1kickKO

Ah I see, thanks for refreshing my mind...I was too lazy to look it up.

Just a word if I may about katas/forms...The Chinese army still to this day teaches a kata in our system called "fu ku gata ichi". This kata is over 500 years old, and is still in use to this day. One of the noticeables int his kata is that you hit all four walls and corners, symbolizing all 8 points on a compass. This is to instill your direction, and balance. They used it to walk in straight lines and help them to know their way. Another thing on a bo kata...one of the uses the Chinese army still uses today for wilderness training is this...stand in a zenkutsu dachi (forward leg block stance), now take a bo and put it up straight. It should hit the front of your foot, along with your knee, and hit the middle of your knuckles. These should all be in a straight line and created a nice, straight line for them to build forts and shelters...just a tad bit of interesting info I thought I'd share with ya guys.

Whoops, you'll have to copy and paste that link By the way, I'm not sure if they'll have any listings up yet, so if you don't find any, or they don't have any up... go to google.com and try a search on "Muay Thai School Listings" or "Muay Thai Instructors" or "Muay Thai Schools in West Virginia" etc... by the way whereso in WV do ya live if I may ask? Because I was just recently up there for a tournament in Clendenin.

as for the website, here's a link for a Muay Thai School Listing:

It's exactly the same. All power...whether in karate, kickboxing, muay thai, etc... comes from the hips. It's similar to baseball, in order to be a good pitcher, you have to have a strong trunk of the body (chest to feet), because it's not just a push off of the mound that gets the ball throwing hard, it's when you put yoru whole body into the pitch. Similar to kicking. You don't want to swing your hips too much because this will telegraph your kick, they'll know it's coming, and your kick will get blocked and countered. Being a soccer player you have a strong advantage because your legs are already built up, helping you extremely with your kicking abilities. How flexible are you? Be sure to stretch when kicking because the more flexible you are, the higher and harder you'll be able to kick without hurting yoruself. But lek I said, if you're performing a front kick, then you thrust your hips forward along with your leg. But there's something called a 4-count kick. This means, if you're doing a front kick, lift your knee up, kick out, bring your knee back to you, then drop your leg. This is like a "formula" for kicking so that your kicks don't get caught. But to get good powerful kicks have a good strong base along with strong legs...same with a punch..it's all in the hips(well, maybe not ALL, but about 80% of it is).

Yeah, Muay Thai is known for its devastating blows with knees and elbows...and they do clinch a lot, and during clinching you're right, they do knee during the clinch, as well with hitting in the head while clinches, and a number of other things. The kicks, well, they're like any other kick as in karate, or any other kicking sport, but in karate normally the kicks are for point, in muay thai they're for hurting or knocking out your opponent, same with kickboxing, so it's not that they're super fast, just pretty powerful and strong.

Muay Thai is extremely useful for streets, as they mostly utilize in stand-up fighting using hteir elbows, knees, legs and fists. Brazilian jujtisu (or any jujitsu for that matter) tremendously helps your ground game, and it is all based on grappling and street-worthy. Karate..of course is stand-up fighting, and is great for competing in and going to tournaments to test yoru skill, along with being good on the streets. Judo, if you don't know..is an olympic sport. It basically emphasizes throwing techniques..sometimes htey might include grappling, but very rarely..basically it's all throwing and sweeping techniques. TaeKwonDo is all based on flashy kicking techniques. Another great sport-martial art, that derived form Korea. It is some use in street-fights, but not much, because fanc y smancy acrobatic kicks won't save your life (no offense to all those TKD'ers out there) but many of the kicks are worthy of a street fight. As for Wing Chung, I don't know much about it...sorry. What I suggest, is call up the dojos and ask for a free lesson, so you can see if you'll like it there..if you'll like the teacher, the instruction, the atmosphere, and your training-partners.

A person in my dojo has our patch tattooed on his skin, it's pretty bad...I'm not a tattoo person myself, but I like lookin' at 'em.

Haha I'm just glad I haven't had to run into anybody who practices this art, as I've had to learn a few areas which can cause sudden death and/or knockout and/or constipation..haha..and we had to experiment with it, like the knockout touches (we had to hit each other, but extremely lightly just to experiment the dizziness efect of it) and it is definitely not fun.

Capoeira is definitely a good choice for acrobatics. XMA is extremely good with acrobatics, but that's just about all they're good with..if you're looking for self defense I'd go with something more classic like regular karate or kickboxing, but since you do want something acrobatic, take a look into TKD, or wushu.

Sure is...in dim mak they believe there are areas of the body that have channels..which energy/blood flows through. When you disrupt this flow, it can cause death, distraction, pain, constipation/diahreea, paralysis, etc..

