G95champ

Wow sorry I missed that but o well. Was I here the first year? Ill have to check my first into post. I know I was close if not. Anyhow congrats Pat hope you have at least another 7.

Last Sinfield show lol

You always have a chance but lets be real with each new attacker your odds goes way down lol. Now the more training you have the better I don't care what style you do or have done. However, IMO your best hops is to have a striking background because last thing you want is to go to the ground vs more than one attacker. I too am a shotokan person and our rule is simple Take out the leader or the biggest most agressive person first and hope the rest realize your a bad cat. If that don't work run. If that don't work pray.

Roys15 Its a crazy world espcially in the US when it comes to how a court will rule. I have a friend who is a BJJ and MT guy. About 10 years ago some people came to his business a local go kart track and were causeing troulbe. He asked them to leave but a fight broke out. He beat all 3 of them up. One had broken Jaw the other a broken collar bone the thrid had a busted nose. My friend only had a few marks. However the judge rulled because it was his place of business he should have showed restraint and he had to do 6 months in the county jail. Not a very fair ruling IMO but none the less. However, his MA training had no impact on the case.

Well no not really. The JKA as late as the mid 1980's made all its black belts get fingerprinted and take a passport photo ID card. However, its only a few and less true today than it was years ago.

I've been away for a year and don't see the names I used to so please if your a shotokan student or teacher say hey.

All a black belt means is that you understand the basics. No more no less. There is not magic and ability to walk up walls and throw fire balls sorry. I think our black belts are very good and needed. I would guess they avg. about 3 hours and the last hour of that is sparring. There is lot ot be said and learned by just completing the test pass or fail. Once you become a Dan then the learing begins. For us in Shotokan the 2nd Dan basically means you have the ability to teach. You will only truely start to understand the moves when you try and teach them. Teaching opens up many doors in not only karate but anything because it forces you to see the problem or move as somone else does and make you find new ways to understand it. Now you very well may be in a "macdojo" as they call it where the teacher just drags people along for money but you may not. Basically you get in what you put in. If you train hard and are over 15 IMO you can bea black belt in 2-3 years. If your younger then its going to take more time. Same as if your older the body and mind just don't work like the body and mindof a teen or person in their 20's and 30's. Sorry but lets call a spade a spade. Bottom line it may be burnout. It may a mcdojo. Your teacher may not know anymore to teach you. I hope all is not the case but take it from me. I have trained in Shotokan since Feb. of 1993 and I have forgotten way more than I know.

Summer time came and I got some free time so I thought I would come back to KF for a time. How is everyone? Who is still here from the good ole days besides patrick lol.

In the back of Master Funakoshi's book Karate do Kyhoan (sp) he goes though several. Remember Master Funakoshi trained and studied with Master Kano the founder of Judo. So you could look into some Judo schools for your answer as well.

If you teach it just make sure your students know which one they are doing.

Its a new story to me as well. However, it wouldnot shock me considering Funakoshi was very much anit combat. Based off what I have read and been taught he strikes me as person who would refuse to spar to prove a higher point of karate training.

One of the reaonss traditional arts that have set forms are better IMO. Not to say what your teacher done was bad or wrong.

Ask your Sensei but yes there are differant ways to do the same blocking. The diffance in the 2 may come from their misunderstanding, past exp in other styles or even a confusing it with another move. I teach my students this. There is basically only 4 things you can do with you amrs. Rising, Inside, Outside and Down block. But if you can do those you can throw backfist, uppercuts, hooks, jabs, etc becasue its basically the same motion if you really look at it.

Family - As said above a style in relation to a certin family. Could also refer to styles that are closely related like differant types of karate. When talking about kata for example some kata are in a FAMILY like the Heian or Tekki series in Shotokan and others. Branch - A school ran by a student of the head Sensei. For example lets say I run 5 schools but only teach at one of them at the other 4 I have studetns I have trained running them. Could be a referacne to a assocation or orginaztion. Also could be something that has developed from another style or family. Style - An apporach to teaching Martial Arts. In the end all roads lead to Rome but differant systems of MA start you in a differant location. For example in karate you may focus on punching and kicking. In Judo you may focus on throwing. In something else you may focus on weapons or meditation etc. But a style is a system that organized what is taught in a cetin order. Form - Is kata. But it may refer to the way you hold your body as well. High stances or Low stance. Natural or fixed postions.

Learn to breathe as you do the move if you forget to breathe you know what happens? You die.... lol but seriously your Sensei is right remain relaxed until the point of contact you will move faster and be able to develope more power as time comes.

Never too old to start espcially if your only in your 30's.

Nothing wrong with pushing each other.

I think he just jazzed it up for the music prob a demo version. Based on the Gi and Yin Yang Id guess some sort of TKD.

really I did not care for the Savate show at all and Excrima would prob be my next least fav. I guess its just what we train in we like better.

Jason would have done better in the Savate one as well but he hurt his leg.

Belt stripes. Ive seen this done a few ways. Some schools will add a color stripe to a belt to tell if your a high or low ranks. For example if your belt order was to go gold, blue, green. A blue belt with a gold stripe wa a low ranking blue belt. As to where a Blue belt with a green stripe was a high ranking blue. Those may come from a poor test or a really good test or it may simple be based on time. I have also seen schools add white or black stripes. We add black stripes to our brown belts. We have 3 browns and makr each by adding a stipe. However each stripe for us comes with a test. I would assume a white stripe or black stripe could stand for low or high ranks as I talked about above as well. Again its all up to the school and the more you see the crazy color systems you will come into contact with.

Judo show was pretty good. Prob. my secodn fav. so far.

left side - our club name (Gilbert Shotokan Karate Accademy) right side - my name (Gehrig Heath Justice) this is the way we have doen ours for years. We do let the student pick the color of thread used in the stitching. Most pick red or gold but mine is blue as was a few others.

Its not Nakayama he died back in the 80's I think thsoe videos are of much higher quality than anything produced then.

No color don't matter. The color belts were added by Kano and Funkakoshi to show the differant stages of training but in most styles you have white and black. Sometimes it is even the same belt just gets really dirty lol. But you may have 2 TKD schools or 2 Shotokan schools or 2 TSD schools etc in the same org. or assoc. and they have differant belt color systems. There is no right or wrong answer but like I said above a general rule is to go from light to dark.