IRKguy

You can get better tonfa slightly cheaper from Carbone, but it takes about three months, since they are custom made to fit you. He only makes the square type. These are heavier than what tends to show up in tournaments, though. I own Shureido weapons and have handled a pair of the tonfa. They are very well-made and will last for a long time. The pair I handled was over ten years old with no wobble at all. I've held barely-used Century tonfa that seemed like the handles were about to pop out. I've also used new Century tonfa whose handles did pop out with one good swing (fortunately, I was not facing the mirror). I've seen other people use Century tonfa for years with no complaint. It is a question of quality control. My only complaint with Shureido is the limited number of sizes they offer. If they have a size that fits you, I would say you should buy them. You will feel the difference. A thing of beauty is a joy forever. They are not heavy, but they are heavier than what you tend to see at tournaments. Good balance makes the weight less of a difference. Mass-produced competition tonfa are ash and are faster but don't hit as hard and will wear out. Shureido tonfa are oak. Peter Carone's tonfa are bubinja or jabota. I understand that some people are making them of purpleheart wood. If you do any contact with the tonfa, I would stay away from the lighter and mass-produced models. As for whether they are worth the price, I'm still not sure. Unfortunately, there seems to be no middle ground between cheap weapons and premium weapons. However, I just got a circular in the mail from a sporting goods store and saw what people are paying for golf clubs. Suddenly I feel better about paying 100 bucks for a pair of tonfa.

Depending on the make of your sai, you can spin them them 720. Some sai flip faster if you throw the pommel out and catch the handle. You can retract them faster by using nothing but wrist. You can even wrap a finger over one of the prongs and flail the weapon like chucks. This is fun to do, but remember it is not what the weapon is for. It's good to learn these things because you really get to know the weapon toying with it, but these are not effective techniques. The effective technigues are not fancy at all. When you spar with the weapon, you want control, so even when you are switching grips you have your fingers on the grip. If you play with the weapon you will learn certain things. If you practice hitting things really hard, you will learn other things. Both have their place. BTW, spinning like a cowboy should be just about impossible with good sai. 270 is easy (bump the prong with your middle finger), but 360 or 720 would be more trouble than it is worth.

I've read the rules and nothing excludes this. I want a bunch of agricultural fertilizer and a U-Haul truck. I would blow up the building, show up late, and collect the fragments of my trophy. It's not technically a chemical weapon. It's just dung.

"You are kind of on the right track, here. I was told (but am not sure of the reliability) that the reason is because in the days when swords were worn, they were always worn on the right side, whether you were left handed or not. Therefore, if the sword, dagger, etc., was worn inside or outside the clothing, it would be on the right side, and thus easier to draw." Are you sure? I think that weapons were (before pistols) generally worn on the left side so the right hand could draw them, daggers in the back for a quick left hand draw without crossing the sword and slashing your own arm. In Western ettiquette, that's why you offer a woman your right arm, so the scabbard would not bounce off her skirts and so she would be behind you if a fight broke out. (Think military weddings where men are wearing swords. If you drew the sword, she'd let go of your elbow and you'd have your scabbard behind you as you step forward to protect her. Her grip on your right arm is also a sign of peace.) Even when dancing, you offer a woman your right arm. I've seen a couple Iado demonstrations, and they tend to cross-draw (right hand reaches for the scabbard on the left side), which makes sense. A right handed man cannot comfortably or quickly draw a sword on his right side. You can't even draw a sai from your obi unless you either cross draw or it is in the reverse grip. In my school, it is common during testing for weapons to unexpectedly appear in the uke's right hand from under the jacket. However, I would say that this is just taking advantage of the fact that the jacket is open on the right side to make a concealed weapon available. (I'd imagine the Japanese took advantage of the same fact.) Even western robes, jackets, double-breasted suits, men's shirts, and overcoats are made that way (which is why shoulder holsters work). It seems to me that you if your jacket was open on the left, you would run the risk of a long weapon, like a sword, getting the hilt tangled in your jacket on the draw. I like where ShorinRyuu was going with this, but I have to say the exact opposite. In both Eastern and Western cultures, a man's jacket is closed on the left and open on the right to allow for smooth drawing of a sword and maybe for access to a short weapon hidden under the jacket.

I have never lost any weight doing Karate, and I've been doing it for years. The weight I have gets harder and people say they think I have lost weight, but I only gain weight doing Karate. However, at 185 lbs, I walk softer than 150 lb people in my office who shake the floor when they walk. I take 100 mile bikerides when I have a free weekend, and I can hike for as long as I want to (days) with a full Alice pack and camping gear. I'm in better shape for doing Karate, but it takes cardiovascular exercise and less food to lose weight. Karate is mostly anaerobic exercise. However, is weight really an issue? In Karate, extra weight can actually be an advantage, once you're used to moving it quickly.

