Groundfighting in karate

[D Dempsey]

I would much appreciate if you would substantiate this claim. I can't imagine that a clinching and throwing art would NOT have a ground game. Those techniques don't just crawl out of the darkness. What other purpose would techniques to project an opponent to the ground have if not to continue grappling. Games are not a representative sample in order to get the big picture.

It really wouldn't be that surprising, a large number of asian folk wrestling styles consider it a loss if your knee touches the ground, so actual ground grappling wouldn't even come up. Examples include Mongolian Boke, Chinese Shuaijiao, Korean sseiurm, and I believe Japanese sumo is the same. There are quite a few European wrestling styles that follow a similar rule. I would imagine that Okinawan tegumi would probably share some similarities with the folk wrestling styles in the surrounding countries.

 

[Brian S]

You will never find BJJ methods inside karate kata. However you will find very sound ways of dealing with grapplers and groundfighters.

I hope you are not talking about biting and eye gouges...

To deal with BJJ shoots you MUST learn to sprawl. Sprawling is not a part of karate.

 

[Makalakumu]

It really wouldn't be that surprising, a large number of asian folk wrestling styles consider it a loss if your knee touches the ground, so actual ground grappling wouldn't even come up. Examples include Mongolian Boke, Chinese Shuaijiao, Korean sseiurm, and I believe Japanese sumo is the same. There are quite a few European wrestling styles that follow a similar rule. I would imagine that Okinawan tegumi would probably share some similarities with the folk wrestling styles in the surrounding countries.

Here's the thing. I have know idea what actual tegumi looks like. I wish that I could get a video of an actual match. If I could, I think I could tell you if the techniques were meant to continue grappling or if they were meant to just toss someone on their ***. I've trained in judo, wrestling and bjj, so I've had background enough to see where the focus would lie. Without actually seeing what is being done, how are we going to assess it?

 

[D Dempsey]

I think that's the big issue. There really isn't any information available on tegumi from a credible source. The only thing I found described it as being like sumo, but you could win by pinning your opponent. That would lead me to believe that it's probably similar to freestyle wrestling.

 

[Tez3]

I hope you are not talking about biting and eye gouges...

To deal with BJJ shoots you MUST learn to sprawl. Sprawling is not a part of karate.[/quote]


I imagine it is if someone gives you a good old shove!

I am a bit puzzled about whether we are talking self defence or in the dojo? Self defence surely would allow anything whereas if you are playing by rules you have to stick to them?
Does it depend on why you train what you see in kata?

 

[fuyugoshi]

You've never seen a fight where somebody straddles somebody else and beats the crap out of them? That's what ground grappling skills are designed to both counter and enable. If you don't know a practical way to reverse the mounted position, you don't know how to fight on the ground, period. A "practical method" does not consist of pain compliance, kyusho, counterstriking or adapting standing grappling techniques. People have tried all of these; they don't work very well. Bridging, shrimping, establishing a rudimentary guard with the legs -- these *do* work and there is no evidence of their existence in classical karate.

It is true that sometimes, a brawl adopts the form of a mounting position match. Not that very often, though. Anyway, if all you need to be satisfied with karate is to add mounting position techniques, well, just add them. During most of 20th century, karate took his ground game from judo, and during the 19th, from tegumi. Old Okinawan karateka have always trained ground fighting, regardless the presence or absence of ground fighting techniques in karate kata. It is in the 20th that people starts looking at it as totally separate disciplines, forgetting that karate had been particularly interested and committed in cross-training.

Just to be sure that you are following my reasoning, groundfighting in karate has different purpose than bjj groundfighting, and is part of a different approach in strategy and tactics.

Before going further, could you explain what you mean by "classical karate"?

 

[Em MacIntosh]

The style I currently study (Chito-Ryu, Canadian Chito-Kai) has had strong judo influence thanks to our sensei Higashi. We make no claims to be proficient at the common impression of groundfighting as our material doesn't include sprawling or rolling (other than shoulder rolls and ukemi). We have plenty of set ups in our bunkai, especially neseishi and nage no kata. We seem to concentrate on using the stance to break the opponents stance (wedge), wristlocks and armbars. Grounding somebody with an armbar and using your stance (knee) to keep their arm straight is about as close as we get. We do remind sharply of any lack of vigilance regarding your downed opponent but we have no illusions about our lack of groundfighting. I suggest anyone who hasn't to get some ground experience so as not to be totally helpless and blind if you get into unfamiliar territory.

 

[fuyugoshi]

There are and have been many different forms of wrestling in Asia (everywhere, actually). What people do, usually, is cross-training. I think it is when Japanese developed sport karate, ground fighting was eliminated from the training. However, some karate kaiha have kept the ground training usually by training judo.

By the way, Okinawan wrestling ends when your opponent is on his back.

Just remember that what you call "known historical trends" is usually from the Japanese sport version of karate developed during the 20th century, and there are not many books about the previous non sport karate. History is always rewritten and thousands of examples of "known and accepted historical truths" being suddenly dismissed can be quoted. But, I don't think this is the place to discuss the nature of historical research.

When the historical evidence and practical technical experience is overwhelmingly slanted toward one point of view, and a few people insist on taking the other, it *does* have to go that way.

