You're missing the point. For years now there's been an argument, "Karate doesn't have 'grappling' in it." And Karateka always reply, "Oh yes it does!" That's what's bullcrap. The incessant argument. I want it to go away and replace "Yuh-huh!" "Nuh-ugh" with actual facts.
Now, my personal experience is that the Karateka I've encountered & trained with have limited or no grappling, but maybe I just haven't met the right ones. Maybe there are lots and tons of Karate styles which include all kinds of grappling. I'd love for that to be true. But show me.
Just saying, "feel free to not read" is the same thing as saying, "your experience is indicative of Karate as a whole." Instead, try answering the question. Say, "The Sokitume style I study has a list of 12 throws, 10 joint locks, 8 chokes, and 9 ground holding techniques. We practice them regularly and are required to know and demonstrate an increasing number for each belt-grade test. We are free to use them after X belt-grade in sparring and people regularly do so."
I'd love to hear that.
Peace favor your sword,
Kirk
Honestly, I come from a Korean Karate background, and I'm somewhat familiar with the repertoire of many of the karate and karate-based schools in the area. All of them have grappling. None of them have comprehensive grappling, unless you count schools that
also teach a separate grappling art as part of the curriculum.
In my own style, as in most kata based styles, the art is, to a certain extent, what you make it, so I'll take the set of 100 applied techniques that everyone is required to learn and practice and test on, rather than the 381713847183 applied techniques that various individuals in my system practice and train, because otherwise, well, that's just chaos.
Out of one hundred formal applied techniques, the grappling versus striking, and standing versus ground fighting counts are as follows, as offense, as defense, and as an offense to which you are to learn to defend. The count will be extremely rough, and will likely exceed 100, since most of the drills have two or three parts, often with multiple possible classifications. The techniques which involve going to the ground begin at green belt (out of white, yellow, green, red). A swift moving, dedicated adult student should be able to easily reach green belt within the first year and a half:
Standing strikes and parries/blocks/traps/etc:||||-||||-||||-||||-||||-|||- FINAL COUNT - 29
Standing kicks and parries/blocks/traps/etc:||||-||||-||||-||||-||||- FINAL COUNT - 25
Ground fighting strikes and parries/blocks/traps/etc: ||||-||||-|||| FINAL COUNT - 14
Ground fighting kicks and parries/blocks/traps/etc: ||||-|| FINAL COUNT - 7
Standing armbars/locks: ||||-||||-||||-||||-||||-||||-|| FINAL COUNT - 32
Ground fighting armbars/locks: ||||-||| FINAL COUNT - 8
Standing head controls/chokes (RNC, Guillotine, reverse guillotine, Full nelson, etc.): ||||-||| FINAL COUNT - 8
Grounded head controls/chokes: |||| FINAL COUNT - 4
Standing sweeps/throws:||||-||||-||||-||||-||||-| FINAL COUNT - 26
Ground fighting sweeps: ||||-|| FINAL COUNT - 7
Standing leg locks/bars: || FINAL COUNT - 2
Ground fighting leg locks/bars: || FINAL COUNT - 2
Ground positions (Mount/Guard/Side-Control): ||||-||||-|||| FINAL COUNT - 14
Tackles/bearhugs, etc: ||||-|| FINAL COUNT - 7
Chair-based striking: ||||-|| FINAL COUNT - 7
Chair-based grappling: ||||-| FINAL COUNT - 6
Grappling against a wall: ||||-||||- FINAL COUNT - 10
Mixed Grappling and striking in a car: ||||-||||- FINAL COUNT - 10
Techniques while being dragged: ||||-| FINAL COUNT - 6
I suddenly realize, thinking that this sounds more grappling/ground heavy than I expected, that part way through counting, I switched from classifying entire drills to classifying the requisite pieces, but I'm too lazy to re-do it all.
So, at a very,
very rough count, I find that 97 out 100 techniques include some form of striking, so obviously striking plays a large role. However, I also counted, roughly, 137 grappling techniques, both standing and grounded. I counted 129 instances of standing technique, versus only 69 instances of grounded techniques.
Anyway, by this rough count, over half the drills end with at least one partner on the ground, and exactly 1/8th of the drills begin and end with both partners on the ground.
The primary teachers in the style come from entirely karate backgrounds, with the exception of a little Tai Shing Pekwar in one, and some Taiji Chuan and Bagua in another. I can't say if this level of grappling is typical of many karate schools, but it certainly isn't out of the ordinary around here. I personally haven't worked with anyone who teaches applications mainly of a punch/block nature, with the exception of a Shoalin Kempo Karate place I attended briefly.
I know chair-defenses extend back to early Japanese Karate with the original Shotokan. I'm assuming the car-stuff is slightly newer...
So again, my system is not terribly traditional, (I mean, it's American from Korea from Japan from Okinawa), but it's also not terribly mixed. When I've visited other schools, or otherwise interacted, I never feel like my school is more grapple-heavy, generally speaking.
And yes, it's apparent that we're more strikers than grapplers, and also that we are much more stand-up than ground, and that our ground is mainly anti-ground. But I think it's also fair to say that we
do grapple, and that we don't ignore the ground.
Be interesting to see some other Karate-ka TKDers give some rough breakdowns.