I can't get the link up at the moment, but on youtube there is a video of some club competition it looks like, called "DKK Retribution". My question is, why do people feel the need to put up video's that show Karate in a bad light? And another question is, what's with the funky names? I was expecting to see something brilliant, and it well, wasn't. What is this "retribution" stuff about?
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYnXOsx1_o8&feature=related]You[/ame] [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JN1sBYpwc7Q]mean[/ame] these?[/ame]. Just videos about karatekas throwing down in kumite. What's so bad about that?
Looks fun. I wish JKA-US Northwest did stuff like that. I probably wouldn't have left the organization. puma, why do you think that this is "karate in a bad light"?
Didn't look that bad to me. Some sloppy technique in those vids, but it looked like a local competition rather than national level, so you wouldn't expect everyone to be Shokei Matsui.
Well, there is no technique at all, no movement, nothing. I just don't see the reason really for posting something like that. Just wasn't impressed. I looked at the name, and thought, "This might be good." But it was just scruffy, slow and sloppy. Just a poor take off of Kyokushin.
Is your beef with the continuous-no-head-punches striking and groundfighting? Or are you okay with that sort of rule set, but you just wanted more talent at a local tournament? If the latter, could you post a YouTube videos of local karate tournaments that you think are worthy of posting to YouTube? Full-contact continuous kumite is always going to look "scruffier" and "sloppier" than light-contact point-stop...but that certainly doesn't mean it's inferior.
I'm okay with the rule set. Just didn't see the point of posting it really. Which answers the second question. I personally wouldn't post small local competitions on youtube as I really don't think it is a good idea. I wasn't sure by looking at this one if it was full or light contact to be honest. The write up said it was for points, and it was controlled. But they looked like they were really trying to hit each other hard, but no one was getting hurt, which if you are trying to hurt someone, isn't a good thing.
that would be the "control" part of things. hitting hard, but not too hard. presumably, points are only scored on legitimate hits, rather than simple contact. minding the antiquated ruleset, it didn't look bad.
I don't think they had control or power to be honest. Just my opinion, but their technique was too bad too have any control.
What makes it a bad idea? I can think of two benefits to doing so: (1) Free advertising for next time. If that was local to me, I'd participate next time they held it. Looked like a royally good time. (2) Everyone who participated in that tournament, and is shown on those videos, can send the link to their friends, post it on their Facebook pages, etc., saying "look what I did last weekend!" Seriously, out of all the pointless stuff on YouTube (fat guys who live in their mom's house dancing to O-Zone, myself using an air pump to spray air in the face of my six-month-old to make him laugh, etc), why do you think the line should be drawn at amateur martial arts tournaments/events? Looked like the sort of "light contact" at my old Shotokan dojo, not my most recent. The sort of "light contact" which means "hit them hard enough to really get their intention, but don't try to all-out KO them." I, personally, much prefer this version of light contact to the "hit the gi but not the body underneath" interpretation I've sometimes seen. Once again, could you post some videos of what you think kumite at a local amateur competition SHOULD look like?
As I said, I wouldn't post a video of a local competition, because 9 times out of 10 they look crap. Most people that are Karate-haters, and there are a lot of them rightly or wrongly, won't look at a video like this and think, "Oh, it is just a little club having a bit of fun." They will look at it and use it as another example of Karate being pants. As for advertising, I don't think it is impressive. Again, just my opinion. It doesn't make it look as though these students are getting particularly good instruction. And for those who want to post videos to their friends, fine. But it doesn't have to be on youtube, again in my opinion, showing poor quality Karate. These are my opinions. It is just the video was "hyped" if you like by the term "retribution". If it said, "Little competiton run by local club where the standard isn't great," it wouldn't bother me as much.
You want some cheese to go with that wine? Seriously, I don't understand what your problem is. What we've got here is an obviously amateur competition, evidenced by the fact that it's obviously held in a community center with like 30 people watching. It would be like someone getting on the internet and whining about an MMA smoker called "MMA slaughter house." It's just a name dude. Get over it. Additionally, I don't see how anyone could get the idea that karate is pants from this video. If you want me to come up with examples of "why karate sucks," I'm going to go find some videos of fat guys doing katas and kids doing compliant drills. That stuff was solid amateur competition. So instead of whining about how much these guys suck, why don't you show us the good stuff? Where's your competition footage? Your schools competition footage? What are YOU doing that's so much better than these guys? I'd wager it's not much or you would not be on here trashing the people who are doing it.
Ironically, the one non-karateka in this thread, an MMA guy, liked the videos. And I strongly disagree that for non-martial-artists, this would give karate a bad image. The big criticism I hear among adults is that karate is too unrealistic, too entrenched in perfect kata, kumite that resembles tag, etc. These videos contradicts those assumptions; it doesn't confirm them. For comparison, if you're a Shotokan karateka, you can see some real talent in the two videos below, but for your average layman or martial artist from MMA or whatever, I can see how someone would scratch their head and say "that's supposed to be fighting? That's all you get after training for a decade?" [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tV63FZZkC08"]ISKF Nationals 2008 Team Kumite Northwest Team - YouTube[/ame] (Shotokan kumite--ISKF nationals) [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQtuLC8XIRs"]ISKF Nationals 2008 Sochin Kata - YouTube[/ame] (Sochin kata--ISKF nationals) Well it cost them nothing at all, and in this thread alone, you've got one person who said "I would go," several who said "looked fine to me," and only one who criticized it. Seems like effective advertising of a local tournament in my book. ...and that's fine, but when you start a thread about your opinions, don't be surprised when other people express their opinion that your opinion is baseless. I thought the standard was just fine for a local event, better than many in fact. Your refusal to post videos of what you think amateur karateka should look like makes it hard to say anything more. And I don't think calling a tournament "Retribution" is over-hyping it. It's just a name. When I buy a Dodge Challenger, I'm not expecting to get a real space shuttle.
I think I understand what your problem is. You're ****ed that karate people are using pragmatic technique that works rather than some idealised hokey-fu, right?
The video is of a member dojo of the OMAA, an association my dojo belongs to. Gavin Sensei group is hardworking, realistic and produces some excellent fighters. They work at a much higher level than my dojo in terms of kumite, I have alot of respect fo them. My old Sensei has nothing but praise for their methods and quality, he has attended a couple of their training camps and witnessed some of their multi man kumite tests. I think to make assumptions otherwise is foolish, I have done some full contact in my time and this is the same, really good stuff. (i now train Bogu Kumite in my dojo for safety). When you can get hurt, everything changes mostly people who dislike this approach haven't had much or any exposure to violence, I applaud Gavin Sensei and his group and they are considered an excellent Goju Ryu group in the UK. Granted I find some of the names used not to my taste, but we need to look way beyond that at this group.
I know of this group as they have two clubs, one in London and another in Bristol. I trained in the Bristol club for a very short while until my job made it unworkable. They are a Goju Ryu club and the real deal in my humble opinion. They train and fight hard and are open to new ideas and always looking for realism in their training. When I trained with them they were very experimental and would allow the students to play around with ground work and their stand up sparring was tough going. I have a lot of respect for them. If you look at the videos you will also see Neil "The Goliath" Grove sparring (former Cage Rage star who recently went over to the UFC). No it doesn't look flashy but it works! As for advertising, it made me pay attention to them again. I am currently in an excellent TKD club and combat jujutsu club so I have no current plans to switch but at some point in the future I might pay them a visit again for some good pressure testing to complement my training. I like these videos a lot.
