italian_guy

Sorry Goju_boi I have to disagree about ground fighing in Goju we do learn ground fighting and grappling... maybe not as much as a JJJ or BJJ practitioner but we learn some... I know that there are some schools where they teach also kobudo. However my school does not. I think the advantage of goju is that it is a pretty complete system even if it is mostly a striking art (ok it is karate not MMA), another advantage is that contain some ci kung elements. On the bad side I also think that Sanchin breating if done incorrectly can produce some arm, and the sparring is usually point fighting that maybe is not so good if you want to learn self defence. About my second art (JKD) I think that it is very good for self-defence and has also the advantage that it teaches a lot of diffent things, striking, locks, grappling, trapping, weapons (kali). The bad thing is that you don't have an indeep knowledge of all these aspects until some years have passed... that's why in my school it takes a minimum of 7 years to get a black label (equivalent of a black belt). ...and then you are only an expert beginner....

Bad days happens... It's normal.

Also okinawan karate has a lot of grappling MMA elements. I think that depends mostly on the school; in my Go ju ryu dojo we spend about 30% of our time in grappling, sometimes we do entire weeks of training doing only grappling. So it is not 50%-50% balanced but has quite a lot of grappling in it. While I have seen once a Kyokushin karateka visiting our dojo that had very little grappling experience.

I agree with y2_sub you need a combo of 1 striking + one grappling, If I have to choose only one I would take BJJ.

In my case is (probably) MT. Almost all kicks we do are aimed at legs and looks some kicks executed by MT practitioner, but I don't know much about Savate kicks, what's the difference?

I think that Tai Chi Chuan is a good self-defence art but that it takes quite long (let's say 5-6 years depending on the individual and the teaching) to be self-defence proficent. However it has some other side effects, (i.e. health, relaxation, flexility improvements) and it is a very good cross-training art. So my opinion is: if self-defence is your primary goal I think you should concentrate on other MA that teach you self-defence faster. If you are interested on an Internal type of martial art Tai Chi chuan is a very good option.

I put influenced by other martial arts. I started my MA journey with kickboxing after more then 1 year of training I felt the need of something which includes other aspects of martial arts (forms, tradition, self defence applications) so I switched to Go ju ryu karate and never regret.

Co0ngratulations

In my JKD school at least 7 years. In my karate school at least 4 years (but now they are going to increase this time).

I cross train Goju ryu karate and JKD, and I have no problems. They are different enaugh not to make confusion... Probably there are situations where you can make some confusion (like two different karate styles at the same time) but I think that cross training is mostly beneficial. About the others two arts in my curriculum I did them in the (near) past.

Werlcome to KF. Osu!

Welcome to Karate forums Garth!

Welcome to KF.

I'm always in favor of cross-training as long as you are able to separate them (ok some mistake sometimes happens), and I also agree with Bleeding Lion about not making comparisons in front of the instructor in the two school (unless explicitly asked). I think both mixing you suggested are good TKD-Hapkido is nice because it add some grappling skills to your TKD. TKD-Kung fu (Kung-fu is a very generic term let's take a nothern style); you may have some superposition problems here, both arts are striking and mostly rely on kicks, but I think still is a valid cross-training option, however I prefer the mix TKD-Hapkido.

Welcome to the forums

Hi welcome to KF

Well...second dan in 5 years is really few...specially for a fifteen ager...she's probably a genius or where you live they are not so picky as in Italy. Me, with the same years of training i'm still a brown belt even if my instructor say i've good qualities... By the way...in Italy until you reach 18 you cant test for first dan. No it has been lowered to 16 (in FILJKAM) but then you need to stay at least 3 years as shodan before you can test for nidan. So in Italy it would be impossible. Are you with FILJKAM Jade?

Hi, It is since april, but I studied also one month in 2003. In our class after basic warm-up (15-20 min) we usually do either kickboxing or trapping or grappling (about 30 min or more) then kali (20-25 min) sometimes we do abs work at the end (5 min). Usually the class lasts 75-80 min.

Congratulations Sam

Congratulations, way to go mate!

Congratulations keep doing good work.

Karate 2 x 2.5 hours/week JKD 2 x 1.25 hours/week for a total of 7.5 hours of MA/week

Welcome to KF, I hope you find a MA that may suit you.

Welcome to KF

I agree... even if you need self-defence proficient with TCC you may need more time then with other martial arts, although TCC has lots of additional benefits.