Sparring quirks

[mijemi]

During a recent grading I had this guy stick his tongue out at me Maori style every time he got a shot in on me while sparring. It was really quite distracting and I got a few punches in the stomach as I stood there with my mouth open thinking "What is this guy doing?". I am pretty inexperienced as far as sparring goes but thought this was quite funny. I've also heard this other guy make a hissing sound every time he strikes and another girl makes her own little sound effects. Has anyone else come across some funny sparring quirks or better yet, do you have any?

[MBuzzy]

My instructor just stands still with his hands at his side, talking about what I'm doing with a grin.....until he decides its time to knock me down. Is that a quirk?

[Ninjamom]

I met someone who had special contact lenses that she used for regional sparring competitions - they gave her a 'cat's eyes' look.

I think some such things are OK for distracting or unnerving an opponent, but sticking out your tongue and other self-congratulatory displays after a hit/strike seem more like poor sportsmanship to me, personally.

[elder999]

I think some such things are OK for distracting or unnerving an opponent, but sticking out your tongue and other self-congratulatory displays after a hit/strike seem more like poor sportsmanship to me, personally.

Actually, he said sticking out the tongue "Maori style," and he's in Australia, so it's possible the guy was actually Maori, and culturally this is an intimidation tactic, and not self congratulatory.

I used to hum when sparring; I think that's a quirk. It was great for regulating my breathing when boxing, kickboxing or karate sparring, but kind of upsetting when I'd put a choke on someone and hum "lullaby and goodnight", so I had to give it up...:lol:

[TraditionalTKD]

None that come to mind. We were always taught to be respectful of our partners use good concentration. God forbid someone start humming or stick out their tongue. They would end up paying for it. Probably the only thing some people do is smile during sparring, and even that's borderline disrespectful.
We've had guys come in in the past and wave their hands around a la kung fu. I think they ended up getting broken fingers.

[MetalStorm]

During a recent grading I had this guy stick his tongue out at me Maori style every time he got a shot in on me while sparring. It was really quite distracting and I got a few punches in the stomach as I stood there with my mouth open thinking "What is this guy doing?". I am pretty inexperienced as far as sparring goes but thought this was quite funny. I've also heard this other guy make a hissing sound every time he strikes and another girl makes her own little sound effects. Has anyone else come across some funny sparring quirks or better yet, do you have any?


The hissing sound is pretty normal, well atleast from what I have seen in Muay Thai, we are taught to breath out with really quick breaths when striking. Not sure the whole reason behind it, was explained to me before but I cant seem to remember.

[Blindside]

None that come to mind. We were always taught to be respectful of our partners use good concentration. God forbid someone start humming or stick out their tongue. They would end up paying for it. Probably the only thing some people do is smile during sparring, and even that's borderline disrespectful.
We've had guys come in in the past and wave their hands around a la kung fu. I think they ended up getting broken fingers.

Smiling during sparring is disrespectful??? Sparring is a training drill to develop tools, and why shouldn't you have have have fun during training? We have a pretty close school, and you'll hear (joking) taunts throughout our sparring class, and yet the respect is still there.

Lamont

[mijemi]

Smiling during sparring is disrespectful??? Sparring is a training drill to develop tools, and why shouldn't you have have have fun during training? We have a pretty close school, and you'll hear (joking) taunts throughout our sparring class, and yet the respect is still there.
Lamont

I agree that smiling could be considered disrespectful in the case of a tournament or another more formal occassion but this grading was pretty informal so I just laughed about it afterwards. It all depends on the situation doesn't it?

[mijemi]

I met someone who had special contact lenses that she used for regional sparring competitions - they gave her a 'cat's eyes' look.

:lfao:That is so funny. I wonder if it worked?

[TraditionalTKD]

It also depends on who is sparring whom. Two people who have known each other a long time and are good friends will probably do things that others would not let each other get away with. I used to spar with a partner that I knew for a long time, and we'd do things that I would never have done with others simply because we knew each other well, such as smiling, talking, unorthodox technique etc. It wasn't as formal as others might have been.

[Shaderon]

Probably the only thing some people do is smile during sparring, and even that's borderline disrespectful.
We've had guys come in in the past and wave their hands around a la kung fu. I think they ended up getting broken fingers.


Smiling during sparring is disrespectful??? Sparring is a training drill to develop tools, and why shouldn't you have have have fun during training? We have a pretty close school, and you'll hear (joking) taunts throughout our sparring class, and yet the respect is still there.



