kata sequence question

[twendkata71]

I can see where that would be uncomfortable. A kenpo stylist trying to a Shotokan kata. Benny Uriquidez(former world champion kickboxer) combined American kenpo and Shotokan karate. I am not sure how he did that. I am sure he had to twek the stances a bit.He started out in Shotokan and ended up in kenpo. I don't know if he kept any of the kata.
The deep stances of Shotokan where meant for training anyway. Funakoshi did not expect his students to fight in a deep back stance or horse stance in a real confrontation. If you see the older pictures of Funakoshi his stances are the higher Okinawan stances which are better for closequarter fighting. I have all of the Shotokan kata on CD rom. I cannot download it to this forum for some reason. It comes with the kata drawn on a chart as well to print out and put on the walls. I have tried to burn a copy for people,but it seems not to take. Perhaps the people that I bought it from made it that way so that people couldnl't just copy it and resale it.
I had planned on doing my own kata dvd series this year and had it in production,but the guy that I was working on it with was in a bad motorcycle accident and that put everything on hold.
If I get back to filming I will let anyone interested know.

 

[IWishToLearn]

My first style was Yasashii Do Martial Arts - which I was recently notified I'll be promoted to 3rd Dan/Sensei in on the 15th of this month -which I actively and passionately pursued for seven years. Numerous times I was told by peers, instructors, and students that I had the best understanding of and performance of forms in our system - which I attribute to the talent of my instructors who trained me. I was exposed to Kenpo in 2004, and fell in love with the logical approach to training, which said explicitly - this is what this move is for - with practicality in mind, rather than abstract definitions. I practiced both arts (in addition to traditional TKD simultaneously) up through summer of 2005, when I made the choice - or rather my body (having nastily herniated a disc in my back) made the choice for me - to use basics and an art/science that is formulated in correct anatomical movement, rather than basics formulated for use in rice paddies over the past few centuries.

Where I was going with that - forgot - dern meds - was that even in the sparring matches in traditional systems - using the traditional fighting stances I still feel far too vulnerable now, and I got in trouble a lot for using something that felt stronger, stabler (is that a word?), and more efficient to use. Oh well =) To each their own.

 

[IWishToLearn]

For my forthcoming writeups I'm going to abbreviate stances and blocks to save me some writing :
LFS = Left Front Stance
LBS = Left Back Stance
LCS = Left Cat Stance
HS = Horse Stance

LLB = Left Low Block
LHB = Left High Block
LKHB = Left Knife Hand Block
LRB = Left Reinforced (Outward) Block (done with the radial bones, palm up, rib height or higher)


Peian Shodan Write Up
1)Begin in Yoi position.
2)Turn 90 degrees moving left leg to LFS facing 9:00 simultaneously executing a LLB.
3)Move R leg forward (9:00) to RFS simultaneously executing Right Reverse Punch.
4)Spinning clockwise, move R leg to 3:00 to RFS simultaneously executing RLB.
5)Transitionary move: Draw R leg back to RCS simultaneously bringing your R hand across your chest, (like sweeping it from the low block across to your left hip, then up to your chest).
5a)Stomp your R foot into a right walking stance (rechambering left fist) simultaneously executing a right downward hammerfist strike to rib height.
6)Move L leg to 3:00 into LFS simultaneous with left reverse punch. (Kiai)
7)Turning counter-clockwise, move L leg to 12:00 to LFS simultaneous with LLB.
7a)Immediately after the LLB, execute a LHB.
8)Move R leg to 12:00 to RFS and execute a RHB.
9)Move L leg to 12:00 to LFS and execute a LHB.
10)Move R leg to 12:00 to RFS and execute a RHB. (Kiai!)
11)Spinning counter clockwise, move L leg to 3:00 into LFS simultaneous with LLB.
12)Move R leg forward to RFS simultaneous Right reverse punch.
13)Spinning clockwise, move R leg to 9:00 into RFS simultaneous with RLB.
14)Move L leg forward to LFS simultaneous Left reverse punch.
15)Move L leg to 6:00 into LFS simultaneous with LLB.
16)Move R leg forward to 6:00 to RFS simultaneous right reverse punch.
17)Move L leg forward to 6:00 to LFS simultaneous left reverse punch.
18)Move R leg forward to 6:00 to RFS simultaneous right reverse punch. (Kiai!)
19)Spinning counter-clockwise, move L leg towards 9:00 to LBS simultaneous with LKHB.
20)Move R leg to 10:30 to RBS simultaneous with RKHB.
21)Move R leg to 3:00 to RBS simultaneous RKHB.
22)Move L leg to 1:30 to LBS simultaneous with LKHB. (Kiai!).
23)Await close command - close.
24)Bow.

