How much contact and when

[lonecoyote]

At what stage in someones training do you bring a student into contact sparring? How much contact and how hard? How much time in do you think they should have first? What are some ways to ramp people up to using hard contact? Too early and there are some that get gunshy, just covering up and running all the time. I believe I saw a kid ruined early in his training by getting paired with a guy who went too hard all the time, it just blew his confidence all to heck. I thought it was bad teaching. I've had instructors use contact drills to the body first to get people ready, as well as using foam rubber thingies for sparring, they can't hurt you much, but you feel what its like to get hit in the head and so you don't freeze as much when it actually happens. Are these good ideas? What do you do. Thanks in advance for any answers.

 

[kenpochad]

for me contact just kinda grew as i went along

but i hit as hard as i want to be hit

 

[Sapper6]

i would say early on (white belt) that way they become accustomed to it over time. of course, gradually increase the amount and force of contact over time as well. starting out slow and progressing with skill level.

 

[Xequat]

I suggest to tell the newbie to go as hard as s/he wants to get hit and then pair him/her with someone who can follow that rule until the new person goes all out.

 

[lonecoyote]

Thanks Kenpochad.I can dig the hit as hard as you want to be hit statement. I've heard it before and tried to go by it but if all your training partners are not on board with it sometimes, it can be hard. There will be a guy who doesn't know his own strength, one guy who is just an ahole, one really timid person, and one who thinks they are the next incarnation of Bruce Lee.

Thank you, Sapper6, I agree it has to be a gradual thing. Do you do different types of sparring for different grades, like white belt-no touch, yellow belt, light touch body, no touch head, purple belt hard contact body, light touch head? I mean is it a specified thing in the training or is it just a feel thing, where you go by the individuals in the class? Everyone is different and can handle different degrees of contact at different points in their training, IMHO.

 

[searcher]

I suggest to tell the newbie to go as hard as s/he wants to get hit and then pair him/her with someone who can follow that rule until the new person goes all out.

This is a great suggestion. I have my students start contact training from the very first lesson. I have the luxury of having high ranking students that have great control and can seem to judge how much the lower ranking student can take. As they progress i their training and as they get more used to harder contact the higher ranks will start giving them more. If a student is very nervous about sparring and getting the crap beat out of them I will spar with them and try to ease their nerves a bit. With female students they get little to no contact until they have several months in training. When males spar with them they are only allowed to give light contact on the chest protector and "touch" to the head. As females get towards 1st Kyu and Sho-dan rank tests the contact gets heavier, but not to the level that they can't handle.

All of my students must go through the 50 man fight to get their Sho-dan, but the females have a lighter level of contact during this part of the test. The 18-36 year old males have a very brutal test and sometimes the contact level gets pretty high. This group understands what can happen before they ever test and have several months to prepare.

Hope this helps.

 

[Ubermint]

Also from the first lesson. You won't need to go full contact, but resistance in the drills is immediate, and then we move along to actual sparring at the range they've been learning at. Obviously it's not full contact vale tudo from the first day, but the impact, energy and resistance should be present right from the start.
In an "alive" environment most of the drills are a type of limited sparring anyway.
I don't believe there is any benefit to "no touch" sparring. Even if you have to go light, you will still need to hone your accuracy, timing and distancing, and forcibly stopping your techniques before impact will hinder you in that.

 

[Sapper6]

Thank you, Sapper6, I agree it has to be a gradual thing. Do you do different types of sparring for different grades, like white belt-no touch, yellow belt, light touch body, no touch head, purple belt hard contact body, light touch head? I mean is it a specified thing in the training or is it just a feel thing, where you go by the individuals in the class? Everyone is different and can handle different degrees of contact at different points in their training, IMHO.

the sparring has to contain some amount of contact. when i'm sparring with someone of lower rank, even white belts, i go at their pace. as long as they are comfortable. most times, the lower ranking students can start to get a little out of control. when that happens, increase your contact a little to "show" them, "i can do that too". starting out slow and light, building upon them over time.