I agree that smiling could be considered disrespectful in the case of a tournament or another more formal occassion but this grading was pretty informal so I just laughed about it afterwards. It all depends on the situation doesn't it?


It also depends on who is sparring whom. Two people who have known each other a long time and are good friends will probably do things that others would not let each other get away with. I used to spar with a partner that I knew for a long time, and we'd do things that I would never have done with others simply because we knew each other well, such as smiling, talking, unorthodox technique etc. It wasn't as formal as others might have been.


We don't just smile while sparring, we have a good laugh and I'm always giggling, especially when I get hit in the nose or I manage to strike someone on the head who's not got their guard up. We smile during sparring in grading too, I don't consider it disrespectful as long as it's not spiteful smiling. It's enjoying what you are doing to me.

I bite my botton lip when I'm about to do a combo, it's a concentration thing but the people that have sussed it out beat me regulaly, I've learnt to stop it a bit but sometimes I do it on purpose now to throw people off the scent.

[kidswarrior]

We don't just smile while sparring, we have a good laugh and I'm always giggling, especially when I get hit in the nose or I manage to strike someone on the head who's not got their guard up. We smile during sparring in grading too, I don't consider it disrespectful as long as it's not spiteful smiling. It's enjoying what you are doing to me.

I also think the training hall is a place to have fun. Yes, we all know it's serious business, but we don't have to walk around like we're in a life and death situation every second--a little too much intensity for me.

If we're doing San Soo (our form of 'sparring') and someone really puts a good combination on me, I tend to laugh--at myself.

Had one instructor who thought this was disrespectful of the art. To me, it's one thing to take the art seriously; it's another to take ourselves too seriously. :)

[Shotochem]

To me, it's one thing to take the art seriously; it's another to take ourselves too seriously. :)


My sentiments exactly. :)


-Marc-

[Eternal Beginner]

There is a guy at our club who hums while he rolls. Very unnerving for some reason.

[Touch Of Death]

During a recent grading I had this guy stick his tongue out at me Maori style every time he got a shot in on me while sparring. It was really quite distracting and I got a few punches in the stomach as I stood there with my mouth open thinking "What is this guy doing?". I am pretty inexperienced as far as sparring goes but thought this was quite funny. I've also heard this other guy make a hissing sound every time he strikes and another girl makes her own little sound effects. Has anyone else come across some funny sparring quirks or better yet, do you have any?If those quirks effect you, they just graduated to timing mechanisms.
sean

[Touch Of Death]

None that come to mind. We were always taught to be respectful of our partners use good concentration. God forbid someone start humming or stick out their tongue. They would end up paying for it. Probably the only thing some people do is smile during sparring, and even that's borderline disrespectful.
We've had guys come in in the past and wave their hands around a la kung fu. I think they ended up getting broken fingers.And just what the hell are you talking about? It sounds as if it is y'all whom are being dis-respectfull. I hope you guys enjoy hurting newbies.
sean

[zDom]

Sticking a tongue out or biting a lip while sparring is dangerous, a bad habit.

A shot to the chin at the wrong time could result in needing several stitches.

[TraditionalTKD]

We don't enjoy hurting newbies, we enjoy hurting people who think martial arts are fun and games or a social event.

[Shotochem]

We don't enjoy hurting newbies, we enjoy hurting people who think martial arts are fun and games or a social event.

Without the fun, what's the point? Hurting anyone you train with intentionally is not what MA are all about. It is the higher ranked or more highly skilled persons responsibility to make sure their partner does not get hurt.

It is the instructors job to eliminate horseplay and instill a learning atmosphere.

-Marc-

[Shaderon]

Sticking a tongue out or biting a lip while sparring is dangerous, a bad habit.

A shot to the chin at the wrong time could result in needing several stitches.


Yea I know I shouldn't do it, it's hard breaking the habit though. Better breaking that habit with friends I trust though, than going into a comp and getting that split lip.

[tkd_jen]

Without the fun, what's the point? Hurting anyone you train with intentionally is not what MA are all about. It is the higher ranked or more highly skilled persons responsibility to make sure their partner does not get hurt.

It is the instructors job to eliminate horseplay and instill a learning atmosphere.

-Marc-

I agree 100% with you.

A few weeks ago I was sparring with another female black belt. We have trained together for a couple years now and are friends outside the gym as well. She got me with a good back kick and I started laughing because really I walked right into it. Immediately our instructor stopped the match and warned us to be serious, because 1. sparring is serious and you can be injured at any time really and 2. we are black belts and are supposed to be setting the example for other students.

