Martial arts training (page 2)

bboyneko

Joelbear,

as an avid breakdancer I know many martial arts people and have seen and tried several styles... there are a ton of options available for you, great for a beginner.

Tai-chi- VERY deadly martial art, it is one of the few chinese disciplines that teaches death touches similair to what was shown in the recent jet lie movie kiss of the dragon. THis is a style that uses little strength and emphasises using your opponents energy against him while using as little as tour own as possible by alligning your bones to balance your body instead of using muscles.

Northern sryle kung-fu: The guy who taught me breakdancing practises this style. It has some beautiful forms such as mantis style

mantis style

Tae-kwon-do: the ballete of the martial arts world..very over-used, very common, kinda boring. Originally developed to fight opponents that were riding on horses, it uses a lot of kicks and arial attacks.

Karate: generic word used to describe tae-kwon-do and some other common forms. The exception is the fighting style developed on the island of okinawa in japan.

My favirote: CAPOEIRA!!!!!
This is an amazing african-brasilian martial art developed about 300 years ago when the african slaves were brought to brasil by the portoguese. It is made to look like a dance, since the slave owners forbade the slaves from practising self-defense. The styls is very beautiful, very graceful and is the style the modern dance of breakdancing is based off of.

It's not difficult for a beginner, especially angola style capoeira. Angola is slow, low to the ground and requires little power. Regional style is the more powerful, difficult form.

In general, I highly reccomend any style of chinese kung fu. Id stay away from the japanese styles like akido, jujitsu and others. The israli's have a very very lethal style, I forgot the name but the israli army trains in it and its very viscious. The fillipinos have some great styles also.

joel bear, the ironic thing you will find is the more adept you become at killing another human being with your bare hands in less than 5 seconds, the more likely it is you will never have to fight. Its more than a physical discipline its a mental and spiritual one, steeped in eastern philiosophy (or in the case of capoeira some afro-native south american ideals) and history. have fun!

Capoeira from Brasil

slipnslidemaster

Yeah Joel, for some reason that would be funny cumming from a girl though.

Just kidding, ((((((joel))))))

Slipnslidemaster: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

- Ben Franklin

bboyneko

I personally, trained in Tae Kwon Do and Boxing, but from what I've seen on the "Ultimate Fighting Championship", Jujistu rules!
Tae Kwon Do won't do you any good if your legs are pinned in a grappling hold.

you are thinking of BRAZILLIAN jujitsu, a very differnt style than traditional jujitsu

Nathan Natas

I agree with the comments about looking into handgun training.

As far as empty hands self defense, I'm like to suggest that if you are interested in REAL self defense instead of the forms that are taught in traditional schools, you should investigate a couple of alternatives.

The first would be boxing, where you find out what it's like to take a hit very early in your training.

Go to About.com and look up the "SCARS Institute" and "Krav Maga". Also look into Philipine Escrima/Arnis and "non-traditional" Jeet Kune Do. Do a search on "Charles Nelson Self Defense" and think about getting some of the videos. Search on "Bulldog Jeet Kune Do" for a VERY non-traditional style that gives you tools you can effectively apply with brief practice.

All the other arts mentioned are dffective for street defense after years of practice. As impressive as the octagon is - and Brazilian JuJitsu RULES there because of tremendous grappling skill the Gracie family has developed - there is also the fact that these are not no holds barred street fights, they are a couple of notches above pro wrestling.

Whatever you decide, rule #1 is: NEVER fight fair!

bboyneko

boxing is very inneffective against multiple opponents, chinese forms are designed to fight off many opponents at once.

Mui-tai kick boxing is a good style though, american kick boxing sucks

Yerusalyim

The Gracie style Juijitsu is excellent in my humble opinion. I've taken Tae Kwon Do for about 5 years, and Juijitsu for about a year now. It's a much more practical fighting style. What ever form you take, make sure it's geared toward street fighting, and will teach to to fight both standing and on the ground (70% of all fights end up on the ground). Stay away from fancy kicks or complicated moves. I've vowed never to kick above the waist again (some exceptions to apply) I completely incompasitated a guy with one tiny shin kick. Stay away from intricate movement, when fighting you're under stress and resort to gross motor skill movements. Just my humble opinion.

