Martial arts discussion thread

[GoktimusPrime]

While studying martial arts is no walk in the park, it's not rocket science either. Most people of average intelligence and physical coordinative skills, with sufficient dedication and training, can become reasonably competent fighters in shorter time than most people imagine.

Anyway, I was taking a morning jog here in jolly ol' China and found this dude practising his Tai Chi on the footpath. Took some happy snaps. I didn't know which exact form he was doing, but I recognised his movements as Chen style Tai Chi. I can't speak Chinese to save my life, but after taking the photos I said to him, "Chen Tai Chi?" And he nodded and said "Chen Tai Chi." I then took out my notepad and wrote down down some Kanji and he wrote down the address of a martial arts supply store which I hope to check out later.

[GoktimusPrime]

omg... this is so sad...

Here in Guangzhou they have a martial arts themed restaurant chain called "Zhen Kung Fu" (Real Kung Fu)

Links:
Official site: http://www.zkungfu.com/
Review (in English): http://travel.nytimes.com/travel/gui...nt-detail.html

The mascot is Bruce Lee. The staff uniform is based on Bruce Lee's outfit from Game of Death (or Beatrix Kiddo from Kill Bill ).

Talk about your literal McDojos!

I can't help but also shake my head at the extreme irony of a restaurant franchise calling itself "Real Kung Fu" considering that Bruce Lee is more known amongst martial arts circle for having founded the martial art Jeet Kune Do - a martial he created in as a sort of antithesis to Kung Fu. While Bruce Lee's started off practising Kung Fu, he openly criticised Kung Fu of being corrupted by "classical mess" and that was one of the reasons why he created Jeet Kune Do.

The other reason was because Bruce Lee was rejected by the Kung Fu community who:
a. Disapproved of Bruce Lee's standard of Kung Fu (or lack thereof)
b. Were full of racists who disapproved of Bruce Lee teaching Chinese martial arts to non-Chinese people.

So here we have this restaurant called "Real Kung Fu" - yet its mascot is a man who was rejected by the Kung Fu community, and who himself also rejected Kung Fu in favour of his JKD.

Note: This post is NOT intended to start any kind of "Kung Fu vs JKD" argument... merely noting the contradictory irony of this restaurant's name, theme and choice of mascot. Commercialisation to the max!! But as long as they sell their food, I'm sure nobody gives a WHA-TAAAAHH！

Another facepalm...

[Bartrim]

We're on break now but the last two weeks I got to spar/partner with one of our Sempais. Normally as I have mentioned before I spar with this teenager who is the same belt as me and of a similar height. This teenager (again as I have prevoiusly mentioned)is incredibly unco and scrappy... usually because he is distracted as he has a crush on a girl who comes to watch her friend in our class. Again as I have mentioned I have complained numerous times to the Sensei about this. But I'm not meant to complain in this post. The past two weeks sparring with the Sempai I have felt my technique improve so much that I've asked him if we can spar on a more regular basis. At the end of our last lesson we had to put on demonstrations in our pairs. Everyone was so slow and scrappy and granted I had the benefit of working with a sempai but when we did our demo and he attacked me at full speed and I responded with equal speed and force not only did it shock the other students but for me it just felt right. It was the first time in 9months that I actually got to practically apply the techniques I've learnt and I can't express how much I enjoyed it.

[GoktimusPrime]

It's great when you can pull your techniques off reflexively without having to "think" about what you're doing. That's when you know you're actually learning. And it's always great to train with someone better than you.

