It's all in the Practitioner

[marie curie]

I don't think that you can generalize to a system from any one school. I was in a system that could be considered only concentrating on competition sparring, but I had a great instructor, so he had a much more eclectic curriculum.

[cross]

Whats more versatile, a wrongly applied punch and getting grappled to the ground, or a completely unpredictable opponent who makes the best of things.

When it becomes a game of chess, your going to get outclassed eventually, no matter who you are, therefore by saying "im a striker" admits that one cannot apply striking to any situation and your weakness will be exploited, training to fight, trains a person for any situation.

By understanding my own body, I know exactly what that person is feeling in theirs, put the pieces together naturally in a second, their position and physical ability is the only thing thats going to take me down.

I see this as a difference between sport and martial art.

Its fine to say that training to fight will teach you to deal with anything. But rarely will schools claim they teach you to fight, nor will they prepare people to effectively deal with anything other than the techniques contained within their style.

If your only training is striking, weather you look at it from a fighting perspective or not, you are going to have limited skill in other areas, the majority of traditionally taught striking doesnt directly apply to ground situations or positions other than a fighting stance. So unless you actively train in all areas and are actually doing groundfighting, weapons etc, you can expect striking to cover all areas.

[Menjo]

Its fine to say that training to fight will teach you to deal with anything. But rarely will schools claim they teach you to fight, nor will they prepare people to effectively deal with anything other than the techniques contained within their style.

If your only training is striking, weather you look at it from a fighting perspective or not, you are going to have limited skill in other areas, the majority of traditionally taught striking doesnt directly apply to ground situations or positions other than a fighting stance. So unless you actively train in all areas and are actually doing groundfighting, weapons etc, you can expect striking to cover all areas.

Yeah, you have a great point there.

[gzk]

Bruce Lee once said that if it helped you, to practice it, no matter what it was. He did not believe in styles but believed in getting what best worked for you out of the traditional styles.

This I agree with. If it helps you, then practice it. But then you say:

...always there is one winner but never necesserally on style that wins overall. Why? Because its all in the practitioner and how hard he dedicates himself to his training, if he keeps his mind open to learn from others, and if he always reaches for perfection.

The reason that different styles exist is that they teach different techniques, train them differently, and use them in competition differently. If you, hypothetically, could test various methods of delivering a round kick with all other variables controlled, then one would prove superior to the others. Depending on one's goal, the "chamber and snap, strike with instep" method may be more or less effective than the "swing the leg around with the body, keep the leg bent and strike with shin" method. That is, the element of one style would "help you" more than the same element of the other styles.

However, comparing an entire style against another is a more complex proposition. MMA provides us the best proving ground that exists for martial arts styles. If certain MAs emerge with better results, over a large enough sample, than certain others - and they have - then that tells us that their combination of technique, training and suitability for use against resisting opponents is better.

With this in mind, I don't understand why everyone dogs on ATA. I know they run things as a business, BUT, to me, they have one of the finest styles of Taekwondo out there, and that is also an opinion, but what I am trying to say is for people to stop saying that EVERYONE that comes from ATA is horrible. I am in ATA, but i leave myself open to all other styles, I DO love ATA's style but of course its mostly about money to them. I dedicate myself as hard, if not much more than the next guy. So why must I continue to hear from fellow martial artists that I'm no good just because of the school I go to? Its all on how hard the person practices and how much he cares for it. What do you'all think?

When I see "ATA Taekwondo", the images that come to mind is of little kids getting black belts inside 1-2 years, fighting with hands down and weak chins, no leg kicks, etc. I may only be seeing the worst view of an overall good style, but that's the only view I've seen. That's why people dog on ATA.

I'm sure you practise hard. The question to ask yourself is, would you be a more effective fighter if you put that hard work toward a different style, or additional styles? Working smart, after all, is every bit as important as working hard. If I were to invent my own style - Head-Butt-Do - consisting entirely of headbutts - and work with superhuman effort towards perfection - I probably wouldn't be that effective a fighter, because of deficiencies in the style.

[cross]

You make some excillent points gzk.

For the original poster, wingedMonkey. If you really enjoy doing tkd then why should it matter what other people think?

[The BB of C]

There are many different ways of kicking, training, and explaining things. It's because of this I believe that it's nearly impossible for one specific technique to be the ultimate universal most effective way of doing it.

Anything can be used in a fight when you get down to it. But there are correct ways to train it. For example, when I trian independantly, my friends and I have attacks that we practice that if you were to see, I almost gaurentee the first thing you'd say would be "That would never work." But because of the way we teach and train them to make sure they do it right before the practicioner moves on, we make it work. I've used them myself. I've seen them work for my other friends who train with me.

