AngelaG

It may be true that you and your club believe this ... but, sadly, it would be naïve to assume that this was every karateka's point of view. Precisely my point. I know it isn't every karateka's point of view, but IMO it SHOULD BE every karateka's point of view. If we are learning dangerous and/or deadly techniques it our RESPONSIBILTY to use this knowledge wisely!

That's the biggest pile of cr*p I have ever read!!!

Having read these forums for a bit I am quite surprised at the number of people bragging about the street fights they have been in, and who they have beaten up using their Martial Arts. When I started karate it was impressed on us that it was only ever to be used as a self defence and a last resort. If I was overheard in the dojo bragging about what fights I had been in and what I had done to the other person I would no longer be training. I know for a fact that my Sensei would have booted me out. Similarly, if I had been attacked and had needed to use my karate in self-defence I would be vindicated, but if I was then telling everyone about it in gory detail afterwards and seemed proud of beating someone else up I would be in big trouble. The whole point of karate is to teach humility and to build up a better character. The first rule of self-defence is to try and avoid situations that may turn nasty. If you know a pub that has a reputation for having weekly fights and yet you are still going there then maybe you need to question your motives. If you are walking through dangerously lit, bad areas late at night then you are asking for trouble. It seems to me that martial artists can sometimes become a danger as they start to become curious as to whether their skills will actually be effective in a street fight situation, and deliberately wind up situations that could have been talked down. To then go onto public forums and boast about how many people you beat up, and what injuries you left them with seems to go against everything a martial artist should stand for. It saddens me when people talk about their martial arts that some people judge an art purely on how effective it would be in a real life fight. Surely there are many more facets to every art to make it meaningful and enjoyable? Just because something does not instantly apply to a street fight does not make it meaningless. There are many more things to life than being able to physically abuse someone. What about it being fun? What about the social aspect? What about aiding fitness? What about the increased confidence? What about somewhere to relax after a stressful day at work? What about getting together with a group of like minded people and training for the sheer pleasure of training. What about teaching your body new skills that once seemed imposssible? The list goes on.... Violence should only ever be the last resort.

Got to say that the feeling after a cough does nothing for me.... a good sneeze though...

Hiya My instructor left the KUGB to be with the OCI, which is an open organisation. We have practitioners from loads of different martial arts within out organisation and get together for seminars to learn what different styles have to give. The rest of the time we study our Shotokan the way our head instructor wants us to study it. It is very much still HIS dojo.

At the risk of making your contributions to this thread positive, would you mind sharing some of those? I did make several positive contributions in this thread, only my last one was off topic because I was upset by someone deliberately misinterpreting my threads to provoke an argument.. If you seriously want me to share some of my training tips then I will start a thread on it when I have a bit more time.

Actually I did not take it personally, I did not go off on one blah blah blah. Please go back and read my first post and tell me where I took the original post in a personal manner and offered anything other than friendly and helpful advice. (Helpful hint, it's the 3rd one in) I just merely stated at first that push ups are harder for most women (not impossible... harder). Then I later pointed out that push-ups have nothing to do with being good at Martial Arts... hey it's your right to disagree with that statement but it's my right to think you are totally and utterly wrong! Oh and for a statement that had NOTHING to do with me let me point out I posted first and YOU quoted ME. At which point did the bit where you referred to what I said and asked me a direct question did it have nothing to do with me? My first post did not quote anyone... it was my view (Tut! Freedom, of speech whatever next?) and some advice to the original poster! As I SAID IN MY FIRST POST I am working on improving my pushups for my own reasons not one of which is to make me a better martial artist )... at no point did I want a girl/boy debate about this that or the other. All I said that it is harder for most girls to do them, not that we should not bother! But actually now you come to mention it I can think of much better ways to improve my upper body strength and I can think of much better ways to improve my martial art's ability... So next time before you wade in and get your posterier into your hands get your facts straight. Now quite frankly you're boring me and I've already wasted enough of my time banging my head against the brick wall, so I am moving on. So many push-ups to do... so little time!

Most definitely B and C

The problem with stereotypes is that they often come about when the majority is true. It's like cliches, used so often because they are so often true.

Has anyone tried doing push-ups where the hands start really narrow and gradually work as far out as you can go? Or round the clock push ups where one hand starts at "12 o' Clock" and gradually works its way around whilst the other stays still, then change hands. Or ones where you start with the fingers pointing inwards and then slowly change which way the fingers point. These are killers.

I don't know about that. It's a question of number crunching. Anyone can see that it is better for business to expel one unruly student, than to let him stay and have 5 good students leave. As it is traditionally considered that McDojos are all about the money I would suggest that they have no problems about booting unruly students. I would say it's more the traditional dedicated Sensei that would not want to give up on that person and would keep find out why they are misbehaving and try to work with them. I also suspect you get more unruly children in McDojos because there is usually a higher student to teacher ratio. This means that the Instructor has less time to spend on each student, and the ones not being paid attention to will get bored and fidgety.