It is not my fault that believing these things is silly. It is not my fault that we know that baihequan doesn't have a submission/position game, that we know the Fujianese ground art is both moribund and that its forms look like no modern karate kata, that Chinese grappling culture did not include an involved ground game and that tegumi contests end when you touch the ground with anything above the knee. These are all true things. I did not invent them. Meanwhile claims of a meaningful newaza game require some explanation as to why something totally inconsistent with the known historical trends should be taken seriously as a "traditional" practice, but why it miraculuously escaped general discussion before the 1990s.

 

[fuyugoshi]

You will never find BJJ methods inside karate kata. However you will find very sound ways of dealing with grapplers and groundfighters.

I have a curiosity: isn't bjj a form of judo? If so, there are sweeps and throws that can be found in karate kata and judo kata, therefore, there should be some common methods in karate and bjj. On the other hand, aren't some grappling techniques in karate kata similar to some jujitsu grappling techniques? If that is true, and if judo comes from jujitsu, and bjj comes from judo, then there must be some grappling techniques common to karate and bjj. Am I wrong, or bjj evolved so much that now it is a totally different discipline with a totally new set of techniques and strategies?

 

[Em MacIntosh]

There are many common methods between jiu-jitsu and karate, just not regarding the popular interpretation of groundfighting.

 

[DavidCC]

I hope you are not talking about biting and eye gouges...

To deal with BJJ shoots you MUST learn to sprawl. Sprawling is not a part of karate.

I am not, I've never seen any biting or eye gouging in karate, but I am not a karate teacher.

and sprawl is not the only effective counter to a shoot. It might be the only one taught in BJJ schools... or maybe at your BJJ school... but there are other things to be done and at least some karate and kenpo teachers teach them.

 

[DavidCC]

Quote:
Originally Posted by DavidCC
You will never find BJJ methods inside karate kata. However you will find very sound ways of dealing with grapplers and groundfighters.

I have a curiosity: isn't bjj a form of judo? If so, there are sweeps and throws that can be found in karate kata and judo kata, therefore, there should be some common methods in karate and bjj. On the other hand, aren't some grappling techniques in karate kata similar to some jujitsu grappling techniques? If that is true, and if judo comes from jujitsu, and bjj comes from judo, then there must be some grappling techniques common to karate and bjj. Am I wrong, or bjj evolved so much that now it is a totally different discipline with a totally new set of techniques and strategies?

I'm probably not familair enough with either style but I think what you re saying has some merit. I was referring specifically to the grounded submissions and ground-fighting maneuvers.

 

[D Dempsey]

By the way, Okinawan wrestling ends when your opponent is on his back.

Do you have a source for this? I was led to the same conclusion but everything I found seemed to contradict other sources. Now days it looks like it is predominately sumo wrestling with some unorthodox tie-ups.

 

[fuyugoshi]

Do you have a source for this? I was led to the same conclusion but everything I found seemed to contradict other sources. Now days it looks like it is predominately sumo wrestling with some unorthodox tie-ups.

Yes, "The History of Karate", by Morio Higaonna. If you look at the end of the book, there is an alphabetical index. check "tegumi", "ground fignting", "ne waza" and "shima". I don't remember the page, but that is the way I read it. If I am not mistaken, in the same book Higaonna also compares rules for Okinawan sumo and Japanese sumo.

 

[D Dempsey]

Thank you. That sounds pretty credible to me, I'll have to look into it.

 

[Brian S]

I am not, I've never seen any biting or eye gouging in karate, but I am not a karate teacher.

and sprawl is not the only effective counter to a shoot. It might be the only one taught in BJJ schools... or maybe at your BJJ school... but there are other things to be done and at least some karate and kenpo teachers teach them.

"other things"???? Are you going to leave it at that,lol??

 

[DavidCC]

Yes I am because

1) written descriptions are insufficient unless they are exceedingly long and detailed and I don't have the time to write it out for you.

2) even if I took the time the write-up would probably not be enough to teach you the technique. Notice I said TEACH it to you, in writing. Is that evne possible?

3) if I had the time, and managed to produce a write-up that COULD teach it to you, you probably wouldn't do anything more than argue about it anyway

so if you really want to know, find a teacher near you that can teach these things and go train with him until he teaches it to you.

I will throw you a bit of a bone though did you see the last season of TUF, the guy tried a shoot and got his shoulder dislocated? Well, his shoulder was previously injured and vulnerable, but it wasn't a sprawl that did that to him. So if you get that video you migt see one possibility for doing something other than sprawl.

 

[MattJ]

David -

With all due respect, that is a huge cop-out. To hint at something and then not explain it is specious at best - especially on an internet forum. Surely you can make SOME explanation; off-angle striking, tai-sabaki, etc.

This isn't rocket science.

 

[DavidCC]

Sorry but it is what it is. I could give you some pieces or descriptions but I just don't see the point, I won't convince anyone who believes otherwise and the argument is boring...

 

[DavidCC]

did you see the last season of TUF, the guy tried a shoot and got his shoulder dislocated? Well, his shoulder was previously injured and vulnerable, but it wasn't a sprawl that did that to him. So if you get that video you migt see one possibility for doing something other than sprawl.

Manny G. was his name.