[tkd_jen]

We don't enjoy hurting newbies, we enjoy hurting people who think martial arts are fun and games or a social event.

Hi TraditionalTKD, based on your previous posts, I don't think you really meant this literally (correct me if I'm wrong). It can/is frustrating when you are training hard and you get a partner who just isn't dialed in that day. Challenge yourself when you get partners like this. Take the opportunity to work on something, anything specific you want to improve. That way you get some benefit from a partner who is being a lousy partner.

[TraditionalTKD]

There are times in Tae Kwon Do when you can relax a little and smile and laugh, it is not always serious. Sparring is not that time. Sparring should be serious because A. the possibility of getting hurt is real and B. You need to have respect for your partner regardless of level or friendship. If someone smiles at me, laughs, makes weird noises, or hand gestures, it shows that they either aren't concentrating or they don't respect me as a fellow student. I will give them one warning and then if it happens again I will respond appropriately. I heard stories in the past of people that came to class and tried stuff like that and got really hurt, to the point where they needed medical treatment.
This is something that separates traditional matial arts from so-called "American karate"-traditional martial arts takes a dim view of stuff like that, whereas American karate classes might let it slide.
BTW, I've gone to at least one class in our organization where color belt students acted like that (very informal during sparring). I could not contact them because of my rank, so I had a talk with the Instructor to let them know what was going on. Perhaps an attitude adjustment was in order.

[Kacey]

We don't enjoy hurting newbies, we enjoy hurting people who think martial arts are fun and games or a social event.

I don't enjoy hurting anyone, and I don't appreciate or approve of people who do enjoy hurting people... no matter how much I disagree with their opinions. I enjoy teaching people how to not let others hurt them.

[Touch Of Death]

We don't enjoy hurting newbies, we enjoy hurting people who think martial arts are fun and games or a social event.Well its sounds like you have a serious problem. Go join a street gang. They look for respect for no good reason too. Prolly save you some money.
sean

[TraditionalTKD]

We don't really enjoy hurting people. We do take it personally when some yahoo who doesn't take practice seriously comes to class and does the things I mentioned. Some of us worked hard, sweated, bled, and got knocked around. So when we spar against someone who thinks it is fun and games or a social get together, we get a little miffed. Like I said before, if you want martial arts to be fun and relaxing, go to the American karate school down the road (or whatever it's called).

[rutherford]

Perhaps an attitude adjustment was in order.

Oh, I get it. You go to that Cobra Kai karate dojo in Reseda. How's Johnny?

[Touch Of Death]

We don't really enjoy hurting people. We do take it personally when some yahoo who doesn't take practice seriously comes to class and does the things I mentioned. Some of us worked hard, sweated, bled, and got knocked around. So when we spar against someone who thinks it is fun and games or a social get together, we get a little miffed. Like I said before, if you want martial arts to be fun and relaxing, go to the American karate school down the road (or whatever it's called).Whats the deal with this "respect" you value so much. What are you trying to accomplish?
Sean

[TraditionalTKD]

Actually, some of the people I used to spar with weren't too far from that. Other than not taking out your knee, they were not above contacting you hard if they felt you were not concentrating or taking it seriously. I saw guys get knocked back 20+ feet with side kicks. And those were the ones we liked.

[TraditionalTKD]

Whats the deal with this "respect" you value so much. What are you trying to accomplish?
Sean

It's one of the cornerstones of traditional martial arts. Respect your Instructor and your fellow classmates. Considering that traditional practice can lead to serious injury if your concentration is not high, it is important to maintain a high level of focus and decorum to show you understand the seriousness of what you are doing.
Many Americans' problem is that they do think martial arts is fun and games and a social get together. As a result, they consider something like sparring to be the equivalent of playing soccer or softball. Just a game, have fun and enjoy yourself. Real free fighting is not like that. If you don't respect your partner, who has worked hard to get where he is, it is perceived as an insult. You show respect by taking what you and him are doing seriously. Even if you don't respect him personally, you respect the activity and the fact that you or him could get hurt.