Sure and it's also a personal choice. Personally I think that 100 push ups from the knees are just as good, if not much better as 25 full push ups. It's like sometimes I will do sit-ups and may decide to do 100, other times I will do full on stomach crunches and may decide to only do 50. Variation. The spice of life!

I guess it's down to personal choice and how seriously you take your training... and how much work needs to be done. I still drink at the weekends. I work VERY hard all during the week and I need a little relaxation at the weekends, so I either go out with my dojo buddies, or stay in with a wine, a nice meal and a DVD. However, I don't go and and get wrecked.

Well you know what they say about assuming! Yes I am quite sure, but thanks for patronising anyway! I was referring to the title of the thread. I don't know if you've noticed but it was called "girl push-ups"?

Comparitively to what I would expect from a martial artist is what I meant when I said "in poor physical condition". I should have clarified that. It's just my opinion that you should at least be able to push up yourrself at least once. It's not impossible, I'm sure you can achieve it. I can do more than 1 full push-up. At no point have I said I can't. In fact I can do about 10 before I have to stop, but that's more to do with poorly wrists than anything else. BUT I do know men that can lift heavy weights, but cannot do push ups. Because the thread was about male/female push ups

I am friendly with everyone. Forums without arguments... I mean debates .. would be very boring places indeed.

Actually MY jab does come from the legs and hips. If yours doesn't then that's up to you. but I know which one I'd put on being more powerful because I bet you that my legs and hips are more powerful than your arms no matter how many push ups you can do! Again as I mentioned before, it's also down to the individual. I can do loads of push ups from the knees and I can do loads of sit ups, I can do squat thrusts, burpees, stomach crunches, star jumps, row for hours but I have trouble with full on press ups.. Say what you want but I know I am not unfit and whether you like it or not an average female chest places a lot more weight on the push-up... It's pretty basic, even the armed forces and services don't make the females do the same amount of press-ups as guys. Also as I said I know for a fact I hit pretty much the same strength as the rest of the guys as my instructor has a punch shield that measures the strength of strikes. Push-ups are not the same as striking!!

I can only hope this is humour. geez Angela, of course it was humour (hence, the SMILEY FACE) : Well sorry, but judging from some of your previous comments I couldn't be sure. Oh in case you're about to get offended, I invoke the power of... THE SMILEY FACE!!

I can bench press my entire body weight once and that's all I need for my one killer strike. Stamina is entirely different from strength in an instant. I can hit hard a few times, maybe after 10 I am getting out of breath, but if after 10 punches your opponent is still standing you are doing something wrong anyway! Punching also comes more from the hips/legs than from upper body, and your legs are always going to be more powerful. Your hand/arm is just the weapon. Let the hips and legs do the work for you! (like a whip, all the work is done down at the handle, but the tip of the whip is the bit that hits and hurts!)

I can only hope this is humour.

Did I heck!! I had the moves to all my kata embroidered on mine!!

You guys have more to push? Yeah, right. I don't know if you've noticed but that's a ) someone who has trained to the very peak of physical fitness. There's a surprising dearth of normal men walking around looking like that! Whereas most women wander around with breasts. And the fact that he has trained that much will help him do the push ups. that guy could probably easily bench press two of me! That is the biggest pile of male cow dung I have ever heard. I can punch almost as hard as most of the guys in my dojo (my instructor has a pad that measures hits). That's all down to body mechanics and making sure you do it correctly, whereas a push up is merely a physical exercise. FWIW I can pretty much beat all the men in my dojo on sit-ups and barely break a sweat, but struggle on full push ups (although can do over 100 'girl' press ups). What does that say? I have the physical strength to sit-up until the cows come home! NEVER underestimate your opponent on what simple PT type skills they can do!

Oh come on!!! tThere's a diffrence between conditioning knuckles, elbows etc by real fighters and belting yourself around the ribs with a stick. As another point, I bet all the soft squidgy internal organs love all that hard impact!

Very eloquently put WW.

I think that repeatedly hitting yourself with sticks is over the top, and IMO a bit weird. If you weren't a martial artist and someone found out you were doing that they would probably refer you to a psychiatrist. I find it disturbing that many people see to seem this institution of self-harming as normal and natural. I find it disturbing that someone can suggest to somone else on the board that they do this and most people actually go more into the biology of it than point out that this is dangerous and irresponsible. There are kids reading this board who may decide to implement these, frankly scary, ideas. Parents out there, how would you feel if you found out that your teenage child who is interested in Martial Arts was beating themselves in the ribs, with sticks(!) every night??? And then if you found out they had got the idea from somewhere like this?