Crying students in sparring

[StudentCarl]

I was a little concerned, but I Iet Benjie fight. He got thrashed and roughed up properly. At one point he was punched on the neck and kicked close to the groin, and he started crying. I pulled him to the side, ready to get him out of the event, but he refused to quit, wiped his tears and went in for more punishment. He lost, but he held his own. He's sparring more carefully and respectfully now, and is getting good ideas about when to bang, run or stand firm in an exchange.

There's the bottom line I'm hunting for: he didn't let his emotions control him.

Tears happen on the road to self-control. It's our job to get 'em back on the road.

 

[Gwai Lo Dan]

I quietly joke to the older guys (teens and up) that if they start crying I will call them a wimp.

 

[Thesemindz]

Before we let anybody spar we have them do line drills with light to medium contact. What that is the line up close stance and one will turn out and the other will kick with a back leg roundhouse, we also do the back kick cut kick, and fast kick. Then when they can handle that we allow them to spar, alot of people need to be brought along slowly when sparring, it is not like the old days when you lined up and just hit each other and thought it was fun.

It might not be like the old days, but I think the sparring is better and once you break them to karate you can still bang. You just have to get them there first. In my experience they all end up just as thirsty for combat, even if we have to walk them to the water first. And I get more women and children excited about sparring too. Once they get into it, they'll fight just as hard as the men. But if I put them in the ring against a six foot tall fully grown man and said "go!" without drawing them in first they might never learn to love it. And I want them to love it, because that's the only way they'll do it forever.


-Rob