People must also remember that there is almost no universal ways of training even inside the style. There's a Tae Kwon Do school down the road that stinks on ice. To make things easier for me, I'm just going to say that they train 'X' way. About 30 miles west, there is another Tae Kwon Do school. They train 'Y' way. And to the east of 'X' Tae Kwon Do, is 'Z' Tae Kwon Do. I have seen people from 'Y' stomp on practicioners of 'X' and then get beat by 'Z'. But then 'Z' got beat by 'X'. These were all Tae Kwon Do schools. But they all had very different instructors and they all had very different ways of doing things. The only similarity is that they both preached flexebility and high, fast kicks, like you'd expect of Tae Kwon Do.

Now let's refer back to some of the earlier posts. In the left corner we have a Wrestler with three years experience. In the right corner we have a Tae Kwon Do practicioner of five years experience. The fight starts. One of them moves in first and attacks. The other defends. We all know Wrestlers grapple and TKD people kick. The Wrestler moves in and gets kicked in the head and knocked out clean. When the Wrestler recooperates, a different TKD man with the same amount of experience in the style but from a different school comes in. The fight starts. The Wrestler moves in. The TKD man misses the defending kick or the Wrestler blocks/dodges it and gets tackled and obliterated. The truth is, we don't know who is going to win. It's all about who is fighting and sometimes who gets lucky.

Now, I will give it this much; some styles are better than others at certain things. That's usually because that's what they're made for. What are the odds a pure Tae Kwon Do fighter would be able to throw like an Aikido fighter? What are the odds a pure Aikido fighter could cartwheel kick like a Capoeira fighter? It's not that one is a better fighter, it's that they're better at certain things because that's what they've been trained to do and that's what the style was meant for.

And when you're talking about fighting, how can you say anything will work for sure? There are so many different types of fights, so many different styles, and in each one - an infinite amount of factors that could influence who wins or loses. Nothing is set in stone in a fighting situation.

Apply this to any combination of styles you can think of and always remember. There are anywhere between 300 and 400 different styles of martial arts out there. None of them are better than the other. They are different. But nobody is better when it comes to fighting.

[ninjer]

Now let's refer back to some of the earlier posts. In the left corner we have a Wrestler with three years experience. In the right corner we have a Tae Kwon Do practicioner of five years experience. The fight starts. One of them moves in first and attacks. The other defends. We all know Wrestlers grapple and TKD people kick. The Wrestler moves in and gets kicked in the head and knocked out clean. When the Wrestler recooperates, a different TKD man with the same amount of experience in the style but from a different school comes in. The fight starts. The Wrestler moves in. The TKD man misses the defending kick or the Wrestler blocks/dodges it and gets tackled and obliterated. The truth is, we don't know who is going to win. It's all about who is fighting and sometimes who gets lucky.

When you're speculating and talking about theory, yes its going to be difficult to determine who is going to win- in theory, the TKD fighter is going to ko the grappler- in theory, the wrestler will take his opponent down- every style has their theory.

The thing is that by now we have actually taken people from different styles of martial arts and put them against each other- we now have evidence that will help persuade our decisions. In theory, a TKD fighter is going to kick the wrestler in the head and ko him before he manages to move in and grab him, yet our empirical evidence shows otherwise- time after time again we've seen the wrestler grab ahold of the boxer, the karateka, the TKDer, or what have you, and throw him to the ground with great success. This will heavily influence our opinion of who will win a fight between the two styles based on previous evidence.

Now, I will give it this much; some styles are better than others at certain things. That's usually because that's what they're made for. .

The problem is that most people dont know what their styles were initially created to do- not all were designed for unarmed combat, and many are outdated by todays standards for what you would need to train in in order to learn how to fight.

Lets take something like Ju Jitsu/ Judo and compare it to BJJ (for arguements sake, those are the styles I know most about).

Old school Ju Jitsu rivalries in Japan led to many fights, and there were various ways to "win" a challenge match. One of these ways was by perfect throw (ippon) landing your opponent on his back. Judo adopted this rule and method of attaining victory. BJJ'ers thought it kinda odd that the fight stops in Judo the moment you get a perfect throw, since they know that someone is simply not going to stop fighting just because you were the one that happened to execute the takedown- as such they changed the rules and kept fighting on the ground.

