OneKickWonder

This. Also, even something seemingly unrelated like running laps around the Dojo can help with self-defense if taught correctly and with the right mindset... because self-defense is also a mental and spiritual question. The benefit of karate versus street fighting or whatever is karate emphasizes mental clarity and spiritual toughness... I think people tend to forget this. Not to mention, in the case of running laps around the Dojo, that also teaches you to just book it out of there if you're facing a bigger guy. I adhere to the teaching that I'm not learning karate to fight, I'm learning karate so that I don't have to. Running also prepares you for the part of self defence that should come before, or as soon as possible after, physical engagement begins. That is, extracting yourself as quickly as possible from the dangerous situation. I.e. legging it. Fighting is always dangerous. There are no winners. Only differing degrees of loss. If a fight begins, you have already lost. Whether that's skin off knuckles, or your life, or less tangible things like your reputation at work, or your liberty if a court decides you went too far. Best avoid it. Of course we can train for the worst case. But we should always be seeking to avoid physics confrontation, and getting out of there asap if it happens.

Black belt means.... A grown man with real life experience feels really worried about the big headed young kid he's bowing to knowing that said young black belt is going to get the shock of his life the first time he gets caught up in a genuine hostile situation.

With regards to kata / forms vs sparring, the relative value of each depends how they are taught, and the mindset of the student. If sparring teaches you that real fights always begin with exactly two people facing each other already in a fighting stance, and always ends with one person have landed a couple of light taps on the other, then it is utterly useless for self defence. Whereas forms, when trained properly, train you how to move and improvise. Conversely, if sparring allows a broad range of techniques and is extremely physical, while kata is performed as a serious of poses with no substance, then sparring suddenly becomes more relevant.

I think it depends on how well you get in with your sensei. If it is very formal, I'd just walk. But if you've become friends over the years, I'd definitely tell him. But if you tell him, don't phrase like 'karate is rubbish so I'm switching to BJJ' or perhaps even worse, 'I know everything about karate now, it's time to start again with something else'. Instead perhaps come from the angle that every style has its strengths, and while karate is epic as a stand up striking and even grappling art, BJJ adds a lot to the wrestling and ground work that you'd like to explore. Or something like that perhaps.

Engaging in physical combat. Seeking to apply techniques that have the primary purpose of causing sufficient pain and/or injury to overwhelm and disable an opponent. Basically the stuff we learn in martial arts. I may have given the wrong impression earlier. I'm by no means opposed to the idea of anyone training martial arts. Even outside of combat, I believe martial arts have a tremendous amount to offer. However I do find it a little bit disturbing that someone working in healthcare would open with the statement that they can't use muay thai because it's a striking art and goes against the hippocratic oath, then goes on to ask what other martial art would be ok against a patient. I think you're misunderstanding me. What I meant to say is I'm looking for something that will minimize the damage done to the assailant. There will be times where someone will decide to attack either myself or someone else. I'm looking for something that will not only disable the assailant with minimal damage to that said person while at the same time reduce the amount of "evidence" that the assailant would have if said individual was most likely to file a lawsuit for whatever the reason. Perhaps do the door staff course. They are trained exactly for the scenario you describe. I'm sure different countries have different certification etc, but in the UK all door staff have to have passed a certain course. It covers de-escalation as well as physical intervention. Some of the physical stuff looks like aikido, and indeed there are bouncers that train aikido to supplement their security training, but the techniques are specifically modified away from their original joint destroying purpose to work better as non-destructive restraint. If you had whatever is the recognised certification for your bit of the world, and you had to use the techniques, while you would not be immune to prosecution if you used excessive force, you would at least have the backing of having used approved techniques.

Engaging in physical combat. Seeking to apply techniques that have the primary purpose of causing sufficient pain and/or injury to overwhelm and disable an opponent. Basically the stuff we learn in martial arts. I may have given the wrong impression earlier. I'm by no means opposed to the idea of anyone training martial arts. Even outside of combat, I believe martial arts have a tremendous amount to offer. However I do find it a little bit disturbing that someone working in healthcare would open with the statement that they can't use muay thai because it's a striking art and goes against the hippocratic oath, then goes on to ask what other martial art would be ok against a patient.

Engaging in physical combat. Seeking to apply techniques that have the primary purpose of causing sufficient pain and/or injury to overwhelm and disable an opponent. Basically the stuff we learn in martial arts. I may have given the wrong impression earlier. I'm by no means opposed to the idea of anyone training martial arts. Even outside of combat, I believe martial arts have a tremendous amount to offer. However I do find it a little bit disturbing that someone working in healthcare would open with the statement that they can't use muay thai because it's a striking art and goes against the hippocratic oath, then goes on to ask what other martial art would be ok against a patient.

Happens more often than you might think. Mental disability, drink, drugs, or even just being very sick and disorientated can make someone lash out. I know. But surely the mindset should not be the expectation to fight? The expectation to have to use non violent restraint perhaps. But surely not to fight. That being the case, I can't see that martial arts are the answer.

