Using a Gun Technique in Karate vs Gun Fight!

Posted on August 6, 2013 | Leave a comment

Karate vs Gun and your Favorite Gun Technique!

I’ve read a lot of stuff about using Karate gun techniques in a karate vs gun fight. Here are some things to think about.

There are three ‘gun shooting’ distances.

karate vs gun

My kind of girl!

 

The Flashsight Picture method, wherein you pull and shoot without aiming, but just aim in the direction of the looming mass of a close target.

Point Shooting, where you draw and point the finger. This is for mid range targets.

Aimed Shooting, where you take aim and squeeze (don’t pull) the trigger.

Obviously, which method you use is going to depend on how close your target is.

Now, if an idiot has a gun jammed up against your skull, you are in trouble, but this is the second best place to work a karate gun technique whatever martial art you study.

Yes, the gun might go off from the pressure of your moving skull as you roll out from under the barrel. But, what you gonna do?

Well, best thing, in this karate vs gun confrontation, is to give him your money and don’t try any karate technique. But, if the gunman is obviously deranged and you know something is going to happen, you’ll be glad you practiced that gun disarm technique in that karate class.

Now, best distance is handshake away. This means no pressure of the body part on the gun, and you can do a slap before he pulls the trigger if you really did practice the technique in that Karate seminar. This, incidentally, might be equated with the Flashsight picture method. If he is close enough to shake hands, then the body is large enough to shoot without aiming, but just by pull and shoot.

Third best distance in this karate vs gun thing is going to be the Point shooting. For point shooting to be effective the range is going to be somewhere between six and twenty feet. Mind you, these distances are estimates, and will change according to the shakiness of the gunman’s hand. So, you’ve got to rush twenty feet. If he hasn’t drawn his weapon, you might make it. An interesting exercise to do in your Karate class is to have somebody rush 20 feet and time them. Have them rush somebody pulling a rubber gun, see if they can close the distance before the gunman says, ‘bang!’

The fourth best distance isn’t a best distance, but a worst distance for karate vs gun. Over twenty feet the guy usually will have time to draw and aim before you can close the distance and do any kind of martial arts technique.

Now, disclaimers.

First, give him your durned money. Who cares? He’ll get his sometime!

Second, never practice these karate vs gun tricks (closing distances, disarms) with a real gun. Brandon Lee thought the prop gun was unloaded, and guess what? No more Brandon!

Third, don’t take anything I say here for solid fact…test these distances for yourself.

Fourth, practice that gun disarm technique in Karate class. Practice, practice, practice. Even if you never use it, you might use those motor skills, that sense of timing, in other areas.

Here’s a great article, called Apprehending the Scissorsman, on the time I saw the police take on a man trying to stab a boy with scissors.

If you want the real skinny on using weapons, not just the karate vs gun situation, but ANY weapons, trot on over to the Blinding Steel course at Monster Martial Arts.

 

 

Leave a comment

Posted in karate, kenpo, kung fu, martial arts, weapons

Tagged , , ,

The Best Kicking Bag for a Heavy Bag Workout

Posted on August 2, 2013 | Leave a comment

Heavy Bag Workouts are the Way to Go!

One of the most fun things you can do, be it martial arts, kickboxing, or just plain on your own conditioning, is a heavy bag workout.

There is nothing like setting, and whomping that sucker with all your might! Whether you do a heavy bag workout for beginners, women, for weight loss or whatever, there is a satisfaction that comes with watching that bad boy fly to the ceiling!

heavy bag workout

Heavy Bag workouts build real power!


Now, the trick is to have the best bag you can. You have to select a weight that is right for you, and a texture, and so on.

Hard core martial artists will claim that you have to kick something as heavy as an attacker, maybe a couple hundred pounds. The problem is that the bag doesn’t have enough give for you, especially in the beginning. Simply, you kick it, and it doesn’t move that much, and you don’t get satisfaction, and the muscles don’t get that feeling of having pushed something.

