DarthPenguin

As long as this is done correctly, because this being done incorrectly is one the main reason I quit my last dojo and moved on to another. My last dojo had an hours requirement for eligibility to test. And they made it a point to spread everything - especially katas - over all of the hours, instead of giving them to you up front and then you polish it up from there. That said, when I had classes that were focused on things that were not testable, I was livid. We were doing that "extra" stuff, when we didn't have everything we needed for the test. Eventually that, along with other things, is why I packed up and moved on to another dojo. I think this is one of those areas where everyone has a difference preference tbh. I would personally be with Aurik on this one, where i like some new stuff every so often for fun (extra sparring focused stuff / more random pad drills etc). I suppose one benefit we have is that we have a very clearly delineated syllabus which i can look up online if needed and i know i will be tested to by the chief examiner. I also always make a point of learning my new kata in advance of first session post grading (the moves anyway) to make a running start.

This is the same thing as considering yourself handsome because your mother said so (independent dojo owner giving you a dan certificate), but then denying the reality that manifests when women repeatedly reject you because they're repulsed by your appearance (affiliated dojos not recognizing it). I'm with bushido_man here. Taking his example even further i am currently in the process of regrading in Shotokan since i had not trained in it for years. I gave up my prior Dan rank (was only shodan so nothing special!!) and decided to start from white belt again since i wanted to be black belt level when i wore the belt, not just wearing a 'legacy belt'. I personally view belts as important for safety purposes when sparring etc and as a useful marker when techniques are being taught as to peoples likely skill level. Other than that they are just a bit of material around your waist. You train to get more skilled/fitter/better able to defend yourself etc. and the belt is just a by-product of that. Skill levels are subjective, though measuring them against set criteria can alleviate that partially. So it is not entirely irrational for a school to say that they are having you start again as you cant be marked against their criteria. I've always found though that people are usually sensible - generally people will openly mention that they have trained before or it is readily apparent. Those who don't are usually just there for an ego boost (i have found) and want everyone to look at them as the freakishly skilled newbie. I would be interested though in how long it took bushido_man to get the TKD BB with the second org? Did they expedite it a little (double promotions / more regular gradings etc.) ?

All of the cons listed are the kancho's concerns, not the students'. The students want what they've earned to be recognized and have meaning anywhere in the world they go, not just the 1500 sq feet surrounded by four walls and a roof in the middle of Smalltown, USA. I saw somewhere else (either in another forum or on Reddit), a guy who earned 4th Dan in an independent TSD dojang, being told he'd have to start from white belt in a WTSDA dojang. IMO, owners of independent dojos should be required to warn prospective students of this. Otherwise, being independent and not disclosing this is pure selfishness. I don't entirely agree. The cons are the kancho's concerns in the sense that they are responsible for how the organization is run, but they are absolutely concerns for the students the moment they begin to affect the students--the only difference is that the students have no power to correct it, and simply have to suffer with whatever the kancho decides. For example, the political machinations and scheming can result in, as happened to me, being denied a rank exam simply for wanting your school to be independent while you personally remain in the organization. Friends trading ranks can result in the students of those people being harassed about their instructors being frauds. Locking down an exact curriculum stifles creativity and the evolution of the art, which impacts everyone training in it. High costs can result in students dropping out and putting both the organization and its individual schools at risk of shutting down, and then we could lose a great deal of knowledge. I agree with Wastelander here, and have personally been on the receiving end of silly organisational politics too. In my case it was my decision to start cross training in bjj (which i told my CI about directly) as the organisational head didn't like cross training even if something he didn't cover. I was privately told that he was going to wait for me to attend my next dan grading and ban me there (though was still going to let me pay the £150+ for the grading!) to make a point. Regarding the selfishness point i don't see how this stacks up. If i tell you that i will teach you Style A and am not a member of any other body, but present my validated credentials, then i am not being underhanded about anything. I can have no effect on if other organisations will or will not accept the grades i issue nor on if they will sensibly test the student if they look to move organisations to accurately place them in the new organisation rank structure. From the new org. point of view and considering your 4th dan example: the applicant could be amazingly skilled and have been undergraded by their old school and you may want to give them a high rank to reflect this (Sato Ishii starting bjj as a brown belt comes to mind, since you can hardly grade an olympic gold medallist judoka as a white belt!) or alternatively their old school could have been a total mcdojo and their 4th dan is no better than a 5th or 6th kyu in the receiving organisation. Note i am not saying the individual you referenced was not mistreated but it is possible that there is more nuance than disclosed.

