Ironically excellent video showing how traditional stances from Kung Fu or karate are used in MMA

Discussion in 'General Martial Arts Discussion' started by Tom bayley, Mar 12, 2022.

  1. Tom bayley

    Tom bayley Valued Member

    An Ironically excellent video showing how traditional stances from Kung Fu or karate are used in MMA



    In both kung fu and karate stances are transitional points in fluid footwork that are used to train efficient body mechanics and movement. They are all demonstrated here beautifully. Particularly in the last section he shows all the principle transitions, horse to tiger (aka bow and arrow or front stance), tiger to horse, tiger to cat, cat to tiger. Even the stepping and turning for the back kick while not a classical kung fu or karate crane stance still uses the fundamental principles of crane stance.

    Crane stance, aka phoenix aka unicorn aka lots of others https://i.pinimg.com/originals/8b/70/c2/8b70c260f3b27422d879e3dc6d8c438f.jpg
     
    Last edited: Mar 12, 2022
  2. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    The really ironic thing is the videos people point to of Kung Fu stances or techniques working in MMA are never done by people who actually do Kung fu
     
    axelb likes this.
  3. Botta Dritta

    Botta Dritta Valued Member

    Ugh, some of the weirder Kung Fu stances make perfect sense....if you were armed. There are a number of funky guards in western sabre fencing. One of my pupils was flicking through an old fencing manual and asking why I have never shown them Sabre 'Sixte', 'Hanging Seconde' or 'high quarte'. Had to patiently explain that they were only really useful if you were mounted on a horse, and I wasn't about to buy a horse for the fencing club to demonstrate. (one of the brighter sparks then tried to drag out a gymnastics pommel horse from the store room...sigh)

    Some of the more out there stances I think are encoded into forms/kata as a means of preserving the knowledge for future generations, and not necessarily because they have high percentage use. Which begs the question...why so many Kung Fu instructors insist pupils on drilling low percentage stuff? To some extent it's irresponsible, especially if you have pretensions of teaching self defence. You should teach the high percentage stuff ad nauseum and then add the funkier auxiliary skills/kamae/stances later on or as special lessons.
     
  4. Flying Crane

    Flying Crane Well-Known Member

    Given that MMA is derived from martial methods that came before them, it is not surprising that you would see stances and other techniques in common. MMA did not spring forth from a vacuum, fully formed.
     
  5. Tom bayley

    Tom bayley Valued Member

    I am confused - please clarify.
     
  6. Tom bayley

    Tom bayley Valued Member

    How does a video showing an accomplished fighter demonstrating that MMA makes practical use of the most highly drilled stances in Kungfu / karate and traditional other arts, beg the question ?

     
  7. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    Out of interest how did Ramsey become such a watched YouTuber? Who does he train that fights, I know his fight record is more losses than wins?a

    Actually I'd argue there is a specific stance for MMA which is different from both Thai and boxing, it's not as back weighted as Thai and more squared up than boxing both to take into account the clinch and lower body takedowns and whilst all fighting is fluid it is what pops up in most fights
     
    axelb likes this.
  8. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    Shapes are just shapes it's how you fill them that's important,

    Two things on the surface might look the same but if they aren't trained the same under the same pressure they are completely different things on the inside even if they on the outside might look similar
     
  9. Mushroom

    Mushroom De-powered to come back better than before.

    Worked for this dude for a while....

    Lyoto-Machida.jpg
     
    bassai likes this.
  10. Tom bayley

    Tom bayley Valued Member

    You are not entirely wrong. The most that we can say when observing this video is that his behaviour is consistent with the principles of mechanical structure, stability, movement, and power generation of traditional arts.

    You are not entirely right. understanding begins with observation. we live in an uncertain universe. We know that all observations are subjective. If we dismiss all observations because we are aware that they can not tell the whole story, we end up understanding nothing.
     
  11. Tom bayley

    Tom bayley Valued Member

    Cool - mushroom please say more
     
  12. David Harrison

    David Harrison MAPper without portfolio

    Because he's good at the YouTube algorithm game. It's about engagement and growing an audience, not fight records. His beef with Master Wong did wonders for audience "engagement". If you can get people leaving comments, you will pop up in the suggestions for people who aren't already subscribed. Hard2Hurt did the same by doing impressions and taking the mick out of big YouTubers like Martial Journey and that Aikido guy in the same lineage as Seagal. Once they have comment sections filling up with people telling them their idol would destroy them they switch to analysing or predicting big MMA fights and doing click-bait thumbnails like "why your (insert technique here) sucks" or "(insert technique here) don't work".