Now, we don’t want a speed bag, like boxers use. That’s too light, and the muscles don’t get the feel of resistance necessary for weightlifting.

And it is weightlifting, be it fast and violent, and you need to find the exact weight that will work for you.

A 70 pound bag is perfect. It has give, and it weighs enough that it will fly away, but still last you for a while as your muscles get stronger and stronger.

The next step would be a hundred pound kicking bag. After that, you play it by ear, but a 20 to 25 pound increase is about all you want at one time.

No, it doesn’t weigh as much as an opponent, but you need to raise the level of resistance in accordance with how your body grows, not form an unworkable ideal right off the bat.

Now, a couple of interesting facts, and then I will tell you where I get my kicking bags.

Before he died, Bruce Lee ordered a bag that was 300 or 400 pounds. He weighed 135 pounds, and I have no idea how much fly he was expecting to get out of that bag, but…man! If anybody could do it, it was Bruce.

And, did you know that kicking bags are stuffed with clothes? True. I think a lot of them have furniture filling, but it was clothes for years for many.

And, the way they fill heavy bags is with baseball bats. They just have a couple of guys pile drive the end of the bat into the top of the bag until everything is squooshed down, weighs the right amount, and doesn’t have any…edges.

Anyway, think about what I said here, before you buy anything for your heavy bag workout.

And, if you want to know how I pack my personal bags – yes, I do it all myself – then go to cheap punching bag. The story of how I discovered my method, and the things I went through…it’s quite interesting, and it will help you on your journey to the best heavy bag workout you can have. Pick up some free martial arts books while you’re there.

Leave a comment

Posted in karate, kenpo, kung fu, martial arts, mixed martial arts, shaolin, taekwondo

Tagged , , ,

How to Make a Better Martial Art Weapon

Posted on July 29, 2013 | Leave a comment

What is the Best Martial Art Weapon

I’m always fascinated by martial art weapons.
It’s so nice to think that you can stand back and defend yourself
without ever getting your hands dirty.
The problem is that I don’t like many of the martial art weapons out there.

I like the Chinese sword.
It is delicate and quick,
like a knitting needle.

martial art weapons

Great martial art weapons


I like blow guns,
they are silent,
foldable,
you can make poison darts.

I like two sticks,
they are fantastic for training.

And I like a few others,
but most martial art weapons are too heavy,
or confined in their motion.

Now,
that said,
I probably never told anybody this,
but my father was an engineer.
Actually,
he made prototypes.
At first he worked for a small company named Ampex.
He was responsible for materials and machining
for the original tape recorders
back in the fifties.

In the sixties he went to Memorex,
became the prototype engineer,
again,
responsible for machining exotic materials.

Now,
let me bridge this to the martial arts.

In his spare time
he used to play golf,
and he started putting together weird golf clubs.
By weird,
I mean that he had access to space age materials.
And he started making golf clubs
with titanium shafts,
fibre glass shafts,
heads made out of…whatever,
and so on.

He probably invented a couple of things,
but he never bothered with patenting,
the companies he worked for
were pretty obsessive about patents,
so he didn’t bother.
He knew if he patented a golf club
one of those companies
would claim it was theirs.
Seriously.

Anyway,
the reason I bring this all up
is that I don’t see any martial art weapons
using space age materials.

There’s a couple of things out there,
especially knives,
and there’s some other oddities,
but when is the last time
you saw a sword made out of some exotic material,
kept a better edge,
even if you used it to pound in spikes?

I know there have a been a few things made,
but not a lot.

Wouldn’t it be cool to have a staff
as light as fiberglass,
but virtually unbreakable?

A sword that actually bends?

Now,
I can see problems with some of these things,
for instance,
something might not have the weight,
and you do often need weight in a weapon,
but if you put an exotic metal blade on the end,
it would be as quick as a knitting needle,
but longer than a Chinese sword,
and it might put a whole new slant
on fighting with weapons.

Man,
I can think of all sorts of problems,
but it would be fun to make something like that,
see what the probs are,
then reinvent it again,
and eventually focus
on something better.

