Maestro

just a quik comment on jeffin's method (geez, crosstrainin' like a fiend!). That is an excellent and common way of dealing with a situation, my sahbumnim showed me an excellent thing to use with it: While you have one hand resting at the plexus, if they begin to move forward, give a quick jab into the stomach with that hand. For just about anyone, the reaction will be to lean forward slightly and bring the hands towards the stomach some--even if you didn't hit 'em hard, which you probably couldn't, since your arm was out already, their arm will still probably jerk down a little involuntarily, as they were not expecting YOU to be the agressor at this point--during this split second, hook to the face. Like I said, my sahbumnim did it to me, and I fell for it, dangit. But hey, it works.

I have an e-book called "Aikido, The Art Of Fighting Without Fighting." The title is misleading, as it's really not an Aiki book. It is, in my opinion, the best book about avioding and de-escalating situations on the street. I just went to find the site, apparently it doesn't exist anymore. But I would be more than happy to e-mail it to anyone who is interested. I would highly recommend it Dragon. As for the sparring, like they said, it'll come. I have a question for you though: I remember seeing on another post of yours that you were not yet in a formal school, practiced your own style called anything goes? (think it was you, I'm too lazy to check) If so, my question would be; Just how much sparring experience do you have, how often do you spar? I ask because things like reading a telegraphed motion take some time to develop, and no offense intended but I wonder if maybe you're hoping for a bit much a bit too soon?

well, I know nothing about headbut, 'cept that I don't think I'd want to do 'em. I'm just saying welcome to the forum to renketsu. I've browsed around here for a while but I just joined a few days ago. You gotta be careful man, it's addictive, watch yourself!

kensai, have no fear, I watched a friend of mine (TKD, better than I) spar an aikido guy full out. The guy took my friend apart. That whole redirection thing is crazy effective.

I do traditional tae kwon do. It has excellent strikes and blocks, huge amounts of contact sparring time. Also the past twenty years have not yet parted me with the childhood delusion that I am invincible, and that helps too.

well, I'm with bonnyboy, I usually don't talk about MA's to people I don't know real well. But women sure do like flexibility, that's all I have to say...

Hey TJS! You gotta step outside the box too and tell us about your style! Anyway, I practice traditional Tae Kwon Do. I've been in two "altercations" since I started, and my impressions were this: I have learned to move to avoid hits instinctivly, and immediatly counter, almost instinctivly, and very effectivly. I've never used the high-kicks in a real situation, but then, I never expect to. The thing is that it has taught me to move and react quickly and powerfully, almost without thinking. Now. I'll admit my opponents did not strike me as skilled fighters, so I may have got off easy, but still, it made a difference. I have sparred agianst a Judo guy, and I had the upper hand as long as I could keep him at arms length, but once he gets in on me, man, I'm done, kills me every time.

wow. I'm never holding for the low belt tests again. I like my fingers way too much. Once in my doe-chang we had a guy fail a break, hitting it real weird. You know that little bit of webbed skin you've got between you fingers? Well, I guess there was a piece of wood coming off the edges, cause a guy got a huge ole splinter clear through that. Scary part was I was holdin the other end of the board. Board-holding is the most dangerous, most complex technique of all!

Things like meats and milk are good, because they contain what are called complete protiens, whereas the protien you might get from say, a granola bar would not be. Also potassium is very, very helpful in recovery(Bannanas are good, and I belive minute-maid OJ now has potasium added too), Vitamin C is good to help keep energy levels up, and of course, get lots of sleep--believe it or not, it's been found that the amount of sleep you get two nights before can effect your performance almost as much as the night before, or even more than the night before, depending on the person.

Personaly, I would recomend Everlast bags, I have had one for six years now and am very happy with it, the name really fits. You don't have to fill it with anything, it's already filled with something, I don't know what, but it's of good consistency. It's an eighty pound bag, and I find it to be good for hand techniques, but a little light for hard kicking. My do-chang has a 100 pound bag, it's perfect for kicks, I think, so it depends on what you're looking for. You say you're pretty strong, so if I were to believe you I would recommmend the 100lb. Either way, I would say go with the Everlast bag, but I've never had or used a century, so I can't speak for that.

