CredoTe

Congratulations! Well earned many times over!

Congrats!

Congrats! Well earned... Keep the great kung fu/tai chi videos coming!

Every square inch of my skin is tattooed with the "glorious" birthday suit I was given when I came into this world... Nope... no tattoos for me.

This reflects my one true goal for 2015: live a healthier lifestyle. My MA goals of gaining more knowledge of Tii and continued development of my skills in karate will always be an ongoing, lifelong pursuit. That said... My doctor assures me (after a few tests) that my heart/cardiovascular system is good, and that I'm healthy overall. But... I'm just thoroughly...absolutely sick of being overweight. No matter how hard I train, no matter how much kihon or kata or pushups or leglifts or crunches or whatever, I cannot seem to break through the weight wall I'm stuck at. So, something's got to change; I'm going to do something about it rather than just mope around. I plan to eat healthier, introduce a different workout regimen (that still includes MA training), and include my family with it. I'm 258 lbs (117.027 kg); my goal is to reach and maintain 210 lbs (95.254 kg) by the end of 2015. Reaching 210 lbs will be a struggle, but maintaining it, for me, will be a bigger struggle.

Amen to that... Cramped apartment + cold, snowy weather = slightly fatter me... Seriously, my struggle is that I haven't figured out the whole juggling act, yet. That is, juggling family, work, and karate training in the correct order to be able to devote enough time to training after the other two priorities are met. It seems every time I try to figure it out, my mind becomes clouded by the obligatory clown/circus music...

In the dojo or gym, training with partners is essential to true understanding of concepts and development of skills/techniques. Take kata, for instance; to truly understand concepts/bunkai/oyo transmitted by kata, we must take waza out of a given kata and work them with a live opponent. But, that's where the catch is; this should be done under the guidance of an experienced and skilled instructor. When we train outside of the dojo or gym, training with a partner who is not an experienced and skilled instructor can be a pitfall. There are many benefits, as well, like fellowship/camaraderie, working the techniques, getting a workout, etc. However, the major pitfall is for training partners to train incorrectly and develop bad habits/techniques. While partners are essential for true martial art skill development and understanding, IMHO, the core essential of training outside the dojo or gym is true self internalization of concepts (the Shu-Ha-Ri thing). I am of the philosophy that a practitioner's most significant gains in internalization of concepts come after the partner work/training in the dojo, when the practitioner is alone and training/contemplating what was worked at the dojo; when the practitioner reaches internalization/true understanding on his/her own. After all, the greatest instructor in the world cannot make anyone understand anything; instructors are never really givers of knowledge, rather, they are guides that point to knowledge. The student/practitioner can only (and must) reach knowledge/understanding/internalization on his/her own. An experienced and skilled instructor guides the student/practitioner to keep him/her on a conceptually sound path to the knowledge/understanding/internalization and to keep him/her from developing bad habits/techniques.

Congrats to all! Well earned!

Congrats!

Besides "family", "community", "representative", etc that others have used, two others I would use to describe KF are: Preservative Enlightenment

Congrats!!!

Great video, great share. As always, well done, very detailed...

Congrats

Agreed...

Yeah, looking at the photo that's posted in the article shared by Bob (photo at the bottom of the article with all the people out front of the bar), you can see the old Nagamine Osensei dojo in the far right edge of the photo...just barely visible.

I think that's the place that our director goes to every time he visits Okinawa to train at the WMKA headquarters. If I remember correctly, that place is next-door to the old Osensei Nagamine dojo (that closed, unfortunately...Nagamine dojo, that is). Many of the photos on The Dojo Bar's FB are of Matsubayashi-Ryu practitioners...

I lived in Augusta, GA for 3+ years, and have actually been to this school. This is a top-notch place, and probably the best choice of the MA schools in the Augusta/CSRA. As a bonus, the head instructor's wife is also a top-notch dance instructor. You could learn self-defense and learn how to ballroom/salsa dance from the same place... Pretty intriguing... I visited A LOT of MA schools during my time in Augusta, but never joined any of them because a vast majority of them are McDojos that will not give you the self-defense aspect you are looking for. They will give you the tournament aspect you want, which has its value in and of itself, but no real self-defense. The biggest McDojo in the Augusta/CSRA that I visited was Seigler's Karate Center (main location in Martinez). Again, they will give you a great workout, discipline for your kids, and training/experience in tournaments, but I question their effectiveness in self-defense. I didn't see any real self-defense skills taught until I visited their MMA/BJJ school. At the time, their MMA/BJJ school was extra, on top of normal MA training/fees/costs. It may not be that way now, but I don't know (I'm not in Augusta anymore). Just my $0.02 worth of experience from my stay in the CSRA...