The whole thrust of war
has been for better machines.

The machine gun revolutionized warfare.
Then along came the tank.
The submarine,
the blimp…and the plane.

So why not the martial arts weapons?

Think about it,
a heat seeking nine section chain dart.
Or,
a laser guided samurai sword…

Well,
perhaps I’m going a little too far,
but if necessity if the mother of invention,
imagination is the father of invention.

All right,
let me share a win…

Al,
I just wanted to say that I think that your Blinding Steel program is a great addition to my students escrima training. I have been teaching them the Heaven Six patterns and found that your concept of the Circle of Blocks is a great way to enter into these patterns. The ability to flow from the circle to the heaven patterns is a great way for the students to learn movement, striking and blocking with ease. The nine square concept made it very easy for them to see the angle of attacks that can be delivered at any given time. It also is a great way to remove the fear of being struck during the disarm section of Blinding Steel. Excellent info once again. Well done Al, well done. I just want to say thank you and keep up the great work.
Michael G

Thanks Michael!

And for everybody,
my programs,
and especially the Blinding Steel,
are martial arts by themselves,
but their real purpose
is to clarify all martial arts,
and you can use them
with your martial art
no matter what martial art it is.

Anybody who teaches martial art weapons,
should consider implementing blinding steel.

Anybody who teaches Karate,
should start of with Matrix Karate.

And the Shaolin Butterfly
should be taught before traditional Shaolin.

Don’t you understand?
These are unique and whole martial arts by themselves,
but they expose and clarify
and give a big, whomping, huge,
kick in the butt
to all the traditional martial arts.

I haven’t re-invented the martial arts,
I have just figured out better ways to teach them,
how to make them work together,
how to figure out the lost (concealed) pieces,
and so on.

It’s like putting space age material,
on ancient weapons,
and getting something better.

Oinkey Donkey,
here’s the URL…

http://monstermartialarts.com/martial-arts/3a-blinding-steel-matrixing-weapons/

have a great martial art weapons work out!

Speaking of Martial Art weapons…have you read The Bomber’s Story by Al Case?

Leave a comment

Posted in aikido, karate, kung fu, mixed martial arts, shaolin, tai chi chuan

Tagged , , , , ,

What Training Beyond Black Belt Should Really Be

Posted on July 25, 2013 | 6 comments

Beyond Black Belt…

Beyond Black means in any martial art, as you will see in this article.

When a person is beyond black belt it means he is ready for advanced training.

In Karate, and similar martial arts, the training is more advanced forms.

beyond black belt martial arts

What lies beyond Black Belt?


But these more advanced forms don’t always mean much. The movements are sometimes so esoteric that they aren’t workable, and they don’t seem to make only marginal advanced energy capability in the body of the student.

This holds true for just about every Martial Art, from Karate to Aikido to Taekwondo to…whatever.

So the real reason for these advanced but same old same old forms are that they afford the practitioner the means to ‘polish’ his art. To get better at…the basics.

To get better at the basics means that they become smoother, more intuitive, more usable.

And, there are other qualities to be appreciated here: calmness of mind, a certain type of wisdom, some sixth sense abilities (if you lucked out and got in a good system, very rare) and so on.

When I found myself in the position of teaching people beyond black belt I decided to do things differently. I began teaching whole arts for each level after black belt.

I might teach a Shaolin style to second black black belt, a pa kua style to 3rd black, and so on.

This gave me tremendous leeway in what I teach. I was actually able to shift programs around like shuffling cards, and fit the programs and specific martial arts much better to individual students, and yet still maintain a distinct discipline and structure in my classes.

Furthermore, the polishing consideration was not neglected, but rather enhanced. Basics are basics, from art to art, and there is little difference. Thus, not only was the student working on basics, but he was getting different viewpoints of basics, which helped him understand them in depth.

The truth of the matter is that this method allows me to teach more than art, but a viewpoint of art, a perspective that is not able to be taught in normal classes.

It is a matter of how much knowledge you can impart, not art, but quality of knowledge, and the ability to import more knowledge…at a glance.

