou then ( quoth Duke Mdyna, with a brow half angry ) fight with one of these Spanish pullets." Peeke replied that, "...hee was unworthy the name of an Englishman, that should refuse to fight with one man of any nation whatsoever." At this Peek's chains and shackles were removed and a space was created for him to fight a Spanish champion by the name of Tiago. Both were armed with Rapier and Poinard. The ensuing fight continued for some time before Peeke, using the guard of the poinard, trapped the blade of Tiago's rapier and simultaniously swept the Spaniards feet from under him. Peeke's rapier, held to the throat of senor Tiago brought forth the necessary capitulation. Spanish pride had been sorely wounded and it was demanded of Peeke whether he would be willing to fight another Spaniard. Peeke replied in the affirmative provided he was allowed to fight with. "... mine owne countrrey weapon called the quarter - staffe." Upon this remark the Spanish unscrewed the head from a Halbered to create a makeshift Quarterstaff. Armed with the weapon of his choice Peeke stood ready to meet his next challenger. However the Spanish were clearly no longer so confident in the prowess of their soldiers for, to Peeke's consternation, two Swordsmen stepped forward to fight him. Peeke sarcastically asked if more would like to join them. The Duke of Medyna asked how many he desired to fight. "Any number under sixe". replied Peeke. The Duke smiled scornfully and beckoned a third man to join the original two. Peeke and the rapier men warily traversed each other, all the while thrusting and warding, till finally Peeke gambled on an all out attack. His first blow a left one of his adversaries dead and his subsequent blows left the other two injured and disarmed. No doubt they also left the spanish seriously questioning the wisdom of their invasion plans. Peeke's feat so impressed his Spanish captors that they released him and granted him safe conduct to England.

Personally, I think nunchaku are too much about showing off. Oh, you didn't mention the other two traditional karate weapons: tonfa and bo. Of the five weapons, my personal order of preference would be: 1) bo 2) tonfa 3) sai 4) kama 5) nunchaku Having said that, I'd rather learn english quarterstaff than japanese bo staff.... Tonfa are very practical self defence weapons, similar to some modern police batons - they are strong for defence as well as attack.

I've read many times that a (european) quarterstaff expert would ALWAYS overcome a (european) swordsman....

Skipping lunch = bad. You can always took food with you if the stuff at school is no good. Generally, it's actually better to have 5 or 6 smaller meals a day instead of 2 or 3 larger ones. Your largest meal of the day should be breakfast, and your smallest the last meal of the day. If you have few meals or very little food, your body thinks it's in a starvation situation and responds by trying to store as much fat as possible.

The first time I went to Karate, I think I ached for three or four days. But the second time for about a day, and after that it was fine. Stick with it. If you need to take a week between this workout and the next one, so be it. It doesn't mean you've failed, it means your body is adapting to exercise - to give in now would be to waste all that work!

When I was still a Karate white belt, I took up Judo and found the combination fantastic. I'd heartily recommend taking up two arts (if you have the time) when they're quite different. If they're similar though (both predominantly striking arts, for example) I think you need more of a solid grounding in the first art before taking the second - say a couple of year's practice (green/brown belt kind of level). That should be enough to prevent learning the second art confusing you in the first one. Just my opinion though.

Cracked toe in Judo randori - this beginner was struggling so I decided to let him throw me. But he threw me while standing on my toe, part of which therefore tried to stay behind! Ouch!

What are your training targets? What do you want achieve/improve at? What MA style are you involved in? Do you have access to a gym or loose weights, or are you just interested in body-weight exercises? http://www.trainforstrength.com might be a good starting point, but you'll need to answer the above questions in order to select (or be advised) exercises that are suitable for you....

The following are the significant components of a diet: 1) Water 2) Carbohydrates 3) Proteins 4) Fats 5) Fibre 6) Minerals 7) Vitamins You need all of these in your diet ... fruit and vegetables (obviously) contribute towards Fibre, Minerals and Vitamins. Fruit and Veg also contain antioxidants that help your body maintain itself, reduce effects of aging etc.... If you don't eat veg at all, you're probably not getting enough fibre, and missing out on the antioxidants (which, incidentally, are present most in fruit and veg with strong colours). Fibre helps maintain the health of your digestive tract and strongly lowers risks of bowel and intestinal cancers. Mineral/Vitamin supplements don't contain either of these. If you can manage fruit though, these do contain the fibre and antioxidants as well as vitamins & minerals ... try to eat a variety of them if you can. Breakfast cereals and bread are good sources of fibre. BTW, you didn't mention any problem with tomatoes or peppers - any problems with these? These are very good on antioxidant chemicals.

