bushido_man96

I agree with you. I kind of feel the same way about those who use running a certain distance as well.

I remember No Retreat, No Surrender! Ivan was his character's name! Wow.

First of all, you should check out a school yourself. You can do all the reading about the style, but the instructor is what you need to know about. Finding out their credentials is a good start. Watching a class is of upmost importance, so that you will know what kind of teacher the instructor is, and what you are getting into. Free intro classes are a good sign. I won't say that black belt children is a bad sign, but watching their technique and how they act is a good idea.

I believe that Funakoshi is probably the person most responsible for interjecting the moral and ethic values into the study of martial arts. In the title of his book Karate-do: My way of Life, the title states that it is his way of life. Others may view it differently. Now, another question is can you view martial arts like other athletic activities? Take football, for instance. It can be used to build physical skills, like the martial arts can, and it teaches things like teamwork. However, there are some terrible people out there that are great football players. I think the same could be said for the martial arts as well. Boxing and wrestling don't teach moral and ethical values as part of their core curriculum. However, we still consider them martial arts. Are they now not martial arts, because we realize this? I am not saying that I think the martial arts should not teach morals and ethics. I think we should do these things, because it is the right thing to do. I will teach them. However, I don't believe that these things should begin with the martial arts.......it is the job of parents to lay down the morals and ethics that we are to grow up with. Now, that being said, it is true that in there purest forms, the martial arts, as they apply to war, were used to defend the practitioner's country in times of war. Saying that they were used to defend what they felt was right for the people of their country, then would lend to the ideas behind what we all learn today in the arts.

Do you think of a backfist as a thrusting technique, or a snapping/swinging technique? I think it snaps more than thrusts, but that is just my interpretation.

Oh, come now, I don't live here! Do I? You think?

That is good advise, but you may want to spend some time in one art to get a good base foundation, and then move on. Welcome to the forums, BTS!

Kind of like a punching bag you can wrestle with.

Yeah. It is like, when you are getting ready to work out, and you want to improve your speed. You tell yourself that you are fast. You punch fast, you step fast, you kick fast, etc. Loren Christensen talks about it in some of his books, and it helps to reinforce postives as opposed to focusing on things you can't do well.

Even Bruce Lee was a little arrogant, and some would have said he was cocky. However, his contributions to the MA world are well known. Most of us would probably say that he is a martial artist as well.

Like the scene in Hard Target with Van Damme, where he kicks the guy off the bike. Ouch!!

When we were taught the back stance, we were taught to make an L with our feet, and then the front foot goes 3 feet lengths forward, and then bend the knees. For the cat stance, we were taught it was half of the back stance length, or 1 1/2 feet lenght, and up on the toes of the front foot.

Even in point sparring, I think it could be beneficial to allow clinches and lightly applied knee strikes, just so students can get the idea of how it feels to apply them, and what its like to see them coming in.

true, though i think the greek systems were sport oriented somewhat like modern MMA. it just seems to me that a lot of kata using arts were designed for non-sporting, non-battlefield situations. there are exceptions of course. True, they were sport, but people got killed doing it. And as it is with UFC today, they probably tried to do it quickly, and with the most efficient moves available. Sometimes they even fought with gloves with spikes on them!

Do you think this is the case for most TKD schools? My instructor is this way as well. The only way I was able to take up Combat Hapkido is because he got his 1st dan in it. If he wouldn't have been teaching it, I would not have had a chance to learn it.

My dad studied Moo Duk Kwan TKD many years ago. He said the forms I do now are the ones he used to do. He also did the old palgwe forms, too. His style was a little more open in sparring, allowing sweeps and groin shots, as well as hands to the head.

I think that the only time you will see a fight start from a stance is in competitions. Most of the time, it is a fairly natural fighting stance, nothing really fancy.

"Will you teach me how to sweep?"

How hard a punch is also has to include what you expect a punch to do. Like a jab--it won't usually knock someone out. A cross can. Or is the prerequisite for a punch just to contact an object with a closed fist? From what postition does the punch have to be initiated? Does it start from the rib, or from an advanced arm base? Does have to travel 12 inches, or just 2? There are just too many variables.

I train for free Must be nice!

I concur. My knees.....hurt every day.

I liked 5 as well....I mean, come on, it has the best street fight ever filmed!!! "I didn't hear no bell!"

Hey, that's great!!

Um, wow. That's just wrong.