 

[kenpochad]

it can be hard. There will be a guy who doesn't know his own strength, one guy who is just an ahole, one really timid person, and one who thinks they are the next incarnation of Bruce Lee.
IMHO.

i know what you mean ,
i tranned with a guy for while that would tell me lets go light today .
i never have a problem with that but first thing he would always do is blow of the line and kick really hard so i would hit him back as hard . he would say things like you dont have any control so i told him that your satting the power .
with that first kick every time . then he would just get mad and start running
off at the mouth. so i told him that i wasnt going to spar with him anymore
i never really had that big of a problem with his power. i just didnt want it to go any farther and really get out of control
sorry for the spelling if it suks:erg:

 

[BaiKaiGuy]

I think it needs to be done as soon as possible. It's an important skill, and letting it go is asking for trouble.

The issue of how much contact is best answered, IMO, by "What is the student capable of?" It has to be about their comfort level at the beginning levels. I'm one of those people who is now having to rewire my fighting style because of prior bad instruction. You can't just dump a new student into the ring and say "spar", and wonder why they get upset after getting beaten down, and sadly that is how some schools do things. They need to develop thier comfort zone.

However, you have to be careful of the other extreme as well. Students need to understand that we do martial arts, and that part of what we do entails physical contact, sometimes of the rough kind. We're not pillowfighting, and we're not doing ballet. You are going to get hit, and students need to be able to understand that. There is nothing worse than someone who has a rank or two, has sparred, and gripes that "you hit them too hard". My ex does TSD and has brown belts and red belts complaining that they actually have to work when they deal with him. And his control has been noted many times by the instructors, people just get lazy. I'm not advocating brawling, because not every student wants that, but if you have achieved a certain level and still aren't comfortable getting hit, I have some question as to your skill and why you were advanced in the first place.

So, we do lots of live drilling in my school. One of the first techniques people are taught involves a throw. We ask that they actually perform the throw to get them used to actually engaging their opponent. We do a number of different drills with pads, movement, pushing hands, and others to get people used to throwing punches and kicks at each other, as well as defending against them. We also have what we call "touch tag". The goal is to tag your opponent on the knee or shoulder. It works a lot of the same skills as sparring, and is a good way to keep students on their toes in-between sparring sessions.

I would close by stressing that the last sentence above is very important. Drilling is necessary to work the skills needed for sparring if your school doesn't spar regularly. This way students don't get panic attacks when the sparring gear comes out because they've only ever hit a stationary bag.

 

[Jerry]

Fourth class, full power, any technique they can think of, very slow movement.

Your a target for anyone and everyone on the floor as of about 6 months.

 

[kenpochad]

I think it needs to be done as soon as possible. It's an important skill, and letting it go is asking for trouble.

The issue of how much contact is best answered, IMO, by "What is the student capable of?" It has to be about their comfort level at the beginning levels. I'm one of those people who is now having to rewire my fighting style because of prior bad instruction. You can't just dump a new student into the ring and say "spar", and wonder why they get upset after getting beaten down, and sadly that is how some schools do things. They need to develop thier comfort zone.

However, you have to be careful of the other extreme as well. Students need to understand that we do martial arts, and that part of what we do entails physical contact, sometimes of the rough kind. We're not pillowfighting, and we're not doing ballet. You are going to get hit, and students need to be able to understand that. There is nothing worse than someone who has a rank or two, has sparred, and gripes that "you hit them too hard". My ex does TSD and has brown belts and red belts complaining that they actually have to work when they deal with him. And his control has been noted many times by the instructors, people just get lazy. I'm not advocating brawling, because not every student wants that, but if you have achieved a certain level and still aren't comfortable getting hit, I have some question as to your skill and why you were advanced in the first place.

So, we do lots of live drilling in my school. One of the first techniques people are taught involves a throw. We ask that they actually perform the throw to get them used to actually engaging their opponent. We do a number of different drills with pads, movement, pushing hands, and others to get people used to throwing punches and kicks at each other, as well as defending against them. We also have what we call "touch tag". The goal is to tag your opponent on the knee or shoulder. It works a lot of the same skills as sparring, and is a good way to keep students on their toes in-between sparring sessions.