There were many challenge matches between BJJers and Judoka, and they often transitioned the same way- Judo guy throws BJJer, BJJer chokes out Judo guy on the ground- perhaps BJJ would be a better fighting method for modern day fighting

Why did the old rules of ju jitsu dictate that a perfect throw wins a match? Well lets remember that the samurai wore armor and fought with knives, daggers, swords, and spears. Should you lose your primary weapon in an altercation with an opponent, you would quickly engaged in hand to hand fighting with your enemy. If you were able to throw your opponent to the ground, while maintaining yourself on the feet, this was ample time to draw your secondary weapon and proceed to kill your fallen enemy. Ground grappling would also not lend itself to well due to the fact of the amount of armor either party was wearing-

--To go off on a tangent- armor also helps explain differences in fighting- one often sees a particular strike or serious of strikes in a martial art and wonders "why would you ever want to do that" or "how could that possibly be effective?" Many seemingly odd strikes and stances were adopted to attack at the chinks in an opponents armor. A right cross to the face seems much more plausible than say, a spear hand to the armpit, but when your opponent has an armored helmet protecting his face and no armor covering the underside of his arm, the second option becomes much more practical.

The flaw of many of these styles was that they clinged to ancient ideas for no other reason than the fact they were ancient, and thats why time passed many martial arts by.

If you're fighting in feudal Japan shielded with armor, knowing how to throw someone to the ground is going to be more beneficial to you than knowing how to finish someone on the ground, and utilizing a spinning jump kick is going to be more beneficial than western wrestling if you're a korean peasant trying to unhorse an invading horde of mounted samurai.

What are the odds a pure Tae Kwon Do fighter would be able to throw like an Aikido fighter? What are the odds a pure Aikido fighter could cartwheel kick like a Capoeira fighter? It's not that one is a better fighter, it's that they're better at certain things because that's what they've been trained to do and that's what the style was meant for.

When someone says a wrestler is going to soundly beat a boxer, they're in no way suggesting that the wrestler is better in all aspects of a fight or that hes a better puncher than a boxer- it simply means hes more likely to impose his will on his opponent and make him fight his game, and thats the definition of what it means to be a good fighter.

And when you're talking about fighting, how can you say anything will work for sure? There are so many different types of fights, so many different styles, and in each one - an infinite amount of factors that could influence who wins or loses. Nothing is set in stone in a fighting situation.

This is true- a more correct way of putting it would be that the more efficient your style has proven to be in what it does and the more you actively train in it, the greater your chances of being successfull in an altercation.

Apply this to any combination of styles you can think of and always remember. There are anywhere between 300 and 400 different styles of martial arts out there. None of them are better than the other. They are different. But nobody is better when it comes to fighting.

As I have shown, they were all developed and designed for different purposes and in the particular scenarios that were shown, each martial art was the best for what it was designed to do- learning how to throw someone is the best for an armored samurai who loses a mount and primary weapon, learning how to jump and kick is the best for a korean peasant fending off mounted samurai, learning how to wield a knife and stick effectively is great for a poor phillipino resisting occupation, and learning how to box/wrestle is the best for someone who wants to be able to fight in a modern day situation.

[bushido_man96]

Keep in mind that this is not a "which style is best" discussion, or a style-bashing discussion. The discussion is focused on the practitioner, and not an art. There are a lot of good points being made so far, and I want the discussion to stay positive.

Thanks.

[gzk]

hmm...anyways...back to the individual, we have many moments where the individual shows he is what causes whether he is good or not. Not his style.

Like i said before, that's why you see fights of like tkd vs. muay thai, and in one the tkd guy wins, in the other the muay thai guy wins, then in the next two the tkd guy wins then in the next three the muay thai guy. What is the variable in all these confrontations, definitely NOT the style, but the individual.

I agree that a bad fighter will rarely beat a good fighter, regardless of style.

The thing is, would a good fighter in style A be a more effective fighter in style B? Do the champions of style A beat the champions of style B? Is there a strong correlation that comes from that?

If you control all variables except the style, and the styles come out as equally effective, then I agree that it's only the individual that counts. The best evidence (not really conclusive evidence, but the best we have) - MMA - suggests otherwise.

[wingedMonkey]

well, the only styles i would say that would not be able to be tested would again be something like ground fighting versus a martial art. But of course little is known about this but taekwondo DOES have some ground fighting, you just don't learn it until you are some degree of blackbelt, even though i was taught a few cuz my instructor rocks.

Oh, and there is a video of a taekwondo blackbelt going up against a juijitsu school, and in the beginning of the video it asks, "How would a tkd blackbelt do against grappling?" and the whole video you think oh its this guy from the grappling school beating all these tkd guys, but in the end, it shows that it was the tkd guy that won! Then at the end of the video it says, "Never underestimate a tkd blackbelt!" but anyways..i think that says also of how it was probably him who dedicated himself a lot.