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Post by malk103 on Feb 4, 2013 13:19:03 GMT
I want to tell this story but can't/won't/shouldn't name them so it will be a bit vague.... This in my mind enforces notions of having a global standard type thing to prevent extremely poor Karate giving us all a bad name. Last night my Sensei and I went to a nearby town to look at another club/org who he used to be part of, we heard that the instructor had moved away and we may be interested in expanding our club if there was nobody else there. We had also heard recently that the club for that location had all but folded and another instructor had setup on his own in the town in direct competition. So we turned up to watch and saw 4 people training, the instructor was a Black belt but apparently this org has a habit of grading Kyu grades early so they can fill an instructors post. The level of training was about 4 Kyu grades lower than what they had around their wastes, some of our beginners have better stances as at one point I thought they were doing Wado ryu as it looked nothing like Zenkutsu Dachi. The level of instructor droning on to actual movement was about half and you could see them getting very bored, I even watched the badmington at one point as it was more interesting... There was lots of instruction but very little technical detail, no hip twisting, no speed or power and his sambon zuki was all at Jodan level with no pause after the first punch. I'm not saying that we are fantastic but this is supposed to be part of a large org, they were acting as though they had read a book and were trying to practice Shotokan. It wouldn't normally bother me but people look in and see that this is what has happened to Karate - that fierce, fast, action packed Martial Art that spread across the globe like wildfire.... rant over....  |
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Post by jimlukelkc on Feb 4, 2013 13:42:07 GMT
I understand how frustrating it is to watch this kind of rubbish and realise they could be conning students who would otherwise be training with you. The only saving grace hee is he only had 4 students and they were bored.
Teaching is difficult and not everyone is suited to it. I think most people recognise the difference between those ho can and those that can`t.
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Post by Rob S on Feb 4, 2013 18:14:59 GMT
There was lots of instruction but very little technical detail, no hip twisting, no speed or power and his sambon zuki was all at Jodan level with no pause after the first punch. Mal, what rules state that there has to be a pause after 1... before 2-3. Could it not be a 1-2 ... 3, or even a 1,2,3? Curious why you chose that as the benchmark. I can the ZKD issue, but who said they were Shotokan. I suspect from description that they may be an infamous group with a high profile marketing strategy? |
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Post by malk103 on Feb 5, 2013 8:43:34 GMT
There was lots of instruction but very little technical detail, no hip twisting, no speed or power and his sambon zuki was all at Jodan level with no pause after the first punch. Mal, what rules state that there has to be a pause after 1... before 2-3. Could it not be a 1-2 ... 3, or even a 1,2,3? Curious why you chose that as the benchmark. I can the ZKD issue, but who said they were Shotokan. I suspect from description that they may be an infamous group with a high profile marketing strategy? Hi Rob, My instructor came from their organisation and carried over the same syllabus, the instructor we saw would have been trained by the same instructors or indeed by instructors that had been trained by my instructor. Unless he was just doing it differently - which is entirely possible - then he was way off. The main point was their was no hip movement or consistency as he demonstrated it 3 times and they all seemed different with the last one looking like all 3 were Jodan punches. I'm not sure which org/club you mean but this one has been accused of putting money first. |
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Post by kensei on Feb 5, 2013 21:05:25 GMT
Higher standards are good, and if your instructor has a link to the area or wants to link up with the instructor perhaps he can bring the higher standards back up in that area. some people are put in possitions to teach who dont want to or dont have the skills to do this. I say dont blame the instructor, blame the guy who left him in charge!  |
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Post by malk103 on Feb 16, 2013 22:44:59 GMT
We've recently found out that another club nearby has expanded into an additional training location, this instructor left the big org a while ago, trained for a while under our chief instructor then set up on his own.
No problem there as there are no laws against that and he's been running a small club for a while.
It seems in this new location he should have been required to provide his insurance details and CRB as other clubs have to, either he now has them or they have bent the rules for him?
It also appears that he has graded himself a couple of times?
We don't mind the competition but have had a couple of his students transfer to our club that have been dreadful. We've also had feedback from school pupils where he did a demonstration last year and it wasn't good.
Is there no way we can stop these muppets from teaching their own style of Shotokan, but very badly.