I would close by stressing that the last sentence above is very important. Drilling is necessary to work the skills needed for sparring if your school doesn't spar regularly. This way students don't get panic attacks when the sparring gear comes out because they've only ever hit a stationary bag.

yup

 

[arnisador]

Start out very slowly and grow it in time. It's like boiling a frog...

 

[OC Kid]

I start a student out with light contact to the body..none to the face.

Then I remind them throughout the session that they have to use control and that that if they dont want to get hit hard they shouldnt hit hard.

As the student progresses so does the contact. I still try to keep away from the face contact until I feel they are ready. Usually about green belt level which takes about 2 years in my system as a adult or more for kids depending on their age and maturity.

 

[kenpochad]

there is no face contact in the school i go to untall your a black belt
if your have a face sheild on that is opean game and every one goes for to
:erg:

 

[terryl965]

Full contact is important function of your training it should be done with the up most respect for the art as it can but still hold enough force so the student can see how hard it is to train. I f a student is gun shy at first always pair off with someone that will pull kicks and act like they are getting hit hard even if they are not it gives a sense of accomplishment.

Terry Lee Stoker

 

[TigerWoman]

In our school, white belts can go full bore on you. And any other belts can only do taps in return. After that it goes up according to what you give out. I have seen very timid yellow-orange belts who need more confidence so I open up more. It becomes fun for them and they learn. If they are really aggressive and advanced for their belt, they need to work to their level, so then contact can get harder. I first started receiving hard contact at blue belt, enough to take the wind out of you with chestgear on. It does make you much more respectful of your opponent. Then you start thinking strategy more. TW

 

[jkdhit]

i think contact should start as soon as possible. also, there's always sparring for every rank so there shouldn't really be a minimum

 

[Grenadier]

A difficult question, since different styles and schools have different philosophies.

My belief, is that someone who is a relatively inexperienced kyu rank, should be paired up with an experienced yudansha. It's the job of the yudansha to present a target, so that the mudansha can take some shots, in a controlled manner. I try to emphasize light contact. As the mudansha gets more experience, I'll still emphasize light contact, but also tell them to throw a strong attack, and tap the surface of the gi.

I will also explain to them that if they can tap the surface of the gi, while still throwing a strong kick or punch, then I would have full faith in their abilities to perform the same technique, but aiming 8 inches deeper, for the purpose of a full fledged fight.

As they get up there in rank, coming close to being able to test for a yudansha rank, I'll tell them to give each other some decent taps. Nothing to harm each other, but to still go a bit beyond surface tapping.

Once they reach their yudansha rank, they are expected to give, and receive, a fairly brisk, but controlled, punch or kick, although I'll still tell them to try to avoid the strikes, instead of taking them straight up. I'll also firmly emphasize, that they can expect to get hit about the same amount as they are hitting. You get what you give.

 

[MJS]

At what stage in someones training do you bring a student into contact sparring? How much contact and how hard? How much time in do you think they should have first? What are some ways to ramp people up to using hard contact? Too early and there are some that get gunshy, just covering up and running all the time. I believe I saw a kid ruined early in his training by getting paired with a guy who went too hard all the time, it just blew his confidence all to heck. I thought it was bad teaching. I've had instructors use contact drills to the body first to get people ready, as well as using foam rubber thingies for sparring, they can't hurt you much, but you feel what its like to get hit in the head and so you don't freeze as much when it actually happens. Are these good ideas? What do you do. Thanks in advance for any answers.

IMO, the student should have a good understanding of footwork, blocking, striking, kicking, etc., before they begin to spar. Once this begins to take place, they should gradually begin the sparring phase. This should be done with a more advanced person and someone who has their best interest in mind. To step into the ring in the beginning, with someone who's goal is to hurt them, not help them learn, etc. is going to be counter productive to their learning. There are of course, many different drills that the student can do to aid them in the ring.

Mike