Let me cover 2 things, Ist, Bruce ""GAVE" Rick Nelson a karate black belt, Again words without knowledge are noise, Were you there, I was, NOBODY GAVE RICK ANYTHING, For his era Rick was a good black belt, All of our rank requirements were Written out, Rick trained 2 nights a week after class, And as one of Bruce's assistant instructors on occasion I was asked to assist, As a throwing dummy, Heavy bag and twisting/choking dummy, And for this era Rick was pretty good, He passed all his forms and basics tests and entered the inter school tournaments to earn points for his sparring competition, Rick was in good shape and learned very fast, In this era the most important thing for testing were the katas/forms, Rick was not going to make anybody forget Mike Stone or Pat Burleson, But he was a good black belt, Rick trained NOT to be an expert, He saw karate as a fun hobby, Just as he did tennis and trapeze work, Which he also did, And as good self defense training.
2nd. As far as Bruce's training, I st As has been said, His parents were both judo black belt, This is before the era of specialization, the "judo" of the day was the full spectrum of martial arts, Sure the judo man did the throws and falls and ground work that we think of today as judo, PLUS they did atemi waza, Using the hands and feet to strike the nerve centers and pressure points of the opponent, Think karate, Also the holds, Locks, Chokes and escape from holds that was the old style jiu jitsu/aikido, The schools that the tegner's worked from were among the most respected of the day, There were always traveling Japanese black belts coming through, And in that era there was not the same level of little children being jealous of each other, There were MARTIAL ARTISTS sharing with each other, Many of these martial artist of all styles were willing to share and to improve all those who were true martial artists, And 1 last thing, I do know a little something about martial arts fighting, Some of those I've trained with and learned from include, Joe Lewis, Mike Stone (seminars ) Howard Jackson and Howard's boxing trainer Julio Flores, The one thing these men have in commen is there fighters, And while I'm not a great fighter, Nothing I've seen from these men was that different than what I learned from that "fraud" Bruce Tegner, Did they do it better, Hell yes, I knew these men when they were among the best in the world, I started with Bruce in 1959/60 Long after he had retired from competition,
PS, I always hear this garbage that Bruce was the Chris Pisso/ltx of his era, That's bull, When I started training in June 1959 My first course was $29.00 for 12 one hour classes, I then upgraded to 30 classes for 59.00, Once I was allowed to join the judo club it was $10.00 per month or $100.00 per year, And lets talk about being commercial, After class there was at lest a one hour practice time, Watched over by the black and brown belts, Compare that to the schools now where they run you through like cattle, Your 50 minute hour is over, Now get out of the way so the next herd oops class can come through.
Again for those of you having a kenpo discussion I'm sorry to intrude.
