Martial Arts Feats

[sensei8]

Websters Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary defines the word "Feat" as...

1. Act, Deed 2. a: A deed notable esp. for courage b: An act or product of skill, endurance, or ingenuity.

With that being the understood and acceptable definition of the word 'Feat', let's list some martial arts feats. I'll start...

1) Masutatsu Oyama's 300 Man Kumite:

It was with these examples in mind that Oyama decided to test his own abilities. And he would go one day better! He chose the strongest students in his dojo, who were to fight him one at a time until they'd all had a turn, and then they'd start from the beginning again, until the three hundred rounds were up. He defeated them all, never wavering in his resolve, despite the fact that he himself suffered severe physical injury in the process.

Each student had to face him about four times over the three days, though some never made it past the first day due to Oyama's powerful blows. Oyama was willing to go for a fourth day, but no one else was willing or able! This took place not long after he had completed his mountain training.

This feat is well known throughout the martial arts world, and its not been bested or neared, yet! Calling this feat unparalleled would be an understatement, at best.

Not many have tried and completed the 100 Man Kumite; 14 in total. In the 50 Man Kumite; 17 have tried and completed it.

Would I love to try it? You darn skippy I would!

[Wa-No-Michi]

Would I love to try it? You darn skippy I would!

Not sure I would?

Personally, I spend my time training ways to keep conflict to a minimum. IE quick fast over and done with and "get the heck outa there".

100/200/300 + man kumite is a conditioning tool for the kokushin based guys. Nothing wrong with it, but its not conducent to the style of Karate I study.

I have an understanding in terms of what my style of Karate is designed to "deliver" (I hope) - and it ain't about fighting for 3 days constant - even if I could!!!

But yes, I guess it's a feat... but then again so is climbing Everest - or walking backward from Land's End to John o' Groats for that matter.

WNM

[sensei8]

But yes, I guess it's a feat... but then again so is climbing Everest - or walking backward from Land's End to John o' Groats for that matter.

OK?!?

It's just a topic, not a do all to end all topic, but, it's just a topic.

I don't doubt the complete totality of any martial artist, therefore, just because I'd love to do the 100 Man Kumite, it doesn't mean that I don't understand my style of Karate either.

[still kicking]

Sensei8 wrote:

He defeated them all, never wavering in his resolve, despite the fact that he himself suffered severe physical injury in the process... Each student had to face him about four times over the three days, though some never made it past the first day due to Oyama's powerful blows.

Interesting topic. When I shared it with a few of the women in my karate dojo yesterday morning, one of them said that a woman would never need to to that. It does seem like a particularly macho thing to do, but it is fascinating and impressive nevertheless. We use only light to medium contact in our school, which I think combined with bag and mitt work at full contact is fine preparation for real fighting, if it came to it. I did have a bit of confirmation of that once, when I strange guy coming up some stairs behind me grabbed my butt, for some inexplicable reason. My response was to spin around and roundhouse kick him to the head immediately. Though it was only medium contact, at least it surprised him and gave me a second to get ready to go all out if need be. But that was just one incident. In any case, I guess what it comes down to is that I am ambivalent/undecided what I think about the wisdom of even trying this "feat", but lean slightly to being against it because I think it's foolish to abuse and injure one's body to such an extent. I don't think I see the point. At the same time, I totally respect the desire and willingess to test oneself to such a degree. It's just that I'd want to preserve myself to fight another day, if possible. Maybe that's why I don't practice a full contact style.

[JusticeZero]

Well, people talk about 'gaining confidence'.. You gain confidence by having been tested, and having had your comfort level shoved hard out of bounds. When a challenge comes up, you want to say "You know, i've had a nastier challenge before, and I managed it; this is going to be easy.." rather than "Oh no, I don't know if I can handle this!" You should be able to know that you've dealt with multiple attackers and combat that runs until quite a bit after your fitness is knocked flat. A woman is MORE likely to need to have that confidence than a man will, really.

[still kicking]

JusticeZero said:

Well, people talk about 'gaining confidence'.. You gain confidence by having been tested, and having had your comfort level shoved hard out of bounds. When a challenge comes up, you want to say "You know, i've had a nastier challenge before, and I managed it; this is going to be easy.." rather than "Oh no, I don't know if I can handle this!" You should be able to know that you've dealt with multiple attackers and combat that runs until quite a bit after your fitness is knocked flat. A woman is MORE likely to need to have that confidence than a man will, really.

