As usual with any such comparisons on the differences between styles, we have to accept that all comments are generalisations as there are many styles of Karate and Tang Soo Do, so it’s impossible to make comparisons which hold true for every single style of Karate and every single style of Tang Soo Do.
Also, I have to say that although I have had influences from many different martial arts I am primarily a Karateka and have not formally trained in Tang Soo Do. So my observations on Tang Soo Do come from attending multi-style course that they were teaching at, watching classes, further reading, Youtube and a trained/experienced eye. That said, I will endeavour to be fair, as I have done with similar comparisons between Karate and Tae Kwon Do, which TKD practitioners were happy with. Continue reading “Differences Between Karate and Tang Soo Do” »
A strike that is often not very well explained is the Ridge Hand Strike. The focus is usually on striking with the hand, making it of limited use under pressure as it requires quite a lot of accuracy and the small bones in the hand can be damaged if they strike the wrong target.
A simple modification to focus on striking with the forearm makes it more powerful, requires less accuracy (very useful under pressure), can be used at multiple ranges, reduces the chances of damaging yourself and can flow very easily into other applications.
Please check out the video below for a more full explanation.
This is a light hearted fun challenge from Jesse Enkamp to Iain Abernethy. The rules are that each of them chooses a movement from any Kata and the other one has to give a practical street application to that movement.
The judges . . . . . well anybody watching the video can put there vote in the comments section (in Youtube) below the video.
I’ve trained with Iain Abernethy at several seminars and know him to be extremely good at what he does, knowledgeable about Karate concepts and history and author of a numerous books and dvd’s. He’s also an intelligent and articulate man with a great sense of humour who is really approachable with no ego or pretentiousness about him at all despite being regarded as the best in the UK and a world leader for practical Karate Kata bunkai.
I’ve never met or trained with Jesse Enkamp, but I would like to at some point. He runs his own blog KarateByJesse.com and is well informed, articulate, extremely enthusiastic and despite being Swedish I’d say he has a bit of British style self-depreciating sense of humour (which if you read this Jesse, is a compliment)! 🙂 He always refers to himself as the “Karate Nerd”; I guess for his nerdy attention to detail!
So please check out the video and leave your comment. And as Jesse says at the end of the video, “after all, doesn’t matter who wins, the important part is that you learn something”.
I was a little intrigued recently when I came across the picture below on Facebook depicting a bare knuckle prize fight that took place in 1877. What intrigued me was that the punch being delivered looks a lot more like a punch that we’d find in Karate/Taekwondo/some styles of Kung Fu, than it does a modern boxing punch! The back is straight, head up, legs are practically identical to our forward stance, hips turned square on and shoulder not turned in as much as a modern boxers. Even the non-punching hand is back on the hip (hikite) like a Karate/TKD punch.
Many martial arts, especially the Oriental ones include the practice of shouting at certain points in training. Japanese styles call it Kiai, Korean styles call it Kihap. I don’t know what the Chinese word for it is, but I have trained with some who simply called it Chi Shout. For simplicity, I’m just going to stick the Japanese notation of Kiai (as I’m primarily a Japanese stylist and it’s the version I’m most familiar with)!
First of all, what is it? Very simplistically, it’s a shout that comes from contraction of the diaphragm and feels like it’s coming all the way from belly. A shout that comes just from the voice-box, sounds more like scream. I have a simple way of teaching this, especially to kids. Though it’s not the nicest of explanations, it does make it Continue reading “Kiai/Kihap/Chi Shout - Is It Really Necessary?” »
Having recently posted about why Korean martial arts are held in low regard, it seemed only fair to look at the criticisms levelled at my own primary art of Karate, and Shotokan Karate in particular.
Me, at 17 when I first started. Try not to laugh!
Back when I started in the late 70’s, there was nowhere near as many styles, associations or clubs as there are today and there seemed to be even more rivalry as people stuck more rigidly to their own style with less cross training then there is today. It was a bit more like little empires!
When I first started Karate, most people, especially our Oriental masters, would teach that the primary function of the Hiki-Te hand (the one that pulls back to the hip) was to increase the power of the other hand going out in a punch/strike/block. This is undoubtedly a useful training method for beginners as it helps to teach them to rotate their hips and as such this explanation was not questioned very much in the early days.
However, with the advent of Mixed Martial Arts/Cage Fighting and the Internet, such ideas have come under more and more scrutiny. Boxers, Kickboxers and other such stylists can generate powerful blows whilst still keeping the other high as a guard to the head. When experienced Karateka (and other traditional martial artists) start to experiment, they find that they can too. Hiki-Te is simply not necessary for generating power once good technique is established. Continue reading “A Forgotten Use Of Hiki-Te (Pulling Hand)” »
Some of the newer and more reality based martial arts which emphasise real self protection (as opposed to sport) such as Krav Maga and Systema argue that the strength of their system is that they emphasise principles of movement rather than techniques. They argue that most of the older Oriental martial arts by contrast put the emphasis the other way round, on techniques more than principles. They argue that this makes their arts better for learning self defence more quickly and effectively. Continue reading “Techniques As A “Shorthand” For Learning Principles” »
I have done a very similar video to this before about maximising the thrust in the reverse punch (gyaka zuki). This time however, I wanted to take it a bit further by adding a sliding step, which is a very useful and powerful technique from both competition and self protection points of views. It moves the body weight forward further and even more rapidly giving a lot of acceleration, impact and covers distance in a very deceptive maner.
In the video, I look at some of the details of the technique to achieve this sliding step more easily and efficiently. It’s nothing new, it just goes a bit more into detail which I personally feel not people explain in much depth. If you find it useful, please “like” it and leave a comment below.
Every now and then, you get an “aha” moment, when something falls into place. I had one recently so I thought I’d share it with you.
I was on a seminar recently with Sensei David Hooper, an Englishman who has studied with the Japan Karate Association in Japan itself on and off since the 70’s and moved there permanently in 1988. He now lives in Tokyo and runs his own Dojo there.
Sensei David Hooper
Now the Japanese have the reputation for doing many hundreds of repetitions of a given a technique. My understanding was that this practice was mainly to achieve physical strength and stamina, whilst developing a very strong determined mind that can push through the pain and tiredness and keep going. Develop a strong indomitable mind and spirit, even if it ruins your joints in the process (especially knee and hips)!
Anyway, one the main themes of Sensei Hoopers seminar was achieving a high level of relaxation whilst executing your technique. He pointed out (and this is where the “aha” moment came in), that when you know you’re going to do about 500 front kicks, you pace yourself. When you pace yourself, you do each technique in a more relaxed manor, rather than what I call the “ug and grunt” of trying to ring out every last morsel of muscular exertion into the technique. This made sense to me. If you going full pelt, you simply won’t last for 500 kicks (and neither did the Japanese expect you too). However, 500 paced techniques, teaches you to maintain the structure and body mechanics; but do so in a very relaxed manor. And as anybody with experience will know, a relaxed technique is faster and can be more whip like”
Now I still think that doing hundreds of repetitions, especially kicks, will damage your joints and I still wouldn’t recommend it. I’m told that many senior Japanese instructors have had hip and knee operations, but it’s something that is not spoken of by them. However, I can see the value in doing a high enough number of reps that you need to pace yourself. It is one way to learn relaxation. Intuitively, we associate fighting skills with strength. It is what we grow up with as unskilled fighters always rely on strength. When children play fight, they generally wrestle and it is usually the strongest who wins. So men, especially strong men, are used to relying on strength and it takes a lot to let that go!
