Jeffthefurrydog

Hello Sorry to create another topic about this. If I have another similar question, I will put it here. A dojo somewhat near to me, which teaches Kyokushin, is part of the International Federation of Karate (or IFK). Are they well known? Are they known have some mcdojos as members, or are they mostly quality training? And is anyone aware of an International Karate Organization (IKO) affiliated dojo in northern New Jersey US? I've looked on their websites, but some of the IKOs don't have dojo locations easily available. Is there any agreement on which IKO is the most official or best? I know that there are a few of them. And if anyone has much familiarity with both the IKO and IFK, how do they compare in terms or prestige, recognizability, teaching philosophy, and quality? Thanks

Hello I'm looking for a martial arts school in my area and thought that traditional jujutsu could be interesting. Does anyone know of any traditional Japanese jujutsu organizations? I have not been able to find anything online. Many organization websites that I've looked at list local dojos that I can't find in other search engines, such as google. Also, I live in Northern New Jersey US, so if anyone is familiar with the area and knows about a traditional jujutsu dojo around there or central NJ please tell me about it. Google maps is useless for this. When I type in jujitsu, it gives me results for every type of martial arts in existence. And I am looking specifically at traditional Japanese jujutsu, not Brazilian or Judo. Although I would also consider a Judo club that focuses on self-defence training, but almost all seem to focus on sport.

Shito-ryu Karate-do Genbu-kai http://genbu-kai.com/ Is anyone here familiar with this organization? One of the dojos I am looking at is associated with it. If so, is it known to give quality lessons?

Hi I've been looking at different karate dojos to train at. The way in which sparring is incorporated into training varies by dojo. I have no experience with karate, so I really do not know what to make of these differences in sparring practices. What I've seen so far are places that 1) Do not make contact. They stop their strikes before hitting their opponent. I guess this is so that they don't risk injuring someone, but is this as effective in teaching self defence as sparring that makes contact. I wouldn't think so. If not, why? 2) One of the dojo's does not practice sparring. This place has two man drills that practice the application of self-defence techniques but doesn't have any free sparring. When I first heard this, I thought they were leaving out what seemed to be a part of self-defence training necessary if you want the ability to put it into any kind of practical and effective use. But the teachers argument made sense to me. Sparring, even sparring that makes hard contact, isn't meant to injure your opponent to the point where he is no longer a threat. In a real self-defence situation, you will want to render your opponent unable to harm you as quickly as possible. Through repetition, free-sparring gives you reflexes detrimental to that. Imagine that you are in a situation where your opponent poses a real danger, but you reflexively strike in a way as to avoid inflicting any serious harm. This could prolong the conflict, which would be dangerous to you. Does anyone here agree? If not, what would be a counter argument? While doing research online, I've found many people claiming that full-contact sparring is needed to teach practical self-defence. I actually have been unable to find a dojo that does full-contact sparring, though there are two more that I'm considering making a visit to. If you believe that full-contact sparring is vital to effective self-defence training, why is that? If I can't find a place that does that, would you recommend a dojo with no-contact sparring, light-contact sparring, or no contact sparring? Why? ThanksHe