That's the rut I'm stuck in... I can't find anyone better than me to train with regularly (not saying that I'm any good, it's just that I can't find any decent people to train with). Most of the other students in my school have NO interest in learning martial arts for self defence... they just do it for health/fitness. There's ONE other student who has a black belt in Karate, but he doesn't seem interested in combative training anymore. And my instructor is constantly "correcting" me just for the sake of making my moves more soft and supple (since it's an internal style) -- and that's fine, I have no problem with that, but she doesn't show me what the fight applications for it are. And sometimes when I move in a way that's counter intuitive to fighting (e.g. widening my stance thus exposing my groin more) I seldomly get an explanation for why we do this. The only explanation I finally got was that a wider stance is more stable. True, but it's also more exposed. Nothing wrong a wide stance per se, but you don't want to open it in a way that exposes vulnerable points to your opponent. And my teacher tried to demonstrate this my shoving me from my side - which doesn't make much sense since you wouldn't face an opponent side on in a bow stance (similar to Karate's Zankutsudachi) - but for the sake of argument, let's say my opponent managed to side-step really quickly to my open side and, as my teacher tried to demonstrate, shoved me backwards. When she shoved me, as I started losing my balance I just regained my balance by dropping into a twisted stance. She didn't really have a good answer for that (she just said, "so you can see how your bow stance is unstable)... yeah okay, but I can compensate for that if someone side steps and shoves me. I'd rather compromise a bit of stability for the added advantage of protecting my gonads! Worse case scenario, if I do fall, I could just do a breakfall technique... while being on the ground is NOT a good situation, it's not necessarily the end of the fight - there are ways to fight while on the ground (even if it's not ideal).

Last night I went to a martial arts class here in China. The first one I went to - a Yang Tai Chi class... pretty ordinary. The teacher just stood in front of the class, BACK facing students, then everyone did their forms. Some students did them well, others not so well... I tried to follow along because I'm still a super-noob at Yang Tai Chi... but the teacher never looked at us while we were doing the forms, let alone circulate himself around the class and correct people. (-_-)

Afterwards I went to a nearby Chen Tai Chi class. Some of his students were sloppy, but some of them were also pretty good - particularly this one senior student whom I was told was a national champion. He demonstrated a form to me which looked fairly decent (some of his side stances were a bit sloppy, but overall quite good). I then spoke with the teacher who did basic one-arm push hands with me and seriously showed me some issuing of power using supple moves and small circular motions. Since then my arms have been killing me! (owch!)

And this is one criticism I've had of the school I've been attending since last year back home -- because we hardly EVER do any contact activities, and when we do, nobody seems to issue power... so my body's just gotten soft. Little wonder I've been in pain all day _despite_ having trained regularly since last October. (-_-)

[Bartrim]

Well after four weeks off I went to karate last night. Glad I went too. I was feeling like I was losing interest. This has happened a couple of times and everytime it has all it takes is 10 minutes back into the lesson and I'm back into it.

Lately whenever we've been doing pad work or anything with a partner I've been working with one of the Sempais. Last night was no different. Again I must say how much I prefer working with him, simply for the extra pointers he offers. Where as the other couple were punching the pads in the set combination to the count Sempai Rob would attack me inbetween counts to work on my guard and he also moved around to work on footwork while the others just stood still.

Of course while working one-on-one with a Sempai has it's advantages it also has it's disadvantages. The last thing we did was "happy slaps". This is where you take a kiba-dachi or horse riding stance, place your hands on your head, tense your body and your partner slaps your body for 20seconds. This is an exercise where I would prefer to work with someone who worked abit lighter. I started to buckle at about 8 seconds but managed to hold on for the full 20 count. However once my sensei called time I dropped like a sack of spuds.

Then as an added bonus when I went to leave Sempai Robs wife, Sempai Cath stopped me and talked Transformers for about 20 minutes as she is a nerd herself

[GoktimusPrime]

Where as the other couple were punching the pads in the set combination to the count Sempai Rob would attack me inbetween counts to work on my guard and he also moved around to work on footwork while the others just stood still.

*thumbs.up* Nice. Training to set counts/beats is really a form of rote learning, which has its advantage in terms of just drilling the movements into you, but has the disadvantage of making you just do it automatically to the set count/beat and not spontaneously - which is where random variations in beats, speed, tempo etc. come in real handy. It's also good because the set counting becomes a distraction -- you want to look for the random attack, but moving the the set distracts you from it, then suddenly that random move comes at you! Good stuff.