What was really pleasant for me is that I often run into these old students, and they’ll say they learned some new art, and I’ll ask them about it, and they’ll say something like, ‘Oh, I got together with so and so and we traded systems.’

Traded systems. Just like people did before everything went commercial. As in trading Pa Kua for Tai Chi. Or Shaolin for Karate. As it says in various accounts of martial artists, especially those who created their own systems.

Able to trade a whole system because they have been trained not to do a million punches, but to do a million punches while absorbing several martial arts systems.

And it gets really interesting for me when I get around these old students, they’ll be talking about things like shifting the tan tien while making a kung fu kick work in a karate style, or retaining power without dropping their weight, or some other oddity that it took me decades to figure out, but they are doing in a couple of years…and they have a whole lifetime to go places I dream about.

Lucky guys.

But, that’s okay. When I give up this body I’ll get a new one and find one of these guys to teach me.

Oh, and I would be remiss if I didn’t let you know that the reason I am able to teach lots of martial arts beyond black belt is because of this Matrixing Technology I developed…it’s at Monster Martial Arts.

6 Comments

Posted in aikido, bagua zhang, karate, kenpo, kung fu, pa kua chang, shaolin, taekwondo, tai chi chuan

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Best Martial Arts Equipment for the Money!

Posted on July 24, 2013 | Leave a comment

Here’s Some Wild Martial Arts Equipment!

You guys may think that this is a tongue in check article on getting the best martial arts equipment, but it isn’t. I have personally tried the methods here, and they are top notch body calisthenic methods.

First, I tried cinderblocks. I didn’t want to dig holes and sink poles for the Plum Flower Fist, which is a form of Praying Mantis Gung Fu. This was great. Jumping up down gave me strength, as well improving my balance.

martial arts equipment

Yeah, baby!

From there I look for other things to use for martial arts equipment.

Tires were great. I learned to use tires originally for swinging a wooden sword. Took a lot of strength and control to make the tire turn and bounce the way you wanted it to. So I grabbed nine of them, arranged them in a simple grid of three by three, and started walking the circle, Pa Kua Chang style. This was odd, hard to ground through the springiness of the tires. but, you often learn more from what doesnt’ work than what does, so I moved on.

My my next experiment in Martial Arts Training Equipment.I put four by fours on edge and practiced forms on them. This was interesting, and taken directly from Ton Toi Northern Shaolin Gung Fu. Ton Toi means springy legs, and I learned all sorts of things about balance while springing from beam to beam.

And, I tried doing forms on top of fences. It was wild. Trying to spin and move, six feet above the ground, without falling al-l-l the way down! I don’t know how much I got out of this martial arts equipment, but if was fun!

And, in between these things I tried hanging balls from the rafters, punching tennis balls at a wall, and other sorts of things. But my next big foray into martial arts equipment was at the old Los Angeles Zoo.

The old zoo, now sort of gone, or at least redone into a picnic area, was a mess of cages and bounders strewn about in the cages to give the animals some sort of sense of nature. So I worked out in cages…lions and tiger and me…oh my!

And I learned a lot! I especially grew in arm strength. Having to hang on to the side of a cage, or going across the top monkey style, built up a lot of strength in the arms. Trying to do kicks while so perched was especially educated. You get a whole new appreciation for how the hip joints work.

Now, last in my martial arts equipment were trees. At the Los Angeles zoo there were all sorts of low hanging trees. I could walk on the trunks of some of them, climb to joints, and generally swing around and do all sorts of stuff. The interesting thing about this was that I could practice sinking my weight.

One of the places I got this idea from, aside from my experiences in the cages, was a fellow wrote an article where he had to hang from a tree limb for an hour a day for a few months before the master would teach him.

Well, having done a little hanging myself, I can definitely attest to the benefits in the arms and shoulders. It stretches them out and gives truth to the old saying, ‘A long muscle is a strong muscle.’

