What good is sport martial arts?
- Thread starter Kong Soo Do
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OP
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Good, I'm not looking to make an enemy
Yes, as full out as is safetly possible.
One of the things I personally detest...once a person is trained, is throwing a half-hearted punch two feet to the side of their head and leaving the arm there so they can grab it and pull off their favorite cool lock/flip/throw etc. That isn't doing anyone any good. It is teaching the bad guy to miss and giving the good guy a false sense of security. When they meet Mr. 'Don't-give-a-damn-about-your-cool-move' that doesn't know he's suppose to miss and leave his arm out there, and instead is throwing a barrage of punches at their face....it is a whole different ball game.
Learn it? Sure. Would the students retain anything meaningful? Not a chance, and certainly not enough to defend themselves with.
Daniel
Good, I'm not looking to make an enemy
Yes, as full out as is safetly possible.
One of the things I personally detest...once a person is trained, is throwing a half-hearted punch two feet to the side of their head and leaving the arm there so they can grab it and pull off their favorite cool lock/flip/throw etc. That isn't doing anyone any good. It is teaching the bad guy to miss and giving the good guy a false sense of security. When they meet Mr. 'Don't-give-a-damn-about-your-cool-move' that doesn't know he's suppose to miss and leave his arm out there, and instead is throwing a barrage of punches at their face....it is a whole different ball game.
None of us are.
The highlighted text has been my biggest issue in a lot of dedicated self-defense systems. I always envisioned the way I'd practically apply a self-defense course as using "Uke and Tori" in a style almost like a Judo kata with more resistance.
miguksaram
Master of Arts
What would you base this assumption on?
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miguksaram
Master of Arts
The assumption that if a student went to an 8 hour seminar that they would not be able to retain anything nor use anything learned at the seminar to defend themselves.
Actually, I said "retain anything meaningful."
I said 'not enough to defend themselves with,' not that they couldn't use anything to attempt to defend themselves.
Such a class would provide a good base to start from, but for student who doesn't know self defense (i.e. a student with no previous training), a single eight hour seminar will not be enough to get them to the point where they can actually defend themselves with any sort of reliability. Eight hours is not enough to establish any kind of muscle memory with regards to technique.
Also, for a person with no prior training, an eight hour seminar will likely be too much information for them to absorb, which is why they will not retain anything meaningful.
Given eight hours, if I were fluent in Korean, I could teach an Korean person to phonetically read English. But they will not retain anything meaningful because in order to effectively read, you have to be able to do more than just sight-sound letters.
On the flip side, I learned to phonetically read hangeul in less than eight hours. I have spent the past year improving my knowledge of Korean language, but have not taken a formal class. Guess where my fluency in Korean is?
So yes, I can 'read' Korean if you count being able to read it phonetically. No comprehension outside of MA terms, commands used in the dojo, and a small assortment of words and phrases (hello, goodbye, thankyou, your welcome, see you tomorrow and see you next week). I would hardly call that 'reading.'
The student of an eight hour seminar might remember helpful things, such as don't be jabbering on the phone while you walk to your car in the mall parking lot at night, don't park your car in the darkest corner of the parking lot, etc., but those are not specifically self defense. More along the lines of good sense.
But if you are talking about defending oneself in a violent attack, a single eight hour seminar is not going to literally teach you self defense in any way that will enable you to retain it in any meaningful quantity.
If you have in mind a karate black belt going to such a seminar to learn self defense, that is different; they've hopefully spent the last two to four years learning self defense. They already know how to defend themselves. The seminar may help them to better connect their training to scenarios that occur outside of the school and may give them some useful tips, but at that point, they are building upon knowledge that they already have.
Again, what assumption?
Daniel
mastercole
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Good, I'm not looking to make an enemy
Yes, as full out as is safetly possible.
One of the things I personally detest...once a person is trained, is throwing a half-hearted punch two feet to the side of their head and leaving the arm there so they can grab it and pull off their favorite cool lock/flip/throw etc. That isn't doing anyone any good. It is teaching the bad guy to miss and giving the good guy a false sense of security. When they meet Mr. 'Don't-give-a-damn-about-your-cool-move' that doesn't know he's suppose to miss and leave his arm out there, and instead is throwing a barrage of punches at their face....it is a whole different ball game.
Do you and your students train under the constant threat of being knocked out by any type of full force blows to the head? Meaning, are students allowed to knock each other out during any part of these training sessions?
ralphmcpherson
Senior Master
We train this way to a degree. If we are doing any defences against a head punch, for instance, the attacker has to throw the punch full speed with accuracy and actually try to hit their opponent. Basically, if you dont move/defend you will be hit very hard or maybe knocked out. I found this out the hard way recently and ended up with a black eye from my 7th dan instructor. There were no hard feelings from my end, because if I ever have to use this stuff for real the 'bad guy' will be trying to knock me senseless. Other physical activities train this way so I have no problems with MA adapting the same philosophy. A cricketer does not spend hours in the nets batting against slow bowling because they know when a real game happens the bowler will bowl at 150klm/h. When rugby league players do tackling practice they hit hard, same as in the real game. I have no problems with MA training this way.
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Yes, depending on the drill, and the level of the student. In these instances safety equipment is used as well as a saftey person to intervene if necessary. It is good to go full bore, but not to the point that someone is needlessly hurt. We all have families and jobs etc.
In all my years of training, I can only remember a few instances of minor injuries. And they weren't even in a full out session. In one, two of my assistance were training throws and got to close to the wall, the result of which was a hole in the wall. But it was only dry wall so no one was injured. In another, we were doing handstand push ups and one student accidentally struck another with his foot when going back to his feet.
