bushido_man96

Thanks for the advise, Sohan. I think I will bookmark those sites. I also have some of the Gracie books. I could peruse them and work something out.

I like breaking boards as well. They demonstrate focus and power. But, my question was, do you practice it in class prior to having students perform them in testing?

My classes are pretty uniform as we practice basic techniques in the form of the Shotokan's Ten-no-kata Omote at the beginning of each and every class for about 10 minutes. After that we will branch in to more varying kihon (basics) for about 20 mins and then Kata (forms) for an hour and kumite (sparring) for a half-hour after that (actual times may vary from class to class). Sounds like you have a long class. That would be nice, though. Ours is only an hour long, but I can go 4 times a week. I think if I ever started a school again, I would have 1.5 hour classes.

Jacob: There are many nice people in the martial arts for you to discover. You are correct, and there are a lot of them here.

As an instructor, I feel that it is my duty to have my students fully prepared for their testings. When I owned my own school, we practiced board breaking in class, requiring a knowledge stripe for it before allowing a student who had to board break for testing to do so. In the current school I am a student at, they do not practice board breaking in class. Aside from the basics we do, we may do some target pad work for the required techniques the week before the test. What are your feelings on this? How would you teach? Personally, I feel that our students success rates would be higher on the board breaking if they had some in-class practice on actual boards. I did notice that at my former school, the success rates were higher.

Check them all out. Then decide. As always, check out the instructor as well.

Hey, Sohan. I also have some books by Tudor O. Bompa. Do you recommend them as well? He is very knowledgable.

Very true. In a knife fight, expect to get cut. Live or die, the average knife wounds sustained in a knife fight are 7. DCMS. Didn't know that. Good stat.

Ah, I understand now. I thought they were two seperate styles.

Yes, and if you go from one Uechi dojo to another they're pretty close. Now the exception being that advanced classes will do different exercises than beginners, but they're all things that we've been through. The basics for our school are uniform throughout the Association that our school is under. It is nice, that way when you visit another school, you can jump right into class and know what is going on, for the most part.

It does work out nicely, because of the way the basics are taught. Once the orientation is complete, and the students are doing basics in the class, they start learning their form. What is nice about the basics is that the techniques are perfromed in the same stance that they usually are done in the form with. For example, we do double knifehand blocks in basics in a back stance. Most of the time in the forms, the double knife hand block is done in a back stance. So, in this way, it re-enforces the learning. Instead of thinking of technique and stance seperatly, they come together.

You should stretch every day, after a good warm-up. Work Chinese splits, American splits to both sides, stretch the groin with a butterfly stretch, sit with your legs spread wide and stretch to the front, and then to each side as well. Stretch each leg single as well. Another idea is to use the pulley system I described in another post. You tie a rope to your ankle, and you can pull the rope and hold it to stretch your leg into a side kick/round kick or front kick postition. 30 minutes of stretching a day will yield results.

Sohan: It's absolutely imperative a fighter be comfortable in all quarters. Anything can go wrong and you can't always dictate where/how a battle will be fought. It really makes me laugh when some of my karate contemporaries insist that they don't need to learn grappling because they are skillful enough to stay off the ground. I agree with you here that ground training is very important in all MA training, and learning to fight in all quarters. Unfortunately for me, I have no way of practicing ground combat unless it is impromptu. And in this case, it may not be a very constructive learning experience. So, I just try to keep my wits about me and try to think of what I would do if I did get taken down.

First of all, talk to your instructor about wanting to start your own dojo. Being an owner himself, he can probably give some helpful info. He may be very helpful. The YMCA or rec center ideas are good ones. Talk to them about wanting to set something up, and they will tell if they are interested or not.