JusticeZero, I see your point, and agree with you as far as the endurance part. It's just that I tend to think it would show a certain disrespect for my body, to willingly and purposely undergo training that would lead to "serious injury". But maybe I'm just an unmotivated slacker wimp. Seriously, though, it seems to me that going through this kind of endurance exercise would be great, with more moderate contact. Maybe that would somewhat detract from what was proven or demonstrated, but in my mind it would be more than compensated for by the fact that I wouldn't have to train for ever after with some kind of chronically disabling injury. To each his/her own, of course.

[isshinryu5toforever]

Well, from what I know about Oyama, which honestly probably isn't as much as the Kyokushin members here, he did things like this to test himself. He always wanted to find the strongest opponents to test his abilities. The goal he had in mind with his style of Karate was to make it the strongest Karate in the world.

Things like the 300 man Kumite and fighting the bull were done to bolster the reputation of his style of Karate. It was a great marketing tool, as well as a test of skill. We may make comments like Bruce Lee's, "Boards don't hit back." when we talk about someone breaking a lot of boards or a lot of bricks, but we do tend to admit that breaking boards and bricks is a test of focus and skill. So is fighting 100, 200, or 300 people over a 1-3 day period. Those boards do hit back though.

[tonydee]

So is fighting 100, 200, or 300 people over a 1-3 day period. Those boards do hit back though.

It's impressive fitness and conditioning, but what does it really mean? It's necessary to point out that an instructor/senior can never be certain of his students'/juniors' preparedness to attack for real. The instructor/senior must dominate, and will be as rough as necessary, whereas the student doesn't really want to, and this often translates to a lack of commitment behind attacks and hesitation when an opportunity presents. Sometimes for a junior, only attacking full speed will be fast enough to have any chance of catching a senior, but that will also be uncontrolled and the potential consequences less acceptable. I've definitely seen this hesitancy in videos of Oyama-sensei sparring. It's pandemic in Aikido practice.

Fighting people with your own experience level where there's no such expectations does make sense and can be meaningful. Fighting seniors or juniors with controlled contact makes sense, but to my mind full-contact doesn't... there's no glory in thumping a junior, irrespective of how many other's you've just fought.

Look at Shokei Matsui's test here - he's undoubtedly a great fighter, but at 3:49 he seems to be beating up a kid. At 4:22 he knocks down a green-belt kid with a kick to the head. I'd be ashamed of myself if I did that, but each to their own - I'm sure the kids knew what to expect, and Matsui-sensei didn't cause serious injury. And - in line with my concern above - there are numerous times in the video when other people could have attacked but just stood there waiting to be hit. Of course, there are lots when they attacked pretty savagely too .

I think this aspect of sincere commitment in sparring is insidious in intra-school full contact where one side must win by knock-down, and there's a clear winner/loser line that is hard to cross. Which student wants to be known as the one that knocked Oyama-sensei out in his 212th round?

More generally, martial arts feats that get discussed often involve breaking, high-flying kicks, and real-world fighting. There are no objective standards in most such things, except jumping which is more athletic than martial, so it's hard to assess them. For example, I heard Oyama-sensei was once attacked by a yakuza with a katana, but caught the blade as it came down towards his head between the palms of both hands, then struck and killed the yakuza... quite a feat of timing and coordination, for something he'd never practiced but just did instinctive. But how savage was the stroke? I heard about some Korean master who fought 50 or so gangsters single-handedly, running through the streets of Seoul, killing many with his head-butt. But did any of these gangsters know how to fight? Some say Ueshiba-sensei managed to teleport out the way of a bullet, but warned each time he did it it took years off his lifespan. Who believes it? Then there's the everyday experiences which most of us old timers will have had: strange things that just happen in the spur of the moment, suddenly moving out of the way of an unexpected danger, shouting with "ki" energy when we really wanted our voice to carry, blocking an unexpected projectile in a way that defies post-facto belief, blowing out a candle from ~two metres away, catching something that just slipped from your hand on route to the ground... lots of little things that signal advancing ability....[/u]

[sensei8]

Does anybody have any other martial arts FEATS to list in this thread?

Whether one likes or dislikes the word 'feats' and 'martial arts' used together, they're there for us to admire or for us to be repulsed. Either way, humans are very curious, and this example is brought to the light everyday when one's driving and they come upon a traffic accident...we've just got to look at it!

I'm not saying that any martial arts feat is a good/bad thing for the martial arts. I'm just saying...it's just something to look at!

[bushido_man96]

There are a lot of interesting points made here concerning Oyama's 300 man kumite. I do think that it is a great feat, just being able to continue fighting for that long.

I don't have any feats of my own to list, unfortunately. Perhaps someday...