Shorin Ryuu

Yeah, my description and view of this kind of palm heel strike is actually a mixture of Arakaki's views and my own personal views, so I actually agree with you. Perhaps I should have been more specific (and perhaps you may still disagree with me after I explain better). When I said there is no tension, I was referring more to the hand and arm. There is some "pushing" action (for lack of a better term) coming more from the center (or hara and whatnot) to give more penetration rather than a "surface impact" as you rightly describe using the other method. Essentially some of what you used to see me do when I would palm heel strike that makiwara back in our college days over and over again coupled with some more understanding I've supposedly gained in the time since then.

I've been trying to resist answering questions like this since they get asked a lot, but since Skeptic 2004 did it, I'll be a sheep and play along. I train about 5 hours in the dojo a week. We have classes Monday, Wednesday and Thursday from 5-7:30, but I am only able to make it twice a week due to my schedule (and the fact that it is 2 hours away from my house plays a minor role). I spend about an hour in class at a place actually in my same town doing Stick and knife (various styles so I won't mention them all...) but I usually don't count that as it is more of a "supplemental" thing to my real focus of training. On the other hand, I spend on average about 10-15 hours a week training specifically karate outside of the dojo on my own (not including hojo undo with traditional Okinawan training devices about 6 hours a week). Unsurprisingly, I agree with Skeptic2004's thoughts on the benefit of practicing outside the dojo. In fact, I wrote something regarding this same topic on page 2 of this thread here (How far would you travel for class): http://www.karateforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=19902&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=10 I will repost it here in case people are lazy... One thing I've noticed about people is how much many of them brag about how they go to martial arts class X days a week. I think it is great to be able to attend class as much as possible. However, unless you have the time to practice by yourself, you're not really getting the necessary free space for your own development. Don't get me wrong. I love going to class and having the opportunity to discuss concepts and techniques as well as train with my instructor and other students. I think there is a certain danger in that going to class as many times as some of these people because it makes it less likely that they will train on their own. Not training on your own is disadvantageous. For one, the "class" environment has a tendency to change the dynamics of your training. When there are other people doing kata with you, you have to change your pace to match a consensual tempo. The presence of other people when you are doing sparring or what have you adds that extra layer of analysis to all your sensory inputs. That isn't a bad thing, but sometimes you really need to focus on yourself, especially in regards to biomechanics. When an instructor is there pointing out your faults or explaining things to you, it relieves some of the burden of self-discovery. These are all good things in their context. However, I think it is much more difficult to grow as a martial artist if you are almost always only in the class setting. I acknowledge the existence of those that train 4-5 days a week and workout much on their own. On the other hand, there are a lot of people that don't fit this model. Most people practice only when they go to "practice". My opinion is that class is only for the learning of new material, the correction of mistakes and the discussion of ideas and concepts. Many people short-change their learning by using class time to go through the necessary repetitions of kata, drills, or whatever they train in. Again, my gripe is with emphasis here. Repetitions and drills aren't a bad thing in class. It's for the sake of correction, discussion and letting the instructor know where you stand. But never, never should it be used primarily for the purpose of getting the material down-pat. That's just a bonus. The building up of repetitions for training in whatever you do should be done outside of class, in my opinion. You may do some things incorrectly, but that's what class is for: to correct those mistakes. Class time is often too short to go through every single thing with corrections as it is, let alone struggling to do something that could've saved precious time (yours, your instructor's, your fellow students'). Getting as much done outside of class ensures the most gets done during class. It's very simple and quite obvious, but many don't do this? Why not? The answer to that lies in busy schedules, conflicting obligations, etc. I understand that. But to those people that go to class 5-6 days a week, I dare suggest it would be better to skip class one night and work out on your own. An added benefit to this is that it really forces you to think about what you're doing. Well, ideally anyway. Once you do that, you'd be surprised what you can learn and come up with on your own. Having an instructor tell you everything and correct everything is nice. But it doesn't mean you're learning. It just means you're copying. At some point or another, you have to start taking those conceptual leaps on your own. It's something most people acknowledge and espouse, but actually don't do rather often. You probably won't discover anything that hasn't ever been discovered before. There's very little that's new under the sun when it comes to martial arts by now. However, most masters didn't become great by simply getting everything from an instructor. There really isn't that much time. They had to figure stuff out on their own. I was once told by Kyoshi Doug Perry, the head of my system for North America that out of all the martial arts knowledge he has, only 10 % of it was shown directly to him. The rest he had to figure out himself. Now math isn't necessarily my strongest suit, but I figure that's 90% he had to figure out on his own. That's quite a bit. I for one am very envious of just 10% of what he knows. So what does this all mean? It means you got to start thinking for yourself. I don't care what rank you are, but if you're just a carbon-copy martial artist, you really have to turn yourself around. Sure, it's awfully hard to drive down a street without any lights to show the way. But if you're just in the passenger seat, you're not really driving, are you?

