Kajukenbo and Tracy's Kenpo

Spartan

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I studied a little Tracy's kenpo back in the day and have general idea of what the the system's like. Now I'm thinking about learning kajukenbo from a guy I know. What are the main differences I'll find between these two arts?

Thanks,
Spartan
 

loyalonehk

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I studied a little Tracy's kenpo back in the day and have general idea of what the the system's like. Now I'm thinking about learning kajukenbo from a guy I know. What are the main differences I'll find between these two arts?

Thanks,
Spartan


Depends on the guy you know - feel free to PM me or Prof Bishop with his name and we should be able to help more.

Kajukenbo is so diverse depending on the method you are going to study. Biggest thing off the bat should be the contact and ground work. Not to mention the Ohana spirit. check out the kajukenbo cafe if you have not already. Theres a link through the blog attached to my signature, and my blog may give you some info also.

Let us know how it goes... No one style is better than the other, just different flavors. Nothing wrong with Tracy's Kenpo - Kaju should fit well.

Enjoy the journey :ultracool
 

Karatedrifter7

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Having gone the opposite direction from Kajukenbo to Tracy's Kenpo, I notice that the bow stance is everywhere in Kenpo. They have a different variety of stances in Kaju- but they didint seem to use the bow.
 

Blindside

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I moved from a kajukenbo kenpo (original method) to Tracy's.

Transition was pretty straight forward, many kaju self-defense techs have a pattern; block, hurt the guy, takedown, control/destroy on the ground. Think of "Dance of Death" from the Tracy curricullum.

The overall curricullum was smaller, less self-defense techs and the forms are shorter, so there seemed to be more emphasis on the self-defense drilling. Expect lots of contact, old-school kaju schools don't pattycake their self defense techs.

But there is alot of variation in curricullum, there are lots of offshoots, sections, and methods.

Lamont
 

John Bishop

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I can only speak for the curriculum of the "Original Method".
I see many differences between Kajukenbo and various kenpo styles.
The main things I see in Kajukenbo that I don't see in kenpo (other then Shorinji Kempo) is a lot of jujitsu/judo techniques used in our combinations. Probably 60-75% of our combinations have judo or jujitsu techniques. In Kajukenbo we also use a lot of escrima strikes, limb destruction techniques, and footwork.
And of course as many will point out, there usually is quite a bit of hard contact used in most of our technique training and sparring.
Our katas are usually short (20-22 moves), and appear more Okinawan influenced, then Chinese. Although there are 14 katas (Palama Sets), they are only taught thru green belt. And most instructors don't spend a lot of time on analyzing every move of every kata.
 

Blindside

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Not a big difference, but most kaju punch defenses are against "boxer style" jab/cross or cross attacks, while most kenpo punch defenses are against "step through punches" or karate lunge punches.

Lamont
 

Flying Crane

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I see many differences between Kajukenbo and various kenpo styles.
The main things I see in Kajukenbo that I don't see in kenpo (other then Shorinji Kempo) is a lot of jujitsu/judo techniques used in our combinations. Probably 60-75% of our combinations have judo or jujitsu techniques.

Having never trained kajukenbo I cannot comment on that art, but in Tracys we actually use quite a lot of jujitsu type joint locking, joint destroying, and joint manipulations in our techniques. There is actually a fair amount of "standup grappling", for lack of a better term, as well as falling and rolling and fighting from the ground to regain your feet and escape. If we end up on the ground we are not going to stick around and try to win the submission ala BJJ. Rather we fight from the ground to regain our feet and either continue the fight from there, or get away.
 

John Bishop

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Not a big difference, but most kaju punch defenses are against "boxer style" jab/cross or cross attacks, while most kenpo punch defenses are against "step through punches" or karate lunge punches.

Lamont

That is true. Most punch defenses and some grab defenses are done against the boxer/street fighters punches. Jab/punch combos. Jab/hook combos. Grab and punch combos. Grab from behind, sucker punch type attacks, etc.
 

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