Now, that about does it except for one thing…all of the equipment I used cost nothing. That’s right, I didn’t have to spend any money at my martial arts equipment suppliers, and I got a better work out than some big nautilus machine could ever give!

Here’s a good article with no martial arts exercise equipment. Here’s the Monkey Boxing Course itself.

Leave a comment

Posted in bruce lee, chi power, kenpo, kung fu, martial arts, mixed martial arts, shaolin, taekwondo

Tagged , ,

Martial Arts Survival Training for the Masses!

Posted on July 22, 2013 | Leave a comment

Martial Arts Survival Training Replaces Ammunition!

This thing, of martial arts survival training replacing rifles and handguns, is a real thing.

You see, I just read another instance of a gunshop running out of ammunition. So, they limited their customers to one box of ammo apiece.

martial arts survival training

My fists are my real weapons…heh!


I’ll never run out of fists!

Isn’t that interesting, we are having a shortage of ammo because the United States government is apparently buying it all up.

Sheesh! What are they expecting a war? A revolution? An uprising of citizens because of the things that the government is…don’t get me started!

Anyway, the point is that real self defense starts with the fists. Or with broken bottles and clubs and whatever else might make a quick weapon.

You see, the mugger isn’t going to tap you on the shoulder and challenge you to a karate kumite match.

He’s going to jump out of some dark corner and conk your noggin with a rusty engine block!

Yes! I’m serious!

The guy in your house while you are all sleeping upstairs will probably have some sort of weapon, and he will be willing to use it to get away with your stuff. You know, things like your car and your wife or daughter.

And, it is fun to fantasize that you will just pull out your pistolo and give him an extra rectum.

And, I am not discounting that happy possibility.

But, fighting starts with the fists, when you don’t have anything else. And what is your gaurantee that you won’t be pushing a shopping cart across the parking lot when a bash mob comes along and decides you’re the wrong color?

What are going to do? Defend yourself with frozen peas?

What are the chances that you will not be able to get to your Smith and Wesson brain popper…or just that you are a bad shot under pressure and miss the sucker?

What are you going to do if you can’t get to your weapon because it is in a lock box…at the bank! Or has a childproof trigger guard! Or you just plain run out of ammo!

So, now you are down to it. Fists. That lampshade over there. Hit him with a sofa cushion!

And he’s got a knife!

Okay. Made my point, didn’t I?

So you need martial arts training. And not that internet crap where they promise you ten moves that will kill anybody.

You ask any trained martial artist and he will laugh in your face at that.

You are going to suddenly remember a trick, when the guy trained in the prison yard, outweighing you by a hundred pounds, trying to stick a knife in your ribs?

No. It takes focus and discipline to remember stuff in the middle of combat. That’s why people train for years…because the quick fix courses don’t work, never have worked, and if they did…we wouldn’t have martial arts!

So, my advice to you is get to a martial arts school. Start learning something. Don’t be the next George Zimmerman…or Trayvon Martin. Don’t be the victim of bash mobs.

Look, there are probs with the country. There are going to be riots! There are going to be hungry people roaming the street!

So get yourself some real martial arts survival training…it’s worked for thousands of years, and it’ll work now. But you have to do it!

A great place to start is the Blinding Steel Course.

This has been a page about martial arts survival training.

Leave a comment

Posted in bruce lee, karate, mixed martial arts, qigong, ultimate fighting championships

Tagged , , , , ,

Mixed Martial Arts Against Aikido

Posted on July 20, 2013 | Leave a comment

Mixed Martial Arts and Aikido!

Mixed Martial Arts is all over the TV, Aikido…is not. But, what is the difference here? All hype and excitement aside, what is the difference between these two martial arts?

First, Mixed martial arts, such as you see on the Ultimate Fighting Championship and Strikeforce and other such programs, is a contest. A man beating a man. Thus, it is not an art.

mixed martial arts

A bit different than an Aikido Throw.

 

Now don’t get your panties in a bunch, it doesn’t mean MMA is bad, I never said that. But the difference between an art and a sport is that in a sport man tries to beat man. In an art a man tries to control himself.

