mtheiss

No headgear or pads in any competition or intraclass sparring. I hope that is an answer to your question.

To answer Bushido's question most appropriately I would say the kids are wearing no protection as such (headgear and any body equipment). But then, I have one scource in England who believes that such heavy fighting should begin at 8 like what he said. I do not know how Bushido and the others would react to such a senerio. BTW, the rules are clearly 3 minute rounds with a 12 round limit unless you are going for the "knockout only" fights.

I think it sounds like he is working out very intensively. Makes me wonder if the match is 3 minutes and five rounds or even worse. Trust me, some kids could handle that kind of stress.

I was wondering, since young boys and girls now are being trained at the age of 5 (or perhaps younger!), I was wondering about suggestions about how long should the kids be testing in the training gym before you are sent into real 3 minute (12 round?) matches against their fellow students their age. Should they be around 8 or is that logical?

Sorry

I am from Sacramento, CA too! Please tell me if you get any results because i think it would be nice if we could meet sometime. Being 29, i think I am "too old", but then, it would be nice to try something new, don't you think?

I do think it was a fair decision on your part to insist that my soccer comparisons are not fair, but there are certain guidelines which I have noticed in speaking with some international teachers which could very much consider some schools "pantsies". I am not into overhauling the whole means of teaching martial arts in the USA, only that there should be specific camps set up for a particular group of good practictioning youth. Allowing people to keep their normal jobs, I think it is easy for youth to end up in certain situations without causing as much pain as if they were breadwinning adults. I feel that my views are private, but then, if you want to talk about extreme examples, I am game.

As for any karate style, you have to be good at the art. Not knowing what your sparring rules are, such as for age, experience, "knockout", etc, I would think that it is good to teach a well rounded approach to the disipline. I do have one "test" in mind, but I think it is not appropriate for the world to know it.

I think that it is good to take a holiday, but then, true believers tend to not forget the holiday per se, but not be completely devoted to what they do that day. But then, one might perpose the concept of participating in many sports or activities. Danica Patrick can be used as an appropriate example in my opinion. Then, I guess, I do not know.

There are reasons why one can be concerned about one of my chief training ideas, if you do call it a training idea. Alas, the old saying goes, one should be ready for everything...

The worst thing to do in my opinion at any form of work is to keep the training constant and even. There are benefits to taking a break or to include different sparring rules, for example.

I do not think a thing like this is appropriate for a sparring match!

If you use movies for entertainment, I can make a few which could cause conterversy and healthy debate here. It is very interesting.

I think you guys should respect all martial arts aspects as honorable. Particularly belts. In my experience it would be best to wear something that shows that you respect the martial arts and anyone else you might see at things like tournaments or shows. My suggestion is to keep a supply of good looking belts, and save any older ones for the real "special occasions".

I do not want to go into details, but I think that American martial arts training should go to another level. Just read Arena's quote on ESPN.com and I think his comments should be extended to karate, TKD, and a few other specialties as well.