In my style, your black belt is just black. By then, everyone in the dojo should know who you are, and everyone knows who your instructor is. You're not wearing the belt outside of the dojo except at tournaments, and most people there do not know Kanji. Besides, if you were to include all of your instructors, there would be no room on the obi, and whom would you want to leave out? A practical consideration: when tying the belt on in a hurry, after working out in a t-shirt or barechested--think Sanchin--having embroidery means you have to worry about which side of the belt is which. If you want to respect your sensei, bow when he gives you the belt, put it on, keep training hard, and train his students. His training has left its mark on you, so this name on the belt is redundant.

Traditionally, straight swords are good for duelling, broad swords for combat, if by combat you mean melee. Of course, slashing swords are better for mounted soldiers. Stabbing is better on the ground if you want to kill someone. However, combat isn't about killing someone. It's about getting out alive. A good slashing sword tends to make people not want to attack you and can attack many angles. A stabbing sword can attack only one person at a time. While you're killing that person, someone else can attack you. Maybe a good analogy is whether a sniper rifle or a machine gun is better in combat. If you want to kill a specific person, the snper rifle is better. In war, a snper's life expectancy is much shorther than a machine gunner's

My first instinct would be to look at my watch. What time is it? What year is it? Why am I unarmed? I hope I would shake this off quickly enough to react. I would figure if this is happening present day then the guy is probably completely insane and knows nothing about swords, otherwise, I would be dead before I saw him draw it. That's good for me because only people who know about swords know to buy swords that can actually cut. If he is swinging it with one hand, I would ignore the weapon and try to break the arm swinging it. I would go for the inside line, rushing in on an angle, strike points on the upper and lower arm, and break the arm over my shoulder. If he is swinging with both hands, I would take the outside angle, grab the wrist, and do an armbar. I'm assuming he attacks from above, since he would have to be unskilled and swinging overhead if I were alive at this point. If he were swinging across, it would probably be right to left, like a baseball bat. I would wait for it to pass me, rush in, and fight him the same way I would someone with a knife. As I said, if he were skilled and I unarmed, I would be dead before I could consider my options.

I would not recommend that you use dowels for a weapon. They are usually made of white pine, so they break easily. All of the stickfighting arts have a lot of contact. If you can get hickory dowels, then go to and make sure you sand and oil it first--coarse sandpaper and lindseed oil. Splinters hurt. Look up the properties of the wood you are using. It makes a difference. I've seen people try to spar with pine sticks. It's embarassing and painful when they break. You can get measurements from any MA supply website. Japanese people tend to have shorter arms, generally. Your chucks should probably be about 13.5 inches per piece (your system might be different--check with your sensei). This changes if you are unusually tall or short. It's a ratio to the length of your forearm. However, the size of your chucks are not as important as the size or your sai or tonfa, since you don't block with it the same way. It seems to be the only weapon Shureido does not offer many sizing options for. It doesn't matter too much. As for the chain, it's not necessary. Go with rope. It is faster, and speed is the essence of this weapon. The length of the rope depends on whether you plan on using it for striking or grappling more. Compare weaponsconnection to ShureidoUSA. It varies. Learning the basics is a matter of getting used to what the weapon can do. That's how the martial arts were made, by people screwing around with a weapon and fighting with it until something clicked. If you want to really learn the weapon, you will need a traditional Karate school that can teach you kobudo. If you want to be cost effective, just buy a pair of Escrima and chucks through anyone online. Set up a wooden fighting dummy and see what works. However, it will not be as effective as having a real teacher. There are lots of DVDs out there, but they are usually pretty worthless. If you're trying to teach yourself chucks, just try to not hit yourself too many times. Those things bounce on contact unless you strike through.

There are two things you can do for any metal weapon if you work out with it or carry it. This has worked for me with MA weapons and guns, and I have some pretty corrosive sweat. 1) Wipe the weapon off when you are done using or carrying it for the day. The moisture, oils, salts, and sweat will even cut into stainless steel. I've had stainless pistols and knives I carry rust without regular care. Think "stain less" not "stainless." I carry a cloth in my gym bag for this, nothing special, just a dry rag, though you can use a silicon-impregnated cloth available at any sporting goods store, probably in the fishing section called a reel cloth. Those aren't too good for kobudo. They make weapons a little bit slippery. 2) Throw a dessicant into the case you use and replace it regularly. Those silica gel packs that come with your shoes, luggage, beef jerky, and vitamins will do it (the little bags that say "do not eat" on them). However, they do not last forever. Replace them regularly. If you don't buy shoes too often, go to a gun shop and buy dessicant packs. Many of these can be recharged in a conventional oven when they wear out, if the silica gel is packed in metal instead of brown paper. The brown paper stuff is clay and is disposable. However, it is cheaper, so the US military uses it. Either will work.