I believe what Skeptic2004 is trying to explain is some things along the same lines that I posted in this thread with the topic "Whats the difference between Okinawan and Shotokan". http://www.karateforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=18075&start=0&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight= I posted very specifically my opinion point-by-point. Pers and I essentially agreed to disagree, but if you want to know my opinion, it is detailed with some depth in that post.

Does anyone have any thoughts on what I posted earlier about the difference between using it like a "palm heel thrust" and the way I described it? I was curious to see if it made any sense to anybody.

Just out of curiousity, what do you all consider the "traditional way of training"? I see the phrase tosed around a lot and never explained.

As far as not responding, it's only been about half a day since you first posted. Second of all, it's a pretty well-worn topic, so don't be surprised if people pass it over. I am in favor of demystifying the black belt. On one hand, it doesn't make you a master. On the other hand, you should have some modicum of skill which denotes you should be fairly competent against facing random aggression. You also have to put this in perspective. In most places that use belts in the Orient, black belt doesn't mean too much. Everyone has a relative that has one. It doesn't mean they suck per se, but the requirements are much less stringent than they are at some places in the US or elsewhere. I've talked to quite a few Okinawans and Japanese and they always remark on how they have heard how hard it is to get a black belt in the states. And this really gets to the crux of the argument. In culturally-Confucian groups like martial arts in the Orient, it's more about the time you have put into it rather than your "rank". They don't care if you are a shodan, an ikkyu or a godan. There may be some disparity in skill level if you match people of these ranks with the "average" person of the West, but what is more important is simply the time spent doing the art and the skill obtained. In other words, by making it so much harder to get a black belt (either by very long time requirements or just an extremely strenuous test which people will pass anyway as long as they don't "give up"), you build up an unhealthy mystique about the "black belt". In the East, they really don't tend to have this because to them it isn't a big deal. In places where this mystique exists, you have a wide disparity of the "quality" of people at shodan level and the expectation that they should all be "really good". Another thing: people tend to associate the shodan level with some magical switch where all of a sudden your perspective and approach to training changes. This is pure * in my opinion. With the exception of younger kids (yes, there are exceptions...but that is what they are, not the rule), people should be able to exercise a critical eye and analytic approach for their martial arts development from day one. Perhaps it is simply evidence of a growing culture of those who simply lack critical thinking skills. As the age for entering martial arts is quite young nowadays, that is pretty natural. Most people don't develop this until they are in their late teens, twenties or not at all. It isn't realistic to expect five-year-old Timmy or 14-year-old Laura to have them. The other facet is character development, often toted as part of the spirituality of martial arts. Perhaps inculcating desireable character traits is a plus to martial arts training, but there isn't any magical threshold. Some people have it before they take up martial arts, some develop it, some never do. It has no relation upon their actual skill in fighting. Those that do not tend not to stick around too long in "traditional martial arts" (whatever that appellation means, anyway). As I explained in my much passed-over article posted a bit ago ("Who put the 'Traditional' in 'Traditional Karate'"), there is a definite need to differentiate between what is intrinsic to traditional martial arts and what is intrinsic to Confucian societies in the spirituality aspect. Truly traditional Okinawans would remark upon a fighter lacking desireable character traits as being an incomplete person rather than an incomplete martial artist. Back specifically to the level of shodan. Since everyone has different standards for what the level should be, it highlights the fact that it means virtually nothing. You would assume there is some sort of correlation of skill and rank even in the roughest sense, but extremes on both ends tend to skew even this much when talking about cross-style and cross-school comparison. As I belong to a pretty healthy organization, there is a strong correlation between rank and skill, with exceptions here and there. But the relative nature of belts in the end renders the whole debate almost fruitless in any attempt to make a gold standard for what it should be. In the end, it boils down to whatever the school/organization wants it to be. And, in the end again, the rank doesn't mean anything when you are forced to use your skills. Yes, the ultimate aim is not to use it, blah blah blah, but I am talking about the situation where you haven't got much of a choice at all. That argument tends to always be used as a safety net..."Well, you shouldn't be using your skills anyway if you are aiming for the highest level of proficiency"... Fine and good, but if all arguments reduced to that, these would be rather boring forums indeed. In case you were all wondering, I tested for my black belt which included a "skill portion" and then a rather pointless (from my perspective) exercise/exhaustion portion. I had already long since been to basic training and all that several years ago at that point, so it felt rather ridiculous and almost annoying. My original instructor had me test with his instructor for it which was nice, but I've long since developed an almost distaste for the notion of "testing" for a rank. As long as you are testing under people who know you (and even if you aren't in most cases), you usually will never ever be tested unless you have the proper skill level (whatever that is for your organization). Therefore the "test" seems to be a pointless exercise in adding more externalization to your individual skill, which is something very internal. My current instructor (my first instructor and I have moved due to the nature of our profession and still keep in cordial and frequent contact) doesn't even test people. He believes (as I did before I even met him) you test when you come to practice and he sees you. When he feels you are ready, he gives you the rank. Maybe it doesn't satisfy the hyper-sensitive, hyping-sensitive nature of many people, but I don't think that should be the point. If you're still worried about the color of your belt by the time you hit shodan, you've got a long way to go (I think the awareness should be built in from day one that black belt doesn't mean anything rather than "by the time you get it you realize it"). I could go on and on, and often do. My main point is this: What does black belt mean? I really don't care what it means...