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Post by Bob Davis on Feb 16, 2013 22:55:00 GMT
Simple answer, no.  |
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Post by malk103 on Mar 16, 2013 20:49:04 GMT
Not another one.....
My Sensei was off shopping 2 towns away near to where we have our Friday club, in the busy town centre there was an amazing Karate display from another local club.
But amazing, as in amazingly bad!
He had to phone me up to tell someone as he was gob-smacked by how bad the instruction was. Unfortunately the shoppers were keen to stop and look.
I can see how we have ended up with several clubs and orgs popping up everywhere, some of the clubs/orgs end up churning out rubbish so good Karateka go off and start their own, some leave their good intentions to others or students who end up being very poor.
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Post by garage on Mar 16, 2013 22:22:50 GMT
There is one near here he has 4 4th dans. He is about 30ish. He teaches everything Krav Marda MMA you name it.
His students there are a lot of them took a grading in Bo he charged them £50 for a Bo he brought for £9. Rumour is he is really yellow belt in wado ryu.
Why do Japanese karate chief instructors not go and shut these clubs down?
1- they are not going to kill the goose that lays the golden egg.
2- they are so sport orientated they can't do a room of people any more.
Or a mixture of both or niether?
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Post by kensei on Mar 18, 2013 18:55:21 GMT
Japs?  ?? |
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Post by makoto on Mar 20, 2013 12:58:01 GMT
Yeah, I have to say I do not like the term "Japs" either. It is basically the N-word to me. I am not Japanese, but my kids are. I doubt there was any intent to be insulting, but basically it is not a nice word to be saying. I know in the UK the phrase "Jap car" is often used and deemed to be ok. But if I referred to a pen that was made in China as a "Chinq pen" , or "Lets go out for Paki food tonight" ,I bet that would not go over well. None of these phrases are acceptable on an open forum like this. But, like I said, no offense taken because there was no intent to offend.
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Post by garage on Mar 21, 2013 2:23:17 GMT
I have modified the offending word which was more of a result of text speak in that I am doing something else at the same time working. I am afraid all the examples you have given I have heard despite conducting training days to discourage this. www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21226068 Since this has gone this way if you read the artical on this link it suggests that whole section of history are missed out thus leaving the nation at a loss to understand why their neibours are hostile to them. Whilst I am not using this to justify my slip up I find it more terriflying. I also understand enough language to realise I am not being paid complements in a lot of cases. My kids are not english either and I have to deal with the problems that arise. That aside I was hoping for a debate about why there are no standards in karate. I apoligise for the slowness in addressing this issue but it can be days before I get a chance to even read these things. No I do not want to spend more time on the internet but I wonder how people manage to fit it in. |
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Post by Bob Davis on Mar 21, 2013 10:04:16 GMT
Without wishing to drift the thread (I'll get back on topic soon), this situation is common to virtually all history, not just that of the Japanese. If you look at less well publised Western history, and British/English history in particular, you get a very different view from the "History" taught in our schools and it starts to become very easy to understand why we are hated in so many parts of the world (this is not a new thing) but 90+% of the British population are totally unaware of the reality of their nations actions in foreign parts.
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Post by malk103 on Mar 21, 2013 15:52:02 GMT
I really like talking history with my kids and filling in a few blanks, mainly World War 2 as that's my main interest. How we sent thousands of people to their certain deaths, how lots of Polish people were put on trains to Russia never to be seen again, how thousands of Italians were left in a field to freeze/starve to death.
There are plenty of bad pages in history and it's unfortunate how some are glossed over or only get a few lines of text, but certainly done by many countries.
Steering slightly back on train, unfortunately nobody has the authority to impose a global standard on these cowboy clubs, there are plenty of organisations but none are in charge.
On the other side of the argument, there are plenty of clubs/orgs that don't want a standard, or to be told "you have to do it our way"
I was chatting to someone the other night who failed a Dan grade because his prefered Kata application was different to the JKA version, the fact that he had a workable application or three should have been enough!
On balance then I would rather fall inline with a global standard if it would mean eliminating these Mickey Mouse outfits - or encouraging them to meet a minimum standard so long as there wasn't many unworkable restrictions placed on us or greed entered the equation. (in other words it will never happen)
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Post by Deleted on Mar 21, 2013 16:00:57 GMT
The only thing we can do about bad karate clubs is to move into their patch and demonstrate what a good or great karate club looks and feels like. I assume that other martial arts must have similar problems in witnessing mc dojo's and arts that have been combined and morphed into something else!