 

[exile]

For reference, in Kenpo we utilize a LOT of simultaneous strikes to a lower body and an upper body target. It allows us to seriously create damage quicker and really plays haywire with someone when they get hit from 3 places simultaneously.

I've noticed that in the videos that Kenpojujitsu3 has been making available on MT---it's a very different approach to strikes from what you usually see even in sophisticated bunkai for TKD, where the interpretations tend to be, one `terminal' strike, then another (if the first didn't do it)---the extreme rapidity and multiple striking actions of the `defender's' limbs is very impressive, but at times hard to follow because of the speed of delivery.

Now then...

One of your comments I'm confused on - where you stated someone told you a backfist is code for a straight punch.

Not always. It's just that in TKD, as in other karate-based styles, the forms usually involve concealed techniques (I don't mean `hidden moves', but just moves that are deliberately and systematically mislabeled so that the original intent is disguised) and can't be taken literally, and to make things harder, decoding the meaning of a given technique is usually `context-sensitive' in that it depends what other technques precede and follow the one you're interested in. A backfist might really be a backfist. Or it might be a throw (hair-grab/ear-grab/head hook) where the action itself doesn't result in impact by the knuckles of the fist, but rather involves a pulling of the attacker's head as part of the throw. Or it might be a coded front punch, as Kwan Jang suggests. The interpretation hinges on what makes sense given the preceding and following moves in the sequence (usually a sequence corresponding to a complete technique is two to four moves long, at least in what I've seen so far, in both TKD and Okinawan/Japanese karate).

If I perform a side kick with my left leg (to the knee or elsewhere) and then attempt a straight punch with the same hand...where do you generate any torque or any hip rotation for power? Even if someone drops their head, from the position these forms are taught from, you're standing face to face - so with that granted - you'd be punching them on the top of their head. Clarify this for me?

I suspect that it's not the top of the head that's the target in this case, but the neck under the jaw. And here is where something fairly important in the interpetation has been left obscure: there is a `reverse punch' that precedes the problematic sequence, with a right-fist chambering that would precede the low-to-mid kick and the subsequent front punch, on Kwan Jang's interpretation. That `chambering' is probably a muchimi technique corresopnding to a seize-and-pull that pulls the attacker into the defender's damaging sidekick, and the defender doesn't let go. The attacker's whole upper body is lowered by the low kick, and he's still being pulled forward as the defender's weight comes down on the left leg. The front left punch to the attacker's neck right below the jaw coincides with the forward projection of the defender's weight, with the attacker's very vulnerable neck/lower head brought into range by the effect of the kick in tandem with the pull of the so-called `chambering' right fist.

However - the whipping backfist strike combination does present a much better target opportunity - since you can direct that backfist horizontally to the side of a dropped head or you can be really mean and use more of a vertical hammerfist strike as he's coming down and meet him in the middle. Poor guy.

Nice idea, Steve---well, maybe nice isn't the right word, eh? But effective... I'm going to try out both KJ's and your scenarios next time I can find someone in my class who's willing to let me experiment on them. I'm still trying to crack this particular mystery---there are a lot of moves in Palgwe Oh Jang that I don't don't know how to read, need to play around with the possibilities before I can be sure of any of this. Thanks very much for your input!

 

[IWishToLearn]

I've noticed that in the videos that Kenpojujitsu3 has been making available on MT---it's a very different approach to strikes from what you usually see even in sophisticated bunkai for TKD, where the interpretations tend to be, one `terminal' strike, then another (if the first didn't do it)---the extreme rapidity and multiple striking actions of the `defender's' limbs is very impressive, but at times hard to follow because of the speed of delivery.



