Another thing to consider about UFC and such tournaments that are supposed to be “real-to-life,” the odds of running up against another well-trained martial artist in such a conflict are very, very low.
I’m not a big fan of Pride or UFC but I do believe the rules have changed somewhat. Such as weight classes, and stomping on people when they are fallen. Because right after the Gracie reign, I remember a 300 lb 6’ guy that would use the classic street fighting technique of crush your opponent against the alley wall and stomp on him till he is senseless.
Other moves I use to see employed in street fights not seen in organized competition is deliberate targeting the digits (finger and toes) to break them, thus crippling your opponent.
I don’t either, I mean when I was in a gang there were a few other people from various martial art school. Muey Thai, Dragon Fist, White Crane, TKD. But in the end when we got into fights at KTV or in the streets. 2x4, baseball bats, beer bottles and garage cans were the weapons of choice.
Sure maybe one or two clean martial art technique and the rest of it was just plain ugly. Beating people to a pulp. Making sure the cops didn’t get you or you didn’t get hit from behind was the rest of it.
Most people I studied under had police record. The Kung fu teacher I had beat up a traffic cop in public for wrongful ticketing. The TKD teacher I had a police record going back to high school, when he took on the whole football team for calling him a racial slur. Unfortunately, if you want to learn how to fight, you need to learn from people who just enjoy fighting, even if the fights are under questionable circumstances.
To be honest most traditional schools are behind in sparring drills which is why they don’t do that well fights. Usually in most traditional kungfu schools the sifu will not even discuss the fighting and sparring till he can trust the student. In long fist there were about 20 forms each with 20 techniques. In praying mantis another 10 forms with 30-50 techniques in each. So it could be a good decade or two before sifu is ready to sit someone down and talk about the uses and fighting. That’s even if the sifu is inclined to teach you that aspect of the school. But all the techniques are there in the forms; kicking, punching, throws, grappling, submission, etc.
Also most kungfu schools are independent and don’t feed any organized sparring competition. So even if you met someone who has master every technique taught to him. Chances are the dimension of sparring, foot work, pacing, and ring strategy might not be as robust as someone who spent years in a ring.
Where as from my experience in a TKD school focused on Olympic tournaments, all you focus on is sparring and mastering 5 kicking techniques in various combination. And you start sparring from day 1. Not to mention it was made clear the 7 standard TaiGook forms have nothing to do with sparring.
Anyways as one gets older hopefully the situation for random street fights will diminish.
If you want to see modernized kungfu, there are those organized Sanshou competition springing up. Sort of like Muey Thai. Or even that Wushu stuff which is where Jet Li comes from.
Another thing I learned is that people who have lots of experience fighting usually decline random fights or fights that are not in their sport unless there is something material to be won. Because no matter what the skill difference is, you’ll get bruised and sore, even when you win.
My personal experience to why fighters adopt this attitude occurred in college, when 8 drunken frat boys pushed my girlfriend off her bicycles. I was 1 month away from a state tournament which qualifies an individual to be invited to Olympic training center to compete for a spot on the national team, so near my physical peak. Anyway I approached the leader of the group. He ask me if I wanted to fight, I stated “No” and quickly roundhouse kicked him and back kicked the guy next to him. The group quickly lost the will to fight and left. I got cheers and a few handshakes from the people that gathered.
However, I was in complete disappointment because I realized skill difference between me and the majority of the population was vast. The exact situation that use to give me such a rush when I was in a gang, 3 year early and a world away, barely registered as a workout to me mentally and physically. In addition, my foot was sore from kicking though the uneven surface on the top of the sneaker, which was even more annoying because I would need to alter my training routine for the next week to account for that, with my qualifying tournament only 4 weeks away.
Well in any event, hopefully you find what you are looking for in martial arts.
Depends which art you’re learning I’d have thought.
If you’ve been learning tai chi under a couple of years it’s of very limited fighting value. Whereas if you study a short range ‘external’ system, such as wing chun, it’s going to be of considerable use to you the next time some shit for brains grabs you down your local night time entertainment venue.
Personally I don’t like traditional arts, but unless someone pulls a shooter some of them still have practical uses.
this might be a whole other topic; what do you guys think of Dillman?
