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Post by genkaimade on Jan 8, 2011 10:04:06 GMT
Okay, so in training yesterday, we spent a fair bit of time with Jiyu Ippon kumite with light to medium contact. To my great pleasure, I was paired with a 14 year old shodan who is honestly as quick and powerful as is possible; and effectively, due to my own lack of concentration, I was getting hit a fair bit  I did finally manage to get myself together though. What I didn't realise though, was that my partner was just about to start going a little easy on me, so when I launched in with a chudan maegeri (not thinking I was going to make contact), my foot ended up about an inch into his stomach :/ Of course, I apologised profusely as I'd kicked just that little bit to hard and he was quite obviously in a fair bit of pain for a good 10 minutes. However, I have to say that it was for the better - it put us both back into a state of absolute focus (him with his hurting stomach, and me with my throbbing little toe which I hadn't curled back properly) and from that point on we both started to get a lot more out of the kumite than we ever would have had we both not made that contact. It was almost a if by actually hitting each other properly, we were no longer afraid to hurt each other. And this is why I think that supposed "non-contact" karate is not karate - through contact and pain we form the respect and sharpness that would be otherwise impossible to achieve. |
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Post by genkaimade on Jan 8, 2011 11:06:45 GMT
Even in contact karate there has to be rules. Pop along to your local Kyokushin club and do a direct face punch and see how annoyed they get. I can't think of anyway of training where you can let lose without breaking bones. It it going to help your learning of karate to walk round with a series of fractures? To an extent, yes. Provided of course that I learn from whatever damage gets done to me so that I won't suffer the next time I'm in the same position, I'm perfectly happy being bruised all over. That's not to say that I'm looking to get hurt, of course, on the contrary. However, sometimes you need to really feel what's going to happen if you drop concentration, and there is really no substitute other than pain. To quote one the seargents at my previous school's cadet force, "pain reminds you that you're alive". |
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Post by genkaimade on Jan 8, 2011 12:38:35 GMT
If you place on target the bones will break. We used to break each other ribs for a laugh. In the full contact used to stand battering away away at each other. In the semi contact kicks on target bones break more than full contact. If you push in the stomach kick you can normally rupture the spleen. A good punch to the eye can easily rupture the eyeball. Open hands you can catch the tip of the fingers and drive it out of joint. Mawashi geri breaks the jaw quite easily. Throw them on their back fail to get the break fall and the discs will not line up properly to name but a few. Yes I know I am alive everyday it is not the bruising, unless it is into the stomach cavity. Depends on what pain he means. If you are damaged you can't train there fore can't learn. Do you want to risk pain that could last forever? You seem to have misunderstood how much contact I'm implying. I'm not suggesting that we should be actively looking to put our fellow karateka in hospital, but the odd bruise can be very revealing as to what you need to work on etc. Obviously never being able to digest food properly because someone has beaten your throat up so much that it's like veal, isn't a good thing. Getting a slightly painful but not excessively damaging mawashigeri to the face to remind you that you've been totally ignoring, say, your tai-sabaki for the last three months, can be a good thing though as far as I'm concerned. |
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Post by jimlukelkc on Jan 8, 2011 12:41:50 GMT
Ha! You are both right! a certain level of contact is essential, Alex is right it keeps you focused and engenders a faster learning curve but full contact? No! people would die!
would die! few bruises? no problem
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 8, 2011 13:13:08 GMT
we have no right to learn how to injure, maim or even kill others unless we are aware of the potential of what we study. Karate is a martial art and a certain amount of contact is essential in the training for various reasons. it must be planned and well overseen but is essential. injuries may occur via accidents but that can happen playing golf!
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Post by guyakuzuki on Jan 8, 2011 15:08:49 GMT
Ha! You are both right! a certain level of contact is essential, Alex is right it keeps you focused and engenders a faster learning curve but full contact? No! people would die! would die! few bruises? no problem even in kyokushin which is considered as a "full contact style" we didn't go 100% at each other during training sessions(not all the time anyway).It depended on who you were sparring with but contact was just gradually increased depending on your ranking,if you were a youngster,..... Plus most of the time you wore shin protection ,gloves,groin protection..... to minimize the risk of injury(at tournaments there was no protection worn by adults/youngsters wore shin-,groinprotection,gloves,and head protection). so a certain level of contact...yes but keep in mind who you are sparring with!!......You also have to keep in mind that there are practitioners who have a job who can't afford to appear with a black eye,broken teeth ..etc...at their job or who have to take a month of due to broken bones....they have a family to support you know... ;-) |
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 8, 2011 15:16:18 GMT
exactly guy but it is the practitioner not the Dojo that should decide whether they participate or not. if we dilute the training to keep numbers up we are betraying the art and the students IMHO - a difficult balance i know but if you don't like the heat go to another Banana should be the approach not turn the onions down
'The iron ore thinks itself needlessly tortured in the furnace but the tempered steel blade looks back and knows better'
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Post by Paul Bedard on Jan 8, 2011 23:16:26 GMT
Read your training partner! If they come at you just as hard & are grinning, turn it up a bit. If they are wincing, turning pale & slow to focus, then turn it down to their level. A couple of equals turning it on & getting a few small bruises, can be fun. However, putting someone in pain just because they have a black belt or brown belt is just plain wrong.
