DokterVet

If it's specific to crunches, my guess is it is breathing. Make sure you breathe out EVERY time you crunch up. Never hold hold your breath. Concentrate on the breathing whenever you do them.

I love samauri jack! The art is hillarious. It's enough to keep me interested.

Ok, thanks. I'll probably bulk a little more, and maybe try some protien powder, because I'm starting to really enjoy getting stronger. If I flex my abs, the topmost "packs" are visible at this point. So I guess I'll bulk for a few more months, then try cutting for six weeks or so. It might not be my thing, so I'll see.

Ok, I am quite thin, but I have a bit of fat, almost exclusively covering my abs. I think I have about 10% - 15% bodyfat (I had 6% a year ago, but I've been bulking up), and I'd like that totally ripped Bruce Lee look. How long do you estimate that would take?

Typically, how long would a cutting cycle be?

Yep, I know strength isn't everything. It's just a curiosity thing. And realistically, I believe you do have to be somewhat strong in order to stand a chance at high levels of fighting.

I am wondering how strong today's top fighters are. Just as a ballpark figure, how strong is your average successful UFC or Pride competitor, K1 kickboxer, champion judoka, etc? We'll use the max bench as the measuring stick, while acknowledging that it is not the definitive measurement of strength for a number of reasons. Also, if anyone knows any specific strengths of various competitors (ie, I know Tank Abbot's max is 615), that would be cool. I'd be interested to see how much Royce Gracie or Tito Ortiz could press. My interest is to find out how strong one must be to be able to fight anyone.

Yes, I imagine the question to Jet Li refered to punching with both hands. When my club did it, they were punching with both hands, karate style in shikodatchi. Now I wasn't the one who took the measurement, nor was I there, but that is the supposed result. They punched as fast as they could for 10 seconds, then divided the number of punches by 10. Who knows how good the punches were.

Lin to my sensei

Well that settles it; I'm dropping out of karate and starting judo lessons.

When people are pushing and shoving you, the adrenalin (fight or flight) is pumping around your body and there is no time for consious thoguh you just have to ask and if you think your gonna start prouncing round jabbing the guy well, what more is there to say. --------------------------------------------------------------------- No time for conscious thought in a fight, huh? Well maybe that's why boxing and EVERY SINGLE OTHER MARTIAL ART's goal is to work on instinct and muscle memory.

Yes, we would move back (or to the side) against a kick like that in practice, but we were just drilling the block on its own at the time.

TJS, It's a front thrust kick to the midsection. The leg is vertical but the motion is mostly forward (It is chambered with the knee up then the foot shoots relatively straight out from there). The blocking technique is an outside scoop block. With the open hand you redirect the kick to the outside. It was done with the forward arm against a rear-leg kick. It is essentially a more dificult and subtle way to handle a kick that would normaly blocked with a low block ( a forceful block that travels ACROSS body to knock the kick out of the way) in karate. Against someone like him, I would definately do forceful block. I imagine I'd have slightly more of a chance defending against it that way. Withers M.A.A, Great story. A lot of the senior dans who are small and old and fat at my club have punches like pistons. Boy do they make them count.

I practiced with them for the first time last summer, and found that they changed the fighting quite a bit, but not so much that all of my skills were void. TJS covered a lot of what I learned about them. You can't slip your first through your opponents guard very easily when each of your firsts are massive bulges. So you have to use some different strategies to get the punch in. I think that a good ballance of training with them (for full contact) and without (for precision) is good. I'm thinking of getting a pair myself because I'd like to do more training with them.

Wow, I found out today first-hand just how powerful my sensei is. He is an 8th Dan with the All-Japan Karate-do Federation in Wado-Ryu. He was a world-class karateka in the 70s, competing in tournaments with guys like Billy Blanks and Bill Wallace. Anyways, today I was at yudansha (black belt class) and we were doing a deflection block drill on a front thrust kick. I could do it okay (although I still need work on the technique) on the other black belts, even some of the top fighters. But when my sensei did it on me as an example, I could not move the kick at ALL. If he drove that into me I would have been toast. It was very humbling. Has anyone else had experience with someone like that?

5-6 months for a purple belt!?!? That's insane! At my club we don't have purple belts, but it takes about 3 years to get a brown belt, and another 2-3 to get your black belt from there.

This guy is amazing. Not only is he effective, but he's a showman as well. Nothing's better than seeing him nail a spinning side kick, or do a cartwheel onto a guy who's on the ground. But he never seems to reveal where he gets his kicks from. I've noticed he has a huge follow-through in his roundhouses that look like Muay Thai, but he also uses side kicks, spinning techniques, etc. that would look more at home in a karate dojo. Perhaps he's just taken his favourite techniques from various styles. Either way, he's a great fighter and a lot of fun to watch.

You nailed it by saying that both is the best thing. Karate won't do you much good if you are weak. It will teach you how to maximize the effectiveness of your muscles, but the stronger your muscles are, the stronger your karate will be.

Why is it that 99% of movies use that loud, rediculous PPSHHT every time someone gets punched? It doesn't sound like anything I've ever heard in my life, especially not a punch. Even the Rocky movies used it in the boxing matches. Everyone knows what a boxing match sounds like, so why was that not seen as absurd? I might want to go into movie audio one day, and I'd really like to make a movie with realistic sounding punches. I know there are a few already, but there are not very many of them.

Are there really styles that regularly do full contact bareknuckle to vital points?

Heheh, the guy taking a hammer to his wrist? Let me know how it is.

That's cool. I'm Canadian BTW. I might try to pick up a heavier one. How much padding do the MMA gloves provide? I've seen people wear them but never tried them myself.

Boo-urns, I just weighed my bag and it only weighs 55 pounds. Oh well, I've had it since I was 11, so I couldn't be expected to need a huge one back then. How much would a 75lb bag cost?

According to kyokushinmail.com, it wasn't three fingered pushups that astounded Kimura, it was WALKING ACCROSS THE FLOOR IN A HANDSTAND ON THREE FINGERS ! But I don't think Oyama ever challenged him to a no holds barred match. He did state however, that Kimura was no match for him in karate.

Wow! Holy crap! I had never heard of that guy. That stuff is incredible. Is he still alive?