It's funny sometimes when you see other people who don't do that, and they do these drills and start having random conversations... then you work with them and they go, "So how about the weath--" POW!

Of course while working one-on-one with a Sempai has it's advantages it also has it's disadvantages. The last thing we did was "happy slaps". This is where you take a kiba-dachi or horse riding stance, place your hands on your head, tense your body and your partner slaps your body for 20seconds. This is an exercise where I would prefer to work with someone who worked abit lighter. I started to buckle at about 8 seconds but managed to hold on for the full 20 count. However once my sensei called time I dropped like a sack of spuds.

Yeah, you gotta be careful with body conditioning exercises like this. Your sempai shouldn't be slapping you so hard that it hurts like that. The slaps should sting and be rather uncomfortable, but not actually seriously painful. Once it starts really hurting, you need to let your Sempai or Sensei know immediately, and they have to either:
1: decrease the strength of the strikes and/or...
2: stop the activity for you and/or...
3: see how you are and if possible administer first aid

Martial arts teachers have the same legal duty of care just like school teachers. And quite frankly, being beaten up well beyond your pain threshold isn't that beneficial for you anyway -- cos otherwise if it were, you might as well ask Sempai to smash you a couple of times with a sledgehammer to toughen you up.

Like other forms of conditioning, it's gradual, like say doing weights. You don't start off at the extreme end and keep going - you start off small, and as you improve you gradually step up. So in the beginning the slaps should be relatively light, then as your tolerance for the slaps builds your partner can slap you a little bit harder then increase the strength of the slaps as you become more resistant. And this may take weeks or even months to build this kind of tolerance.

Then as an added bonus when I went to leave Sempai Robs wife, Sempai Cath stopped me and talked Transformers for about 20 minutes as she is a nerd herself

Caught out! Maybe you can convince her to let some students sew Transformer logos onto your gis.

[Bartrim]

*thumbs.up* Nice. Training to set counts/beats is really a form of rote learning, which has its advantage in terms of just drilling the movements into you, but has the disadvantage of making you just do it automatically to the set count/beat and not spontaneously - which is where random variations in beats, speed, tempo etc. come in real handy. It's also good because the set counting becomes a distraction -- you want to look for the random attack, but moving the the set distracts you from it, then suddenly that random move comes at you! Good stuff.

It's funny sometimes when you see other people who don't do that, and they do these drills and start having random conversations... then you work with them and they go, "So how about the weath--" POW!

Yeah I liked that not only did Sempai Rob rotate but he also would step forward to try and crowd me... really kept me on my toes.

I've used that to my advantage when I've sparred with partners. I work a 3 count punch to which my opponent blocks. I generally repeat this over and over until I notice they are getting ready to counter straight after my third punch and lower their guard and ... WHAMMY I throw a fourth punch that 9 out of 10 times scores a blow.

I've also used it when I've had to revert back to my previous partner (the scrappy teenager). He'll start talking so I clip him over the head with a pad.
Chris: " Yeah there's this girl at school..." WHACK"What was that for?!"
Me: "Guard up!"

Yeah, you gotta be careful with body conditioning exercises like this. Your sempai shouldn't be slapping you so hard that it hurts like that. The slaps should sting and be rather uncomfortable, but not actually seriously painful. Once it starts really hurting, you need to let your Sempai or Sensei know immediately, and they have to either:
1: decrease the strength of the strikes and/or...
2: stop the activity for you and/or...
3: see how you are and if possible administer first aid

Martial arts teachers have the same legal duty of care just like school teachers. And quite frankly, being beaten up well beyond your pain threshold isn't that beneficial for you anyway -- cos otherwise if it were, you might as well ask Sempai to smash you a couple of times with a sledgehammer to toughen you up.

Like other forms of conditioning, it's gradual, like say doing weights. You don't start off at the extreme end and keep going - you start off small, and as you improve you gradually step up. So in the beginning the slaps should be relatively light, then as your tolerance for the slaps builds your partner can slap you a little bit harder then increase the strength of the slaps as you become more resistant. And this may take weeks or even months to build this kind of tolerance.