In the last seminar I was at we were doing a jyu kumite drill, the partner I had was younger trains for tournament all the time, obviously in that win. win , win, mode. Terrible guy to spar with, as you learn nothing, he came in so fast & hard that I just went into survival mode & not what we should have been working on. Think of the rei, respect, work together if it`s one sided this is not good training. Yes turn it on, but only with someone who is ready for it!!!
Osu
Paul B
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Post by guyakuzuki on Jan 9, 2011 6:35:33 GMT
exactly guy but it is the practitioner not the Dojo that should decide whether they participate or not. if we dilute the training to keep numbers up we are betraying the art and the students IMHO - a difficult balance i know but if you don't like the heat go to another Banana should be the approach not turn the onions down 'The iron ore thinks itself needlessly tortured in the furnace but the tempered steel blade looks back and knows better' indeed Steve a difficult balance and you're right :the dojo shouldn't decide the level of contact.Non-contact isn't realistic if you want to do a martial art imop . I think Paul put it down here exactly how I think:Read your training partner"! |
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Post by kensei on Jan 10, 2011 13:21:31 GMT
In my club this is how I set up contact...and I will explain why! If you are between white belt and Green belt- No contact..focus on form and learning the ins and outs of the Waza! If you are between Purple and first brown- Light contact, learn distance and control. For the three levels of Brown belt- medium contact, make sure you have better control and distance and remembering that technique is very important as well as power and use of it. At black belt you should have better control and it is at this point that light free style and Dojo sparring becomes more fun, you need control and you need the ability to take a light contact shot so it is important to not harm each other but learn what it is like to be hit and keep going. I have seen clubs were they rush to do free sparring and try to "Condition" each other to striking. Often it turns into a free for all and technique goes out the window. If I wanted a club with a bunch of heavy strikers that like to nail eachother with power kicks and punches I would open a kick boxing gym. Karate is about the art of fighting, not just going out and wailing on each other. We need to learn the science behind what we do and the techniques must be as good as we can make them. Go watch a knock down Kyokushin dojo and tell me they have great technique....you cant! They have poor form and can wail on each other. I dont want that for my students and have turned a few bruits to the Kyokushin group. Each have their place, but what do you want to teach.....How to hit someone or how to hit someone effectivly and pass on a tradition of good Waza!  |
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 10, 2011 18:10:52 GMT
with respect to your personal preferences Kensei - a tradition of supervised 'contact' has been an aspect of Shotokan in the UK since its arrival here. This is introduced from the get-go and coupled with the development of sound technique and the evolvement over time of pinpoint accuracy. Most of us here who have been here from the beginning or very early stages are known for being able to hit like a truck but at the same time be able to place techniques at skin contact and no more when moving or stationary. None of us encourage or would teach 'wailing on each other' but do teach power kicking punching and striking.
once understood the art of controlling fast and powerful techniques is actually an art of being able to choose were you place the technique in accurate detail and thus you can control - hit - hit deeper and harder. this ability is aimed for from day 1 and it would be my expectation that all students understand they are studying a martial art and at times it will be very physical and include contact to varying degrees.
Now that does not mean i have them knocking chunks outa each other on the first day but from the start they will experience a physical art form.
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Post by kensei on Jan 10, 2011 19:53:02 GMT
I am not disagreeing with you steve, I am saying however I would like to see my students begin with technique work and work into contact. Not all of us train six days a week for two hours and as Karate is more recreation now I think that it would be hard to focus on "controlled contact" when so much more has to be done.
The graded increase of contact can be used to help students ease into contact and not make it a free for all. My comments were more what I have seen by the Kyokushin guys I have trained with, not the shoto guys.