Exactly. The thing is, your logic isn't restricted to your case, but most cases in general. It is one thing if your opponent starts his motion from several feet away and another if he starts his motion from all the way across the room. Even if he starts his motion from within arms reach or just outside of it, I would use a kick more to unbalance him (striking his leg or hip as I mentioned in a previous post) and use my arms in conjunction. At any rate, I'm going to shift out of the way provided I have time (less time due to making his starting point in close proximity as opposed to across the room as originally proposed). In here, the emphasis on "I did a jumping back kick" is entirely misplaced. While it was quite fortunate of you to land it correctly on a moving opponent, the true crux of your situation occured at the "I stepped to the side a bit" moment. Whatever technique you performed to otherwise drop the opponent is not the driving force of your success (although I never would be doing a jumping back kick). It was getting off-line which allowed you to do so.

Parlor tricks are quite impressive, I must admit. There are certain training you have to undergo or certain "tricks" you have to employ. Either way, they are still parlor tricks, not evidence of some mystical, superhuman or supernormal force.

Hmm. Three things. 1. Holding on to the other person and controlling their balance before you hit them greatly reduces the chances of you missing. It's a pretty basic concept yet often "overlooked" by many people. 2. Even if you hit a hard surface, you shouldn't worry unless your form is so terrible anyway. What body part are people specifically worried about hitting when using this strike? If you are using more of a quick movement, the emphasis is on quick penetration and quick withdrawal so the worry of breaking your fingers is greatly reduced. If you are using a continual "thrusting" forward movement, you should develop enough sensitivity to have your hand automatically relax, loosen, or glance off to protect injury. You should only really worry about injury using this technique if you are just "throwing it out there". 3. Just because you see a spearhand in a kata, it doesn't mean you will necessarily be striking with the tip of the fingers.