Can understand that. They have never been the same since they got rid of Jimmy Johnson - that was pure ego from Jones. Dak is massively overpaid for his level. He is good but not top tier. McCarthy is a good coach i think but seems to have run his race in Dallas. Am honestly surprised that Belichick hasn't been offered the job.

Yeah the Bills one is always a funny one. Have seen them rated quite highly in the best teams ever lists since the achievement of getting to 4 straight superbowls was so tough to do - almost harder than winning one! (though i would have preferred a win!)

Monday 29th January Lifting Session Bench Press 20kg x 5 40kg x 5 50kg x 5 60kg x 5 67.5kg x 10 Standing one arm KB press (reps are per arm) 24kg x 3 24kg x 3 24kg x 3 was pleased with this. MAybe could have squeezed out a couple more reps but not done it for a while and it was still heavy so i called it there. Will try to build this up gradually Cable chest flyes weight is per hand 20kg x 8 20kg x 8 20kg x 8 20kg x 8 20kg x 8 Cable overhead triceps extensions 40kg x 8 40kg x 8 40kg x 8 Really pleased with these as i used to always be very weak at this (now am progressing to mildly weak!) biceps cable curls 40kg x 8 40kg x 8 40kg x 8 Ski erg 1.2km 6min 20 sec was pleased with this too. Kept an even pace throughout and wasn't overly fatigued. Stopped at 1.2km as that was planned distance. Will continue to work on gradually increasing it. doing it every day for a min of 500m has really helped i think

is a complex one too! My BJJ coach and his partner own and run the BJJ gym i train at. He also promoted her to her Brown Belt (though it is 100000% a totally legit promotion!) but i know he seeks input on things like that to be fair. The power dynamic is a funny one. For me personally i think i am quite good at separating someone who is teaching me martial arts from someone who should be blindly obeyed in life (not sure if i am putting that well!) but i know others aren't always the same. I have trained with people in the past who seemed to think that being your martial arts instructor gave them carte blanche to be in charge of you outwith the dojo but i generally either made it known that that wasn't the case or found somewhere else to train! (though i do admit i am rather opinionated at times so i may not be the best example to use for anything like this - it's a running joke with my other half!)

For the 4th down plays i saw some stats that showed they were both the right calls - each of them had a higher win probability that not going for it, so the coach was objectively 'correct'. They are very close now though. They are beginning to peak and some of the other teams will be getting close to salary cap issues now. The niners have been good for several years now which gets expensive. They got lucky that they hit big on a very cheap QB! The chiefs are an interesting one to me. Andy Reid gets so much love now but i still remember how much stick he got in Philly as someone who couldn't win the big one. Had a top tier QB in McNabb still but couldn't get over the hump. Now has a first ballet HoFer in Mahomes and has several wins in superbowl and pretty much is a lock for the HoF himself now. Makes me slightly rethink my old views on the Patriots Belichick / Brady dynasty and how bit an impact they each had.

Good points bushido_man! I think what it comes down to is it is actually quite a complex topic and probably lends itself to a lot of sub-categories (competitive fighting; 'civilised altercation' (ie a disagreement with someone who would still stay within accepted norms); being attacked but with some restraint on part of attacker (hurt not kill); life or death situation. Probably loads more too! It's also quite hard to answer on here as everyone trains! So even though quite a few people 'meet the criteria' for the 'big person' in the initial scenario, we all train so it is hard to answer properly objectively! From a personal standpoint i started MA training at 5 (with the odd gap over the years due to life and injuries as most will have), and i was always tiny until i hit 16 (i didn't hit 5' until i was about 12, got to 5'10 when i was 15, started uni at 16 at 6'3" (our schooling ages are different so i was leaving normally as a younger person in the year) and topped out at 6'4"). So i can't ever think of having been the 'big unskilled person' in the scenario (from this context anyway - i would say i could get a lot more skilled!!)

superb! I'm not familiar with the age groups in the American grade system - what age category is that he is in? Though i would intuitively think that Kansas wrestling is likely of a high standard! He do any other martial arts or grappling? Wrestlers are absolute monsters on the mats!