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Post by genkaimade on Jan 10, 2011 20:16:41 GMT
Mm, the way that it's worked at my dojo is as follows:
10th - 6th kyu: no contact, emphasis is on perfecting the movement involved with the techniques
5th - 4th kyu: at this point, a certain level of control is emphasised at which we are told to make contact with the gi
3rd kyu + : this is the point at which age is everything - ie, if we're old enough, light to medium contact is encouraged, but for the kids <13ish who don't really know what's too much/not enough, it pretty much carries on as before.
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 10, 2011 21:22:42 GMT
exactly guy but it is the practitioner not the Dojo that should decide whether they participate or not. if we dilute the training to keep numbers up we are betraying the art and the students IMHO - a difficult balance i know but if you don't like the heat go to another Banana should be the approach not turn the onions down 'The iron ore thinks itself needlessly tortured in the furnace but the tempered steel blade looks back and knows better' all I can do to be honest James is repeat the above. Take Dod's Dojo for example - he has remained true to the above so he has less numbers but you wanna see his kyu grades do kumite - a joy to behold and I have seen visiting Dan grades face them in Basic Kumite formats and struggle. But as i said it is down to the Dojo Instructors approach and I CAN see a process of weaning them in could also work if done correctly - so yes we are not arguing just airing different approaches. |
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Post by Bob Davis on Jan 11, 2011 10:07:31 GMT
It's an old story that I've probably told before but I was facing off against a brown belt in a inter dojo competition (this was some years back, I think I'd only recently passed shodan myself). I caught him with a nice clean gyaku tzuki to the solar plexus, not a hard blow, just enough to make a good "snappy" noise in what I consider controlled contact to the body. He just froze on the spot, game over. He came up to me afterwards to chat and said by way of explanation "nobody has ever hit me before". I do find it worrying that you can be studying a martial art and get to that level without ever once being hit, what is the point of his (probably) 3 years of training if it all falls apart on first contact. So, I do think that a level of contact is very important if your training is going to be any more than an exercise class. Having said that, in my current dojo I teach mainly children so I try to avoid student to student contact as much as possible. My way around this (at present) is to start the lesson each week with standing punch to count where I move down the line using myself as the target, that way I can get them past the reluctance to hit someone (despite the fact that kids appear to do it all the time it's not as natural a reaction as you'd think), check their alignment and technique and control the amount of contact they actually make (it can be a bit challenging when there are adults in the class but it still works  ). We normally finish the class with about 10 minutes of pad work during which I get them to take turns in holding the pad, this introduces them to taking contact without being in the direct line of fire. It's interesting to watch the trepidation on their faces when bracing themselves to hold the pad when you've consistently seen the speed with which the hands go up when asking for volunteers to do so. |
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Post by Bob Davis on Jan 11, 2011 10:57:11 GMT
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Post by kensei on Jan 11, 2011 13:54:05 GMT
When we say Contact, what are we actually saying? I mean I have seen "Contact" as a light tappy punch to the guts in one club and the other full out leg kicks and upper body shots with no face punches, and our Dojo were if you are with the right guy you will be tossed about and hit repeatedly with control...and able to do the same back! Its great fun till you end up with some moron that thinks Ippon Kumite is a great time to use his partner as a makiwara!
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 11, 2011 18:29:28 GMT
When we say Contact, what are we actually saying? I mean I have seen "Contact" as a light tappy punch to the guts in one club and the other full out leg kicks and upper body shots with no face punches, and our Dojo were if you are with the right guy you will be tossed about and hit repeatedly with control...and able to do the same back! Its great fun till you end up with some moron that thinks Ippon Kumite is a great time to use his partner as a makiwara![/b] I totally agree with your last point James I once saw Enoeda Sensei go absolutely ballistic at Crystal Palace because people were not controlling counterattacks in Kihon Kumite formats. |
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Post by kensei on Jan 11, 2011 19:16:31 GMT
I think the rule of thumb is that you give as good as you are willing to get...if someone gives to much it is the instructors job to say that is enough. I have no issue with spirited contact, hell I am guilty of that alot...but I never go over the line and try to hurt someone out of lack of control, excitedness or ignorance! I always say I only hit someone as hard as I am willing to get hit and I take their ability into the equation as well!
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 11, 2011 19:41:52 GMT
well that just about kills this thread then LOL! A succinct and clear summing up of the requirements James. Nice one.