So true... In some cases, one may experience REKS, Residual Enthusiastic Karateka Syndrome... Even with my 25 years of MA, I still find myself doing it!

Oh, I agree. That's why we teach/advocate extension only to the full natural range, and not beyond. I mentioned the case of Soke Nagamine only as a unique contrast to the accepted understanding of extending punches and elbow joints.

First off, welcome to KF!!! Glad you are here! And from: Great posts... Ninjanurse is spot on with what most instructors expect and how they operate. Also, like RJC mentions, when an instructor asks to see benchmark techniques on a test/grading that are part of the curriculum, s/he won't like it much if you give them something else. However, if an instructor asks you to perform any extra-curricular techniques (not necessarily those outside the curriculum, just those not required for you at your level on your test), that's when you'll have the opportunity to show any bonus material you have. Back to what ninjanurse said; if you try to "prove what you know" on a test/grading, most instructors won't like it. If you perform what they ask, they will like it. If you perform what they ask well, then you might even pass...

Great, in-depth analysis of the simple, direct reverse punch. Just a few points... In Matsubayashi-Ryu (official WMKA) and from Ti, we teach to punch straight from the shoulder at the desired target height, fully extending the arm to achieve full range of motion. When the arm is fully extended in a straight line, the major bones and joints of the arm line up together, thus making it an unbroken line/plane. When all of the other parts of movement, as noted by your nomenclature list, are utilized correctly with proper training against heavy bags and machiwara, the actual possibility of injuring the elbow is very small. While we do not advocate extending/reaching the arm past the natural fully extended range of motion (thus, a "hyper-extension"), Soke Takayoshi Nagamine was notorious for being able to achieve lightning-fast, powerful punches that extended beyond his natural full extension. He could gain a good 6-in. without "leaning" or "reaching" into it. In fact, during seminars with him, Soke would use the term, "hyper extend". He did this for his entire MA career with no adverse effects on his elbow joints. And: For us, for proper usage/training of gamaku, these are together, but I see why you separated them. Most of our students complain the next day/class how much their butt muscles hurt after a hard gamaku-training class. Indeed, all the muscles of the gamaku zone are critical for proper development of power/technique. Proper muscle memory must be achieved so one can utilize gamaku in a reverse punch (or whatever) within microseconds in response to an attacker. The muscles of the gamaku zone will already be contracting/expanding during the technique before target impact, but I agree, the entirety of the body must tense during the moment of impact.

Well, in usual Brownies fashion, they look good for a majority of the game, but end up blowing it in the end... For a minute there, I actually thought they might WIN against the Steelers at Pittsburgh. What was I THINKING?!? I wonder how many "almost-wins" the Brownies will rack up this season. Silver lining, though, is Hoyer didn't look to bad; thought he did well for first game and at Brownies' rival's field... On the flip-side, the Bengals managed to beat the Ravens in Baltimore for the first time in 5 seasons. Yay.

Agreed In Matsubayashi-Ryu (Shorin-Ryu), 99.0% of the kicks in our kata are front kicks (including front kick variants). We have a few other kicks according to Osensei, but not many. ShaolinShorin, To address this at the topic at hand, kicking to the head is something we would never do, regardless of physical capability of a student. More importantly, to conclude that an entire school and/or student body is no good based on 1 technique during 1 visit is a little farcical. As Wastelander alluded to, if the technique was performed effectively within the range of motion each student was physically able to achieve, then that's all that matters. The good thing in all this, though, is that you're paying close attention to a prospective new school. It's your MA journey, and you have to be content with where you go on your journey in order to keep on with it.

That's the way we do it, yes. That said, I have also trained at a judo club that promoted based almost entirely based on competitive performance. I was told when I started training there (as a green belt) that I knew more than enough material for a brown belt, but I would have to be beating brown belts in competition to be promoted from green to brown. I'm a perpetually bad competitor, so that never happened Absolutely... Rank should never be used to compare oneself to another student. That's one of the first lessons regarding rank that we teach to new students because it's natural to use it that way, but was never meant to be. Rank is a privilege, not a right, and should only be used as a general guide to denote skill level, knowledge of the art, wisdom with the art, and years of experience in the art for a particular student. While any dojo with half a decent reputation will have a set of rank/curriculum standards, they are very often modified slightly per each individual student s/he can meet individual goals.