Walking is an excellent start if you're beginning from a low fitness point, it would get kind of boring in a back yard. I have a load of fitness drills I could do anywhere, but they require a moderate level of fitness to start with. I still recommend walking as a start, but if you're OK for money then you can use cardio machines and build up your intensity using the same sort of pattern. Treadmills are obviously good. Rowing machines are great because they give close to a full body workout. I have a recumbent exercise cycle which is great for light or moderate exercise as you can sit on it and read a book or watch TV while your exercising. (You can either get a machine at home or join a gym)

Basically, you can change the difficulty of push ups by changing the relative height of your feet and arms. Kneeling, or putting your hands on a surface higher than the floor (a chair, or even a table) will make it easier to start off with. Start off with a level where you can do a few. If you find you can do more than 20 of an easier version, do something to increase the difficulty, until you are eventually able to do "real" push ups. But always aim for little increases at a time... (If you later become a push up expert, rather than doing many repetitions, you can make it more difficult by raising your feet up. Generally it's better to increase the difficulty of an exercise rather than do large numbers (more than 20) of repetitions)

Lots of ways you can go, but here's one take... Start off in the first week with three gentle 30 minute walks (say on Monday, Wednesday and Friday)... Week two ... add in periods of about 2 minutes three times each walk where you walk very briskly, make these brisk periods longer each time you walk - carry on into Week three. Week four - try finishing off the walk with a short jog, maybe just two or three minutes to start with, but each time you go out start jogging a minute earlier. Week seven - by now you should be able to jog for twenty five minutes, only walking in the first five minutes.... now add in 2 minutes three times in each jog where you run instead of jogging.... You get the idea ... start small, but plan. It can also be really helpful to keep a log of how you do - what exercise you did each day, how you felt doing it. Karate classes also tend to be big on pushups ... again the trick is start small, add little by little, and keep a log. Do 1 push up today... tomorrow try to do 2, if you go OK with that add another the next day, if not keep going until you can do two OK. Keep adding one a day if you can. Finally, IMHO it's essential to have one day a week where you do no training at all....

I did something similar to my right hip in 1992, then kept training on it ... I soon got it into a state where I could barely walk for a month, and couldn't train at all for a year. It still gives me trouble now if I'm not really careful with it. My advice ... don't train until you've seen a doctor. See the doctor asap, request to be referred to a sports injury specialist if you have any doubt at all... Oh yeah, and check out http://www.fightingarts.com/reading/article.php?id=256 and the two pages that follow it ... excellent articles and correct stretching and kicking

From what you've said (like using enemies attacks against them, want a competitive art), you could do a lot worse than consider Judo. If you want to be well rounded, complement it with a striking art such as Karate, Boxing or Wing Chun.

Hell, yes There's lots of places you can go for further information, though "The Complete Guide to Sports Nutrition" - a book by Anita Bean, is a good introduction.

Not really. Jigoro Kano originally included striking when he formulated Judo, but generally it is restricted to being in 1 kata which is not taught before black belt.... For the average Judoka, Judo effectively has no striking.

Actually no, I'm still completely clueless about this. Well, mostly clueless.... There's a couple of grappling techniques that really require a grip on clothing, so some sort of strong material (eg. Judo gi) would be an advantage. On the other hand, I'd like to stay away from oriental type uniforms if I can, as this isn't an oriental art (although it takes some inspiration from oriental arts). Using standard martial arts belts is probably a good idea, as everyone is used to what martial arts belts look like, and this could help make the style accessible to newcomers... Although you can't get grey belts, it's the easiest thing in the world to get a white belt and dye it! The temptation at the moment is do go the easy route : training shoes, long trousers(pants), plain T-shirt and belt.... but still undecided. This isn't really a uniform at all though, and I like uniforms as they produce a formal atmosphere that can be more conducive to getting on with training seriously. Training shoes rather than bare feet is the only definite decision so far.... (though they might be removed for safety in groundwork). But if you ever have to fight in real life, you'll have shoes on, so you may as well train this way.

Anyone else here fence, or do any other kind of European sword training? I started foil and epée at school about 12 years ago, now I just fence epée because I don't like the right-of-way rules in foil and sabre... I fence with a club in Herne Bay, Kent, UK - been in a few competitions at inter-club level where I've done OK.

You sound like your requirements are exactly those of the style I've been developing ... unfortunately there's not anywhere you can learn it yet... (See here --> http://www.karateforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=5490 for details) There's only a few styles that really mix striking and grappling well, it can be easier to take two styles to get the balance right. As a teenager I took Karate (Seido: an offshoot of Kyokushinkai) and Judo together, and found these a strong combination though to be really effective in self defence you need to improve the punching by learning a little western boxing or a style that uses similar moves.

Oh yeah and fencing is a bit of a no-brainer to classify 0 0 0 0 0 12

Yes, that's what I meant - sorry, should have been clearer! It's interesting to see different people give the same arts different scores! Anyway, my opinion of a couple of styles I've practiced Seido Karate (pre-black belt: weapons are introduced for black belts) 1)Ground 0 2) Throws/Takedowns 1 3) Infighting 2 4) Punching 5 5) Kicking 4 6) Weapons 0 British Judo Association 1) Ground 5 2) Throws/Takedowns 7 3) Infighting 0 4) Punching 0 5) Kicking 0 6) Weapons 0

It seems to boil down to ... only turn your back on an opponent while doing a technique if they're inexperienced and slow. But surely if they are inexperienced and slow, you can deal with them more efficiently using more conventional techniques anyway....

Who mentioned streetfighting? Anyways, don't forget about the opportunities for grappling (as long as there's a single opponent).