Randy

I used to have problems hurting my wrists punching when i first started training in the martial arts. Was mostly due to improper technique and poor aim so i was hitting the circular bag off-centre and my wrist buckling (ouch) Didn't take me too long to sort it out tho, i can smack it around with full power now without hurting myself.

My sensai drives a pretty crappy car and lives in a shed, so atleast i know he isnt in it for the money. Classes are pretty cheap, theres no contracts or any of that crap and his accounting system relies mostly on the honesty of his students. I think what he gets out of teaching is the satisfaction of teaching people and watching them & his dojo grow.

Ok so heres what happened... Earlier today during our warmup we were doing those pushups where you push yourself up, clap your hands togethor and (hopefully) land back on your hands. Anyways we did 10 of em and on Ju i decided to be tricky and clap my hands twice. Unfortunatly the extra clap meant i didnt have enough time to get my arms back in place to safely lower my body down to the hard wooden surface. CRACK - I hit the floor pretty hard straight on my chin. Didn't seem to be any damage until i rubbed it and noticed all the blood, went and checked it out, nasty little split. I ended up going to hospital to have it checked out and got 2 stiches. I feel like such a *****. Would have been cool if i got kicked in the head by a blackbelt or somthin - but pushups?? sheesh Anyhow I send out a challenge to all you out there to perform a double clap pushups, and dont forget to videotape and send it to me so i can laugh at you when you bust your chin up, or bite the end of your tounge off or whatever.

How about posting this clip? Sure thing. The file is 2.3MB - dont have anywhere to upload it to. Would be happy to email it to someone, or send over msn messenger or somthing.

Is there much you can do when somone sits on top of you like that? I actually have a karate vs jiu-jitsu clip where the jiu-jitsu bloke tackles & sits on the karate guy. Karate guy manages to palm hand him in the chin & push his head up and avoids getting hit.

Dentist says i need my all wisdom teeth ripped out. They are still below gum level at the moment so he is going to have to slice my gum open and tear them out with pliers and stich it all up. All the while ill be in a dental chair with my mouth clamped open and just a needle in gum anasetic (i think) Has anyone had this procedure done before? it seems pretty common. Just wondering what your experience was like and if its as nasty as it sounds?

Over here in Australia they make you vote once you hit 18, unless you're lazy like me and just never bother enrolling in the 1st place.

tried that already nicole, it just downloads a .wvx file and when i open that file it just starts streaming it to media player. I wanna see Mr.Woo damnit!!!

How can i download the entire file? It keeps streaming it and media player sucks too much to buffer more than 60 seconds and my net connection cant quite keep up with it.

Ok heres the way i see it. I usually wear a normal jogger with a rubbery sole, so what im saying applies to those kind of shoes. When you do a kick with the bottom of your foot (ball of foot / heel) the sole of your shoe is between your foot and the target so when you kick, the sole will deform and absorb some of the force. Also the surface area you are kicking with is increased (bottom of shoe is bigger than your foot) so the force of the kick is spread out over a larger area. What that means is that the kick is probably more likely to knock your opponent back rather than bust a rib or an organ. Similar principles to that of boxing gloves, when you get hit your head gets knocked back rather than nose or jaw breaking cause of the much greater surface area of the glove. So those kicks would become less effective with shoes on. I've also found it dificult to pull your toes back for ball of foot kicks with shoes on. For a roundhouse & groin kick, if you kick with the top of your foot only a few layers of cloth are between your foot & the target so i doubt you would notice much difference there, and ofcourse if you round kick with your shin your shoes dont come into play at all.

Ok guys thanks for the advice. I just figure if im going to be doing pushup i may aswell do them on my knuckles to strengthen them up a bit, and make me look tougher So do those of you that condition your knuckles/fists just do pushups on them or what? no one beats up a bag bare handed? ps. Coco i never said i was gonna hit sand, just do pushups on it, and i think you will find that gojuchad actually toughens his shins, not his chins

What happens if your work building catches on fire and the escape is jammed and the only way to survive is to punch through it??? Then you will wish you had big calloused knuckles

A non-deforming object hey? sounds hard, like steel? i think perhaps if you punched a non-deformable object as hard as you could your fist would deform badly and you would lose alot of energy

I was at karate this evening and i was just doing some warm ups before lesson started. I started doing some knuckle pushups and one of the black belts aproached me and suggested i do the pushups only on my 2 main knuckles on each hand since they are the ones that deliver the most force in a punch. Fair enough. Then he goes on to talk about doing the pushups in sand to further harden the knuckles. Makes sence. THEN he told me if i punched a bag bare hand until i wore the skin off my knuckles it would grow back stronger. So im just wondering what you guys think about punching my knuckles raw? and if its worth my while how long would they take to heal up? Cheers

I don't think its very nice to call his instructor whacko. Is there something wrong with wanting to have fit strong students? Fitness is a big part of martial arts isn't it? At our gradings we also have to meet a fitness requirement - although i have to admit 225 pushups is pretty crazy for a green belt. In our style for green belt it is 50 pushups + 50 situps. Its not until we are grading for atleast Shodan Ho that we do anything over 150.

fosters? what does that mean MartialMan?

I dont see any problem with moderate drinking, then again im not a doctor. My 1st grading camp was held at a small coastal village, we trained all saturday and ran up this huge hill. Saturday night alot of us (including Sensai) gathered on the beach to drink and chat. I ended up having quite a few too many drinks and having to be helped off to my tent that night. Next morning 7am everyone was woken up for 1km of kicks along the beach. That was probably the toughest thing ive ever had to do, i felt so sick (hungover & dehydrated & empty stomach) , it was absolete hell, serves me right. I felt sick that whole day and having to stand out in the hot sun practicing katas and performing grade requirments was painful. I ended up getting my yellow belt and have definetly learnt my lesson. Do any of you guys go out & celebrate after gradings? (or the night before like us)... or maybe its just an Aussie thing?

What do you guys count as a proper pushup? For me would be body straight, feet apart about shoulder width, arms at shoulder level but out a little bit wider, then lower myself down until my nose touches the ground and push up until arms are straight, keeping my back straight all the time. It kind of annoys me to see some people doing really weak pushups, not lowering themselves down much just so they can finish 1st and brag to their mates about how they can do 100 in a row. Some people also spread their legs apart really wide and kinda stick their * up into the air, bending their back and kinda headbutt the ground. Anyways doing proper pushups i can do about 35 in a row.

G'day everyone, Im an 18yr old guy from Australia and have been doing martial arts since the beginning of this year. Ive been lurking around these forums for a few weeks while im bored at work and i look forward to participating in some discussions. I study Zenryoku - our sensai refers to it as being "freestyle martial arts" Heres a bit from our website about what it is- "By combining styles such as Kickboxing, Muay Thai, Jiu Jitsu, Karate, Street Defense and Weaponry..." So i guess Zenryoku is what you guys would call Mixed Martial Arts? Anyways i really enjoy it and im learning lots. Cya in the forums. -Andrew