As a person, I think he’s a jerk. He’s also just in it for the money and his ego. There’s another dude who worked with Dillman on developing their theories named Rick Moneymaker (not kidding!). I’ve been to one of his seminars and was knocked out cold with a light tap to GB-20 on the back of the head. I think a lot of it is baloney and has become so commercialized, although it does have a firm foundation in traditional kata bunseki/bunkai. Unfortunately, that kind of serious knowledge being taught on video tapes and books that you can buy for $19.95 is a phenomenon that I don’t approve of. They also teach this stuff to beginners and intermediate students, as well as kids. I don’t believe anything like that should be taught until someone has a very strong foundation. Besides that one seminar, my teacher in China taught me some cool stuff based on the same principles, and he was a lot better than Dillman or Moneymaker, so the stuff does work. The only problem is that you have to be trained very, very, very well to be able to apply it in the heat of a serious confrontation. In those situations, I prefer the good old stand-bys of groin, knee and throat shots, and maybe tearing up some joints. Leave that other stuff to the very few “real” Masters left.
i agree. dillman is just a showman. he hurt a girl, a GIRL!!!, in the seminar i went to! what a jerk! the only good part of the whole thing was Wally Jay and his small circle technique. he was a very nice man.
also dillman makes no demo of how this is suppposed to work in realtime sparring. he’s irresponsible i know that. and some of it doesn’t work like he said.
This is a funny picture to paint: “Hurrah! Gosh! Bravo, old chap! That was quite a putt you sank just there!”
No one else asked, even though it’s very important, so
(sitting cross-legged at his feet, wide-eyed and expectant-looking)
:" Didja make the team, Uncle Ac? Didja?!"
is there are sparring group out there? i would like to come spar with you guys provided it’s not a slaughter. some friendly, medium contact is fine for me,but going all out to hurt each other(mostly me getting hurt) i’m not interested in.
also, i want to find people who are good at sticky hands.
I trained for a good many years with what might be considered a MMA teacher who put a lot more wieght on the internal side of the art. I would also be interested in getting into a bit of light/medium sparring.
This is a funny picture to paint: “Hurrah! Gosh! Bravo, old chap! That was quite a putt you sank just there!”
No one else asked, even though it’s very important, so
(sitting cross-legged at his feet, wide-eyed and expectant-looking)
:" Didja make the team, Uncle Ac? Didja?!"[/quote]
I was quite shocked at the reaction of the crowd, since the altercation occurred near fraternity row on campus and people I was fighting were from a fraternity. My mind was racing thinking of how to survive an on rush of drunken frat boys. Thank goodness things turn out the way they did.
Unfortunately I lost in the finals of State competition and did not qualify to represent my State in round robin competition for a spot in my weight class. I was miffed because the opponent in the finals was not even from that State and enter because his home State was too competitive. I should have gone to Alaska or Guam to compete in State competition.
There was a short time I was thinking about representing ROC, but being an ardent “draft-dodger” put a damper on those plans.
I think there were a plethora of other martial arts techniques that would have been more appropriate, such as applying excruciating pain to a pressure point, joint locks, or a sharp nerve strike. These end those kinds of confrontations much more quickly, more effectively (less effort on your part), and it may not get you the “bravado” that you may have been looking for, but since he wasn’t threating your life (or at least it didn’t seem that way), something much more simple and effective would have done the trick.
IMHO, martial arts is not for show. I don’t like parading around in tournaments or exhibitions, I feel no need to prove myself in that kind of arena. I would always choose to walk away from a confrontation if at all possible. If not, I would choose the quickest and most efficacious means to subdue the opponent. If he didn’t learn his lesson from that, only then would I get more “nasty.” I take the martial arts and the 12+ years of training I’ve had in the States and in China very seriously, as well as the “ethics” of MA that my teachers have done their best to impart on me. Some of the posts I’ve seen on here (the minority, I must stress) do not seem to follow in the spirit of Bushido, or whatever. There is far much too concern with touting ones one ability, rank, the patches they have on their uniform of whatever. I train in street clothes, shoes or work boots, and that’s it. I have a “black belt,” but it’s just a piece of cloth and it’s kept locked away in a cabinet, probably never to see the light of day for a long time. That’s not what the martial arts or “martial spirit” is about.
See, this is why I’m not digging MMA so much. I think MMArtists need to wake up and smell the coffee. I respect a lot of the MMA guys I see on TV, but a lot of them also seem more for fit for WWF (or WWE I should say) than martial arts.
