elbows_and_knees

considering that most of us have never really seen the old masters in action, it's hard to say. I have seen footage of a fight that happened cerca 1954 between two chinese masters, and they both looked like a joke. I know there are people back in the day who could actually fight, but I think we tend to over romanticize how good some of them were. Not only that, but given the advances we've had in training and training methods, the guys of today would be at a big advantage. I would not agree that they could beat most of the MA of today. However, that should be qualified - the master of yesterday should be put against a master of today, not just some generic new guy. Also, muay thai does not have forms. wrestling does not have forms. boxing does not have forms - and traditionally, they have not had forms (other muay have, but muay thai has not) - so would the muaythai fighter 80 years ago have beaten a JMA or CMA master 80 years ago? Way too much speculation in either case. We will never know. That said though, look at what happened when kano introduced randori - his guys beat the top traditional jujutsu schools in japan.

here's a question - how much do you know about adrenaline? most people LOVE to use it as their scapegoat for what they will or will not do in a fight - "I will be stronger, I will be more focused," etc. What most people don't realize is that adrenaline dump is FAST after 2 minutes or less, it's gone. Once it's gone, extreme fatigue starts to set in. Consequently, between that and the other stresses involved, you are correct - you will NOT have time to modify the techniques intentionally, which can be a problem. I've listed examples before of "interpreted" moves in forms that are done differently in the form than they are actually applied. If you try it the way it's performed in the form, it will not work. That is the point cross was making. When you have moves in a kata that you are doing that aren't done the way they should be in order to be effective, then in a fight, you will do them the way you do them in the kata - the wrong way. A good example is throwing. most of the grappling and throwing you see in kata is not done that way in actual application. the form does not teach you kazushi, it jumps straight to tskuri, and in some cases, there is no kake, because you transition to the next technique. with boxing, there is no modification to make. My jab in shadowboxing, bagwork, sparring and fighting are all the same. Therein lies the efficiency of it.

you are still agruing against kata. There are 26 of them... more or less in other styles. 26 kata AND bunkai, which as you know and stated has MULTIPLE applications. You have all of that catalogged in your head... Do you think you will have the presence of mind to spontaneously search through all of those katas and apps and pick the proper one for the situation in time? Even though you admit that fights happen quickly? that's actually not relevant. This discussion is about the uselessness of kata. I can teach someone to fight very effectively without kata. Thus, my arguments are all against them. What else is trained is not pertinent. However, since you admit that kata doesn't train you fully for a fight, why do you think you need them so much?

I know someone in champaign who trains mantis. It may be the same school.

aggressive music - from gangsta rap to death metal - helps alot. Also, train more intensely, with more contact training - hard sparring, more heavy bag work, etc. make a conscious effort to become more agressive in your sparring- work on aggression oriented things, like attacking in combinations and countering instead of just passive blocking. BUT, you have to be careful, because - IME at least - aggression is all inclusive. You will become more aggressive in sparring, but you will also tend to be more aggressive in every day life. In some cases this is a good thing. however, if that's not what you want, you can counteract it in various ways, for example, meditation, if you are one to meditate. regardless of how you train, you are still training. No amount of make believe will make it any more real. Period. The adrenal stresses between a real fight and training in the dojo cannot be compared at all. When you are training with someone, they are NOT in the shoes of someone who is trying to harm you - they are in the shoes of a training partner. If they were in the shoes of an assailant, you would KO them instead of just going hard, break bones instead of letting them tap...you would run out of training partners and have many lawsuits. Training hard is one thing, but training as if it's a real fight is different. Even if you agree, the bumps and bruises you receive will take recovery, which slows training time, as there would be a longer interval between sparring sessions. In addition, no matter how much conversation you do with people in your class, not everyone likes hard contact. Consequently, hitting a person hard who does not want to spar hard will be ill received.