If you want to win at tounaments at sparring, then kata is of absolutely no value. Sparring is a game of timing and spacing. It is not real fighting. If you want learn a martial art, then kata is the whole game. Everything you need to know about self defense or weapon applications is in the kata, unless the kata in your system are invalid. All of my go-to techniqes against a punch, kick, grab, stab, or blunt weapon attack come from the kata in my system's syllabus. I've only been training in martial arts for about eight years, but I take the opposite approach. I can't see how kumite or tournament sparring has anything to do with real martial arts. Maybe you should reconsider how you practice kata. Break the kata down into individual useful techniques. Employ multifaceted bunkai and two to four-man drills on each technique. if you still don't see the value, drop your style and try a new martial art. You will learn new applications of the same body movements. If you're really not interested, try boxing. In boxing, the kata are shorter: jab, cross, hook, uppercut. Eventually, you might get that the catalogue of techniques in the kata are not intended to be used in sequence or in sporting applications. Not a sermon, just a thought

On the one hand, I don't want to support a bias against European martial arts. On the other, I think it might be worth pointing out that the samurai coming back from fighting the Mongols won. Polish cavalry couldn't stop the Mongols, and it was up to the Mongols to pull themselves back when the Khan died. At the time, the Polish Cavalry was considered to be pretty impressive, among the best in Europe. Then again, it might be beside the point. Warfighting and dueling are two very different things. So a samurai with one sword facing a knight with a sword and shield (Of course, with no shield, the knight is beyond doomed.) would be looking at something pretty alien. Neither fighter knows what to expect. In that situation, anything could happen. We should expect the samurai to be faster, but I would imagine that there were as many slovenly samurai as there were fat and lazy knights. The broadsword's nowhere near as sharp, but these things don't really matter. The thing was made to shear mail, go through leather, and hack apart shields. It will do for flesh. Everything the Samarai had in mental preparedness and code of honor had its equivalent in Europe. Everything the Samurai had in hand to hand combat had its equivalent in Europe. The fight is set pretty evenly if this is a fight to the death. The only way to really know who would win is is to play Soulcalibur. BTW, I didn't know you were a history major, so I will, out of deference, change the question. I know that a lion can't live in water and a shark can't live out of it, but if a shark and a crocodile went at it in a fair fight in brackish water with an equitable and previously agreed-upon mix of subaquatic terrain, who do you think would win? Also, which one would the samurai bet on and which one would the knight bet on?

The word Chivalry comes from the old French, meaning horsemanship. The very meaning of being a knight was to be cavalry. The idea of a fair fight between a smarai and a European knight on foot is, by definition, not fair. Furthermore, armor was part of the European martial system. The existence of armor and the expectation that he would be on horseback played into everything from how he trained to the design of his weapon. It didn't take samarai skills for the English footsoldier to defeat French cavalry, once they were unmounted. Back to the weapon: the broadsword was not the primary weapon of the knight. In most cases, the lance was. After the introduction of plate armor, the broad sword lost favor to thrusting swords, hammers, and maces. Even when the broadsword was being used, it was not considered a weapon. It was considered half a weapon and was almost always paired with a shield of some sort. Throughout Medeival times and into the Renaissance, European sword arts assumed that there would be something in the left hand, usually a shield, at least a buckler. It is later dueling arts such as Italian fencing that involved using only one weapon, and these were not war arts. These were dueling arts. Even in dueling, these Italian masters were routinely beaten and humiliated when they tried to teach in England and were challenged by Londoners skilled in sword and buckler. As you've set the situation up, the Japanese would certainly win, but the comparison is meaningless. So who would win in a fair fight, a shark or a lion?

Bailiff: Do you have any weapons? Defendant: I am a weapon.

I think we are disagreeing on two points: what it is to be obsolete and what it is to be an artist. People are saying that the old weapons are not obsolete because they still work. This is why I study a traditional martial art, because it still works. Still, it is not what I would use under ideal conditions. When I am at work, we try to use the best computers we can. When the computers fail, we regress to what is on hand and what used to work. If the computers are all down, we can still use the calculators. If those go down, there might be someone in the building who still knows how a slide rule works. If that breaks, we all still know how to count on our fingers. That doesn't mean that finger-counting is still state of the art. In theory, you can use a stick as one would use a rapier. I think most people would say their styles incorporate improvised weapons and that their weapons techniques translate to empty-handed strikes, but this is, again, jumping to finger-counting when the server goes down. Our modern armies carry bayonettes. The purpose of a bayonette is to turn a 20th century assault weapon into a poorly-designed spear with an awkward club on the other end. Spears and clubs are obsolete, but we use them when we need them, the same way we use our teeth to open things when we can't find scissors. The artistic part of the martial art is a bit more difficult to explain, and it has more to do with the practitioner than the style. It is something so internal that only the fencer and his instructor can tell him whether or not he is a martial artist. It's all that hippie bewitched mystic Schmidt that makes no sense from the outside. There are lots of painters and sculptors who are not artists. There are boxers and wrestlers who are. I wish I could find someone who taught shooting as a martial art. Most instructors teach it as a knack to be acquired.