The problem I have with my current association is that at 5th dan, I think I am just granted the title of Master after testing. I think the test is just like the other tests, and I am not sure there are any different requirements. I guess I don't have to be called master, but I am not sure what to do here. I feel the same way you do in many ways. I to technically have the title of master but I hate being called master and tend to correct people. I am not a master of anybody or anything. I am a student of the martial arts for life. I at best am Sensei and thats all I will ever be in my mind. If I ever make it to 10th Dan I will still just be sensei. Many organizations like yours give the title of master at 5th dan sometimes at 4th dan the title bothers me. I have done a lot of research over the past few months on title and I have found that the title Shihan is normal at 5th dan. I was always told 6th dan was it. I was told Renshi was 4th and 5th dan which I have found was not the case but that it was at 6th Dan. Only time I use the title Shihan is on the promotion certificate I issue. The calligipher who did the kanji recomended it and she is japanese so I took her advice because her first suggestion was Hanshi or Soke and I did not want that. Seen to many people claim the title of soke and have not ever done anything for it and plus not understand what it is or means. A title that may be appropriate for you at 5th dan is Sa Bum Nim I have noticed korean stylists using this title at 5th and 6th dan. I am not a korean stylist nor do I know much about the true korean titles. But to be honest if you are not comfortable being called master then I would not allow it. I hope that helps a little. Thank you for the advise, Brandon. The title Sah bum nim is Korean for instructor. I will probably receive that title at the rank of 3rd dan.

To lose weight, drop the calorie intake and do 20 to 30 minutes of cardio daily. One person told me 1800 calories a day and exercise. Give it a try. You could also start lifting to gain muscle. But when you gain muscle, you will gain some weight. Try losing first, then start lifting. When you hit a target weight, take your measurements. Then once you lift for 3 months, take your weight and measurements again. Then again at 6 months. I think you will like the results.

They are ok, but you could do without them. They are nice for locking your legs into a nice stretched position where you can feel some tension, and then sitting back and watching TV for a while. Otherwise, just stretching on your own is ok, too. One thing about stretching on your own is you can do different stretches, where as a machine will usually only stretch one position. Another option is getting a pulley system to tie a rope around your ankle, and stretch and hold in a kicking postion.

When you break boards, you have to make sure to follow through. I know boxers have good power, but you may need to work on that follow through. As others have said, skip the gloves. Also, I would just go the local lumberyard and tell them that you want boards cut for karate breaking. More than likely they will know what you are talking about, and will cut them for you. Traditionally, pine is used, #3 I think. But some may use different.

Our school has a set of basics that it does at the beginning of each class, and it usually take 15 to 20 minutes to get through them. We also use them when we have orientations for new students. We spend two weeks orienting them, and then they go right into the regular class, being able to do the same warm-up as everyone. This helps to avoid confusion, and facilitate classroom interaction. Does everyone else have the same set of basics that are done prior to all of the classes? Or do you change the order and types of exercises that you do? Just wondering.

I would like to know the difference between these. I am pretty sure they are very different styles. I am sure that Kenpo is Japanese, and I have heard of Kempo being listed as Chinese. If I could get some feedback, I would appreciate it. Thanks!

That is a cool article. I like to find history on boxing, but it is hard not to find anything that isn't about current boxing sport news. It does have a rich history, all the way back to the first Olympic games in ancient Greece.

The problem I have with my current association is that at 5th dan, I think I am just granted the title of Master after testing. I think the test is just like the other tests, and I am not sure there are any different requirements. I guess I don't have to be called master, but I am not sure what to do here.

I agree that it isn't STRICTLY necessary, but is most certainly practical, useful and respectful, and in the vast majority of cases the only thing that is stopping martial artists who don't learn the Japanese etc. is laziness, rather than anything else, although I'm sure that isn't the case with you and I'm sure you're well armed with all the correct terminology. Osu I know most of the terminology used in my classes, but I have noticed that in different sources there are different words for the same techniques. In the ATA books, the techniques are different than in the TSD book that I have, and different than the Kukkiwon Textbook that I have, and those are all different than the terminology that we use in our class. To me, English is just as useful, and less confusing.

We had our kicking class tonight, and when we were doing the switching double round kicks, I found it easier to get the momentum for the second kick by swinging my hands around. I think this is what the Olympic stylists do with all of their kicking techniques. As far as the blocking thing goes, I will always tell my students to keep their hands up. If they want to adapt to the swinging hands down motion for tournaments, then I will let them, in different sparring class settings. But I will not teach hands down. Proper self defense concepts are more important to me than sparring concepts.

If they have a knife, that more than likely isn't going to happen. If someone is within arm's reach, I would rather them be armed with a gun than with a knife. I agree here. Many people think that they can take out a knife wielding opponent, but many don't realize that they will still get cut in the process.