YERUSALYIM
"Vanity! It's my favorite sin!"
[Al Pacino as Satan, in "DEVIL'S ADVOCATE"]

Utopian Reformist

All right. I knew we would end up providing Joel a plethora of advice about styles and details from our own experiences.

I wanted to give generic sound advice without personal bias, but since everyone else has, I will too!

Joel:

Despite the fancy pictures and famous names of people currently on top in the "fighting arts" business and entertainment world, you are still stuck with your current physcial conditioning. You must start there or you will certainly fail as a student.

Begin strengthening your body and building stamina and endurance. Combine stretching with cardiovascular and aerobic exercise along with weightlifting. Once your body is conditioned and strong, you will obtain much more benefit from any combination of styles mentioned in this thread.

Someone mentioned "Filipino Escrima" which is awesome. When I was 18 and a young Marine stationed in CA, my 16 year-old girlfriend was studying at Mr "I's" school. When I visited the school, I could not believe Mr "I" was the actual Dan Inosanto. While I only shook his hand once and obtained an autographed picture, I do remember the vivid demonstrations of street fighting, stick fighting and knife fighting.

Another great resource is the "Jeet Kune Do" concept school. The JKD concept schools are in many cities. They mix JKD (Bruce Lee's personal invention called Way of the Intercepting Fist) with Jiu-Jitsu and Escrima and Thai Boxing. That may be a good all-around mixture.

While boxing does not help in a crowd, it is a good training tool. One of the many reasons women FAIL at self-defense is because many have never been PUNCHED full force in the face. The shock of a facial blow, along with the natural reaction of tears and distraction with dismay, provide enough timing for an attacker to launch a second perhaps third assault.

Wrestling ability is also important. Someone mentioned most fights wind up on the ground. I have seen that to be true in my life. It is important to have the ability and strength to grasp, grapple, hold, lock, and even break an opponent's limb. Aikido, Hapkido; Gojy Ryu; especially Jiu Jitsu provide excellent training in this area.

Don't forget Nathan's advice about firearms. A fellow Marine I served with runs a firearms training school in CA:

Here is the link: http://www.tftt.com/ (Max and I served together in Bravo Company 1st Force Recon Camp Pendleton, CA in the early 80's)

You really need determine your goals, what resources you can use and how much you want this to affect your daily routine in life. It's serious. It still is for me.

Introspection

Hi Joel,

There are a lot of good advice here, I tend to agree with most of the stuff Bboyneko said but also others.

Doc-Fai Wong, the head of the organization where I am a student, (a grandmaster in Choy Li Fut kung fu as well as Yang style Tai Chi) says that there are three types of people that walk through the door: customers, students, and disciples.

If you don't want to spend a lot of time, then by all means look for something practical - JKD is probably a good way to go. The fact is that while as an art some traditional ones may be better than others, it takes some serious time and dedication to become proficient in it. I'm supposed to be an intermediate level student in Tai Chi, but the main thing I've learned is how much work and dedication it would take, even though I'm good at staying relaxed (it isn't a system of rigid katas) and learn the forms pretty easily.

Joel I'm a little curious as to what you mean when you say you're not good at talking your way out of a potential conflict. Of course, maybe the best thing is to avoid it in the first place. I believe in most cases I can simply slip out of the situation before things get too crazy, most people aren't that focused so generally speaking I think it is very doable. But let me just say that mental training is a large part of the training. You can learn something that helps you survive in a street fight, but if you can avoid it why not do that?

A common denominator of all arts is discipline, if you don't have that not only will you have trouble mastering the skills, but responsible masters will not teach you the serious stuff. There are things some people (martial artists included) do not believe exists, simply because it is extremely rare. My brother used to go to a kenpo school, the instructors went to Taiwan and got thrown around by some little Tai Chi master and then they wanted to learn it. They approached the grandmaster of my school but he turned them down. Certainly they would be welcome to join like any other student, but some things take a lot of work on the part of the student and when it comes right down to it, you might say it isn't "for sale."

Introspection

Opps, Sorry Joel - for some reason I thought you said the opposite about talking your way out of a fight. Nevertheless, my point is simply that if they don't even know you exist, they're not going to pick a fight.

Naeblis

Ironically, the confidence that is acquired by knowing you can defend yourself makes it rarely necessary to do so. Remember, noone wants to fight someone that is willing to fight back.

Martial arts training

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