Not always. It's just that in TKD, as in other karate-based styles, the forms usually involve concealed techniques (I don't mean `hidden moves', but just moves that are deliberately and systematically mislabeled so that the original intent is disguised) and can't be taken literally, and to make things harder, decoding the meaning of a given technique is usually `context-sensitive' in that it depends what other technques precede and follow the one you're interested in. A backfist might really be a backfist. Or it might be a throw (hair-grab/ear-grab/head hook) where the action itself doesn't result in impact by the knuckles of the fist, but rather involves a pulling of the attacker's head as part of the throw. Or it might be a coded front punch, as Kwan Jang suggests. The interpretation hinges on what makes sense given the preceding and following moves in the sequence (usually a sequence corresponding to a complete technique is two to four moves long, at least in what I've seen so far, in both TKD and Okinawan/Japanese karate).



I suspect that it's not the top of the head that's the target in this case, but the neck under the jaw. And here is where something fairly important in the interpetation has been left obscure: there is a `reverse punch' that precedes the problematic sequence, with a right-fist chambering that would precede the low-to-mid kick and the subsequent front punch, on Kwan Jang's interpretation. That `chambering' is probably a muchimi technique corresopnding to a seize-and-pull that pulls the attacker into the defender's damaging sidekick, and the defender doesn't let go. The attacker's whole upper body is lowered by the low kick, and he's still being pulled forward as the defender's weight comes down on the left leg. The front left punch to the attacker's neck right below the jaw coincides with the forward projection of the defender's weight, with the attacker's very vulnerable neck/lower head brought into range by the effect of the kick in tandem with the pull of the so-called `chambering' right fist.



Nice idea, Steve---well, maybe nice isn't the right word, eh? But effective... I'm going to try out both KJ's and your scenarios next time I can find someone in my class who's willing to let me experiment on them. I'm still trying to crack this particular mystery---there are a lot of moves in Palgwe Oh Jang that I don't don't know how to read, need to play around with the possibilities before I can be sure of any of this. Thanks very much for your input!

It's all good. I put the Peian Shodan write up up today. I might do Nidan - but I'm tired .

 

[exile]

It's all good. I put the Peian Shodan write up up today. I might do Nidan - but I'm tired .

Hey guy, sounds to me like you've been running on nothing but nervous energy for a couple of days. Get some sleep. I appreciate very much all the work you've, hope I can reciprocate at one point, really. There's always another day, eh? I'm interested in what I can take from kenpo and apply to both learning and teaching my own art, and all your comments and observations have been very helpful.

 

[exile]

The deep stances of Shotokan where meant for training anyway. Funakoshi did not expect his students to fight in a deep back stance or horse stance in a real confrontation. If you see the older pictures of Funakoshi his stances are the higher Okinawan stances which are better for closequarter fighting.

There's an interesting parallel here to the difference between the Palgwe and the Taegeuk hyungs in TKD: the Palgwes use deep stances---my legs burn when I do them; my instructor is WTF but doesn't care much for the Taegeuks, so we do the Palgwes, the deeper the better---and as you pointed out earlier, we're talking basically about a Korean variant of the Heian kata (the Japanese, not the original Okinawan, since the Korean Kwan masters learned in Japan, mostly Shotokan) when we talk about the Palgwes. The Taegeuks in contrast have much higher stances, the standard descriptions talk about `walking stances'---really high, much more compatible with current Olympic-style competition practice. I'd always thought that the deep stances were the traditional ones, for this reason---what you're saying is, they started out high, got deeper in Shotokan (and then got higher again in the Korean development of karate as competition in the ring become more central to the direction of the `official' MA).

I had planned on doing my own kata dvd series this year and had it in production,but the guy that I was working on it with was in a bad motorcycle accident and that put everything on hold.

Twendkata---if you make it, I will buy it, that's a promise---keep us posted on this project, OK?

 

[Brandon Fisher]

There is a lot of Korean kata that resembles the Okinawan / Japanese kata. Much of it was based in the Okinawan / Japanese systems as a result of Japan's control over Korea for so many years.

