The Master
Bow Before Me.
In another thread, the modern day effectiveness of TCMA is brought into question. I'm going to pull from that thread here, to discuss that, to avoid tangenting that topic further. Some of this will be a rehash to set a foundation.
There this was stated:
Others have replied to these in that thread.
But let us look at them here.
On movements appearing the same:
Given: The human body can only move in a finite number of ways.
Given: Of those, only a smaller subset are effective for fighting.
Given: Older arts have had more time to find those effective movements
Given: Older arts have had more time to weed out the ineffective.
Given: Any art must be taught correctly to be effective.
Given: TCMA's are the formalized training of past generations of combat troops and individual skilled fighters.
Therefore:
When one sees similarity between arts, it can then be a reasonable assumption that they have found one of those effective movements.
Therefore:
When the art can be proven to be old, it can therefore be logical to accept that it has been found effective over time and repeated testing.
Conclusion:
Older TCMA that have stood the test of time have a high chance of teaching valid fighting skills, provided they are taught correctly.
On the effectiveness of MMA / Ineffectiveness of TCMA:
Given: Most MMA taught today is sport oriented.
Given: Most MMA teaches for one on one encounters
Given: Most MMA styles do not teach weapon skills
Given: Most MMA styles are less than 20 years old.
Given: Most TCMA styles include multiple attacker drills
Given: Most legitimate TCMA are older than 100 years.
Given: Most TCMA styles include some weapon training.
Given: Any art must be taught correctly to be effective.
Given: TCMA's are the formalized training of past generations of combat troops and individual skilled fighters.
Therefore: One might find a greater focus towards competition fighting in the MMA school, with less street effectiveness due to the lack of multiple attacker or weapon awareness.
Therefore: One might find more street effective training in a TCMA over a MMA due to the formers greater focus on the skills needed for street encounters.
Conclusion:
TCMA is a more effective training idea if one is training for in-street encounters with multiple weapon weilding attackers, provided it is trained in an effective manner from a proficient instructor.
I have 2 questions for MaartenSFS.
- How old are you?
- How many years past the age of 16 have you trained?
You cite your experience, and your extensive training in some of your comments, but I would like to define that "time in". There are members here who have been training in TCMA for 20, 30, 40+ years, and their experience seems to trump yours. Would you care to enhance our understanding of the scope of your experience that has given you the idea that TCMA is not effective today?
There this was stated:
andMaartenSFS said:I'm sorry but Sanda and Gongfu are two completely different things. Sanda is a Chinese copy of kickboxing with some grappling thrown in. It has no relation to Gongfu whatsoever except that Gongfu is a generic term used for all martial arts. Learning Wushu forms or a copy of kickboxing are hardly the same.
andMaartenSFS said:It's been proven that kickboxing/grappling can be applied to real combat. The same cannot be said of TCMA.
MaartenSFS said:Definitely. I do believe that there is some useful Gongfu out there, but the percentage of good teachers is so low that there is little hope left. Personally, I don't like Sanda. To me it just conforms to the kickboxing mold. It is nothing special.
Chinese teachers will tell you that all the techniques are from TCMA, but that is complete ********. Whatever happened to the great age/s when people were actually creative. MMA makes it look like there is only one effectice way to fight. No matter what style the fighters trained in, the techniques all look almost identical. This is just boring. Sanda is just China's way of keeping up with the Jones' and hardly has anything to do with applying TCMA to real life combat.
Others have replied to these in that thread.
But let us look at them here.
On movements appearing the same:
Given: The human body can only move in a finite number of ways.
Given: Of those, only a smaller subset are effective for fighting.
Given: Older arts have had more time to find those effective movements
Given: Older arts have had more time to weed out the ineffective.
Given: Any art must be taught correctly to be effective.
Given: TCMA's are the formalized training of past generations of combat troops and individual skilled fighters.
Therefore:
When one sees similarity between arts, it can then be a reasonable assumption that they have found one of those effective movements.
Therefore:
When the art can be proven to be old, it can therefore be logical to accept that it has been found effective over time and repeated testing.
Conclusion:
Older TCMA that have stood the test of time have a high chance of teaching valid fighting skills, provided they are taught correctly.
On the effectiveness of MMA / Ineffectiveness of TCMA:
Given: Most MMA taught today is sport oriented.
Given: Most MMA teaches for one on one encounters
Given: Most MMA styles do not teach weapon skills
Given: Most MMA styles are less than 20 years old.
Given: Most TCMA styles include multiple attacker drills
Given: Most legitimate TCMA are older than 100 years.
Given: Most TCMA styles include some weapon training.
Given: Any art must be taught correctly to be effective.
Given: TCMA's are the formalized training of past generations of combat troops and individual skilled fighters.
Therefore: One might find a greater focus towards competition fighting in the MMA school, with less street effectiveness due to the lack of multiple attacker or weapon awareness.
Therefore: One might find more street effective training in a TCMA over a MMA due to the formers greater focus on the skills needed for street encounters.
Conclusion:
TCMA is a more effective training idea if one is training for in-street encounters with multiple weapon weilding attackers, provided it is trained in an effective manner from a proficient instructor.
I have 2 questions for MaartenSFS.
- How old are you?
- How many years past the age of 16 have you trained?
You cite your experience, and your extensive training in some of your comments, but I would like to define that "time in". There are members here who have been training in TCMA for 20, 30, 40+ years, and their experience seems to trump yours. Would you care to enhance our understanding of the scope of your experience that has given you the idea that TCMA is not effective today?