Mind you, this splits a few hairs.

Tell me it doesn’t take a degree of self control to enact a strategy in the middle of a fight and I’ll call you a fool.

It takes immense self control to bide your time, play the game, and spring a trap.

However, the real difference here has to do with the type and degree of control.

In Mixed Martial Arts one uses muscles and forceful leverage. It takes real bulldogging skills to take a fighter down when he is bent on taking you down. This is a real fight.

In Aikido, however, one is anticipating the strike, planning on the direction and speed of the strike, and then blending with the strike. Manipulating not by bull dogging, but by harmonizing. Joining with a person, instead of pounding him into a pulp or snapping off his limbs.

Do you see the difference here?

Not forceful leverage, but flowing manipulation. This is a fight of a different kind, and it takes immense…self control to control somebody using this method.

But MMA, as indicated above, is a sport, and Aikido is the art, and the two shoujldn’t be compared because they are simply not in the same arena.

The real problem here, in addition to the type of control needed, is that people insist that Aikido is not a real martial art.

It is a real martial art. It is derived from Daito Ryu Aiki jujitsu and swordsmanship, in which fighters didn’t just fight for the gold and the glory, but for their very lives.

And, the thing that most people don’t know, is that with just a few twists and alterations to the techniques, one could take it into the MMA arena.

That, however, wouldn’t be in keeping with the art, and would change it into something else.

This has been a page concerning Mixed Martial Arts and Aikido.

Check out this great article on Aikido style throws. Or, you could take a look at this course presenting a more combat Aikido style.

Leave a comment

Posted in aikido, jeet kune do, martial arts, mixed martial arts, shaolin, ultimate fighting championships

Tagged , , ,

Karate Puzzle Makes Martial Arts Fun and Easy to Learn!

Posted on July 16, 2013 | Leave a comment

Speed up Learning with a Karate Puzzle!

The Karate Puzzle is the brainchild of Andreas Sturm.

Now, unfortunately for non-Germanic speaking people, the website is written in German. A wonderful language that I can’t speak.

Karate Puzzle

Andreas Sturm, inventor of the Karate Puzzle!


However, a little work with the google translator, and it is easy!

The puzzles themselves are sliding images, and all you have to do is figure out which button to click to mix up the images, then slide them back into place!

Now, I found this quite interesting, and it did tax my poor brain. Even after doing the forms for over forty years, I found myself having to sort through the pictures to figure out the sequence.

And, sorting them in this fashion will help your ability to learn the forms and do them faster.

It really is ingenious, and one of those things where you slap your head and think, ‘Why didn’t I think of this?’

But you didn’t, and Andreas did, and well done to him.

There are seventeen kata on the puzzle page, a full range of the Shotokan forms. This will keep you busy into the wee hours, so when you can’t get to the dojo, you can simply open a soda pop, go through the various forms, and get yourself an armchair work out that actually works!

As for Mr. Sturm…he began his study of Karate in 1995, and began instructing in 2002.

Though the website is in a foreign language, using the translator I was able to read it pretty easily, though a bit slower than I am used to. It is a good website, fileld with solid information, and, of course, there are the puzzles.

Interested in visiting the site? It is at Karate Puzzle.

This article was written by Al Case, for more information on fantastic martial arts training methods like the Karate Puzzle, visit him at Monster Martial Arts.

Leave a comment

Posted in karate, kenpo, martial arts

Tagged , , , , , ,

Best Karate Form to Learn Karate Online

Posted on July 12, 2013 | Leave a comment

Learn Karate Online Now!

To learn Karate online one needs the simplest, easiest method possible. And if you want to learn kung fu online or aikido online, or whatever, this holds true.

Interestingly, there are a few simple forms out there.

learn karate online

Jackie Chan knows Kung Fu, but he doesn’t know Karate!


Classical Karate, for instance, recommends a high dedication to what is called ‘Three Step Blocking.’ This is a straight forward step to the front and block sequence of moves. You step and low block, step and low block, step and low block, turn and repeat. And repeat, and repeat.

