big beefy guys

[Kanku65]

Interesting.

I've only ever trained in Shotokan karate.

I've seen lots of "beefy men", but in no way would I describe our community as being dominated by people with such a body style, or gender for that matter.

We have hundreds of people turn up for Canadian national tournaments, and I have never in my memory witnessed a "beefy man" compete.

My first sensei however was a beefy man. He trained and received shodan in Kyokushin under Sensei Mas Oyama (apparently) before switching to Shotokan and training with Sensei Masatoshi Nakayama.

He was in impeccable physical shape and condition, but had a massive belly.

He actually claimed that this helped him with generating power. And for him, it worked.

I've never seen anyone demonstrate bassai-dai with the same explosive power as he did.

[JohnASE]

I think I remember hearing that Shotokan tends to be linear. Move straight in and move straight out. Not as much side to side or angles as most other arts. Is this true? If so, I can see how there might be a slight tendency toward "beefy" in Shotokan, with more agile people tending to excel at a softer art.

But lost in the gloomy news, and even ignored by many here, is one measurement by which the reputedly diminutive Japanese have been closing the gap impressively with Westerners: height.

Haha! I went to Japan with my wife. She's white and short; I'm Japanese-American and short. She thought we'd get there and she'd be tall! She was sadly disappointed. There were plenty of short people around, but lots of taller ones, too. Oh, well, she still towers over my mom and grandmother, but they're both under 4'10" and shrinking.

[Kanku65]

I think I remember hearing that Shotokan tends to be linear. Move straight in and move straight out. Not as much side to side or angles as most other arts. Is this true? If so, I can see how there might be a slight tendency toward "beefy" in Shotokan, with more agile people tending to excel at a softer art.

But lost in the gloomy news, and even ignored by many here, is one measurement by which the reputedly diminutive Japanese have been closing the gap impressively with Westerners: height.

Haha! I went to Japan with my wife. She's white and short; I'm Japanese-American and short. She thought we'd get there and she'd be tall! She was sadly disappointed. There were plenty of short people around, but lots of taller ones, too. Oh, well, she still towers over my mom and grandmother, but they're both under 4'10" and shrinking.

It is very linear. It's been very hard for me recently to learn how to pivot on angles correctly.

Actually I believe this is due to the longer stances used in Shotokan. Many other styles use shortened more natural feeling stances for training. Much more practical.

We use the long, deep stances for muscle development, and most qualified Shotokan sensei's will make this known to their students.

If, a technique is executed correctly in a long, deep stance, it will indeed be very effective with the correct training.

It is however an impractical way to defend yourself or fight in as your range of motion is greatly limited.

This goes for both beefy body styles and, I dunno, unbeefy? Chickeny?

Remember, this style was not developed BY people with beefy body types, however, there is no contesting the fact that it has been ADAPTED by those with said body.

[bushido_man96]

Thanks for replies

My point is that if you are big and strong then you are more likely to "last the course" i.e. train for a long time and reach high rank, high ability and seniority in the shotokan/goju/judo/kyokushinkai world. Simply because you don't get bounced around so much.

Trading semi contact body blows and hard blocking with someone who out weighs you by 100LBs is not easy. It does make you think that perhaps aikido or wing chun might be a better idea ?

Of course, the lighter guy has an advantage with stamina and being light on their feet, but in the "old school" world of straight line shotokan, its not easy to make that count.

How do you know big guys don't have stamina? I think that's a bit of a misconception about being bigger. In fact, I think there are a lot of misconceptions about being bigger in general. Big guys can have good agility, as well. Underestimating the athletic ability of a bigger guy is a good way to set oneself behind the 8-ball in a confrontation.