Ever since I was a boy I've wanted to take martial arts

[sanjion]

@Caspa: Check your facebook. 1:15am here in Indonesia, and I'm off to bed.

[particle-jim]

anyone do Jujitsu? i wanna learn, whats it like?

I did jiu jitsu ,it's all grappling and very nice if you have a good teacher like i do. VERY technical.

me and my brother been teaching ourselves a bit out of books and stuff but there's only a certain amount you can learn on your own, i need to find somewhere locally to get lessons really

brazilian jiu-jitsu is defo the one tho (spesh 10th planet style, so many unique moves)

[slothrop]

The most important thing, regardless of what you learn, is that you find a good teacher. A good teacher is the difference between a worthwhile experience and one that is just a waste of time. A good teacher won't have an attitude problem, won't bullshit you about "hidden techniques" (cos there aren't any)..

Good advice generally, this, IMO. I'm all sorts of suspicious of people who claim to teach some lethal technique that's so dangerous that they've never used it for real and noone they've ever met has ever used it for real but it's like totally guaranteed to work. If someone tried to sell you a dodgy looking gun for self-defence saying that they'd never fired it or seen it fired and you're not allowed to fire it or see it fired unless your life depends on it but some semi legendary chinese guy in the 12th century fired it once and it was TOTALLY AWESOME then you'd probably think twice about paying up.

Whole thing depends on why you want to do martial arts, anyway... some stuff gets you fit, some stuff is interesting to learn, some stuff teaches you cool tricking type moves, some stuff is sporty, some stuff is meditative, some stuff is good for self defence (although I suspect that decent cardio-vascular fitness is more likely to actually prolong your life than being good at unarmed combat), some stuff is good for your state of mind. What suits you totally depends on what you want to get out of it...

[sanjion]

[slothrop]

I guess I should probably say something a bit more constructive than that, now...

I've done a reasonable amount of tai chi and aikido and a little bit of muay thai and wushu-type kung fu. Of those I'd say:
tai chi is awesome in a way but really not for everyone. 95% of tai chi classes are nice relaxing flexibility workouts with nothing to do with martial arts. 4% do some cool fighting using tai chi techniques but don't really go deep with the internal stuff and learning to micromanage the way you move - which is kind of the point imo. 1% do do all that stuff, but doing it properly involves building it up from the ground up very slowly before you do anything resembling actual fighting, which takes TIME, and can be quite frustrating if you actually want to, yunno, have a bit of a scrap. I've done all three - the second and third types are quite good, but the second loses out to aikido (which involves some similar stuff done better imo) and the third you really have to not mind not learning anything remotely practical for quite a long time. I'd consider going back to it after getting decent at something else, but a) it's really hard to find a good teacher and b) climbing and walking have taken over my free time lately.

Muay thai is great, but at the time when I tried it I didn't have time to train enough and just kept getting battered. Eventually gave up because I wasn't getting much better and had other stuff to do. If you want practical self defence reasonably fast (which I don't) then I'd say that muay thai (plus maybe a bit of something with ground fighting so you can get in control and get back on your feet if you end up on the floor) is a good bet because from an early stage you'll be stood up in front of someone quite hard who's trying to punch, kick, knee and elbow the shit out of you and have to try to do the same to them. Which seems like more valuable experience than doing a nice controlled drill where you practice some uber ninja crippling move against someone who's behaving really predictably.

Wushu (at least the stuff I've seen) is cool if you're fairly athletic (which I'm not) and like learning big flashy tricks, spinning jumping overhead kicks (which I couldn't do) and all that sort of stuff. Good for fitness, fun, looks cool. Limited connection with actual fighting afaict.

Aikido I could go on about all day. It's mostly about locks and throws, with strikes used mostly to upset the opponent's balance and posture. That means it's not particularly practical for self defence in the short term (because grabbing someone's wrist, taking their balance and then throwing them is a lot harder to pull off on someone who's moving around and trying to stop you than just lamping them would be) but it's absolutely fascinating to learn because you go seriously deep into how people move, how they do and do not bend, and how to control their balance. Letting an aikido master hold onto your wrist is like letting them have control of your body.