Caught out! Maybe you can convince her to let some students sew Transformer logos onto your gis.

It wasn't that bad, it just stung... alot and honestly I'd rather feel a hard punch then the sting of constant slaps.... I hate that feeling

I don't know if sensei would go for the TF logos... although he is a bit of a cartoon nerd himself... Everyone that meets him thinks he's walked straight out of a manga cartoon.

[Bartrim]

Was gonna go to karate tonight to try and catch up on lessons for grading but cant go as I have a cold

[GoktimusPrime]

Continued from Maccadam's Old Oil House:

The thing is, I wasn't even paying them attention, Just casually playing on my phone. I believe that what ever is going to happen is going to happen, otherwise known as determinism. Not because of god but for reason still unclear to me. With this sort of mindset I don't actually feel fear anymore, at least in the traditional sense. So I always walk around confident. In hindsight this may be what set them off, I wasn't scared of them.

I don't think they thought you weren't scared of them... they may have thought that you didn't care about them -- i.e. observed that you chose to ignore the potential threat that you presented, and thus concluded that you were a viable target. You may not have been presenting fear, but by choosing to completely ignore them and distract yourself with your phone, it basically tells them that you don't care about their presence... that you're not bothered by them when you should be.

Again, remember the predatory behaviour thing. When a predator is stalking its prey, it doesn't necessarily want to scare it before attacking. In fact, animals only attempt to scare another animal if they view that other animal as a threat. If the prey fails to notice or respond to the predator, then that's the opportune time for the predator to pounce. It's like say a lion strolling up to a zebra, and the zebra sees the lion, but then goes "meh" and continues chewing grass or whatever... pays no mind to the lion. What an ideal opportunity for the lion to kill that zebra.

When someone wants to attack someone, before they attack you they're gauging you to see how viable you are as a target. A better way if you notice some seedy people tailing you might be keep a close eye on them and mentally prepare yourself for fight or flight (preferably the latter). In fact, you may want to quicken your pace - and naturally if they quicken theirs to match you, then run. And if your mobile is already in your hand, punch in 112 and get ready to hit that dial button if anything happens. Or heck, call the police already if you're feeling threatened.

Remember that the legal definition of assault is the creation of fear for your welfare/safety, such as the threat of violence. And it doesn't have to be verbal... being stalked alone is already a form of assault (hence why AVOs can be issued against stalkers). You don't need to wait for someone to touch you before you are technically assaulted. And once you are under assault, you are entitled to defend yourself.

Some people have this misconception that they need to wait for someone to swing the first punch, but this isn't true. The moment you feel intimidated for your physical safety, then you're already under assault. For example, if a person raises a fist at you as if they're going to punch you, you can hit them first. Because by raising a fist at you in a violent manner, they've already threatened to hit you. Likewise if a person verbally says, "I'm gonna smash you!" then you can act first because they have assaulted you. Once they touch you then it's assault and battery, but you don't need to wait for someone to commit battery before you enact self defence. You can attempt to defend yourself after the onset of assault, even without battery. With reasonable force of course.

But another advantage of using more passive internal defensive techniques is that they're also easier to legally justify. Putting someone in a restraining/submissive hold means that you've neutralised them, but you're not actually hurting them as you would if you were striking them with punches, kicks etc. And you only need to learn how to dodge and block an attack long enough to make an escape. Furthermore, sometimes when people start a fight, if they see that you know some moves, they may stand down and abandon their attack on you. Because again, going back to the animal mentality - if a predator attacks a prey, but the prey starts putting up a fight, the predator might give up and let that one go.

Learning martial arts is no absolute guarantee for successful self defence, but it increases your chances of survival -- much like how wearing a helmet on a bike or seatbelts in cars are no absolute guarantees, but we know they greatly increase your odds of survival in accidents.

[LordCyrusOmega]

Gret info Gok. When I have some more time on my hands I'll be looking into some of these.
You're right, should have paid them more attention. Going to have to adjust the way I deal with the outside world again, be a little bit more attentive and cautious.