    That's not meant to be a dis on Ramsey, I like some of his videos and he generally gives decent analysis, but the YouTube game is its own thing separate to the quality of the content (but they are related). Then bare in mind that most viewers will have barely trained, let alone competed.

    I think he gets a pass for retiring though; he did have a guy punch a hole in his head with loaded wraps. Transitioning to coaching and social media after recovering from that is a smart way to keep earning money from his training.

    I also don't think it's coincidence that big YouTubers like Ramsey and Hard2Hurt have a background in TMAs. They can speak to a wider audience and know just what to say to trigger the "too deadly" keyboard warriors.
     
  13. Smitfire

    Smitfire Cactus Schlong

    On top of what David said (all good btw) there's also a difference between being a good fighter, training good fighters, being a good coach and being an engaging Youtube personality. And all those things are unlikely to exist in the same person.
    There are some great fighters who would be awful at teaching. And some great teachers who didn't make many ripples in the fight game.
    Floyd Mayweather might have an unbeaten record (50/0) but is probably not as good a coach as, say, Freddie Roach (40/13)?
    And Freddie Roach is not as an engaging Youtuber as Ramsey Dewey (who I don't find that engaging if I'm honest).
    I really like Gabriel Varga's videos although he hasn't actually trained anyone of note afaik (although he's not retired so that may factor into it). Good proven fighter though.
     
    aaradia likes this.
  14. Mushroom

    Mushroom De-powered to come back better than before.

    Lyoto Machida?
    Karateka and BJJ blackbelt
    Literally stood in a wide horse stance, with a fist by his waist. Suddenly those saying that, that kind of stance would never work due to being wide open for an array of offences, began to say "unorthodox" "not used to the strikinf angle" despite that form existing as long as other styles has existed. Ended up holding the 205 belt for a spell
     
    axelb likes this.
  15. Mushroom

    Mushroom De-powered to come back better than before.

    I just listened to Joe Rogans podcast with Mr Beast. One of the biggest Youtubers around. Began when he was 11 and now at age of 23 has some crazy number of views and followers. But also plays the game.
    One golden nugget was that his content is in English.
    And only 10% of the World speaks English, so he started to get his videos and thumbnails dubbed in different languages.
    But not just anyone. He researches local/native celebrities and hires them to dub over him. Which adds potentially extra attraction to the videos.
    Then he bought a studio solely to dub/translate youtube videos for other youtubers.
    All this at aged 20

    Man was literally bred for the YT game
     
    David Harrison and axelb like this.
  16. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    This goes back to my whole shapes post, Machida trained his karate completely differently to 95% of the traditional people,

    If you don't train the same way as the person you are pointing out looks like things you do in your training you probably aren't going to be able to pull off what he can pull off
     
    Mushroom likes this.
  17. Smitfire

    Smitfire Cactus Schlong

    Yeah. I love watching MMA and seeing stuff that has echoes and parallels in TMA.
    But putting Machida up as the poster boy of "karate" in MMA is ignoring all the wrestling, sumo and BJJ he had to do to make the small part of his karate he ported over functional.
    And ignoring all the other aspects of regular karate training that didn't translate.
    Machida took the explosive and elusive footwork and timing of sport kumite and showed it can be functional in a more permissive rule set.
    He showed that MMA didn't just have to be wrestling/boxing/muay thai/bjj.
    But there are an awful lot of people marching up and down doing kihon in the air, rote performance of application-less kata and limited sport kumite thinking Machida someow validates all of that training when he doesn't.
     
  18. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    Worse was the wing chun lads using Victor knocking out wanderlei as validation for chain punching :)
     
  19. Mushroom

    Mushroom De-powered to come back better than before.

    I would also say same with Wonderboy, Bas Rutten etc who obviously had to change it pending the ruleset surely?
    My BJJ stance is different to my Wrestling stance but I still get takedowns. But differing factors necessarily make me change things up.
    But I guess thats essentially splitting hairs?
     
  20. David Harrison

    David Harrison MAPper without portfolio

    Icefield was getting at training methodology, not tweaking a style to a ruleset. Machida's performance in MMA doesn't validate kata and 1 step sparring as a training methodology.

    I would say that external validation is a natural thing and not exclusive to TMA. How many BJJ players who never had someone trying to punch their lights out use the Gracie challenges or early UFC's as external validation of their training? I've seen quite a few online. Obviously the gap between their training and the champions of their style is way smaller, but it's still there.
     
    Last edited: Mar 18, 2022
    Mushroom and icefield like this.

Share This Page