The problem with this martial arts training method, as you might imagine, is that it gets pretty boring.

Learning it is fun, and doing it as a warm up in class is great and beneficial, but to do it by yourself, hour after hour. Boring.

Ed Parker had a great idea with his ‘Short Form One.’ This little Kenpo Kata is only about eight moves, but it covers the four basic blocks in four directions. Unfortunately, there isn’t much opportunity for change, and this basic karate kata tends to get a little boring, too.

Every system has their basic forms, and they are easily sampled. Probably the best one is the square form.

To do the Square form you simply move around a square. Fight foot forward to one side, left foot back to the next side, right foot forward to the third side, and left foot back to the last side, or the beginning side.

First do it by simply stepping, then, when you understand how simple it is, you can start exploring stances.

The official form is done in a back stance, and with three blocks, low, middle outward, and high.

Now comes the fun part, and the defeat of boredom. Three blocks, four sides. That means the form is constantly changing, and you have to go around the square a few times to get the low block back to the beginning square. You will find this confusing.

And, as you do the form, you keep forgetting where you are, and this tends to build up an awareness, to make you focus your awareness in the form.

The real bonus of this form, however, is that it is not just a beginning form. As you move around and do the karate blocks you will find that the hands tend to circle,a nd they circle in front of the tan tien (the one point) which is the energy center for the body. Thus, you start causing the tan tien to generate more and more ki, or chi.

Within an hour or two of doing the form you will feel the tan tien heat up, and you will feel energy snapping out of the hands, and far in advance of a simple beginning form.

This is the absolute best karate form to learn karate online.

Here is the form on video if you wish to Learn Karate Online. Another good page is this article on how to Master Martial Arts.

 

Leave a comment

Posted in karate, kenpo, kung fu, martial arts, shaolin, taekwondo

Tagged , , , , ,

In the Best Karate Training Drills the Eyes Have It

Posted on July 9, 2013 | Leave a comment

Best Karate Training Focuses the Eyes

In the best Karate Training drills one should look their opponent in the eyes. This is a very interesting and powerful aspect to Karate training, so let me give you some data about it.

First, I have had a lot of people, during karate drills, ask me where they should look. The common answer that I have found over the years, and this is from Karate school to Taekwondo school to whatever Martial Arts school (style) you are studying, is that you should ‘unfocus’ your eyes on the chest. Look at the center of the body and become aware of all the stuff on the outside.

best karate training

You can’t fight what you can’t face!

 


This actually isn’t bad instruction, you want to see everything, but it stops forward progress for the martial artist at a certain point.

The real advice, if you want to experience the best karate training drills, is to look at the eyes.

The eyes are the windows to a man’s soul; look at the eyes long enough…and you can actually see what a man is thinking.

Look at the body, and you stop looking at the mind, and the martial art becomes a thing of reaction, or, at the very least, slow progress.

So you look at the eyes, train hard, do your forms for discipline, and eventually you will actually pick up on the very thought of the opponent.

Tell me this doesn’t give an incredible edge in combat…to know what an opponent is thinking!

Anyway, the point is this: you can’t fight what you can’t face.

And, as you progress, if you don’t look to the eyes, attempt to see the thought behind the action, then you wo’t make the jump from fighting to handling.

You see, in the real martial arts you learn to fight so you can give up fighting.

You don’t look at an opponent and fight him, you predict what he is going to do by reading his thoughts, and then making moves that undo him rather than harm him.

Can anybody spell the word ‘harmony?’

Only idiots fight all their lives. Smart martial arts students, people who want to experience the best karate training drills, watch the eyes and learn to read the mind.

And, eventually, they experience harmony, and greater control.

Opponents become as children, and as easily handled.

And that is why, when it comes to the best karate training drills, the eyes have it.

Check out this great article on Aikido style throws. Or, you could take a look at this course presenting a more combat Aikido style.

Leave a comment

Posted in karate, kenpo, kung fu, martial arts, shaolin, taekwondo

Tagged , , , , , ,