tufrthanu

Jim Wagner thinks a wrist lock in combat fatigues is more effective than a wrist lock in a dobok. Thats just nonsense. Most MA classes are run like biology in college. You have Class room and Lab. Forms are your book learnin, SD and Sparring is your lab.

Once while doing a form in front of the class I had to do a 270 degree backward jumping spin into a back stance, didn't get my back foot full airborne and when I went to land in the back stance it turned and the outside of the ankle hit the floor...there was a loud pop gasps of horror by the audience...it swelled up real good and I was out for 6 weeks. There was a toe sprain due to those evilly inspired jigsaw mats that caused my foot to turn purple. Once during a spar I got a partial fracture from accidently blocking someones knee with my index finger. Couple bangs on the back of the head from falling. Thats it.

Just a couple of points. I had wanted to do a new topic on jigsaw mats myself when I saw this one so I will post it here and hopefully some people will see it. I'm a diabetic with neuropathy and so I have special foot needs. It's been my experience that modern instructors are more than willing to work with you on that however I have been asked by some assistant instructors when wearing MA shoes if the head instructor said it was ok. First, I used to go barefoot once upon a time...until a podiatrist/martial artist told me I was insane. Barefoot + Possible Open Wound + Diabetes + Everyone else's sweaty bacteria laden feet on carpet = No Feet. Then I started wearing shoes. Second, IMHO jigsaw mats are the devils work. At the school where I first got my BB my instructor put them in. At this time I was wearing my MA shoes. At first the mats were like slippery like they had oil or something on them. After that wore off though there was a ton of friction on my shoes. One night doing a spin kick I actually ripped a fully laced MA shoe off my foot. So I decided to go without them...BAD IDEA. One night doing warm up drills we were doing round kicks. Because of the lack of feeling in my feet I didn't realize when my toes were gripping the floor that the pinky toe of my right foot had slid in between two mats. Of course when I went to do a round kick with that leg the mat didn't move. I sprained my toe BAD, swore, and never went back to that school. The next day I looked at my foot and the whole left side of the right foot was purple. I freaked out but it did heal properly thank god. Third, as to the different surface types. I would say a seamless mat especially over springs of some sort like a boxing ring is the best. I've trained on padded carpet...thats OK, I've trained on unpadded carpet (current school) and thats ok...except for falls and rolls which are fairly painful. We also have a boxing ring and another part on the carpet which has a canvas covered mat on it...both are good for falls. One point on hardwood. I've read that the best surface hardwood wise is hardwood on springs. I've also read hardwood over concrete is essentially concrete which may be why you all feel pain if you fall on it. Just my 300 cents worth.

Mr. Miyagi: "Belt used keep pants up!"

I once had a high ranking Ji Do Kwan TKD instructor tell me if you get thrown and get up smiling its Aikido, if you get thrown and get up in agony its Hapkido. He may have been Korean arts biased though.

Interesting Jay but I hadn't even thought of that. Some food perhaps being higher in certain nutritions but for certain groups of people perhaps not as easily digestible and therefore not so good? I read recently that this really high caloric diets that superatheletes like michael phelps use really arent that good for a normal person. They have metabolisms in like the top 2% or something like that and even if a normal person works out as much as they do your body won't handle it.

Actually they do make oranges in vodka...or rather orange flavored vodka. I'm not entirely sure which brand it is smirnoff maybe but they have all sorts of flavored vodkas.

rateh its not in most types of ice cream JUST French Vanilla. Richardz I don't know how many eat it...I'm sure most French people though do. And it's more than likely whats served at any fancy french restaurant if you get Ice cream.

You are correct not all ice cream does have raw eggs that's why I specifically mentioned French Vanilla Ice Cream which does have raw eggs in it.

I'm a bigger guy and one of the instructors at my school helped me modify one of my head instructors counters. In the original you turned into an opponents round kick and then did a back kick to the midsection. The modified one used a spinning backfist instead of the back kick. Another one is to pull down on an opponents front guard hand with yours and then quickly shoot off a backfist with the same hand.

Wow thanks guys these were some great ideas.

Rateh that is correct and why French Vanilla Ice Cream can be so deadly. Seriously. I also am not sure in the benefit of this. Obviously it gives a lot of protein but hardcore protein can be found in other sources like yogurt, cooked eggs, cheese etc.

yes there is a recumbant bike lying around I could try. I was thinking that on the peddles the balls of the foot would face some pressure but perhaps on a recumbant one it wouldn't be as bad or I could adjust my feet somehow.

Unfortunately george being in a pool...especially a public one as a diabetic with an ulcer on my foot would NOT be a good idea. Thanks for the idea though.

Hey all: I am currently trying to lose weight and due to both health and financial issues am not able to train my MA regularly. I have a problem with one of my feet. ulcer that hasn't healed, and that's making trying to find a good workout routine especially hard. Does anyone know of any good routines especially aerobic that don't put weight on the ball of the foot? You would be surprised at how many things do such as push ups etc. but any help is appreciated. Thanks.

Rocky Balboa did.

