With a lot of various new guys joining on here, I thought I'd look and see what type of Karateka we have on the forum!

What I mean is the level of sparring that you do in your Dojo or in competition. You may do several styles of sparring and compete in many arenas but all's good.

It's hard to classify as we, in my base art, use a lot of different methods of sparring to accomplish training goals. I also tend to spar less heavy, less often now that I'm getting older and would rather just roll on the mats.

I'd classify us moderate to heavy contact, with the use of armor and such. An easy moderate without head gear. Leg kicks are almost always on unless we're focusing on hands only. Groin kicks are common with some of the guys if all players have the appropriate attire.

The takedown and ground work may or may not be on depending on the night and striking while down again, may or may not be on depending on everyone's agreement and what the goal is.

Being a part of a small organization (organization is a strong word, let's use association instead) we don't have a large codified governing body telling us what our official competitive outlet is.

I tend to spar kyokushin unless I want to focus on something lighter.

I do them all, and that depends on the moment of what Greg and I want to work on, and for the most part, we'll start out our Kumite sessions on the bottom of your list and work our way up to the top of your list.

In that, Greg and I will work each one in a build up and then our pace reaches a crescendo.

Greg is truly the only one I can do this with because the other high ranks don't want to go all out as Greg and I always want to.

Greg and I have a saying..."Go ahead, do your best, but remember this one thing...I will get a turn!"

I love your poll and its a good one.

I can't vote for just one (but if I had to it'd be Semi Contact - Continuous), as I practice/train to spar on the following rule sets:

Semi Contact - Continuous (currently main concentration)

Semi Contact - Points

Light - Continuous

Light - Points

Due to the different arts/styles that I do; Shotokan, TSD & Kickboxing

My style is Shotokan so sparring is more continuous whilst acknowledging a good point. Good control is a must though.

When sparring with certain people it turns more to semi contact but the realisation is that a lot of us have families to provide for and need to be fit for work so I'd say it's a good compromise, for me anyway.

Edited April 15, 201214 yr by GaryMo

In my dojo we tend to do semi-contact (continuous) unless the kids who compete in tournaments are practicing for a tournament, and then we do more light-contact (continuous) and some point matches. We hit hard enough to let our partner know they were hit, but not hard enough to cause too many injuries (although it still happens on occasion).

IMHO, everyone does semi contact for daily training.

Including professional boxers.

Including professional MMA fighters.

Including illegal bare knuckle fighters.

It is what it is.

I don't really understand the differences between all these.

I don't really understand the differences between all these.

UeshiroKarate-san

My appologies my friend for not making it clearer, consider this when sparring/competing when you give or receive techniques to/from you partner/opponent do you consider it as:

Full Contact is from 70% to 100% power on impact

Semi Contact is From 40% to 70% power on impact

Non/Light Contact is 40% and below power on impact if any

It might as many of us move between the varing levels depending on the partner/opponent or the level of the grade, age etc, I wouldn't expect an Adult to fight Full Contact with a 14 year old boy etc

OSU!!!