The last one involved me personally. I was doing some light sparring with one of my students who was a pretty good kicker. He tried to put a solid side snap kick into my ribs. Because of some other training I've received, my instinct is to raise my leg and take the kick on my shin (as I cover that side of my body) because I've conditioned it over the years in some hard style training with coke bottles, bowling pins, tire and shin kicks etc. Well, his snap kick met my shin block and it opened up a pretty good gash on his leg. I felt pretty bad but was a little impressed as I hadn't done leg conditioning in many years.
But no one fortunately ever got knocked out or really hurt. We try to be as real as possible, but also maintain as high a level of safety as possible. Maybe an occassional bruise or pulled muscle but that's really been about it.
We like people who defend by lifting their leg up like that. When you are up like that, it is very difficult to move, and generally your weight goes back, with the motion of the raised leg.... It opens up all kinds of responses once we see that tendency.
Why the "light sparring"? Isn't that a sport thing? I thought you were all about self defense?
ralphmcpherson
Senior Master
We, too, are all about self defence but light sparring still has its place and is an important part of the curriculum. We use light sparring to work on footwork, distancing, reflexes, trying new things that you may not attempt in hard contact and generally 'learning' to spar. We use hard contact to figure out what actually works for us personally. The two can co-exist, there is no problem with that. Just because a club's main focus is self defence does not mean that 'light' sparring occasionally does not have its place. Students also need to be eased into hard contact, you cant expect a white belt to pad up and jump in the ring and go hard straight off as that can lead to poor technique, confidence problems and injuries.
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mastercole
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How about knockouts during freestyle, non-pre arranged segments, I would call it free sparring.
Are students allowed to go for the knockout in freestyle, non-pre arranged sparring or segments?
OP
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We may have a slightly different perspective or picture when saying freestyle sparring. To some, that would be two people facing each other at perhaps arms length distance and waiting for a signal to begin. Then they try to punch or kick each other. Or something along those lines. That is one perspective.
We are different in some regards. I'm not sure freestyle sparring is an apt description, but it is fine for the example. We might begin a scenario walking into a room and the lights are dimmed and then the person is attacked from the side. Or, we might start to good guy already on the ground wedged into a corner with the bad guy standing over him/her. We might start it sitting in a car or sitting in a chair or standing at an ATM or a counter. Each scenario is different. In one, it may be a carjacking at knife point. In another a couple of 'drunks' that have walked into the store and start hassling you. The bad guy is going to try to do whatever the bad guy is going to do in real life (within reason for safety considerations). If he's using a 'knife' it might be a magic marker or one of the knifes with the white chalk at the end or one of the knives that shock you when contact is made. If he's a drunk he might try to plow you over with wild haymakers.
Sometimes we'll film it for later review which is a good training tool. Learn from mistakes in training instead of in real life. So far, bumps and bruises and the occasional getting 'racked' but nothing major.
WC_lun
Senior Master
There are may advantages to sport martial arts. They promote physical health, in many cases respect for other people, give an outlet for competition, promote confidence, share an interest with others, promote internal drive, and develop an eye for range and speed. Other than these things, sport martial art are usually also just plain fun. The only issue I have with sport arts is when they are promoted to students as something they are not. For example, when Olympic type TKD is promoted as an effecient, safe, and effective self defense art. Its a great sport, but does not qualify as effecient or safe as a self-defense platform. Though the physical skills learned would be helpful.
We require students to compete at least once per year inorder to advance in rank. Competition as well as demonstrations introduce stress and a measure of unknown factors that help the student to mature and grow as well as learning to function under fire which is helpful in developing confindence for self defence.
While almost 100% of our students have placed at something over the last 16 years when competing wining is not the focus but effort, respect for self and officials and doing your personal best is what matters.
For us traveling to even the closest tournament cost at least a $1,000 dollars and over $2,000 to go to another state so we choose to go to cultural open tournaments like all NW which is two tournaments in one TKD and all styles weopons and both contact and point fighting so the students can get exposure to other people and styles.
Next is the area where can the students have access to the most things to do Zoo, Movies, swimming, Culture ect.
I have alot of abused students even to adult that need to gain the ability to defend themselves in some cases even crying under stress during competition but in the end or second round of fighting the result is being able to overcome that and function so they are not a victim the rest of their lives which unfortunately many choose to be and die at young ages or in and out of institutions the rest of thier lives.
Martial art should be balanced using any and all methods to serve the needs of the whole person but age and health apropriate. rediculous having people over 40 over 50 told they must fight like a 20 year old? They should learn how to work with what they have and build on that. Healthy full contact helps develop deliberate penetrating technique crutial to self defense simple strait forward best thing I have heard lately is you do what you practice ,exactly
While almost 100% of our students have placed at something over the last 16 years when competing wining is not the focus but effort, respect for self and officials and doing your personal best is what matters.
For us traveling to even the closest tournament cost at least a $1,000 dollars and over $2,000 to go to another state so we choose to go to cultural open tournaments like all NW which is two tournaments in one TKD and all styles weopons and both contact and point fighting so the students can get exposure to other people and styles.
Next is the area where can the students have access to the most things to do Zoo, Movies, swimming, Culture ect.
I have alot of abused students even to adult that need to gain the ability to defend themselves in some cases even crying under stress during competition but in the end or second round of fighting the result is being able to overcome that and function so they are not a victim the rest of their lives which unfortunately many choose to be and die at young ages or in and out of institutions the rest of thier lives.
Martial art should be balanced using any and all methods to serve the needs of the whole person but age and health apropriate. rediculous having people over 40 over 50 told they must fight like a 20 year old? They should learn how to work with what they have and build on that. Healthy full contact helps develop deliberate penetrating technique crutial to self defense simple strait forward best thing I have heard lately is you do what you practice ,exactly