Are they weak moves? Perhaps your analysis of the kata needs some more work. I suppose there is a difference between a hard rigid strike and a throw, but I necessarily wouldn't call the throw "weak" per se. Then again, I feel if you are focusing solely on just "strike" and "block", then you're missing the point. (I'm using "you" in a general sense)

You are correct. They are the number of people he's killed with his little finger. As a matter of fact, we were walking down the street in Montana in broad daylight when these three swarthy looking individuals wearing leisure suits (don't ask) accosted us and demanded all of our lunch money. I thought all hopes of eating Sloppy Joe's at Bill's Greasy Spoon were done for until Sauzin whipped out his finger and killed them all instantly. If I remember correctly, he pulled the moves straight out of Pinan Shodan. It was by far the coolest thing I have ever seen.

I haven't seen this Jim kata. However, I have seen a great deal of many other Funakoshi kata, whether performed by students today or pictures from "back in the day" in various books (including his own). I must say they differ pretty substantially in essence from the Okinawan kata. You can tell they are the same kata, but they are executed rather differently and with different form, structure, emphasis, etc. Edit: I have now realized I wrote "Jim"...chalk that up to the typo gnomes.

Take a wild guess. [insert whatever smiley you wish here]

Using the search button... http://www.karateforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=18002&highlight=kara+chinese The "China" referred to in the segment above is the same "China" as "Tang" (referencing the Tang Dynasty but still meaning "China" in general). The text mentioned above was the Hanashiro Chomo text. In other words, "karate" meaning empty hand is still rather new, even if it was in place before Funakoshi and/or the 1936 meeting.

I see a lot of people are discussing the use of the palm heel strike in a manner where it looks exactly like a "regular punch" only the hand is bent back and the fingers are curled. In effect, it is described more like a palm heel thrust (if that makes sense). When I do mine, I tend to have my hand and arm completely relaxed (nothing bent back or curled). When I bring it to bear, it strikes more with a whip action where my focus is more upon bending the heel of the palm forward rather than bending the wrist back (subtle difference). At no time is there ever any tension. I find this makes it easier to transfer force (whip action) and use the entirety of the body in generating the force. Nor do I have to worry about my fingers or anything. Is this simply called something different? Am I way out in left field eating a ham sandwich, as my old English teacher used to say? For example, I find this an even more effective strike to the side of the jaw because the reverberating strike against a "floating" target like the head really facilitates the necessary rocking of the brain for a KO. For a more "fixed" target like a person's chest or something like that, it still gains penetration and is capable of literally knocking someone down with the generation of force as the energy is transferred efficiently from you to your opponent.

Usually when I use the word "structure" I am referring to how the entire body is positioned in relation to itself. That could mean stance or it could mean something like how "strong" my arm is in a certain position. It is important to make the analysis of structure 4-dimensional. In other words, time also plays a factor in structure. Another key part is simple biomechanics. What is the body's natural "settling" point? In effect, it is a study to try and keep your body in positions where it is strong AND less vulnerable. Included in this calculation are the exclusion of movements which are potentially injuring to your body, whether that be immediate or long term. A classic example of long term injury is how a vast majority of many people punch or do any sort of arm manipulation, which is with their elbows locked out and fully extended. Sure, you may not necessarily feel it as "bad" when you are young, but it certainly builds up and leads to injury down the road. Other notions of biomechanics and structures can be a simple as when I punch/block/whatever, "is my elbow facing down or as close to down as possible?" Or "does my shoulder turn out too far when I am blocking to the outside"? I find that to be a common one. From a tactical standpoint, doing a middle block (typical swinging middle block to the outside) where this happens is inefficient because there is nothing to block far outside your body. From a vulnerability standpoint, it is bad because your arm is very open to manipulation out there. From a health standpoint it is bad because it places unnatural stress on your shoulder (especially if you are tight). There are lots of other ones such as centerline theory which are common in many styles (whether they call it that or not). Time, patience, and critical analysis of your martial art will show them to you. Learning as much as you can from people of skill and working with willing partners doesn't hurt either. On a related note, I think there is a very heavy emphasis by some people/styles to always do everything as hard and heavy as they can. I think this deafens the mind's ear to some extent because there is a focus on generating strength (or what seems to be strength, anyway) rather than listening to what your body is telling you. Therefore it is good to sometimes slow things do and get some feedback. Some styles like Tai Chi do this a lot more than others. For me, kata is one of the main places where I gain insights into structure and biomechanics (the other being partner work). As such, I always do my kata with various timing or focus. Sometimes I may do it slowly and think only of how my body feels, other times I may do it with "intent", other times still I may do it solely with the application and timing in mind.