UFC and Pride and MMA in general are following an ancient traditional part of Chinese martial arts. The tats, the weird names, the posturing, the constant talk of kicking ass, kicking ass, and then kicking more ass, the challenges, the money, the betting, the wild music, the babes, the rich guys sitting ringside, the shady guys lurking around the ring-----all of that was equally present in traditional Chinese martial arts be it Republican era, Qing, Ming or earlier. And that includes by the way the mixing of arts and the importance of wrestling/grappling.
Martial arts has not changed. The one thing they did not have in the Qing were the cool neon strobe lights but they made up for it by using very unsafe explosives (i.e. mondo massive fireworks which were not ISO 9000 or UL approved)
The average Qing era chinese martial artists had much more in common with “Tank” Abbott or “Wildman” Denny (the one with the red Mohawk who always gives the girls some tongue action anytime the cameria is on him) than with Kwai Chiang Caine.
Take care,
Brian
[quote=“LittleBuddhaTW”][quote=“Vay”]
If you’re a strong striker with a good understanding of vital point strikes (tuite-jutsu), this situation is much more easily dealt with (if you’re willing to injure someone enough and face the potential legal consequences later).[/quote][/quote]
I’m not super strong but strike points and pain were what my past masters taught me. They were SAS whose job it is to kill. They don’t mess around with feeling about "Oh damn did I hurt you… sorry "
I only trained with these guys for 4 months as we were on the same language training class and they got my ass outta bed to come on their light training runs ( light for them a killer for me lol )
I got to be the live traning model ( that hurt too lol ) but still rember and practice what I was taught. But let’s face it… most of us here never have the need to enter into a real fight. I’d rather run than fight unless cornered.
More than one way to skin a cat. Of course I knew these guys were not gang bangers and didn’t threaten my life. But they pushed by gf off her bicycle and needed to be taught a lesson. Sure it was silly the more I think about it, but that is all part of being a young adult.
That’s a whole aspect of sports martial arts. Looking pretty while kicking butt. Sure there are a lot of effective martial artist competing in sport combat that are not pretty and don’t have elegant technique. But I subscribe to the “Is my hair okay?” school of thought on the subject.
Most street altercation are usually about egos and not life and death situations. So might as look good since all parties were dumb enough to get into a physical altercation in public.
It struck me, as I was reading through the thread, that this must be a pretty easy question to solve. There must be some guys from traditional kung fu clubs who would be willing to fight No Holds Barred against the BJJ or San Da fighters. I know there are BJJ and San Da fighters who would fight them. Perhaps some of the better students training traditional kung fu could step forward to defend the honour of their school and their style.
Don’t hold your breath on that idea (traditional kung fu taking up NHB). I need to say at the outset that I have been involved in traditional chinese martial arts since 1976, so I am not “trash talking” traditional chinese martial arts but----
traditional chinese martial arts simply are not competitive in the modern MMA world. The last time most Taiwanese traditional martial arts systems were “ring tested” was in the late 1800s. There have been “full contact” matches held in Taiwan through the 1960s on down to the present and there were some good fighters (Luo Laoshi, Tim Cartmell and others) who came out of those fights but they are the exception not the norm.
The real problem with real fighting is that there really are only three things required:
- outstanding aerobic and anaerobic conditioning. “Gas is king in the ring” (heh, I just made that saying up, it has a nice ring to it, although it is not as profound as the Tao which can be named is not the eternal Tao…)
- lots of experience sparring with non-cooperative opponents across a range of specialities (i.e. wrestlers, BJJ guys, thai kickboxers et. al.)
- A willingness to “step up” as they say
And traditional chinese martial arts has none of these things as currently practiced in 99.9999% of the schools on this planet (including Taiwan).
So don’t hold your breath. Although if you want to see a guy in a weird outfit get beat down, almost everytime at the TKFC there is a guy who shows up in a hakama (the traditional japanese split skirt, like the aikido guys wear), he gets beat down, his pony tail flies apart and he proves whatever it is he is trying to prove. I just watched him on my TKFC dvd.
take care,
Brian
I have no doubt you’re right, Brian. In fact, I’m saying this because I know that despite all the tough talk here, even in the home of kung fu, not one of the big boys from the famous teachers would be willing to ‘step up’ and fight with TBJJ. It says a lot for what they really believe about what they do.
Or maybe they don’t feel that they have something to prove … or that they don’t watch enough TV to even know what BJJ or UFC is … 
Must be something like that.