Bizarre Training Methods...a Myth?

[Uchinanchu]

While the OP video referenced CMA training let me state JMA/Okinawan - depending on the style and instructor's preferences and the training he had received - also had "quirks" in training & conditioning drills etc... But was it part of an established core curriculum, probably mostly not - more of an adjunct tradition?

Most of these methods IMHO have now become "myths" in part due to consumers (students' feedback and tolerance to endure any of this) and of course the bane of us all - lawyers & lawsuits.

Take something as benign as being corrected in a traditional karate class with the whack of a shinai - i.e., onto your quadriceps to emphasize you need to correct the depth of your front leaning stance. This probably doesn't happen much these days in karate classes in America, eh?

Also the advances in knowledge of exercise physiology science during the past four decades would put many of "bizarre" drills to bed if the had an outside peer review. We (martial arts practionors) don't live in isolated Okinawan fishing villages anymore do we?

As far as hitting trees, that's for wussies.
I remember watching a 1960s video of traditional Japanese karate - they had the instructor doing a demonstration by hitting an old stationary locomotive engine with his blocks, strikes and kicks - flesh and bone onto solid iron.

Just watching & listening to the "thunking sound" of these impacts - caused my limbs to get bruised. Thunk... Thunk... Thunk!

Speak for yourself!

I guess I'm a very big wussie!! Heh!Heh!

I remember that video too. If I remember right, it was from the BBC TV show, Way of the Warrior. I used to do something similar with I-beams and water tanks at work when I was still in the service (ahh the memories...)

 

[Zero]

Also, much of the traditional Okinawan Hojo undo (supplimentary training), such as walking sanchin while carrying ceramic jars (sometimes filled with water, sand, or pebbles) is also still practiced. If memory serves me correctly, many of the hojo undo drills/tools can be traced back to China.

At our goju dojo the head sensei has very into traditional strength and conditioning training and we would use those very jars filled with steel pellets, of varying circumference and weight to strengthen grip and wrist/forearms. Aside from the very well known makiwara which was embedded in the ground in the back yard of the dojo for hand strikes I would also condition my shins on trees and practice kicks.

 

[Wey]

Real training can be very boring in CMA

Xingyiquan is based on Santi Shi

Stand this way, don't move for 20 minutes a day and you are a beginner. And after standing this way for 20 minutes.... switch legs and stand that way for 20 minutes. But without Santi you miss the base of Xingyiquan, IMO, and a whole lot of training on how to generate power for strikes.

Non-sports Sanshou; 100 kicks per leg per day 100 strikes per day, 100 elbow strikes per...... you get the idea and my sifu actually wanted 500 he let me off at 300 and I never got to the 100 kicks per side per day. And there are pull-ups, push ups and sit-ups too. Taijiquan do the long form 3 times a day (there's an hour) and now do your other forms and tuishou and associated qigong. Xingyiquan by the way also has forms, Tuishou and associated qigong.

You have successfully discouraged me from training CMA.

 

[Draven]

Take 'The Karate Kid' for example. Did it really have anything to do with Karate???

Sure it did, it had a lot of the Philosophy of Karate-do. As for the Wax on wax off stuff, eh thats from karate was well. Some of the Okinawan systems and old masters back in the day would require choirs to be done that worked muscles need for the art. I remember reading about a Kenpo instructor who own a laudry and made his students put cloths into large clay pots filled with hot soap water and pick up the pot and swish them back & forth. The Idea was to build leg and tunck muscles needed to preform straight & reverse punchs.

I'm sure some of the training has a basis in fact, allot of hollywood movies have a small basis in fact. Just don't take them at their words.

 

[Xue Sheng]

You have successfully discouraged me from training CMA.

Not to worry most schools don't train like this anymore, unless your lucky enough to find a very traditional sifu and you will only run into Santi shi in Xingyiquan but other styles may have postures to stand in as well, but most are internal styles with the exception of Ma Bu in some of the external styles and again many do not push it like they should

 

[zDom]

Does holding a concrete paving brick (bit bigger than standard house brick) and doing hundreds of backfists, straight punches and ridgehand strikes count?

On another note, I kept reading "Hollywood this" and "Hollywood that."

While Hollywood has included a few of these scenes, it was the Hong Kong film industry that did the most with the Special Training Scenes — and they were one of my favorite parts of those old chop saki classics! — followed, of course, by the hero using that Special Technique to win the final fight.


I'm sure there were plenty of creative instructors who came up with some interesting —*and maybe even effective — training methods.

But what we see in movies are almost exclusively screenwriter inventions, I'm sure.