I tend to use the chi ishi, the nigiri game and ishi sashi 3 days a week, the tetsu geta on 3 different days a week. My dojo itself doesn't really have a specific hojo undo program, it's just my personal preference.

Just some friendly advice. You are more likely to get serious and well-thought answers the more serious and/or mature your question is. There's certainly nothing wrong with indulging the impulse to include as many emoticons as possible, but it kind of turns some people off. I obviously can't tell you how you should post or anything along those lines, but like I said, just some friendly advice.

First of all, using UFC to determine which martial arts you should take isn't the only way (or in my opinion, it isn't the best way). There are plenty of martial arts not done by UFC because people good in them don't care for such kind of tournaments or they simply aren't suited for the tournament arena (difficult to "play nice yet hard" so you don't maim/kill your opponent). At any rate, "true" Tai Chi frowns upon egotistical competition (or they would say something like that, I believe). Secondly, doing Tai Chi forms slowly doesn't mean you will move very slowly during a fight. It serves several purposes to do it slowly (training, precision, biomechanical awareness, energy awareness, etc.). Tai Chi can be pretty darn offensive as well. It prides itself on passivity to defeat an opponent, but don't take that to mean you can't strike first. If you want good Tai Chi stories or Chinese boxing (read: kung fu...) in general, maybe you should read some books by Robert Smith. I'm sure a decent library or store has them. Robert Smith was pretty much the first Westerner to write about Chinese martial arts in depth and seriousness. He trained with, under and met many great Chinese masters of a great many styles. I'd recommend his book Chinese Boxing for starters. He's a bit biased towards the softer styles (as am I, although my style is hard and soft). Long story short, I'd recommend you try the Tai Chi place out. My only warning is that there are a great many frauds out there doing "Tai Chi", maybe even more so than other styles percentage-wise because it seems like a New Age type thing to do (despite being rather old). There are very sound principles of fighting that you can learn from Tai Chi.

First, there isn't a set number of bunkai taught per kata. Second, I think the question is rather irrelevant (no offense) anyway (and it's going to vary from dojo to dojo). You can't even determine it based on the number of kata in a system because kata are of varying lengths. You can't even determine it based on the number of movements in the kata because you may have many different bunkai for the same movement or series of movements. Or, you may string together different movements in your bunkai depending upon your timing. It's simply how many your instructor chooses to teach you AND how many you can figure out for yourself. Learning, as opposed to simply training, demands you put forth the mental exertion to think on your own rather than simply have an instructor tell you all the bunkai. It certainly behooves you to see bunkai from various different people to take advantage of differing experience levels and perspectives, but at some point or another you're going to have to get the grey matter going. At any rate, getting attached to a number for bunkai or specific bunkai runs the risk of promoting an unhealthy attachment to specific technique rather than concept.