[Em MacIntosh]

My old instructor used to make this snarly, frowny "hate you! kill you! you die!" face just before he'd come at me. Of course, being an instructor, he had great control and only beat me as hard as he deemed necessary but the look in his eye was like being hit a lot harder than any of his techniques. I've adopted this myself and consider it a technique in its own right. I've affectionately dubbed this technique "Murray Face" to honor my old instructor (his name is Murray) and I've found it very effective as a psych-out, even with people who are used to it. That might be considered a quirk. Sometimes if you can do something humerous and make your opponent laugh you can suddenly become serious and get'em in the gut too. Try it sometime. It might work for you.

[bluemtn]

Well, there are a few people (mostly those that are black belts), that will just let you initiate the attacking and all they do is block... All of the sudden- they'll throw a punch or a kick in. I've tried to kind of counter what they've done, but I'm not all that patient. Although, I believe I'm getting much better at the "surprises"- at least I've been told I am. I've been told that my quirk (although not really one- it's just unexpected depending on the person) is I'll throw out a mixture- they don't always know what I'll do, and I like to keep it close.

[rutherford]

It's one of the cornerstones of traditional martial arts. Respect your Instructor and your fellow classmates. Considering that traditional practice can lead to serious injury if your concentration is not high, it is important to maintain a high level of focus and decorum to show you understand the seriousness of what you are doing.

** some stuff pulled below **

You show respect by taking what you and him are doing seriously. Even if you don't respect him personally, you respect the activity and the fact that you or him could get hurt.

You start from a fine premise, but instead of leaving it at that you take it further and say, "If you're not acting as I feel you should, then I will make sure you do get hurt."

In that case, I think assault charges would be justified.


Many Americans' problem is that they do think martial arts is fun and games and a social get together. As a result, they consider something like sparring to be the equivalent of playing soccer or softball. Just a game, have fun and enjoy yourself. Real free fighting is not like that. If you don't respect your partner, who has worked hard to get where he is, it is perceived as an insult.

Americans also spend a lot of time doing thousands of kicks and punches with poor mechanics in the name of fitness which will undoubtably lead to joint damage and other health problems, all without ever making any contact.

For many people, the martial arts are social and you'd never keep going if it wasn't fun. The fact that you take their desires and precoceptions as an insult is your own personal problem, and I wonder what insecurity brings it out. If your training goals are incompatible, then you should just clearly state so and go your seperate ways.

[Touch Of Death]

It's one of the cornerstones of traditional martial arts. Respect your Instructor and your fellow classmates. Considering that traditional practice can lead to serious injury if your concentration is not high, it is important to maintain a high level of focus and decorum to show you understand the seriousness of what you are doing.
Many Americans' problem is that they do think martial arts is fun and games and a social get together. As a result, they consider something like sparring to be the equivalent of playing soccer or softball. Just a game, have fun and enjoy yourself. Real free fighting is not like that. If you don't respect your partner, who has worked hard to get where he is, it is perceived as an insult. You show respect by taking what you and him are doing seriously. Even if you don't respect him personally, you respect the activity and the fact that you or him could get hurt.Again its sounds like an excuse for a whole dominance and submission vibe, But if you can't make fighting like it was a soccer game, they have no bussiness fighting.
Sean

[tkd_jen]

In an attempt to spin this....

Some of our fighters have a pre-fight ritual that always makes me smile. As the ref calls "June-bi" one kid will slap his thighs alternatingly a couple times. The 1st time I saw it I laughed because it looks kinda goofy! Another guy does the Catholic blessing followed with a loud "Whoo!!!"

My sparring quirk....besides getting owned in the ring....nothing I guess! ;)

[TraditionalTKD]

But don't misunderstand. I'm not advocating two people beating the crap out of each other, and I'm also not in favor of color belts being beaten down because they happen to smile or laugh. We don't want people getting hurt. However, students need to be raised with the mentality that sparring is serious and you respect your partner. To that end, smiling, laughing, talking, whistling, humming, hand gestures et al are frowned upon. I'm probably not going to contact a color belt hard because he smiled during sparring. A young child especially, I'm willing to let that go. A black belt should know better. A black belt who does the above needs to know those behaviors do not fit in free fighting because it does show disrespect to your partner. And if a black belt does do the above, it does not reflect very well on their Instructor and organization.

[Carol]

Moderator Note

Attention All Users:

Please return to the original topic of discussion.



Has anyone else come across some funny sparring quirks or better yet, do you have any?
Thank You,

- Carol Kaur -
- MT Moderator -

[rutherford]

In an attempt to spin this....

Some of our fighters have a pre-fight ritual that always makes me smile. As the ref calls "June-bi" one kid will slap his thighs alternatingly a couple times. The 1st time I saw it I laughed because it looks kinda goofy!