Our tendancy to step in straight lines, not moving outside/inside attacks (I've heard this is a good thing but the principles escape me!) This means there are 3 points. Point a, point b, and a point c. Think of it as a triangle. Point a is your attacker, point b is you, point c is off to the side (whichever side is your opponent's back side). So basically, you're standing at point b, your attacker at point a. When he tries to rush you, his intent is to come straight at you with as many techniques as possible. What is he going to do? He's going to come at you ina straight line...from his point a to your point b. When you see him coming at you, the simplest method of defense is to step off to point c, the side. When you do this make sure you step off to the side that is his back. This is for many reasons. 1. When you step off to the side, he keeps going right past you in a straight line. 2. When you step off to his "back" side, you are now at his ack, and he is in front of you, his back is open to techniques, and in order to attack you again he'd have to turn around a full 180 degrees to attack you. That is the "straight line attack/defense" method. Our lack of in-fighting skills, any simple takedowns or similar would be appreciated. Well, a few simple, but great scoring drills. 1. Kick low to the shins to draw their attention to their legs then kick at their head (done with a roundhouse kick). 2. Say your attacker is in a normal fighting stance with his lef tleg forward. He takes a step forward with his right leg to punch you. as he does this (assuming your'e int he same fighting stance facing him, left leg forward) simple move your left foot back as he moves his right foot forward, so that you are now facing his arm, grab his arm and pull forward while taking yoru left leg and sweeping his right. 3. As your opponent throws a front kick, simply blcok as you lean back, then when he drops his foot step in and punch in the gut. I have plenty more techniques if you'd liek to e-mail me..nmoccabee@yahoo.com Our inability to spot gaps in the opponents defence, throwing combinations rather than situation specific techniques. There is a rule of thumb here..for offense and defense. to spot gaps in defense, they may not have one, so create one. Take a big step, or stop your front foot to make them think you are coming at them, when they make their mistake of stepping away use that to your advantage. Another rule of thumb for creating gaps in defense is this...when you fake high, they block high, opening them up low. When you fake low, they block low, opening them up high. Now for gaps in offense. Whenever somebody throws a punch at you, it has to come back at them sometime to rechamber right? For instance, if somebody throws a right punch, their arm will eventually start to come back to their body at the side of their hip...one good way to score is to follow this back with a punch of your own. this means htey only have 1 arm free t hit you with, while you still have both arms and 2 legs. Any other drills that people have found to develop fundamental sparring techniques. Well, one drill is multiple fighting, which causes your awareness to increase dramatically. Get a bunch of people, put one in the middle (possibly yourself) and have everybody attack. Your intent is not to get frustrated as you will get scored on a number of times, but as you progress you will get better and better. What you want to do is not focus on one enemy, as all of the rest ar eout of focus. Always hit the enemy you cannot see, so focus on all of them at once, and never let anybody behind you. Another drill is basically have one person block many punches/kicks as you throw them. Don't move, just have him block them. Now start moving around htat person as they stay there, you go in circles around them..this develops your periphreal vision. If you'd like any more suggestiosn feel free to drop me a line at my e-mail or pm me.

Hmm...Sure don't, it was at camp, and basically what they called it was "The simple praying mantis form".

Exactly, that's pretty much my point. They all have the same task, to block, or punch and inflict damage, or protect one's-self from damage. Styles are just offsets of each other, such as goju-ryu, shorin-ryu, etc etc...But what i'm getting to in the end..is that a style is a style no matter what, it may have the same goal, but different principles, therefore it's ideas and methodologies are different. So, in it's own form, it has it's own ways of doing things, adn that's why we have different styles today,a nd aren't all just called martial artists.

Well I use kata for a reason, I wasn't referring it to the whole style of praying mantis kung fu, I just simply mentioned I liked that kata and had fun with it, not to mention that it's got some devastating "hidden" techniques in the katas.

I totally agree, when I said it waas slow, I meant in it's original form, I didn't mean when you are practicing it thouroughly, or practicing it as a whole. Karate in the same way can be slow, such as kata, to learn at first, then speed up. But, I'm not going to stray into that as htat's a whole different topic. Basically what I'm trying to get across is that I believe every style has it's own conformities, and that is why they shold remain "styles", or "sytems".

The meaning behind praying mantis is as it reads...based ont he praying mantis. It was based on a man who once saw a praying mantis and some other insect (forget what it was) fighting, the praying mantis was very calm, and swayed in motion, lots of teasing it's opponent, then when it struck, it sliced the head off of it's opponent and had a nice hardy supper. The lesson? Every style has it's own weakness, but then again don't let htat sway you off...I'm sure it's extremely effective in its own manner as is any other style...I learned a praying mantis kata one time and it was incredible. I'm sure you'll like it.

No clue, tell me about it, what is it? A kata?

Of course tai chi is also fighting, but a different "style" of fighting. It focuses on a clear mind, it focuses on smooth and slow movements, a pure body, healing, chi, etc... That's why I think we should still keep our "styles" so to say.

No specific order... 1. Dim Mak 2. Jujitsu 3. Judo 4. Kickboxing 5. Muay Thai 6. Boxing 7. Karate 8. Krav Maga 9. Wrestling 10. Street Fighting

I think it is important to keep the styles up. Of course we are all martial artists, but nonetheless, we are all a different type of martial artist nonetheless. Some may be better at fighting, some at forms, etc...It's like comparing peanut butter and pickles, can't quite do it...but peanut butter and jelly you can. Like Tai chi and karate, two totally different styles that focus on different tasks..tai chi is on inner strength and peace of mind, karate is on outer strength and devastating techniques. So basically, you need a way to recognize both aspects of the arts...each needs a classification..just like foods, if they have everything labeled as "food" at a grocery store and no pictures on the boxes/cans, what are you going to buy?

Hmm..normally within our system at the dojo anybody fights everybody, normally sensei encourages everybody to fight th ehigher belts to get ready for comp, then at comp there are age divisions along with gender divisions..and for jujitsu it's gender divisions and weight divisions. As long as you have fun though, it's all good.

6-7 years in my karate/jujitsu/aikido dojo. Actually for AIkido it takes a bit longer, because in our style of aikido you go by how many hours you put in...quite a different grading scale.

A good fighting fan (and a beautiful one at that) is a bamboo fighting fan..any bamboo will do..look around for somehting you like

I believe mine would be when I was a white belt (a long time ago, hehe) I entered my first martial arts tournament and got grand champion. I was darn proud of myself that day, and to top it off, the next competition I went to when I was a blue belt (also quite a long time ago..lol) I got moved up to the advanced division of fighting because there was nobod in my novice division, a judge said he didn't want to do it because I'd get my butt kicked because their were quite a number of black and brown belts in that division. Turns out, I won that division and defeated 1 black belt 3 brown belts and a purple belt.