I agree that some people work out bunkai for themselves that are unrealistically complicated. You can have bunkai that have several steps, but the key is that they work in succession or somewhat in isolation. That's why partner work is essential in testing your bunkai. There's been many occassions where I work out a bunkai in my head based on a merging of concepts and movement and it works pretty well. Other times, it just turns out to be impractical, either because of my limited knowledge of the human body or what-have-you. In some cases, a failed bunkai is useful because it highlights a principle or something that I was not focusing on (or aware of) before. Obviously there is always give and take when doing bunkai practice. If you know what's coming (or even if you don't), foiling the bunkai is much easier. At the same time, the person performing it isn't breaking your arm or face in order to make you "more compliant". You simply have to work at varying degrees on the compliance spectrum to figure what's practical and what's not. As people have mentioned, striking makes someone more vulnerable to grappling and grappling makes someone more vulnerable to striking. As for me personally, I tend to have several levels of bunkai for movements in my kata. I agree sometimes there is something to be said for a simple soft parry with a simultaneous strike. I'm a big believer in simultaneous action during my bunkai if we are considering the "pure striking" type of thing. I do tend to have both striking and grappling when it comes to my bunkai, however. I believe my style Shorin Ryu is centered on the takedown. Once the opponent is down, he should be incapacitated. Your individual preponderance of striking or grappling is just that, individual. However, I think a good foundation needs to be built in both areas for anyone to be considered a good karateka. That isn't anything new in karate. I think the recent ushering in of books and videos about kata bunkai as opposed to what was in the past is simply a matter of exposure. In the early days, many karateka, such as American GIs didn't spend enough time in a system to learn higher level grappling and things which are fundamentally inherent to Okinawan karate (or simply weren't shown or didn't figure it out). Now that more Americans (insert Non-Okinawans/Japanese) are "into" karate, keep coming back and train in a dedicated manner, more people are "figuring this out" or are being overtly shown by the Okinawans. As such, there is simply more knowledge about the deeper concepts in karate in circulation then there was before. The other reason is that the current "fad" is towards grappling-based systems. Therefore some karateka feel the need to overly pronounce the grappling nature of their style. Some of this is partly because the perception that karate has NO grappling whatsoever. In order to correct this, there is an almost undue emphasis on it in order to reach a happy median. Again, personally I like to do a mixture of both. I don't think karate is "primarily" one or the other. It is only the individual practitioner or method of teaching that may emphasize one more than the other.

That's a great site run by a great karateka. I've got all my hojo undo equipment from him. He also sells (his store is down as he isn't in the country right now) a cd with him describing and demonstrating many exercises to do with the various types of equipment.

Me and Sauzin had this conversation before (and we disagree). I have nothing to prove by doing kata with sharp kama. I have a set of kata kama (Murasaki Kobudo) that are dull and a pair of sharp hardware store kama for cutting practice. It is far too easy to cause yourself debilitating hand injury from a slight mistake with a pair of sharp kama. I honestly do not see the point. Sure, it may help you "focus" and "increase blade awareness", but I think a competent person could have focus and awareness regardless of the sharpness of the blade in their hands. Accidents happen, even to the best.

I've learned the same drills (So, tan, san he hakutsuru I believe) and Hakutsuru Sho as Skeptic2004. I also learned a version of Hakutsuru from my current instructor who learned it from Kyoshi Doug Perry (that one only a few months ago). He learned that version from a family system (Takemyoshi is how he spells it, anyway) when he was stationed in Okinawa and helped old man Takemyoshi's nephew get a job due to his position there. A lot of the concepts seem similar to what you both have mentioned (I know...it sounds like an "I concur" answer). Another thing I think it teaches is really keeping the shoulder down and controlling the opponent's arms and shoulders with many of the small circle movements up and down with your arm snaking up theirs. I apologize for my grevious lack of specific terminology... Also, the notion of namikaeshi or "returning wave" seems very evident in how many of the blocks (which of course also contain a simultaneous strike with the same or other hand) transition immediately into a strike as the opponent retracts their hand. This in my opinion more closely mimics a real situation as someone simply isn't going to leave their hand out their but are going to strike and pull it back. Thus many of the blocks take advantage of that and "ride" the returning arm to strike vulnerable points on the opponent. I'm rather fond of the Hakutsuru kata, even if I'm terrible at them.

Sounds like a good deal to me, and believable. My Shorin Ryu place only charges 20 dollars a month regardless of who you are, so it isn't one of those "too good to be true" kind of things. I would check out Shorin Ryu as it usually focuses more on self-defense and close in-fighting to the takedown.