Full contact?

[bushido_man96]

If you worry about hits to the face, then pad up. Wear Boxing type sparring gear and gloves. If you do a medium to light contact session that just gets you into the habit of moving your head and blocking/deflecting shots to the face, it will go along ways to helping you out in self-defense.

Like Mike Tyson says, everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth. That is very real, and you don't want to come to that conclusion when someone jumps you on the street or in a bar. Best to have some kind of experience with it.

[FortuneCookie]

Alright that sure does contain some truth! I will participate in light contact on face (heavy on body tough) sparring!

[MasterPain]

Remember to keep your chin low and your mouth shut.

[ShoriKid]

And your hands up!

[Dobbersky]

And your hands up!

And Elbows in!!!

the Best stance to be in is a "Boxing" stance as this is what we use in Ashihara and Enshin. The most similar stance I see in Karate is Tata Seichan dachi. but with the hands/arms up.

[bushido_man96]

Remember to keep your chin low and your mouth shut.

And your hands up!

And Elbows in!!!

And your butt off the canvas!

[rmurray]

Full contact sparring? I'll go all out from time to time with 16oz gloves on and headgear. Other than that forget it. Except for maybe teenagers and a few misguided souls in the hoods and trailor parks; The only real full contact sparring in this country is going on in prison between guys with free health care and nothing to lose. Who in the real world can afford to go bare knuckles at full speed. A single incident can easily cost you over $10k at the Prosthodontist. Most insurance plans consider putting your mouth back together elective and don't cover it. There's also a major liability issue for all parties (including the property owner). Besides; how long could a real full out match even go? Maybe one minute before someone is seriously injured. I know alot of martial artists, and I can't think of anyone that would even consider full contact sparring. I'll start a short list of potential injuries to you or your partner. Anyone should feel free to add:

Broken jaw, broken nose, lost teeth, broken eye socket, concussion, broken wrist, broken ribs, internal bleeding, broken clavicle, torn iris, damaged trachea, irreversable reproductive harm, a slough of joint injuries.........

[Groinstrike]

As many of the above posters have said, full contact, hard sparring is ok once in a while when you have proper protective gear such as boxing gloves and headgear. Its not worth getting hurt just for tha sake of going hard.

[honoluludesktop]

My group with WKF mitts, does full contact to the torso (minus lethal spots) touch contact to the head (touch by intent because its easy to err), and no striking the limbs. Sometimes broken nose and ribs, black eyes, and occasional KO. If in class this kind of sparing is supervised, if not supervised, must be outside of class. Always by mutual consent of the two fighters involved.

Of course, Sempai always mentors Kohia.

[bushido_man96]

Perhaps the usage of the terminology "full contact" isn't as important as recognizing "full body targets." Even lighter contact fighting using the whole body as legal target areas will improve one's abilities at defending all areas of the body, especially those punches to the head.