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Post by Paul Bedard on Mar 22, 2013 4:44:08 GMT
I think that a few interesting things have surfaced in this subject. First off as the thread suggests that there are clubs out there that get a lot of publicity from either being flashy or by targeting a group that hasn`t had exposure to a higher quality standard of martial arts.
Then we have an example of what might seem a normal term to one, being actually un-ethical to another. This is an important point as it is important to understand what other customs/cultures might take as disrespectful. In Canada for example we have become one large multi-cultural society & a lot of learning curves of ethical behaviour have been & are still being covered. Kudos to Makoto for pointing out one such example in what might seem as a simple abbreviation of a term. Also I commend Garage on going back & modifying his post.
Also I think that we have a reminder of the taboos of communication, ie.. religion & politics.. In this case I have trouble seeing the merit of pointing out the magazine article on how some countries don`t fully educate on their role in certain historical events. I think that throughout history when it comes to warring nations a lot of atrocities have been committed even to ones own people. Trust me a history lesson in many countries will leave out certain details that others study in depth..
This has me even thinking that a term that I sometimes use might be not taken lightly by some, although I believe that I use it with respect. I am guilty of calling people of British origins `Brits` & I think that this will be the last time that I will publicly use this term.
You can still call us `Canucks` though, as we wear this title proudly. However I do know some that would question the term `Cowboy clubs`??
Back to the thread. We had a visit from an instructor of another dojo in our area, come to our club & ask to join us periodically for a workout as he stated that being an instructor he normally doesn`t get to train. He holds the rank of sandan in his org. I`ll just say that he couldn`t handle the pace & my brown belts were somewhat disappointed with his standards. We had a bit of a chuckle on how he had pointed out on how his fancy gi had come straight from Okinawa, but his technique had no power, his conditioning was poor & his timing was slow. Not to mention stance & posture issues. Actually he did me a favour as this re-enforced to my students that they were training at the right place. Oh & we have never seen this other instructor back for another workout. We did our best to treat him with respect & make him feel welcome.
I guess I rambled on a bit here, but this thread has got me thinking.
Also, I do want to encourage Garage to `post away` as has been mentioned. We don`t always get it but you do make us think.
Osu
Paul B
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Post by nathanso on Mar 22, 2013 6:33:56 GMT
I think it is a waste of time and energy to worry about the "standards" of other clubs. Even in a given organiztion, standards are a flexible and ill-defined thing. A 60-year old shodan candidate will not be expected to perform at the same level as a 20 year old. While graders may be looking for certain "priniciples" to be exhibited by both candidates, the fact is there are no absolute standards. All you can do is to try to maintain what you consider to be a high level of quality n your own club and attract students who ppreciate it.
I think hoping for a uniform standard enforced by an all-knowing orgnaization would be one of the worst things that could happen to karate. How many of you are enamored with WKF kumite rules and kata judging?
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Post by jimlukelkc on Mar 22, 2013 7:53:32 GMT
Attempts at standardisation are the reason why karate has moved from being an effective combative system to to a watered-down sport-oriented, athletic pursuit . It stifles innovation and encourages it's practitioners to choose style over substance.
I am sure I am not alone in feeling that I am on a personal journey of discovery ? I want to remain free to pursue my own direction on that journey , not have it dictated by someone who feels they know best.
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Post by garage on Mar 22, 2013 13:12:28 GMT
There are those people that do Karate and there are wimps.
I have said this many times in training as it makes me smile.
I was walking past a sports fair and there was a How many pressups in a minute. I am grey haired and wearing a business suit, so they mocking asked me if I wanted a go. So I took off my jacket left my tie on and did about 70 and stopped. about 30 people took part and 2 people managed to beat me by 1 and 9. So as a straw poll 27 do not do karate.
So 60 is that not that far away do I turn into wimp all of a sudden? This charity allowance for 60's is scary. It about challenging yourself not looking to someone else and thinging I am better than them so that is good enough. Am I better than I was yesterday?
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Post by tomobrien on Mar 22, 2013 17:47:54 GMT
That's one thing that competition is good for. It exposes the phonies.
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