This will release muscle tension. It's a good pre-fight exercise.

I don't like to smile, because it's just excess tension. But don't let that fool you into thinking that I'm not having fun!

[CuongNhuka]

Sometimes I'll make pseudo-hissing sounds as I strike. The sound is a product of me half-exhaleing while tensing my abs and chest. It also trips people up. At times I'll do odd things like stick out a hand (not striking) and leave it there. It distracts the other guy so I can kick him. Depending on were I place it, it also blocks there vision. I could tell you more, but I'll go with the standard army reply. I could tell you more, but I'd have to kill (lol). Being serious, it's more like "I could tell you more, but you'll have to find out the hard way".
One other thing I'll do (at the rare tornament) is just after the match begins is kiai as loud as possible. Suddenly every one is paying attention. And the other guys is woundering what the heck is going on. Well, just long enough for me to rush in and bash 'em a couple of times.

[tkd_jen]

This will release muscle tension. It's a good pre-fight exercise.

I don't like to smile, because it's just excess tension. But don't let that fool you into thinking that I'm not having fun!

It absolutely works for them, one last thing to get them in their zone! I think it started as a nervous twitch kind of thing and just became a habit. More power to them!

[Tez3]

Having a Maori stick their tongue out at me would rather intimidate me! Having them do the full Haka would probably have me running for the hills lol! Couldn't say it was disrespectful though!

[bookworm_cn317]

The only thing I can think of would be: sometimes I get into a 'rut' when sparring (I get into a pattern, 'kick, kick, punch'), and the only reason I can tell you this is my instructor teased me about in class one time (I was only mildly embarrassed. He was talking about what you should/should NOT do when sparring and he used me as an example of what NOT to do. Apparently I got this UBER-innocent look on my face as he was talking. That's when he knew that I knew.).

That's my 'sparring quirk'!

[Thesemindz]

During a recent grading I had this guy stick his tongue out at me Maori style every time he got a shot in on me while sparring. It was really quite distracting and I got a few punches in the stomach as I stood there with my mouth open thinking "What is this guy doing?". I am pretty inexperienced as far as sparring goes but thought this was quite funny. I've also heard this other guy make a hissing sound every time he strikes and another girl makes her own little sound effects. Has anyone else come across some funny sparring quirks or better yet, do you have any?

Man, we used to have some real fun. Just for fun, I liked to sing "Lady in Red" while I sparred. It really threw people off, and it's a great song. I used to play around alot with the guys in my sparring class. We'd mock the fighters who celebrate every point by raising our fists into the air and cheering for ourselves. I'd turn towards the mirror and pantomime fixing my hair after being awarded a point. Once while grappling, I actually took my hair down, fixed it, and then put it back up while maintaining the mount position.

The thing is, there was no disrespect. There was huge mutual respect, and that allowed us to have fun. When it was time, for instance during testing, we were all business, but during training, we liked to have some fun.

Some things I did to gain a tactical advantage were kicks and strikes fired away from the opp. to cause them to flinch into a follow up strike. Fixing my eyes off angle from my opp. so they couldn't predict the target of my strikes. Dropping my weight suddenly to "stomp" the floor, or clapping to distract my opp. "Accidently" stepping on my opp. foot, and then leaning in to strike, causing him to attemp to retreat, only to be stuck by my foot. Feinting towards my opp. in ways I know he'll block, so I can hook his block in and return a strike.

I had a roomate who would follow every inward block with a blind spinning backnuckle. The first one almost knocked me out, and the second one might have for just a second, but after that, I fed him punches to his open side all night so he'd block, spin, and jam on my prepositioned blocking arm and take a cross to the jaw. All night.


-Rob

[CityChicken]

During a recent grading I had this guy stick his tongue out at me Maori style every time he got a shot in on me while sparring. It was really quite distracting and I got a few punches in the stomach as I stood there with my mouth open thinking "What is this guy doing?". I am pretty inexperienced as far as sparring goes but thought this was quite funny. I've also heard this other guy make a hissing sound every time he strikes and another girl makes her own little sound effects. Has anyone else come across some funny sparring quirks or better yet, do you have any?

When I first started sparing, I held my tounge between my lips and teeth. Some kind of nervous thing I guess. My master nipped that in the bud quickly, telling me i'm going to bite my tounge off when I get kicked/punched in the head or fall down. Really good point. I would not adopt this tounge technique you're seeing.