For the scenario you describe, none. Do you really have the mindset that you might have to fight a patient? Perhaps do a security guard course instead, to learn how to use body language and words to diffuse a situation, resorting to non violent restraint techniques as a last resort. Then keep whatever martial arts styles you enjoy for your private life.

Treadmills are a good training tool, I agree. But alas, I don't have the mental resolve to use them. I'm lucky enough to live somewhere with such diverse scenery. I live right on the coast so I can run by the sea, or I can drive for a few minutes to woodland or open countryside. My pace is improving too. I'm sub 8 mins per km now. Still too slow but getting quicker. Also that time is slightly misleading, as I believe most people start and stop measuring on the actual run, where as I start mine as soon as I get out of my car and stop it when I get back, so in essence my warm up and cool down are skewing the results. My favourite route by the way is on grass with lots of gradients and uneven surfaces. I think that makes it harder than some routes. That's not an excuse. I still need to speed up and increase my endurance capacity, but it's coming I think.

The word 'art' is slightly misleading these days because it is a word with multiple meanings, one such meaning having become archaic and fallen into obscurity. Nowadays, art is as you say, most widely taken in the context of creative expression. But it also means skill set. Art is the expression or result of skill. I love your observation though that art is not a sport. Art can be presented through sport, if a strict and objective rating system can be devised, but by definition, as soon as something becomes a sport it becomes restricted. For example, for martial art to be used as sport, we have to say, as a minimum, don't snap your opponents neck or rip his gonads off. Straight away then the art is limited. A good thing in this example, but limited all the same. Whereas the art, if practiced against an imaginary opponent can still have all its full expression of technique and principles.

Well as I said in my first post, if all other factors are equal. If all other factors are equal the person training 3 times a week will progress faster than the person training 2 times a week. No. Not necessarily. If two people are identical in every way, and have identical lifestyle diet etc, we could assume they will have identical recovery rate. Every time we do any form of physical training, we actually injure our muscles. I don't mean as in properly hurt ourselves, I mean that to stimulate the process of strengthening muscles, we have to work those muscles to the point were some muscle fibres become physically damaged. When this happens, the damaged muscle is actually weaker than it was before, because you've just worked it to its limit and damaged it. That sounds bad, but as long as you don't go too far, it's perfectly normal. Different people have different recovery rates. The recovery rate could be plotted on a graph as strength over time following exercise. In that case, you'd see strength fall immediately after exercise, then gradually rise again. If you never exercise again, at some point the line would reach the level it was at immediately before you did exercise. Shortly after, it would rise further, at which point you are fitter and stronger than before the exercise. If you continued to rest for even longer, the line would start going downhill again as the muscle begins to atrophy. The point at which the line on our graph returns to the pre exercise level is our recovery rate. For some people, it might be as short as 24 hours. For others it could be as long as 10 days. Now let's say for our two identical martial artists, it turns out that recovery rate is 2 days. Then you're right. The one that trains 3 times a week will progress faster. Now let's say their recovery rate is ever so slightly longer, at 3 days. That's not unrealistic. Now the person that trains 3 times a week needs to somehow fit a total of 9 days recovery time into a 7 day week. It can't be done, so they gradually burn out through over training. Our 2 day a week person on the other hand only has to fit a total of 6 days recovery into a 7 day week. That works, so he gradually becomes fitter and stronger and more able.

That's exactly what I was trying to say. Thank you for wording it more succinctly than I managed

Unless the person that trains 3 times a week is unable to recover fast enough, so cumulatively and gradually they become more damaged and less fit. The person that trains 3 times a week AND realises that giving 100% means paying attention to the often overlooked details like breathing, posture etc and signals coming from the body, will indeed progress faster than the person training twice. However, the person that trains diligently twice a week will progress faster than a person that pushes their physical limit 3 times a week without focusing on the details.

Actually that's not true. In medieval England for example during saxon times, there were no 'official' armies so to speak. Wealthy lords and dukes would swell their ranks by hiring anyone that was willing to fight for money. It was some time later when it was formalised. That's when 'bill drill' became mandatory for all boys over the age of 13. Bill drill by the way happened on Sunday mornings in the local gathering place, usually a town square or village green. The 'bill' was a bill hook. A farming implement that was a large blade on a stick, with one side of the blade having a hook. It was used for many things, primarily cutting hedgerows. Bill drill was simply the practice of wielding the bill hook in various combat oriented poses. Bill drill became mandatory almost as a form of national service. It was to ensure that should thee boys ever be needed for a battle, at least they'd know how to hold a bladed farming implement.

Excellent article. Thanks for sharing. EDIT: Thinking about this some more, when I did judo for a while, and aikido for a while, those guys kneel a lot. That really pulls like crazy on the quads and hips and after a short time is quite painful for the newbie to those styles. Yet regular practitioners of those styles are extremely agile. They may not do all the fancy kicks that you find in stand up striking styles, but they don't half chuck each other around, so they clearly have strength and flexibility where it matters.

