Reality or sport based martial arts

[Alan Armstrong]

Are you clear about your martial art style as if it is reality based or sport based?

Can you divide your reality and sport MA aspects efficiently?

Do you expect your teacher to supply both reality and sport MA aspects?

Does the sport aspect of your style interfere with the realities of your self defence needs?

Are you a martial artist that feels let down by your chosen system when it comes down to defending oneself from potential attackers?

[Zaine]

Should we judge someone's worth by whether or not they take a sport MA or one that is more centered around self defense?

[Alan Armstrong]

Personally I don't judge anyone's worth by their ma style; reality or sport based.

Each individual has personal choices to make with their chosen ma style.

Some think that ma sports are also reality based, it is difficult to tell the difference for some and not for others.

The difference is one uses a point system while on the other side no points are counted or awarded.

Both however can involve a judge, one in the ring and the other in a court room.

[wildbourgman]

Can we have both? I like both and I don't think one unseats the other they both have their place in martial arts. It's like anything, it's all in what you put in to it and understanding what place each hold. Sport karate is not reality life or death protection and someone that can protect themselves very well might not look comfortable in sport karate.

Personally in my current shape I'm might not be able to do either very well.

[Alan Armstrong]

I believe we can have both reality and sport martial arts. Just be aware that what is supposed to be a sport, some belive it to be a licence to kill.

Don't be fooled for one minute in to thinking sport karate is 100% safe.

At one tournament I was reversed punched in to the chest with full power, I wasn't wearing any chest protection. I was totally floored. Instead of disqualifying my opponent, I was given the option to continue or forfeit the match and give it to my opponent. It was supposedly a light contact tournament. After getting my self together I continued the fight and won. I won with anger and not at all proud of the fact.

The previous fight I was hit so hard on the arm that it went in to a uncontrollable spasm, flopping about for approximately 10 seconds. I won that fight also. This (loosing) opponent was so upset that he lost to me, that he wanted a real fight with me outside after the tournament was finished. He was about 8 inches taller than me and outweighed me also. This tournament matched up competitors with belt ranking and nothing to do with hight or weight differences.

After these two tournament fights I was very paranoid, the judges continued letting me get hit with full power techniques while I was still fighting with light contact. Judges were not accepting my light contact points, so I switched to full contact mode. Unfairly I was disqualified for using full contact.

The biases in the eyes of the judges were not in my favor, perhaps because they were favoring there own students.

The point I trying to get across is that conflict/fights no matter where they are on the street or tournament, reality based or sport will never be exactly fair.

[Nidan Melbourne]

I believe we can have both reality and sport martial arts. Just be aware that what is supposed to be a sport, some belive it to be a licence to kill.

Don't be fooled for one minute in to thinking sport karate is 100% safe.

At one tournament I was reversed punched in to the chest with full power, I wasn't wearing any chest protection. I was totally floored. Instead of disqualifying my opponent, I was given the option to continue or forfeit the match and give it to my opponent. It was supposedly a light contact tournament. After getting my self together I continued the fight and won. I won with anger and not at all proud of the fact.

The previous fight I was hit so hard on the arm that it went in to a uncontrollable spasm, flopping about for approximately 10 seconds. I won that fight also. This (loosing) opponent was so upset that he lost to me, that he wanted a real fight with me outside after the tournament was finished. He was about 8 inches taller than me and outweighed me also. This tournament matched up competitors with belt ranking and nothing to do with hight or weight differences.

After these two tournament fights I was very paranoid, the judges continued letting me get hit with full power techniques while I was still fighting with light contact. Judges were not accepting my light contact points, so I switched to full contact mode. Unfairly I was disqualified for using full contact.

The biases in the eyes of the judges were not in my favor, perhaps because they were favoring there own students.

The point I trying to get across is that conflict/fights no matter where they are on the street or tournament, reality based or sport will never be exactly fair.

Light Contact varies tournament to tournament, rules and also who hosts the competition. So as such there is no one standard for "light contact".

Also officials have a slight variation of what they were informed about the level of contact, or there was a lack of clarity of the levels. As i said tournaments will have their own rules, so you would have a different level of bias there; as such i only compete at wkf tournaments because you can't have any member of your own school officiate your divisions.

[Alan Armstrong]

Have personally witnessed in a ma tournament that the referee was (female) refereeing a bout. The points were even between between the two (male) combatants. The referee awarded the match to her boyfriend.