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Post by tomobrien on Jan 12, 2011 3:24:48 GMT
It's pretty simple. If you want to learn how to fight, you have to hit & get hit.  ;D Thanks, Tom |
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 12, 2011 3:53:20 GMT
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Post by kensei on Jan 12, 2011 13:19:47 GMT
That is old school....We do baseball bat vs Billy bats in our club! |
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 12, 2011 23:47:15 GMT
baldy tw*ts and Silly Tw*ats in most though  |
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Post by westbfella on Jan 14, 2011 10:37:35 GMT
Just a couple of thoughts on the subject:
"An instructor once said to me that you should treat you partner like borrowing his car"
I would expect that in the same condition you left it and a full tank of petrol.
I was teaching at a club (that is not my own) and my heavier contact was something that didn't happen in this club. They appreciated though because the contact was not malicious or over the top. I train by realism and it is so difficult to explain this, so I have a quick vid. please excuse me
My partner is from the club I talked about - not one of mine. If you can see my partner is smiling through it (I know towards the end he cannot take much more - listen to his breathing). His body also naturally deflects my right leg because he does not want to take the impact on his chest.
I am only kick lightly but with intention and I know when to stop. I can see my partners smile so he is going to go away buzzing that for once his karate means something more than making shapes.
Again just something to add to the discussion.
Ossu
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Post by Paul Bedard on Jan 15, 2011 3:43:13 GMT
To me it starts way before anything that I`ve seen mentioned so far. As soon as my students are feeling comfortable with distance & the fact that a punch or kick is coming at them, I get them blocking hard. I take white belts & yellow belts & match them up with my senior students ( the ones that I can trust their control of distance ) & as the sparring continues they use connection & make the blow more solid. Let me explain that we are still using the `one sun` distance from target. When the fist stops at jodan,a slight lift & you are touching your partners nose, chudan it`s `touch gi`. Anyway as the student gets more comfortable we punch more solid, therefore he/she must block more solid.. The student gets to know that if he/she can block our punches, they can block most anybody. Sure the arms can get a bit bruised at times, but they get tougher & it gets harder to do so. Now that they have gotten used to their arms taking it a bit rough, at least by blue belt ( 5th kyu ), we do mae geri much the same as James showed us in the video with his mawashi geri. We kick each other in the abdomen, not hard, but it`s solid. When you wear it exhale & make your gut strong. Now of course it`s the instructors responsibility to keep this at a controlled level. Also you must understand that not everyone wants to train like this & respect that. `But most love it`!!! `KIAI`
Osu
Paul B
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Post by fujicolt on Jan 15, 2011 15:32:18 GMT
as i have said before the key to contact is control - the ability to place fast powerful techniques exactly on target - a not insignificant skill that requires massive amounts of training.
Once established it allows you to stop completely without touch, skin contact, in a little and on up to full contact.
Billy Higgins one of the world's best fighters in the 70/80's said to me once 'you should be able to decide and action a spirited technique in the time it takes a light bulb to switch on but then return to passive as quick as it takes that light bulb to turn of!'
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Post by tomobrien on Sept 28, 2011 2:46:24 GMT
It's a funny thing that when you get a worse injury the one you had seems to go away  I hit Miguels elbow with a round house kick now my leg hurts more than my shoulder Thanks, Tom |
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Post by PoppaBear on Sept 29, 2011 9:53:48 GMT
Fella came back that has been away for a yearish this week, first round of sparring he spinning urakens me in the head - "fair enough", I think to myself, try and read him a bit better then *bam* front leg mawashi geri to my eye.
Shiner, cut eyelid & he has to sit out the rest of the class...
Spoke with sensei after class, and apparently he "hasn't got the best control!"
If he's there tonight, I don't think I'll be sparring with him!
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Post by fujicolt on Sept 29, 2011 15:54:54 GMT
my advice - YOU CANNOT PICK WHO WILL ATTACK YOU FOR REAL - spar with him as often as you can. at first just concentrate on making sure he doesn't hit you = block evade continually. as you learn to read him your defensive skills will improve. it is also a must that your instructor helps him with control issues. Good luck!
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I did finally manage to get myself together though. What I didn't realise though, was that my partner was just about to start going a little easy on me, so when I launched in with a chudan maegeri (not thinking I was going to make contact), my foot ended up about an inch into his stomach :/ Of course, I apologised profusely as I'd kicked just that little bit to hard and he was quite obviously in a fair bit of pain for a good 10 minutes. However, I have to say that it was for the better - it put us both back into a state of absolute focus (him with his hurting stomach, and me with my throbbing little toe which I hadn't curled back properly) and from that point on we both started to get a lot more out of the kumite than we ever would have had we both not made that contact. It was almost a if by actually hitting each other properly, we were no longer afraid to hurt each other.
).
I hit Miguels elbow with a round house kick now my leg hurts more than my shoulder