I've come to realise that I need to be more specific when training various muscle groups. I've come to realise I have serious imbalances that are holding me back. My main weaknesses / imbalance is my abs. They're rubbish. My butt and legs are strong. My back, arms and chest etc are decent. But my abs are a bit pathetic. Til now I've been a bit blasé about it. I figured they can't be so bad. I can do most of the things I want to be able to do and I can keep up with my peers in most things. But since adding running into my training regime, and tai chi, I've really started to notice how my weak abs are affecting my lower back. So I've started to increase my abs targeting. I'm mainly doing crunches and leg raises for now. The question is though, what do folks find more effective? Aiming for a steadily increasing number of reps, or not counting but keep doing it for a given period of time? I'm going for time over reps at the minute. I keep going for 1 minute, rest for 30 seconds, then a different exercise for a minute, rest, repeat. I used to go for reps, but I realised I was sacrificing form to boost the count. By doing the time based strategy, I find I keep decent form throughout, even if I have to slow down.

I tend to agree with bushido_man. Mindset is important but 90% is maybe exagerated, technique, physical shape with the appropriate preparation is very important. I would say a more conservative 50-50% between mind and body (including muscle memory). Having said that, I think that in martial art schools we do not have enough mindset training. As martial artists, we tell ourselves and each other things like this. Technique is everything. Physical conditioning is everything. The mindset to put it all together and use it under pressure is everything. So how come people who have never trained in their lives have tales of survival where they've had to just do whatever they can to fight their way out of a life threatening situation? As an example, I know a lady that was in an abusive relationship. She suffered in silence right up til the point where her much stronger male partner attacked her with a kitchen knife in front of her young children. With no training, no conditioning, no muscle memory, and all the odds stacked against her, she managed to get the knife off him, and stunning him long enough for her to run, grab her kids, and get out of there screaming. She wasn't a trained fighter in any way. Technique is just a means to train the mind to move the body. Conditioning is just to improve the ability to keep doing that in case the fight lasts more than a few seconds, which they rarely do in reality. Without the mind, there is nothing. If you watch professional fighters, they are at the peak of their game in every respect. Yer if they get knocked out, they do nothing. They still have the same amount of muscle. They still have years of training behind them. But if they're unconscious, their mind has no power of the body, the body just lays there doing nothing. Mind is everything.

So far, we seem to have established that the 'martial' in martial art is misleading, because a martial art doesn't have to be applicable to war fighting in the present age. We've established also that it has to be a system, with multiple techniques, and some kind of progression. I can understand all that. Cool. But then, it does beg the question, we're the soldiers of the various peasant armies from all parts of the world and at all points in history prior to recent times where armies became 'nationalised' for want of a better word. Ie those folks that were just ordinary farmers, blacksmiths, lower class poor folk who would, when required and suitably paid, take their pitch fork or bill hook or whatever tool they had that could also be a weapon, and form up and fight in battle. Were they martial artists? Some were trained. Many more were not. But of those that survived, others would look to them for inspiration. Most likely this is the origin of what we consider today to be martial art, but was it at the time? And if by some implausible circumstance a modern day farm hand were to go into battle with a rake or a pitch fork, would he be a martial artist?

So if I add in a reverse punch to my new art of onekickwonder ryu, then it would be a martial art?

So how many techniques does it need? What is the magic number that makes it qualify?

If I start a club today, and call it One kick wonder ryu, and teach first a regular roundhouse kick off the back leg, then when my students get that, teach them to do it off the leading leg, then at brown belt give them jumping roundhouse then 360 jumping roundhouse etc. Would one kick wonder ryu be a martial art? It would have everything you say defines a martial art. It would have history. If I open the club today, it will have history by tomorrow. It will have a codified system. My students only get the different variants of the one kick as they advance through the grades. And it has lineage. I currently train in tang soo do but have in the past also trained in wado and king fu, all of which have the roundhouse kick in them.

I think the quote, if taken literally, is a load of twaddle. I think either something has been lost in the many translations since the original. Or the meaning is more subtle and implied rather than literal. Or both. I think it's a bit like the much more modern saying, you can talk the talk but can you walk the walk? As in, just saying it proves nothing, but saying it doesn't mean you can't do it. It just doesn't mean you can. I'm also mindful of the young idiots that boast about how tough they are. They tend to not be tough at all, but the ones that have confidence have no need to boast. Perhaps that's the intended meaning or something along those lines.

Good tips there DWx. Thanks. I've looked at the c25k program and can see it's appeal. It's probably the right thing for me, but I like to just wing it. I went out again today. Different route, different terrain. Probably a bit harder than I'm used to. Mostly on grass with small hills, rather than my usual completely flat pavement route. I only managed 3.5km and even that was with short walking breaks in it, but it's an improvement on my previous stats, so everything is slowly heading in the right direction.

That's solid advice. Just out of curiosity - Do you feel that yoga could provide the same benefits? I know people who claim great benefits of yoga. I have very little experience of it myself. Just a few of their poses very occasionally introduced into our warm up and stretching phase.