Well, I've weight trained my whole life so... Yes whitebelt, there are exercises to increase muscle edurance, but there are two types of endurance, and it depends on which you want to build: -There is aerobic endurance, which would best be achieved (in my opinion)by middle and long distance running. Aerobic activities can obviously be carried out for long peroids of time, but the disadvantage is that the aerobic (slow-twitch) muscles of you body are less powerful than the fast-twitch, or anaerobic muscles. -Anaerobic endurance (I suspect this is what your looking for) can be achieved many ways. If you have done next to no weight training before, just about any weight training will create some good gains here at first. After a while though, I would recomend an exercise type called burn-outs. They are basicly just what you asked-less weight with higher reps. Your target repitions would be around 50-60, where on the last ones you are really straining. I would not recommend any more than 5 sets of these, tops, you sound like you're new to lifting, so actually, I'm gonna say four, tops. These exercises are great for building power endurance, i.e, succesive very, very hard hits to a heavy bag, something you cannot get just by running. Caution though! These types of exercises are hard on the muscles! They build up a lot of lactic acid, and can leave your body quite exhausted, so I would not recommend starting them until you have established some good ligament and tendon strength, and until that initial week of soreness after starting a weight routine has passed. After that though, they're awesome. Bonnyboy makes excellent points too() Obviously your not going to spend all you time in the gym, so maximize you time and do the big-group exercises. I would suggest squats, deadlifts, Bench(at all inclines), rows, military press, and power-curls. Probably in that order too. No motion in martial arts isolates a muscle group, so why should you? Chances are, you hit your abs pretty good in shotokan, so probably you don't need to focus on those a whole lot, but well, you know if you do or not. If you don't, better do lots of abs and obliques too. Another word of caution though: Just about any weightlifting exercise requires you back for support(especially military press, deadlifts, and power curls). A lot of times martial arts will focus on the abs and obliques, but not the back! This would be a horrible oversight when it comes to weightlifting. I would suggest that for the first few workouts you go with light weights, but make sure to hit your lower back pretty good. If you start up on the heavier weights before you have the proper back strength, you are just asking for trouble. Maybe the best advice I can give you is this: don't push too hard! We martial artists push our bodies to the limits all the time, but the weightroom is one place that this can really come back and bite you! I have seen it happen all to often. Just use your head man. Good luck to you!

Those of you who have mastered the one handeds and are looking for something even more fun should check out my post in "bodyweight calisthetics." It's good stuff, if done correctly.

Shotochem is right. I also had this problem around your age with the hip, and just went by what my regular doc told me, and regreted it. Definitly you should see a specialist.

don't try to stretch it too much for three or four days. You need to let it heal before you can start lengthening it again. If you stretch when you have a micro-tear, you will just create more scar tissue, which is less flexible than normal . "Take it slow or you'll be going backwards." that's what my sahbumnim tells me, at least. Very Zen.

That's right man, you'll only grab what you reach for. I dunno though, I think I would put the toaster between sliced bread and pushups, 'cause really, it makes the bread just that much better ya know?

Jmy77, looks like you enjoy pushups! I'm with you man, they're the best. If you want something really challenging, try these, though I'm not sure I would recommend them to be done before you've got the one-handed's pretty good, 'cause if you don't have the strength, you might end up doing a face plant, as these are a lot more of a ballistic exercise than normal pushups. -Hands and feet shoulder-width apart (probably wider feet at first, but bring 'em in eventually, the idea is to focus on the arms here) -Spring off with your hands, putting much more force into one side than the other, at the same time impart some extra twisting force with your legs. (picture rolling over, only about 2 feet off the ground) -Once you get it, you can do it one way, landing in the down position and pop right back the other way. I know it sounds a bit out there but believe me, myself and my training partner do these, and they develop power and arm speed like no other!

Wow, this thread has just increased the number of drugies in the world by ten or so. Just kidding, I get hip-popping too, I think I'm gonna try it out.

Basicly anything rough that will build up calluses will work alright. The idea is just to get a good callus, it acts like a bumper to spread out the impact area. I do knifehands to a piece of that fabric-backed 300grit sandpaper with foam behind it, works pretty good. The sand is excellent though, especially if you want to condition the entire hand.

deep six it sensei.

John G, I could not agree with you more, and Kirves, I think we could agree that unfortunatly as it may be, it's what the vast majority of the public wants to see? Deep, respectful bow to you both.

Haha I've nothing to add, I just wanted to see if it made more sense the second time.

Oh man, that goes way beyond LOL!

"keep all bleeding internal" That's great!

dangit, I'm a moron, I'll admit it. Pretty cool though.

Actually, I can say come train with us. You overlook the fact that there are many different ways of teaching tae kwon do. You seem to be insinuating that there is a hipocrisy in my response on this point, that we would go to a high kicking demo to draw in new students, then teach people something else entirely, but you see, my school does NOT attend high-kicking tournies or hold high-kicking demos, so it would be completely legit for us to believe that if you want to learn effective tae kwon, you should come try ours. Please do not think that I am saying TKD schools do not teach what they exhibit. I'm sure that all the sport schools teach just like they compete. What I'm saying is that just because the schools holding tournies teach high kicking, it doesn't mean that all schools do. The initial thread here was TKD vs. Streetfighting: my point is merely that TKD, when effectivly taught (i.e, non-sport, the schools that DON'T emphasize high kicking, but rather self-defense, as the art was originally intended to be), can be more effective than people who cannot get past the high-kicking issue think. (And I realize that there are all sorts of demonstrations that do not involve high-kicking. I was not refering to demos in general, but to tae kwon do ones, where people have unfortunatly come to expect the high kicking, and, at least for some people I know, that's the only reason they would go. Believe me, I myself would rather watch another art's demo without high-kicking, as everytime I see someone doing flashy kicks all I see in my head is them getting kicked in the grion in midair!