I did the shodokan style (sometimes called tomiki), which I particularly like because you get to work up a technique from feeling how it should work in a totally non-restive drill, through various stages up to trying to understand how to get it to really work on someone who's fully resisting it in a competitive bout. I dunno, I guess I'm an empiricist but if I'm going to make a statement like "if I bend your arm this way, you won't be able to stay standing however strong you are and however hard you push back" I'd like to be saying it because I've tried it and it worked, not because my master said that his master said that his master said that some dude in the 12th century did it and it worked then...

Not sure how well that kind of stuff would go with a spinal problem, though - there's a fair bit of falling and rolling and generally getting chucked around the place.

[collige]

I suppose I should elaborate more on my initial post.

Taekwondo is very straight forward and 99% of the techniques ares blocks and strikes with an emphasis on kicking. If you're interested in martial arts for self-defense, it's definitely one of the ones where you learn how to defend yourself very quickly (the first thing I learned was to kick someone in the nuts and run).

Your typical workout will consist of a LOT of kicking drills followed by forms (a set of predetermined rules simulating a fight) and/or sparring. Sparring is very aggressive since it basically consists of someone trying as hard as they can to kick you in the chest.

There's also a big tournament circuit if you're into that.

At a good school, you're almost guaranteed to learn techniques such as grapples from other martial arts in addition to just Taekwondo. If you're going to learn TKD, make sure the school is Kukkiwon/WTF certified (ITF is lame). This means that they know what they're doing and their black belts are officially recognized by the headquarters in Korea.

[HRKRT]

If someone tried to sell you a dodgy looking gun for self-defence saying that they'd never fired it or seen it fired and you're not allowed to fire it or see it fired unless your life depends on it but some semi legendary chinese guy in the 12th century fired it once and it was TOTALLY AWESOME then you'd probably think twice about paying up

would sell for bare. antiques roadshow shit.


my mate does wushu for england. its fuckin nutty.

any know muay thai? is it as lethal as its made out to be? *EDIT read post above

[Motorway to Roswell]

Most people who I've seen who teach martial arts are like this.



I only trust eastern people.

[upstateface]

If someone tried to sell you a dodgy looking gun for self-defence saying that they'd never fired it or seen it fired and you're not allowed to fire it or see it fired unless your life depends on it but some semi legendary chinese guy in the 12th century fired it once and it was TOTALLY AWESOME then you'd probably think twice about paying up

would sell for bare. antiques roadshow shit.


my mate does wushu for england. its fuckin nutty.

any know muay thai? is it as lethal as its made out to be? *EDIT read post above

I do Muay Thai, just got back from class.

[sanjion]

Most people who I've seen who teach martial arts are like this.



I only trust eastern people.

My point exactly. Profiling your prospective teacher and gauging their attitude is the most worthwhile thing you can do. Also, In the case of internal arts, there shouldn't be any grading system. The Chinese use no grading system other than your own prowess and ability. In Wing Chun we determine someone's capability by doing Chi Sau (Sticky Hands) which enables us to feel if someone is more Yin (Soft) or Yang (Hard).. and respond accordingly.

[danoldboy]

Krav Maga seems like it could be quite useful in real life situations, not sure if it's strictly a martial art .

[Dwight K Schrute]

This is a message to the entire forum so that everyone can see I can physically dominate them!

[sleepyhead1]

im a blackbelt in tae kwon do, and been doing muay for about 10 months. i love martial arts and fight sports, only sports im good at

[slothrop]

Krav Maga seems like it could be quite useful in real life situations, not sure if it's strictly a martial art .

You want to be pretty fucking sure that's going to work before you try it for real, innit?

Tbh I've never really looked into krav maga because of the air of wannabe-Rambo bullshit that seems to surround it. Do they actually spar properly or are they in the 'our techniques are too deadly to actually practice them in a meaningful way' camp?