 

[twendkata71]

I had also planned to do specialize kata video's. Per the request of the person buying. I have learned and cataloged 40 traditional Japanese and Okinawan kata. I know that is a lot. The Shito ryu style has 50 or more. Not all students learn that many and that is up to the individual. I started learning so many kata basically to improve my referee skill. So that I would some reference of different kata when I was judging. It also gives me a large reference library if you will for learning techniques, which in turn means I have more to teach my students. Many of the kata that I have learned are different versions of some of the kata. First I would learn the Japanese kata then go back and learn the older Okinawan versions.
It will take me the rest of my life to fully learn this many kata and perfect them, if perfection is possible. Most styles and systems average between twelve and 18 kata. Shotokan has 26.
Let me know which Japanese kata that you are interested in.
I enjoy watching the Chinese kung fu and kenpo forms. Many of the Chinese forms are extremely complex. Shows you where the original Okinawan kata comes from.
My thing is research and learning. The more I learn the more I want to learn.

 

[exile]

I had also planned to do specialize kata video's. Per the request of the person buying. I have learned and cataloged 40 traditional Japanese and Okinawan kata. I know that is a lot. The Shito ryu style has 50 or more. Not all students learn that many and that is up to the individual. I started learning so many kata basically to improve my referee skill. So that I would some reference of different kata when I was judging. It also gives me a large reference library if you will for learning techniques, which in turn means I have more to teach my students. Many of the kata that I have learned are different versions of some of the kata. First I would learn the Japanese kata then go back and learn the older Okinawan versions.

It will take me the rest of my life to fully learn this many kata and perfect them, if perfection is possible. Most styles and systems average between twelve and 18 kata. Shotokan has 26.

Let me know which Japanese kata that you are interested in.

That is a lot of kata you've trained... the ones I'm particularly interested in are the Pinan kata and some of the great Okinawan `classics' like Naihanchi, the ones that have been incorporated (sometimes in difficult-to-recognize form, as we've already talked about) in TKD hyungs. But I'm also interested in any kata where there's some good realistic bunkai available, because it seems to me that to learn how to probe MA patterns for their effective applications, you need to see how it's done for any arbitrary form off the shelf---whatever the principles are that you need to know in order to `read' kata, they're going to be applicable in general, whether or not the form you're looking at is one your do personally. So a lot of the kata analyses I've looked at involve Okinawan and Japanese forms that I don't do in TKD, but the rules being used to decipher them are going to be the same as for the TKD forms I do. The more you see how people are going about the task of recovering the combat applications of forms, the sharper you'll get yourself at doing it... I'm really still at the earliest stages of learning how to do that, so the more examples I get to see, the merrier.

I enjoy watching the Chinese kung fu and kenpo forms. Many of the Chinese forms are extremely complex. Shows you where the original Okinawan kata comes from.

I haven't seen any of the Chinese forms, but yes, that's what I've heard---very, very long and involved.

My thing is research and learning. The more I learn the more I want to learn.

I know just what you mean and feel exactly the same about it---there's no end to it.

 

[twendkata71]

That is what takes a long time with kata it decifering the bunkai and oyo in the kata. Once you learn the bunkai of the kata then they make sense.

 

[IWishToLearn]

The Japanese kata I learned in my traditional years are based in Shorinji Ryu karate - so they might be slightly different.


Heh - I'm not running on nervous energy - I'm stuck in a situation where I'm waiting on workman's comp to authorize surgery for my herniated disc. That makes me not able to sleep - a lot. So between trying to keep my work schedule and teaching 15-20 hours a week, and then trying to put in some practice time myself - I wind up running on adrenaline. And fatigue, for that matter. I really don't know where I was going with all this - enjoy I guess lol.

 

[exile]

The Japanese kata I learned in my traditional years are based in Shorinji Ryu karate - so they might be slightly different.


Heh - I'm not running on nervous energy - I'm stuck in a situation where I'm waiting on workman's comp to authorize surgery for my herniated disc. That makes me not able to sleep - a lot. So between trying to keep my work schedule and teaching 15-20 hours a week, and then trying to put in some practice time myself - I wind up running on adrenaline. And fatigue, for that matter. I really don't know where I was going with all this - enjoy I guess lol.

I'm a long-time insomniac---I have had bizarre sleep cycles all my life, find it impossible to sleep at all sometimes---but I've only rarely been in a situation where pain made it impossible for me to sleep. Those few times, though, were some of the roughest I've ever been through. Can you get something for the pain? Herniated disks run in my family---mother, uncle and cousin have all had them---have been lucky so far but it was scary to see how bad it was for them when it hit.

