Entries in Martial Arts Category

You know, every martial arts instructor has those little things that they often say and every student knows them by heart.

Well, I've been thinking about what I wanted to do with the Martial Arts section of my blog. I'm not knowledgeable enough to write a weekly (or even monthly) column on something related to the arts, so I decided to just begin using it as a way to keep track of these little things that I hear from an instructor, read in a magazine or whatever hits me.

This week, we discussed a self-defense technique that was designed to knock the wind out of an attacker. Many people asked if this was the appropriate move (as opposed to snapping the guys neck for example). My instructor explained that this was a very valid option especially given the scenario that he had outlined.

Then he went into his explanation of why:

If you can't breath, you can't fight.
If you can't walk, you can't fight.
If you can't see, you can't fight.

This response takes away the opponent's ability to breath, even if it is only temporary. During that time, it will be difficult if not impossible for the opponent to fight and it gives you ample time to do whatever else needs to be done (i.e., leave the area).

I was talking with a fellow martial artist the other day and we began to discuss what we would do in a variety of situations involving weapons. We came down to three generic situations that we thought would cover most things that one would encounter in the real word.

First, what would you do when someone that you are involved in a confrontation with indicates that he has a gun. The answer that we came up with was simple. Assume he's telling the truth and act quickly so that he can't pull the gun; knock him out, then search him for the gun. Why? If the guy pulls the gun, then you're in some potential trouble (see below), if you kill the guy because he said he had a gun but actually did not, you may not feel so good about it in the morning (or on the day of the trial).

The next escalation would be when a guy pulls a gun. In this scenario, it's clear that this guy is out to kill you. You must react fist. Running away is not an option because it's very difficult to outrun a bullet. If you are close enough to do so, taking the opponent out is the best course of action. If you are not close enough, you have to buy some time and close the gap.

Another situation is when a person pulls a knife. In this situation, the best option is to run away. The knife can only hurt you if you are close. If you can get out of harms way, you're safe and ultimately that's what the end goal should be.

12/17/2008

Last night was my first night back in karate class in a couple of months. The class was a good one for me to get back in the groove of things. We worked on charts, the very basic elements of our art.

One part of chart two is leg stretches. When we got to this point, someone asked "Why do we stretch?" and "Why is it better to stretch after you have warmed-up?".

Have you ever picked up a rubber band and watched it snap as you stretched it around something? The same kind of thing can happen to our muscles. If we take them cold and pull them to their limit, they will break. Muscles with a greater range of motion are less likely to experience tears when used actively.

Take two identical rubber bands. Let one of them sit. Subject the second one to daily "exercise" in the form of stretching it every day. You want to stretch it so that it gets a good stretch, but not to the point of breaking. Try this for a couple of months. At the end of that period, compare the two rubber bands. Are they the same length? What happens if you put both of them on your fingers and stretch them at the same time? Which one breaks first? My guess is that the act of stretching the second rubber band has resulted in it being longer and having a greater range of motion.

This results of stretching the second rubber band is the same thing that you want to accomplish by stretching your muscles.

Stretching stimulates blood flow to the muscles helping muscles heal after a hard workout.

We had a good day at the Family Day.

It was at the Dutch Valley Church of God located at 1416 Breda Drive in Knoxville.

Many significant promotions happened on this day. Master James Ogle was promoted to 9th Dan, Rick Breeden was promoted to 6th Dan, and Daniel Johnson and I were promoted to 2nd Dan among many others.

During the seminar, we had some instruction in Sambo and a few arm bars by Master McMahan.

Then Brad Walker, Chris Hawkins and Ron Tolliver talked a bit about knife, gun and other weapons. (http://mckeehan.homeip.net/martialarts/self-defense/BasicGunDefense.html)

Mast James Ogle discussed and demonstrated some basic drills for understanding and disrupting another person's balance.

Sensei Mike Allan demonstrated and lead us thru some basics with Eskima sticks. We discussed the 12 basic strikes with the sticks and then practiced with a few basic techniques.

Master Rick Breeden told us about TESTing ourself with kata.
T - Think before you run the kata
E - Eye contact
S - Strength - run all kata with appropriate strength like you are competing each time - perfect practice
T - Tempo or Timing - kata have an ebb and flow...be mindful of it.

Sensei Cofer was the last session of the day and he presented the 5 reasons he stays in Karate.

It was a great day and I had a lot of fun with it.

Welcome to The Progressive Martial Arts Academy

I came across an advertisement for this event in the June 2004 Black Belt magazine.

It says:

Learn from an incredible roster of world-class instructrors

Jeet Kune Do concepts
Filipino Martial Arts
Groundfighting

Train and network with Martial Artists from all over the world - and take home an incredible wealth of information!

Learn how to integrate JKD, Filipino Martial Arts and Groundfighting into your Martial Arts curriculum.

Saturday we had a good training session at Ogle's dojo in Madisonville.

We had about 15 black belts and a couple of under black-belt level guys in attendance.

We had sessions on New Weapons, Sport Kumite, Isshinryu Weapons and Full-contact fighting.

New Weapons
Master Pete Mills lead the first session. He demonstrated the use of the Kama. Then he demonstrated the use of the Chinese Broad sword.

Sport Kumite
Daniel Johnson lead the second session in place of Rick Breeden. Rick had a case of the flu and had sent Daniel with his outline of what to discuss. Daniel did a great job presenting Rick's information about Sport Kumite. He began by showing the group a beautiful orange and a very ugly ugly fruit. He asked which one looked better. Everyone agreed that the orange was the better looking. After this agreement, Daniel produced a bowl of orange/ugly fruit pealed and sectioned - no one could tell which was which. Exactly his point. When you step into a ring to compete, you can't tell if your opponent is good based simply on his external appearance. You must always assume that your opponent is at least as good as you are and it's safe to assume he's better.

Daniel continued the discussion by explaining that to win a kumite match, you must be agressive. Matches are not won by being defensive. You have to take chances to open up the opponent for a score.

We concluded the sport kumite session with some examples of agressive combinations to open the opponent up for a scoring technique.

Back fist, reverse punch.
Back leg crescent kick, chamber (not sitting the foot down), side kick.

Weapons Training
Next, we were divided into groups to work on weapons katas that we had not learned yet. I worked on SHISHI NO KUN. I had not woorked on it at all before this day. I worked with Master Pete Mills. He showed me about 50% of the kata. That was a large amount of the kata to learn, especially for a 20 minutes period. At the end of the day, I worked on it some more with Master James Ogle. With continued work I think I will be able to retain what I was shown.

Full-Contact Training
The last session of the day was lead by Master James Ogle. During this session, he showed techniques that he found were used in full-contact training.

Three punches. The lead-hand jab, the upper cut, and the reverse punch.
Three kicks. The round kick (delivered to the thigh), the straight "push" kick (delivered to an area above the groin, but below the belt), and the heal kick (delivered to the lower portion of the leg).

For there, we worked on these techniques with partners. After working these for a little while, we put pads on and began to work on them in a real situaiton.

Our first match was punches only. Second - punches and kicks. Third - punches, kicks and take-downs. Fourth - punches, kicks, take-downs and submissions. And lastly, full-contact sparing. He did prohibit hitting the head during all of these rounds, but other contact was full contact.

All-in-all, a very fun and educational day.