Saturday 27 January BJJ session Really good session. We were working on transitioning between different types of open guard: started in spider guard, moved to collar & sleeve, then to de la riva and then to single leg x. We worked drills on when to transition between them and some techniques in each (mainly sweeps and in collar and sleeve i was working on some triangles). Really productive session i think as it reinforced to me that some of the guard i have been working on are definitely the right ones for me due to my limb length etc. I was told how horrendous my spider guard was due to my absurdly long legs! Did a couple of rounds rolling which went well: managed a couple of Ezekiel chokes and some cross collar chokes

Going back to this original question for some clarification. Seeing the way the conversation has evolved, I think defining some things is important. How do we define "overcoming" the attacker? Are we talking about standing over our fallen opponent in victory? Or are we talking about doing just enough to get away and be safe, and avoid injury as much as possible? Are we talking about two people having a disagreement, and then "stepping outside," dual style? Or we talking about the sudden violence of an ambush attack? I think identifying these parameters can add some nuance to the conversation. Overcoming the disadvantage of being smaller when attacked. So, assuming one is violently attacked by another person, unarmed, single attacker, and is not able to get away without conflict. Though I think the dual style conversation would be interesting! Would also need to add a little more nuance : is the attack unannounced (coming up behind and attacking) or can the smaller person see the attack coming and prepare for it?

you were pretty close on the score though! should be a good game in the superbowl this time. Would be amusing to see Brock Purdy go from 'mr irrelevant' to superbowl winner too!

Best of luck to him! Wrestling is a tough sport! Though if he can compete (and win!) with that type of tooth pain he likely has the grit needed to succeed!

All very true - life (and aging!) do somewhat get in the way! Being older now and with kids i can no longer devote 5-6 days a week to training - it might hurt over much and the family need time too! Can workaround it a little by the kids training too of course!

Hopefully! I was originally due to sit in in December but decided not to as i thought i had missed too many sessions in the lead up etc. and wasn't 100% ready (in my mind anyway!). So hopefully (touch wood!) nothing goes awry between now and then!

Wednesday 24 January Karate Session First for quite a while! My left achilles has been playing up but strapped it up and felt ok. Warm ups Usual warm up Kihon Didn't do too much: just a couple of kicks and punches as a combination - very much a loosener Kumite Majority of the class was jiyu ippon kumite practice. initially the grading required stated attacks then unannounced ones. Was good fun. The instructor is really wanting us to go in a lot harder - was insistent that the opponent needs to block or they get hit with a reasonable amount of force (to body mostly). Was good fun. kata ran through a lot of kata too in sequence. All the katas from Kihon kata to Heian Godan (in sequence) and ran through Bassai Dai 3 times too. Got some good feedback (plus the things that were pointed out last time didn't get pointed out so hopefully thats them sorted!). Instructor told me he is intending for me to grade in March, so a bit of polishing up to do and then hopefully can get my 1st kyu done then!

totally with you there! thought he did an amazing job. Never really had a top top qb but still managed to get loads of wins. Surprised he hasn't been hired already tbh

Yeah, it worked out great for those teams, but the result may not be the same. How many bad teams change coaches and do so again in a few years? I remember when the Chiefs went through stints like that. And Dungy did end up winning a Super Bowl, so it's not like he couldn't win. After all, only 1 team a year does so. Think about the Manning/Brady rivalry over the years. Brady got most of them. But when Manning got his, he really got his. I felt like I was anguishing as a Chiefs fan during the Marty Shottenheimer years. Then I really anguished after they moved on from him. I'd rather have Marty ball than those lean years. Yeah i totally get that, and i know it is a risk. Dungy was an excellent coach and he brought the missing piece to the superbowl team he won with. I think the difference with Manning/Brady and Brady winning most is most people could see that the Colts spent so much on their resources on a couple of players (Manning, Harrison, James, Wayne) that the rest of the team had to be a little lower standard. It was always a debate about roster building at the time - plus the Pats managed to get plenty of people to take a pay cut to get a good shot at a ring. With the Bills, i think that now after a few years they are getting perilously close to the definition of insanity thing about repeating the same action and expecting different results. Something needs to change or they won't get a SB win

Congrats!