Well gee as someone with neuropathy that sounds bad. Perhaps BEFORE getting therapy you should consult an internist or other medical professional. The reason I say that is because you have both the femoral artery and some major nerves there. Who knows what could be causing it. Nerve damage, artery blockage, pulled or torn muscle. Could be something simple that just requires therapy could also be way more serious.

When my dad took TKD back in the 70s they had 8 grades but only 5 belt colors not including black. It went White, Yellow, Green, Blue, Blue, Brown, Brown, Brown. Then Black Belt of course.

I have asthma, and diabetic neuropathy among other things. I also wear glasses. A good instructor won't care what shape you are in so long as it is safe for you to work out. I weigh 300 pounds or so now but I was always a heavy kid. I had one instructor tell me I had to lose weight before I could train at his studio. Suffice to say I didn't give them a second glance. The important things are this: Inform your instructor of any conditions that would make you unable to participate like asthma in my case, Take your glasses off when you spar unless you are completely blind without them, even if it's supposed to be no contact to the head you can always walk into a punch. What I did when I went looking for my current school was I actually brought a notebook with the questions I had about the art, the instructor, and the school and I wrote them down. Then I looked over the schools I visited and made my decision. Just one more thing. Its about private lessons. Some people take those because they are shy or whatever but you have to realize several things. First, EVERYONE sucked when they first started. Well maybe not everyone but I would bet 98% or so. So if you are afraid of looking out of shape or silly in front of others especially higher belts, don't. We've all been there. Heck I'm still there. Second, there IS a benefit to training with others. Not everyone does things the same way even though technically they are supposed to. This means in a private lesson you will miss out on seeing how others do things which may potentially be very beneficial to you. This is especially true when it comes to sparring. Also learning solely from your head instructor may make it more difficult. My current instructor weights about 160 pounds less than I do and is almost 7 inches shorter. Is this a good person to learn solely from? He's very good at instructing and has all the knowledge of course but it helps to learn from people that have similar attributes to you also. For instance, he has no idea what it feels like to hit the ground as a 300 pound person off of a throw. It's just different. Hope this helps.

Of course I'm sure a linguistic point could be made that there are different types of staves? Bo staff, Jo Staff, Eakubo staff? If the original is a variety of staff then it could still be used with the word staff. Especially if you are talking about staves from different cultures. A bo and a dragonpole for instance. At least in english. You are still right that their would be redundancies in the original language. One that always used to upset my dad and is not strictly a repeated word is "Close Proximity". They mean the same thing so it's like saying close closeness. I've heard apologists say, however, that there can be degrees of closeness. Far closeness versus near closeness. I don't buy that though.

What do you do as part of your rambo drills?

The third "Bourne" film as I recall had some pretty good fight scenes I remember him having a rather long one with this terrorist and I remember one spot where he put him into an outer wrist lock throw and the guy did a standing jumping back flip and landed on his feet to get out of it. Road House with the late Patrick Swayze also had some good fight scenes. I'm not sure what the name of it was but wasn't there also a recent film with Djimon Honsou that had alot of good fighting in it?

I think that use of various types of blades and firearms would be a good part of a self defense class. They do count as being martial in nature and knowing how to use one whether you are defending your home or using one that you have taken away from an assailant is important. I do feel however that many schools including the one I belong to teach some unrealistic gun defenses. I was trained by a guy that teaches police officers how to use their guns and so I have a fairly good idea of how to properly fire a hand gun. When I hold the gun it is in my right hand with my left hand cupping it. This means that most of the techniques that have a single handed assailant or that rely on batting the gun out of their hand probably wouldn't work as it will be well controlled and between both of my palms. Another issue that is rarely brought up in gun defense is that of distance. Many of my friends and I laugh about this in the movies. The bad guy holds the gun right up to the good guys temple or whatever and the good guy then swings around and takes it away. This leaves out the most important facet of a firearm and that is that the bullets actually leave the barrel. You don't have to shove it through someones flesh to make it effective. What this means is that an assailant with a firearm may not need to stand right next to you to be able to threaten and/or kill you with their gun. I very rarely see self defense for a gun where the victim has to cover 10/15 ft before effecting the disarm. Now these two items may not be that big of an issue if you are dealing with the local moron who just wants to rob the liquor store down the street but if you are dealing with a terrorist or experienced killer who may have been trained by a military or police expert or something along those lines it changes the whole dynamic.

It doesn't have anything to do with teaching methodologies (TKD, Karate, Whatever). It has to do with human anatomy. It's not my opinion that your hips determine where your foot is. It's biology. To try and teach hip position through foot position is not good and why many beginning martial artists get pain when kicking.

Well to both bushido and sensei all I can say is that the hips are the important part of the side kick and many other important techniques. Far more important than the base foot. I'm not sure why this is so difficult to understand except that perhaps it's been focused on incorrectly by martial artists for so long. The hips are important. The base foot only ends up at 180 degrees because that's where it needs to be to get the hips in the proper position. Otherwise it's completely irrelevant. As I have said before body physiologies differ and this is what can affect the final position of the base foot. At no point however should the final position of the foot be used as a judge on whether a proper side kick has been effected. Figure out where your hips need to be and then turn your base leg the appropriate amount to get them there. It's as simple as that. It doesn't matter which version of a side kick you do. Try it. It works.