I personally would pick muay thai. What are you looking to get out of the martial arts? knowing that can help you to decide. Is the jujutsu japanese or brazilian?

at an advanced level, karate is not solely linear. it's quite fluid. shotokan may be an exception to this. there are hard, linear styles of kung fu, and those which accentuate both. The taiji sword is not a bendable (flexible) weapon - it is a straight sword. flexible weaons include the meteor hammer, three sectional staff, chainwhip and rope dart, to name a few. Any Form of Boxing - seems to be the route more and more people are taking.. straight forward, deals with hard solid attacks while keeping an optimum defence against ure opponent.. not too sure how it works but training is geared towards fighting if you don't put a great deal of thought into your fighting and training, I would suggest you not box or train muay thai. yes, definitely. What is available in your area?

1. why do people always assume they are or can be faster than the bigger guy? I weigh 230, but do plenty of cardio and lift weights constantly. I guarantee you that you can't move so fast that I can't hit you. There are plenty of other big guys like that out there also. This is a dangerous assumption. 2. in a street fight, cardio isn't a major issue. anaerobic capacity is actually more important. fights happen quickly.

reminds me of the kettlebell get up and turkish get up exercises.

stances are meant to teach you transition and footwork. You do not fight from them. low stances really aren't meant to be used in fighting - they are used in training to build muscular endurance in the legs. lowering your body is dynamic - it's done for while you are executing the technique, then you recover. there really is no difference in "going for the street fight" and fighting in martial arts. fighting is not pretty and does not look the way you train it. fighting is fighting. period. fighting from a low stance tends to kill your mobility, which is bad. if you want to be technical, grappling is far more traditional than karate. Every civilization since the beginning of recorded history has had some indigenous folk wrestling. no, it doesn't. but let's say that it does. who has a more "elevated sense of muscle memory" - you who does the SAME combinations in kata repeatedly, or me, who spontaneously creates my own combinations while shadowboxing? you are actually making arguments AGAINST kata, not for it. What happens when you are in a fight and experience a scenario you have not yet dealt with? until you run into an issue like the one above.

there is a good, basic guard pass escape in the army combatives thread I posted.

there's actually a lot more to it than that. The thigh dig is so overused now, that people are used to it, and it's farily easy to resist. That alone will not free you from someone who knows how to grapple.

he has a standing challenge, where if you put up 10,000 bucks, he will fight you. somewhere online, you can find vids of him fighting someone, but the fight looks staged.

which one you personaly enjoy the most ? what was the best thing (or may be a principal) you learned from each? I like muay thai and judo the best. I'm currently a brown belt in judo and teach muay thai. The best thing I learned from judo is stability. The throws are excellent, but my biggest strength is the fact that it's hard to take me down, and I attribute that entirely to judo. bjj taught me versatility. and ground game. I know umpteen ways to apply the same lock, all of which are applicable and used on a regular basis. bjj teaches you that the fight is not over just because you are in a disadvantaged position. kali taught me how to kill with weapons. it has shown me how to be ambidextrous - you have to be in order to wield a weapon in both hands without hitting yourself - or cutting yourself. We did live drills with double machettes as well. longfist taught me patience. weapons, forms, strikes, kicks, shuai chiao, iron body, qigong... there is a lot to learn and it's definitely a lifetime pursuit. Longfist in particular has many forms, and heck, it can take years to really master even one. karate taught me how to fight. really. My instructor was big on fighting. We didn't do a lot of kata, it was mainly drilling and fighting. This was before I started muay thai, judo or bjj, so it was my first real experience to hard contact sparring and drilling. My instructor was a short, japanese guy who was only 3 years older than me, and about 40lbs lighter than me - and he would mop the floor with me. tang soo do taught me an appreciation for MA in general, as it was the first art I trained in. My love of it at the time is what inspired me to keep training. jkd made me really focus on strategy in fighting, which helps now that I help coach other guys. muay thai reinforced all of the above, except for how to kill with weapons.