The fake punt was a terrible idea, but they got bailed out by the D when the fumble went into the endzone. You're not the only one who wants a coaching change in Buffalo. A lot of fans are unhappy. They should also be unhappy with Stephon Diggs who had a whole 21 yards on three receptions and no touchdowns. Nearly 100 million dollars to this guy and he comes up empty in the big game yet again. I would say came up empty a lot through the season and playoffs. He is usually so good but also seems a bit of a diva (like a lot of top WRs). Hopefully it is just an off year and not the begins of a slide. I think we need another top level WR to stop teams doubling him and then see how it goes. I know it's harsh on the HC but i think it's time. He is beginning to remind me of Mauricio Pochettino (the Chelsea manager) who is a great coach but just doesn't win. He won a little at PSG since they had so much greater resources but even then he did his best to not win. He always gets plaudits for developing teams etc but they don't get trophies. I wonder if the Bills HC is the same - really good coach but not quite able to win

I'd be careful here. I'm not sure a coaching change is what would push them over the hump. I don't know that there was anything happening in that game coaching wise that made think anyone's job should be in jeopardy. I feel like in the world of athletics today people are way too eager to see a coach fired. It's really hard to win games in the NFL, and even harder in the playoffs. They could fire the coach, sure, but then who knows what kind of coach the next one will be? Who would it be? And the Bill's coach has had great success. This year was a great coaching job, after starting out on the lam, and then ending up winning their division like they did. I think it's a case of the devil you know vs the devil you don't. Making a coaching change would be a huge mistake, I think. It's a weird one - i wholeheartedly agree that the coach has done a great job, the team is consistently good and always ranked amongst the top few in the nfl in several metrics. The other side of me though thinks that the teams has probably 1-2 more years left in the current window and i just can't see him getting us past Andy Reid's Chiefs. When it gets to the playoffs the fact that so much of our offence comes through Josh Allen begins to hinder us. Cook was a big improvement this year on prior years RBs but we need someone who can (if needed) carry the team a bit and let us grind out the clock without getting Allen too banged up. Personally with the coaches available this year i would take the gamble on a new one for the last year or two of this window and see if they can get over the hump. I just keep being reminded of Dungy at the Buccaneers or even Bill Cowher at the Steelers (who was a great coach) with them suddenly improving once Tomlin took over. It might not work out at all if they change coach and it would be harsh on him but it does seem to be the same every year. We have one of (in my opinion) the top 2 QBs in the league (i think it's him and Mahomes at the top), with a historically unique skill set (best running QB ever i think with a top tier arm too) and we just keep missing out. If we had reached a superbowl then i would give him a little more slack

Very good points - public perception makes a massive difference. Plus, just because one/small number of individuals misapply a technique that doesn't mean that everyone would. By the same logic any other means of defence that an officer has should be removed if someone once uses it incorrectly (guns in the USA; batons/tasers etc in the UK etc.) which obviously doesn't happen. The public perception angle has also directly contributed towards things being more dangerous i think. As an example: one of my fathers friends (he is in his late 70s now i think) used to be a police officer in Glasgow and, as he is a big guy, he was in the special squad that had a job of (literally!) beating up troublemaking youths! They were meant to pull them down an alley and give them a bit of a kicking and tell them to stop bothering people etc. It actually worked quite well as most of them (in that era) were self aware enough to accept it as a cost of doing business and if they couldn't handle it they bothered people less! Then things changed with people saying these things shouldn't happen as they had rights! This directly led into a change in behaviours. From another personal example : when i was in my early 20s myself and a training partners got jumped in the city centre by a gang of 18-20yr olds (As a guess) with bottles etc. Without going into too much detail we fought them off, tried to find the police while keeping fighting them off and when we eventually did manage to find the police and asked them how they went about charging them were told that they couldn't since the folk attacking us had several injuries and needed a hospital visit. As they had enough witnesses that saw them attempting to cut us with bottles etc. they were willing to let us go but if we pressed charges we would get stronger ones for doing more damage protecting ourselves. That would never have happened in the past - i have some views of the societal changes that have led to this but that would be a complete tangent!! Personally i don't envy you guys as it must be a constant tightrope you are walking balancing your (and the people around you including your colleagues safety) against the outcry if something goes wrong!

Now the Bills are out i am going to have to root for the Lions - would be amusing to have them win the Superbowl only a few years after being historically awful!

As a Bills fan, the latest defeat has me wondering if we are now in the same situation as the Tony Dungey Buccaneers from years ago, who got so close but needed to change coach to Jon Gruden to get over the hump and win a SuperBowl. The head coach has done an amazing job but i wonder if the players need a new voice (not sure who would be a good choice but i think the team is good enough that they would have a LOT of interest!)