Newsletter 1023
The Right Way to Do a Karate Stance!
Good morning!
I was out driving
and came to a stork crossing.
So I had to wait.
While I was waiting I got out
and duplicated the storks motion.
Tried to figure out how
I could make a martial art out of it.
Nah. I’m just kidding.
Already been done.
And,
I believe in physics more than animal motions.
Which brings us to today’s enlightenment.
Have you ever heard of
shiko dachi
It’s sort of like Kiba dachi,
a horse stance,
but the feet are turned out 45 degrees.
Weird.
Here’s a graphic I took from The MartialWay.com.au
Now,
this stance is famous,
used in Goju a lot,
people swear by it,
tout it’s virtues,
and…
it points up how F’ed up karate can get.
Look, the physics of the matter are simple.
The purposes of the stance are two fold.
To grip the ground,
or to launch from the ground.
Examine the feet,
the arches of the feet are necessary for gripping.
If you turn the feet out,
as in shiko dachi,
it destroys the ability of the foot
to grip the ground.
Further,
it splits the intention.
Your knees are pointed in two directions,
but karate,
or any good martial art,
is based on the idea that the body must go
in one direction.
One direction and one intention.
Further,
look at the drawing on the right.
The lower back is bent.
The feet are pointing out,
which necessitates the hips moving in a certain direction,
which causes the back to bow.
But the back is supposed to be straight in karate.
It transmits energy better when it is straight.
So the point is this,
doing Shiko dachi destroys your balance,
ruptures your body mechanics,
and can even hurt the arches of your feet.
Yet people swear by it.
And,
when you examine various writings,
looking for a truth behind Shiko Dachi,
you come up with gobbledegook.
One fellow made a remark that
shiko dachi softens the back.
And he said it like that is good.
And he said it like it makes sense.
When it makes no sense at all.
What the hell is ‘softening the back?’
Another fellow claimed Shiko Dachi is a powerful stance,
then he showed all sorts of applications.
But his applications weren’t based so much
on the power of the stance,
but on edging his body inward to upset balance.
Yes, the stance appeared to work,
but it was really the ‘body bump’ that worked.
And every application he did,
it looked awkward,
and would have looked better,
and worked better,
if he had used a classic horse stance.
The long and the short of this is this…
Shiko dachi is not a good karate stance,
and shouldn’t even be included with karate stances,
except to show how a stance shouldn’t be done.
Yet,
as I said in the beginning,
experts swear by it,
legends taught it (Yamaguchi, among others)
and it is obvious that they were doing something cool,
something maybe even based in other practices
than the martial arts,
and they had
NEVER EXAMINED THE PHYSICS OF THE THING!
But,
don’t believe me.
Try it for yourself.
Learn the physics of the body,
apply shiko dachi,
and see if you come to the same conclusion as I did.
Poke around TheMartialWay website,
they have a lot of good stuff,
it’s not all shiko dachi,
but you will find a lot of stuff written on shiko dachi.
And,
just a friendly disclaimer,
I post this analysis not to bad mouth anybody,
but to educate.
Nowhere do I get personal,
everywhere I talk about the structure of the body,
the intention of the spirit inside and outside of the body,
and so on.
And,
obligatory advertisement,
if you want to learn the real and actual physics of the body
they are in
The Master Instructor Course.
I did that course in 2007,
have sold thousands of them,
and NOBODY
has ever proved me wrong.
And,
only two people have said
they knew the stuff on the course.
But both of those guys agreed that my course
was superior in teaching the concepts.
Here’s the link…
Okay,
I’m thinking about that stork I showed you earlier.
Maybe I don’t believe in mysticism,
but I sure believe in dinnertime.
Can you dig it?
Kentucky Fried…Storks!
Have a SUPER work out!
Al
Here’s the link again
And don’t forget to check out the interview
BTW
Have you checked out my novel?
Monkeyland?