I'm not saying that he (the referee's boyfriend) didn't deserve to win, but how could the referee be able to not be biased in a split decision involving her boyfriend.

After witnessing this blatant disregard for fairness in a ma tournament, I never competed ever again. I resigned from the ma club that held the ma tournament.

There were more unfairness issues with this ma club, the tournament issue was just the last straw for me.

[Nidan Melbourne]

Have personally witnessed in a ma tournament that the referee was (female) refereeing a bout. The points were even between between the two (male) combatants. The referee awarded the match to her boyfriend.

I'm not saying that he (the referee's boyfriend) didn't deserve to win, but how could the referee be able to not be biased in a split decision involving her boyfriend.

After witnessing this blatant disregard for fairness in a ma tournament, I never competed ever again. I resigned from the ma club that held the ma tournament.

There were more unfairness issues with this ma club, the tournament issue was just the last straw for me.

1) Was the tournament an in-house one?

 

1.1) What was the ruleset being used? WKF, ISKA, NASKA or Rules set forth by the Club?

2) Why was this a blatant disregard in fairness in a MA Tournament in your eyes?

2.1) Any sport, referees are supposed to step off or away from the bout or match if there is any relative or anyone where you could have any bias in it.

2.1.1) This is coming not just from a Karate Official (helped out at a few tournaments; about to undertake the next course to become one officially) but also a Basketball Official.

2.2) Was the official (Irregardless of it was Male or Female) fair in what they were doing?

As in they were awarding Points and Penalties evenly without favouring their partner.

[bushido_man96]

These are some good questions. I'll take them one at a time.

Are you clear about your martial art style as if it is reality based or sport based?

I don't think mine is either. We do have a competition aspect, but it isn't a focus of our school. We focus a lot on forms and one-steps, so I wouldn't call it an RBSD style, either. I'd say ours is a "traditional" style. Now, do I like this situation? That's a different question to answer at a different time, I think.

Can you divide your reality and sport MA aspects efficiently?

I'm not quite sure from which angle you are driving at this question, so I'll do my best, and you can clarify later on if you like.

I think I can divide my reality and sports aspects of the MAs that I do. I know that when I teach and train Krav as a defensive tactics system for law enforcement, that I'm not going to be teaching or training any kind of competition kicks one might see in TKD competitions. No spinning kicks, no jumping kick, etc. Heck, hardly even any round kicks. The only one I would teach is a low level, angled round kick to the leg, if that. I'm also very aware that some techniques that I use when I spar in TKD class, I will either have to modify or just throw out for when it comes to self-defense usage.

Do you expect your teacher to supply both reality and sport MA aspects?

No. Its my job as the student to research what a teacher teaches and decide if I want to subject myself to that environment as a student. Would I like the teacher to do this? Yes, I would. I'd love to see more self-defense focused training. But the teacher has his ways, and I'm the student, so I have to go along with what he teaches, or seek out a different instructor.

Does the sport aspect of your style interfere with the realities of your self defence needs?

I don't think so. The only way it interferes is by taking time away I'd rather spend on self-defense.

Are you a martial artist that feels let down by your chosen system when it comes down to defending oneself from potential attackers?

I don't feel let down, because I know what to expect when I go to class. I've learned to seek out training in other places to try to fill in the holes.

[bushido_man96]

Personally I don't judge anyone's worth by their ma style; reality or sport based.

Each individual has personal choices to make with their chosen ma style.

Some think that ma sports are also reality based, it is difficult to tell the difference for some and not for others.

The difference is one uses a point system while on the other side no points are counted or awarded.

Both however can involve a judge, one in the ring and the other in a court room.

All training styles have their drawbacks. Full contact is nice, but you can't train full contact all the time, for safety reasons. Light contact is fun, but you can get a false sense of what works and what doesn't. I don't know how many times I've thrown a head-level spinning heel kick that I've pulled so as not to clean someone out, but they do an immediate counter anyway and show no respect for the kick.

Its tough to "spar" with RBSD methods, because most people like their eyes where they are, and don't appreciate getting kicked in the pills on a regular basis.

Judo and BJJ are excellent examples of styles that have modified training aspects that have allowed for more full-speed and resistive randori and rolling training. Folkstyle, freestyle, and Greco-Roman Wrestling are this way, too.

So, each way of training has pros and cons that they bring to the table. Everyone has one they enjoy more than the others.