Training with the masters

[garage]

I remember leaving my garage and traveling hundreds of miles, sleeping in the car to training with various instructors.

As Karate comes from Japan I tended to make make a beeline for instructors from this country.

What did I get?

On reflection it reminded me of a pop concert with a little dot at the front, it was great to be in the same room.

Did I learn anything? Not a lot.

As these masters get younger than me and, it is the same thing pay to stand in the room with them, I wouldn't cross the road to train with them as no matter how brilliant they are they are poor at sharing and often do not live up the expectation they cause us to have of them.

Thoughts?

[snorri1]

when I go on courses, seminars etc I do it for fun. It's usually an enjoyable way to spend a few hours with my karate mates. If I learn anything that's a bonus. I trained with Kasuya sensei last week and really enjoyed it. He was a really good instructor but did I learn anything I couldn't have got from our own dojo? I don't think so but we had a good time.

[Allan Shepherd]

Hi David

Good to hear you again, how is everyone at the club? Did Kasuya teach at your club?

My friend Richard Pavsic had Sensei Kasuya and Tomiko at his club in Wigan last week but unfortunately I could not train as we flew to Italy 18th September returning late tomorrow. First time ever that I have not taken my dogi/obi on holiday but ran through some kata during the fortnight holiday. Sent an email to a guy in Gaeta (not far from Sperlonga where we are based) before we flew but got not reply.

Best Regards
Allan

[snorri1]

Hi Allan, We're all good thanks hope you are too. He wasn't at our club, it was an open course at a club near Preston. Very poorly attended though unfortunately. Tomiko sensei was there as well. I've seen her before at Yahara courses but it was our first time with Kasuya and I was honestly impressed. His English was good, the content was different and interesting and he really knocked us Welsh boys about! He was showing that karate is a complete art and so did a lot of throws and joint locks demonstrating on us for some reason! Not the usual up and down the dojo kihon that you often get from the Japanese masters. I would definitely train with him again.

[gazrichards]

I agree with the original poster, have trained with Kanazawa many times (last time about 10 years ago, first time 10 years before that) and done the same lesson every time i think with more and more of it taken by his sons. A student of men trained on one of his farewell courses and looked surprised when I basically talked him through the session as if I was reading his mind!
Nowadays there are guys in the uk that have as much experience as the Japanese if not more although I have now started avoiding sessions with the old guard of British masters (seven samurai etc, don't want to name specific names in case of offense) after doing the same thing with them for years on end.

[garage]

Hi Gaz

I think that I am the only one that sees the irony, that the Japanese Instructors where knocking a few balls round the golf course, whilst the english instuctors are knocking heads together to pay to train with them. So effectively have more update practical knowledge.

Would I go to a university in the uk and expect to find redneck fighters? I expect most will not follow this logic before they go off on one and cite some reason why this couldn't be so.

Personally I have run out of money so perhaps I am trying to make myself feel better.

[jimlukelkc]

I can relate to that Bert, I remember paying for courses ( probably with one of the aforementioned 7 samurai) which included age uke gyaku tsuki combo. This was for brown and black belts. Personally I now only attend courses if I feel I will learn something or to support my students. I refuse to commit and full weekend and considerable expense and travel to "learn" lessons I would teach mid kyu grades.

[garage]

Floor clearers. I went to a few day course with the gentleman Gaz mentions paying for a karate sessions, so my view was much improved, when he decides to teach Tai Chi and most people voted with their feet and left.

Of course his own version, as I have yet to find a chinese person who teaches it the same way.

We are customers and should get what we pay for, not contempt.

Another one says "need to work on basics in my organisation". How about taking responsibility for the poor level of instruction that allowed basics to get that bad in the first place.

After a 20 year gap I saw one instructor with the same mixture of standards as if 20 years hadn't passed. Briefly I felt sorry that he was still still teaching the same standard, then I thought who fault is it, that in 20 years there has been little improvement, the guy standing at the front taking the money who doesn't care enough to improve his instruction.

In karate you do not get what you pay for.

[gazrichards]

I think that most of these "masters" Japanese or British are mainly just good at personal publicity.
For instance in a town local to me a prominent British instructor in a large orginisation recently relocated (from a city 200 miles away). He occasionally runs seminars in this new area and gets a small handful of punters where as when he taught at his old org he got 100s turn up. There are no clubs from his org in the area now (other than his own with about 10 students) so no one seems to know who he is and clubs in this area are not exposed to the "propaganda" of training with the "world famous, legendary So Andso 15th dan, 100 times world champion)

The best instructors are often the ones that think a little outside the box, have trained with more than just one coach/instructor/style so the formulate their own ideas and theories and not carbon copy old crap from 30 years ago and are still keen enough to train themselves and continue learning from others.