 

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Spartacus had a great training scene at the Gladitorium.

 

[kaizasosei]

I've been thinking much lately about training methods.

Those exotic type methods are great. A little bit of imagination can go a long way. Amazing what wild ideas some masters can come up with.

But like i said i have been thinking much about training and i think the best and fastest training for developing and having controll over ones body other than pure movement, weapons training or kata is to do weightlifting and strength exercises with a straight spine and also curved spine-this can also twist from left to right or reverse. What is important is that one stretches also. Mild stretching is great for warming up and maintenence but when the body is warmed up, take the opportunity freak out go for the maximum with perfect posture of spine and push yourself down into the various splits front and side-sitting butterfly and crossleggen. Basically, pushing down into the splits slightly forcibly, but with good warmup.

How else is it going to get done?


I just joined a fitness club and am really trying to get the most out of the weights, machines and space. The body truly can and does change it's shape.


j

 

[Senjojutsu]

Spartacus had a great training scene at the Gladitorium.

So true, some great scenes!

First choice - the quick kill.
Second choice - the cripple.
Third choice the slow kill - but always remember...

Of course I have never been able to enjoy watching Spartacus etc. since that famous cockpit scene in the comedy classic “Airplane” when actor Peter Graves’ pilot character “Captain Oveur” asked:
Joey, do you like movies about gladiators?

 

[xfighter88]

Yeah Kung fu definitely used the posts to walk on and do stances and certain moves on. Not sure about the sparring though

 

[xfighter88]

Punching posts and trees yes. This is bone conditioning. plam striking a post and it breaking .... not so much.

 

[kaizasosei]

The stance exercise that Xue Sheng posted is very good. Notice it tells you to switch legs at some point. That means the arms stay the same and only the legs switch. After the switch, it is a very powerful exercise.


j

 

[Mider1985]

Some people train by hitting there hands against hard materials, the tougher and stronger your hands become the tougher the material becomes as your training continues this is true for arts like goju were you punch a bucket full of sand, and later metal, and qigong were you use pots of water to toughen your palms, as well as other material, eventually your hands can break bricks but it takes a long time of tedious and PROPER training its very dangerous. In Thailand the people who were studing muay thai would kick banan tree's supposidly 100's of times a day till there shin muscles were calsified and the nerves deadend.

As for what i saw a bit of in the video i didnt look at it all. They do make you try balancing arts in certain places like the phillipines were you gotta walk on poles? stuck in the ground, in some arts i think its also the phillipines you gotta at least try and wrestle a water buffalo, and you also punch tree's using your fists, four arms and feet and probably shins. Its all designed to make your balance or speed or endurance greater, kettlebelt training is obviously for strength im sure it has other applications as well because its harder to do the positions with a kettle belt then iwth other items of equal weight.

Some arts use meditation and breathing in order to avoid damage or just to clear the mind or move energy around the body like tai chi. The more you train supposidly the more amazing the results but it probably takes a life time

 

[jks9199]

Some people train by hitting there hands against hard materials, the tougher and stronger your hands become the tougher the material becomes as your training continues this is true for arts like goju were you punch a bucket full of sand, and later metal, and qigong were you use pots of water to toughen your palms, as well as other material, eventually your hands can break bricks but it takes a long time of tedious and PROPER training its very dangerous. In Thailand the people who were studing muay thai would kick banan tree's supposidly 100's of times a day till there shin muscles were calsified and the nerves deadend.

As for what i saw a bit of in the video i didnt look at it all. They do make you try balancing arts in certain places like the phillipines were you gotta walk on poles? stuck in the ground, in some arts i think its also the phillipines you gotta at least try and wrestle a water buffalo, and you also punch tree's using your fists, four arms and feet and probably shins. Its all designed to make your balance or speed or endurance greater, kettlebelt training is obviously for strength im sure it has other applications as well because its harder to do the positions with a kettle belt then iwth other items of equal weight.

Some arts use meditation and breathing in order to avoid damage or just to clear the mind or move energy around the body like tai chi. The more you train supposidly the more amazing the results but it probably takes a life time

Your basis for these statements is?

Lots of different arts use progressively denser/harder materials for conditioning the body's weapons. Somehow, I doubt anyone wrestled a water buffalo as martial arts training... Maybe in an effort to get a yoke on it for plowing or to get the dang animal out of the crops.

The video was a clip from a movie that featured some exaggerated training methods, some of which were probably taken from real training, but wouldn't have been done in exactly that manner in reality. However, there are plenty of extreme training methods that exist in reality.