If contact sparring is what you are seeking, I would find someplace else to train. When I was younger, I trained with youger guys who were higher rank than me, and it was easy to overpower them. they would sometimes beat me if we were point sparring, but while sparring contact, they had no chance. At that age, they just don't have the strength yet, despite the technique. Perhaps you could crosstrain elsewhere or ask your instructor if he has some time he could dedicate to spar with you after class.

that's not true. there are a lot of very successful boxers, thai boxers, etc. that are defensive counterfighters. different fighters have different styles.

good post.

riddle me this - why have most us either seen trained MA get beaten in streetfights or actually been the MA that got beaten? If it were as simple as you make it sound, it would never happen...

the entire class period is a circuit?

those same outlawed techniques can only be trained in the air, or done with light contact. Consequently, it's not known by the practitioner how well they will be able to use them, as they have never really used them. That said, when they do happen to be implemented properly, they can cause damage. This is why they were outlawed. In the early UFC and vale tudo, eye gouges were permitted. You would be fined, but not disqualified. While this was in effect, gerard gordeau fought a man named yuki nakai. gordeau eye gouged him while grappling - badly. yuki was blinded, but still beat gordeau AND won his next fight. to this day, nakai is blind. THAT is why these techniques are outlawed. obviously, the gouge wasn't enough to end the fight - he still lost. However, the long term effect was that this man - who WON the fight - is permanently blinded. If that were the street, yuki would be blinded, but gordeau may be dead. So, what good did it do? he still lost. by modified, he means in execution. for example, there is a technique in CMA called shoot the bow. One application of it is a fireman's carry. BUT, it's trained stationary, not with fireman's carry follow through. How well would you use it in a grappling situation? not very well, as the technique has to be changed somewhat and the practitioner may not be used to that. Also, deep, low stances for the sake of building leg endurance - you don't fight that way, so why train that way? yet another modifcation.

I used to carry a stun gun. I stopped when I almost stunned a cop who hit me during an altercation. I may start back though. that order does seem odd. For us, it's verbal, physical restraint, fisticuffs / zapper, OC spray. Spray is always last for us, as we want to eliminate the threat without involving bystanders, and spray can affect multiple, uninvolved people if they are close enough.

that's not true. Anyone can learn fighting skill, but not everyone can learn killer instinct. It's just not in some people. Just like not everyone can be a pro boxer or pro anything, for that matter. Some people just have that knack that sets them apart from others. If anyone could develop it, there would be a lot more pro athletes in every venue. "killer instinct" is no different. Not everyone is cut out to be a fighter. that's just how it is. For those that do develop killer instinct, training is not going to get it for them - experience will. think about the military. Who do you think has a more developed killer instinct - the soldier who went through boot camp, then got assigned to a job working as a cook, or an infantryman who is on the front lines in iraq shooting and getting shot at daily? the infantryman. Why? because he's got the experience. I do believe that MA can help everyone begin to develop such an instinct, but can only do so much. Not everyone is cut out to be a killer... as for what's important, that will vary from person to person. For example, meditation is not important at all to me.

it's all in the scheduling and how bad you really want to do it. I have a family and two jobs, yet I still find time to train and am still in the gym lifting weights 3 - 5 days per week. If you really want it, you will make the time.

I agree with you here. I don't think these programs would teach you any better, unless they did detailed research on adrenal response and stress, are were able to incorporate this into the training, which would make it more real of a simulation on the body. I used to think this way, then I started bouncing in a club. Now I think differently: 1. there is not always a weapon involved. Even in the encounters I've been in as an adult - in the street and not in the club - there were no weapons. 2. there are not always numbers of them. my street fights have been 99% 1 on 1. In the club, several of them have been multiple attackers, but it would still amount to less than half. 3. mindset is a powerful thing, and this is where stress and adrenal response start to come in. Theoretically, the MA SHOULD be better than the non trained thug, but chances are that the thug has had more fighting experience, which means enhanced adrenal control and more control of himself in the situation. His striking may not be as efficient as it could be, but his experience will keep him more level headed than the MA. 4. a gun is not always the best defense. Legally, shooting is not always the answer. From a tactical perspective, it's all relative to your speed and position. I read a study somewhere that stated if a man with a drawn knife is within 20 feet of a man with a holstered gun, the man with the knife can gut the man before he pulls his gun. Ever the cynic that I am, I tried it. I had a baton drawn and my buddy had his *unloaded* gun. I got back 30 feet, since the baton was extended. His gun was holstered. I rushed him and was able to get to him before he could have his gun drawn and trained on me.

I voted 5 or more, counting only arts I trained in for 2 years or more. muay thai judo bjj longfist karate tang soo do kali/jkd