The business about the defender's grip on the attacker's wrist using the `chambering' move is really the key to this form interpreteation, I'm thinking. The defender's right hand has control of the attacker's left arm. A side kick to the groin, abdomen or maybe knee, with the attacker `glued' in place by the grip, will cause him to lower his upper body, and then the `punch' can be delivered---but maybe it's not even a strike. Suppose we interpret that hand move as a backfist-shaped motion. The motion of a backfist is the same as that of a certain throw, where the defender's left hand grips the hair or ear or head and yanks it further to the defender's left; or it could be an armbar, using a leftward-moving forearm to knock the attacker over the defender's advanced left leg after the mid/low kick has disrupted his balance... there's all kinds of possibilities there! The main point seems to me to be the sequential interpretation that Kwan Jang suggested---a foot strike followed by a hand/arm move, rather than literally simultaneous with it. Got to try all this out on some unsuspecting soul at my dojang...

 

[twendkata71]

Which kata are you talking about exile? It is late and I have not been online to keep up with what kata you are talking about.

 

[exile]

Which kata are you talking about exile? It is late and I have not been online to keep up with what kata you are talking about.

Twendkata---I'm sort of reverting here to one of the TKD hyungs, Palgwe Oh-Jang, where you have a left leg forward stance-->right fist reverse punch -->leftfist lunge punch (with no change in the stance at all so far). At this point, the hyung asks you to do a front leg side kick, i.e., get your weight back on your right leg and do a side kick with the lead (left) leg, at the same time carrying out a backfist strike with the left fist. One of our very experienced long-time TKD masters suggested that this form has deliberated conflated two moves that were supposed to occur in sequence, reinterpreting them as simultaneous. In particular, he thinks it likely that the simultaneous kick/backfist actions were intended to be sequential---first the side kick, then the backfist. This gives a move (which to me, anyway seemed perplexing) a plausible interpretation, along the lines in my previous post. The last move in the form right before the kick is the left fist lunge punch, with retraching and chambering of the defender's right fist, as usual. Suppose that that `retraction' is instead the defender pulling the attacker's left hand, which the defender has succeeded in grabbing, back towards the defender, anchoring the attacker and pullng him off balance, right into the defender's side kick to the side of the knee. This will be a relatively disabling strike, which the defender can follow up on by maintaing the grip on the attacker's arm and stepping inside to strike forward at the attacker's lowered head. But it might also be that the followup after the knee really is a backfist motion---not a strike, however, but a hair (or whatever) grab which allows the defender to pull the attacker's head leftward in the direction of the the defender's backfist motion. Or maybe it really is a backfist strike intended to allow the defender to convert the striking fist into the hand carrying out the indicated hairgrab. Any of these would leave the attacker's head and neck exposed to an elbow strike---and sure enough, the very next move after this `simultaneous backfist/side kick' is an elbow strike to where, on this scenario, the base of attacker's skull (and the side of his neck) would be.

I need to check out how well this would work against a noncompliant opponent. But it seems promising as an explanation for what is otherwise just a very perplexing simultaneous punch/kick move.

 

[twendkata71]

exile. I don't know if anyone has stated this on here before. But, If you want a good look at the pinan series or okinawan kata in general you may want to get a copy of "The essence of Okinawan karate" by Nagamine Shoshin Hanshi. It has a pictorial walk through of all of the kata of the Shorin ryu style. Just a thought. I have had several copies over the years. I find it a great reference guide.

 

[exile]

exile. I don't know if anyone has stated this on here before. But, If you want a good look at the pinan series or okinawan kata in general you may want to get a copy of "The essence of Okinawan karate" by Nagamine Shoshin Hanshi. It has a pictorial walk through of all of the kata of the Shorin ryu style. Just a thought. I have had several copies over the years. I find it a great reference guide.

Thanks very much for this reference, Twendkata---I'm a huge fan of the Pinan (or `Peian', as IWishToLearn has cleverly combined `Pinan' with `Heian' to form) kata. I've got some stuff on Okinawan bunkai by Javier Martinez, and am impressed with what I've seen, but it's really useful to have walk-throughs of the kata themselves. IWTL has very graciously posted some walk-throughs of the Pinans in another thread, btw---the more different versions of these beautiful kata we can study, the better, so your pointer to still another take on them is very much appreciated!