tommarker

How many hockey games have been ruined by that song... sigh

my fiancee is a red belt in TSD

once you learn how to do figure eights: forwards backwards 2 hands, forwards backwards 1 hand, behind the back, over the head, etc.... try to keep the staff moving for one minute. try moving in figure eights while rotating your bosy 180 degrees without stopping the staff. you should find yourself suddenly doing backwards figure eights. once you can move for about 5 minutes without stopping, you should be able to have a good idea of what combinations work together really well.

and they maintain both of them? i'm just curious, since a lot of organizations are very particular and picky about their dan members being certified instructors in other styles.

i always just have to pee before my test i think a lot of folks miss out on being able to talk about martial arts with a close-knit group of folks. the people in my studio almost all go to the same college... some of us are roommates, we go to the bar after class sometimes, etc. but outside that, everyone else thinks it's weird. parents/family/girlfriends might be like "oh, that's nice." but they don't understand the impact of such a big step. sometimes it's just nice to be able to say "green belt!!! yaaaaaaaa!"

http://www.cuongnhu.com/About.html apparently a hybrid style designed by a Vietnamese gentleman. Cuong is vietnamese for hard, and nhu means soft.

sounds like a challenge match is upcoming to me

not everyone has the luxury of running, as viable a defense it may be.

yup... http://store.yahoo.com/ymaa/anchinweapma.html (always buy direct from Dr. Yang when you can:) )

Yang Jwing Ming has an interesting resource on Ancient Chinese Weapons. Can't remember what it is called offhand... Perhaps "Ancient Chinese Weapons"

heck yea! I loved the episode with the spiked hammer. I haven't watched it lately though.

I think the chances of him being a member in good standing of both organizations is slim, IMHO. I'm glad to hear he doesn't have separate tests. That would make me suspect he was running a gravy train

i recently took a semester of judo where many of the students, all in college, were still struggling with the aspects of belt tying near the end of the semester

On a related note... If you're thinking of using "everybody was Kung Fu fiiiightiiiing..." IT'S BEEN DONE!

monkeygirl... nothing personal, i've just watched too many demos to that soundtrack our club recently did a demo to Prodigy's "Firestarter" that went really well (first place!).

I've seen bo staffs as expensive as 150 bucks I think a 2 piece would only be needed if you HAD to break it down in order to travel. Like if you rode a bike to class and didn't want to balance a 6 foot staff while doing so. As to what sort you should buy, I'd suggest starting with what your instructor suggests for class. Some schools use a tapered, skinny staff, and others use the more traditional thick staffs. Other arts may use a staff that is thick on one end and tapered to a skinny end.

does the instructor require you to move up the ranks in both? does he make you do separate tests for ranks in both? TKD and TSD are, IMHO, a weird match for mixed MA. Laurie's case is different, and probably comes from the political factioning of TSD/TKD over the last 40 years. A person who offers belts in both sounds a little shady to me on the surface.

nunchaku and swords are like apples and oranges, and what a lot of people pass off for nunchaku skill is really not much more than advanced dexterity drills. most people who do all the crazy moves for the nunchaku are doing fancy baton twirling, and don't understand the true use of the weapon as a close quarter ensnaring, locking, and strangling weapon. I could easily teach you to manipulate a sword in the same crazy way, but it would extremely dangerous to do so. Whack yourself in the head or thigh with the nunchaku and you might have to get an ice pack or a bandaid. Do the same with a sword, and you need a trauma surgeon. The sword is not a weapon of strength, and IMHO, a few years of learning to maximize the efficiency of your movement in karate-do will make a big difference in learning the sword later.

Anything except for the damn Mortal Kombat soundtrack

i'd wait. think about it... in your brief career in shotokan you developed a few habits that you're trying to break in isshin-ryu. Bad habits with the sword can sometimes have a very harsh learning curve, if you catch my drift. Maybe at about ni-dan or so, you should think about seriously pursuing the sword if you're still interested in it. By then, you might have completely different interests. Especially once you've been doing sai and tonfa awhile.

it's also good for training while rehabbing an injury...

I'm sorry to be the dark cloud of hopeless negativism, but: Think about it this way... Go find a history book, and look up the Cultural Revolution in China. To say this was a "bad time" to be a martial artist in China would be an understatement. Some masters were treated as enemies of the state and killed, or sent to "education camps" others went underground hid their skills, and still others left their homeland for greater opportunities abroad. Once the government realized what they'd lost, they started to try to get instructors out of the woodwork and re-hash what had been lost into "Wushu." I will stand by my statement that you can get either equal or better levels of instruction in the US. For that matter, you can probably find it in England too. Sure there are probably some high-level super secret masters still in China who blow everyone else on the scene away.... What makes you think they will teach YOU? A good deal of stuff out there is still limited to families, not to mention Asians. But you're talking about schools around Shaolin... you're talking about Wushu. No offense, but whoopee. You can learn wushu in plenty of places on both coasts here in the US without a major lifestyle change. I've SEEN the people at these schools perform, and no offense, but you are not at their level. We're talking elite level athletes groomed since early childhood for athletic ability and ability to learn complex routines quickly. Not to mention teaching methodologies that come close to child abuse. But if you're tough, you're still going to have to deal with a certain amount of racial intolerance, language barriers, and teaching that is simply not geared towards a beginner. Unless you have a higher calling (i.e. buddhism) then go to a Chinatown and find someone. No offense, but: 1. you are a beginner. 2. beginners will gain little from elite-level wushu ATHLETE training. You will learn a few nanquan forms that you could have done anywhere else for less money, less abuse, and less time. 3. An English speaking teacher will help you UNDERSTAND what you're doing. In China, you will get something more like "that sucks, do again."

How many of you folks have a nunchaku kata that you practice? The nunchaku kata seem to be either largely forgotten, not taught, or possibly just very rare in general. I have seen the form developed by Shinken Taira and passed on through Sakagami. This appears to be practiced some in Isshin-ryu as well. It's the only nunchaku form I've been taught that I can remember. The others were either flashy demo stuff or extremely basic. Thoughts? I'm not really out to debate the usefulness of nunchaku kata... just looking for what is out there.

I think the enterance to the throw and the actual loading of the throw (when possible) is more important to get right in the junior ranks. If you can properly load someone up for a hip toss, you don't necessarily have to dump them every time.

Well done, Sir!