I wasn't meaning to have a go at you. I used to train with an instrcutor who taught abysmal bunkai and insisted that they were the real deal 'because that's the way my teacher taught me'. :bang: I think the problem with the weapons is that due PM's shape he was unable to see his feet while he was using the kama. It also illustrates that you shouldn't play with live blades in front of large crowds.
I do know what you mean about the abysmal bunkai as my last club was like that. From what I have been told PM does like his food , which would come as a big surprise
Bunkai isn't what the general public usually sees. It is the kata and the competition aspects of karate that get the attention. Karate used to be big fifty years ago, like how Kung Fu was big after Bruce Lee, and like how BJJ and MMA took off fifteen years ago. Back in the 1950s, for sport karate you didn't need a lot of fancy things. There were some very good fighters that simply blitz'ed (straight blasted in on the opponent) throwing punches and they won. Due to their speed, power, and sheer athletic abilities, they hit so fast and overwhelmed the opponent that it did not matter that they left their hands down and left their centerlines open. This is different than sparring or randori, this was competition and it was like a rhino charging, get out of the way or get trampled. Then people got smarter about fighting, started deflection blocking and evading, etc. so then it became more obvious that leaving your centerline open was a bad idea. So if you look at what people associate with karate, they really are looking at what worked fifty years ago, when "blitzing" an opponent with a strong and fast attack worked really well. Today people are a lot more sophisticated when it comes to competitive fighting, that stuff just doesn't work as well today as then. Kickboxing really is the modern form of karate competition that is intended to keep with the times. I don't know why people separate kickboxing from karate, the SAME people can often be doing both. For modern times, the two go together.
I don't agree because that's not what I meant (you did say that you were simplifying what I said). I think that, no offence, you greatly oversimplified my argument. Of course there is always going to be a difference in quality between a full time club for pro fighters and a part time club for enthusiastic amateurs who train for fun. However, the basic principles of the training remain. As much as I like Sonshu's club (where I started my MMA training in England), I'm sure even he would admit that no-one in the club, not even him, would stand a chance against the Fedor Emalienenkos of this world, due to the fact that we're amateurs training at a different level. We didn't train as often as the top pros, or with as much intensity, simply because we have other priorities in our lives which prevented us from dedicating our lives to MMA in the same way that they do. However we still trained alive and with hard contact in all three ranges, so the basic principles of training were the same. You look at most karate clubs and you see that the difference between them and the pros is not merely the frequency and intensity of training, as it was for us in MMA, but also the fundamental principles. The training is predominantly dead, the technique applications are unrealistic and the sparring is a tickling contest. Once again, as a flame-proof disclaimer, I will reassert that I know not all karate clubs are this bad and if you train differently then great, but there is a lot of rubbish out there (if I'm starting to sound like a broken record with that point then forgive me but I'm trying to keep this discussion civil). What I expect from my dojo is enjoyment, a good workout, and practical instruction in how to fight. I don't need to train for the Pride GP in order to learn some useful, relevant skills.
Sorry if I oversimplified what you meant. I still think it is a quality issue, not to be confused with the "principles" of training. The idea of "alive training" and "realistic training" is good but if the quality of learning is bad, then the lessons learned will be bad too. Quality is a measure of not just the teacher, but the learning environment which includes other students. What I believe is that it is more important what is learned than what is taught. A quality teacher and teaching environment means it is the best for learning what lessons that need to be learned. For quality I'll define four important factors: 1. Good instruction (qualified and good teachers) 2. Good training facility (equipment and environment promotes learning) 3. Good training partners (other students promote quality learning) 4. Student's willness to learn (the students are motivated to learn, want to learn) Factor #4 is the most important, the want to learn. Of the remaining three, often it is #3 (good training partners) that is the key to training and learning, IME. When you have a diversity of training partners, ones that are years in martial arts from MMA, karate, Aikido, Judo, FMA, boxing, etc. you are going to get your realistic and alive training, no matter what the school is like because that is HOW they train. Many of the people that practice martial arts, don't stick with it and they don't have access to the diverse numbers of training partners. In karate, you get a lot of students that just train together but few have years of background in Judo or boxing or FMA or MMA or something else to ensure diversity. One major thing that kills the learning of karate is the lack of diversity. Most of the time today, you got to be in your black belt ranks to get good diversity in training partners. So when I say it is a problem of quality, I mean lack of quality as in the overall learning experience is lacking in quality. P.S. as my contribution to what I said, I will say that I learned more about karate from studying other martial arts after leaving karate than the years I trained including as a black belt in Goju Ryu. I could not see it when I was in karate, I had to train with karate masters after leaving karate to get insights on some of the original techniques that are not taught in karate, but still can be learned.
If you don't have live training then you don't have quality training. Having diverse training partners from live styles (which you could have in ANY art) is of no use when the lesson is all dead training, and if you're relying on your training partners having done other styles in order for karate training to be effective, then what does that tell you? I do of course agree that there are other factors involved, so even in say MMA you will obviously get some clubs that are better than others. Good training partners are important, but if they're not given sufficient opportunity to help you, i.e. a live environment, then there's a limit to how much help they'll be.
Good points, especially about how a training partner could be limited in what they can do. I was under the line of thinking that a good training partner would not allow someone to train in a completely dead manner (hence, alive training is a given from a good training partner).
Yeah that's true as well, some lazy people will just hold the pads still for you whereas some will move them around, jab you when they see your guard go down etc.
i posted this topic a while ago and was recently attacked when i went to see my girlfriend and karate worked brillianty for me in the street the guy didnt know what hit him. and about fights goin to the ground i have to agree because the other guy did go to the ground. ( fast )
