Search results

Hi, After practicing martial arts on my own I have a lot of muscle pain in the oblique muscles of the lower back and on the sides. These are the muscles that tilt your pelvis to the side. When / How long? Usually I can feel some fatigue on the same day and muscle pain lasts for a few days...

My dad took up wing Tsun when he was close to 70. He keeps training and has had much fun. Good decision. Have fun too.

There are many ways to open the guard: - hit or kick where it isn't, - faint a technique to have the opponent move the guard and go to no. 1 - usually a few techniques in a row will create some opening - move around the opponent - if you deliver a powerful blow even a good guard has limits; I...

Age is just a number. Beeing in your 30s you still have plenty of time and potential to improve. You probably won't be a world champion or so but you still have a lot ahead. If you think your time is more or less up then it will be so because you are mentally limiting yourself. Watch your...

As Jeremy Clarkson would say: it's like the queen running a 110 meter hurdle... Technically feasible but...

Kalimera! Ask 10 people and you'll probably get close to 10 different answers. So here is my different answer... Sport in itself won't do much: the human body is very efficient and has many compensation mechanisms. Burn 500 calories in sport (be it martial art or whatever), the body can...

No: The virus will spread anyway. Masks may slow it down a bit but not more than that. We've been wearing a mask for months already and the virus has kept spreading. What matters is a good immune system.

Welkom aan boord!

Makes perfect sense but it triggers a question in my mind: should we differentiate between combos for a fight / sparring and combos for the purpose of training the technique? In a sparring you want swift combinations to strike your opponent. When training could it make sense to use odd combos...

Hi Dvcochran, No I don't have any suitable mirror. Depending on light conditions I could use the doors/windows when training on my terrace but that's definitely not as good as a mirror. And in the morning or in the evening it's dark in northern Germany, so forget about those doors/windows. I...

@ kung-fu wang: yes I often practice combinations but usually because I find it more difficult to perform the technique after that. Performing a spin back kick is not too difficult but if you do a jab-cross-hook punch before then it becomes more complex to launch a clean spin back kick (for me...

Hi! Two questions about training on one's own outdoors: How many repetitions should one do when training a given technique? The more the better or is there a kind of optimal amount? I have noticed that after a while you're getting somehow tired (muscle fatigue, less focussed). Should one then...

Hi Skrib, I haven't practiced TKD but other MAs and I totally understand you're upset. You are a perfectionist and so it is no wonder that you are disappointed with a result that would please many other students. As you are already black belt 3rd dan I take it for granted you know what you are...

I ab-so-lu-te-ly don't care if someone does not wear a mask. I work in a rather large company in Hamburg in Germany and I commute with the train. I haven't had any single day of remote working since outbreak of covid 19. I haven't been infected or at least haven't had any symptoms. I...

And another point: A weight lifting champion has trained muscles in a certain way that is not completely unrelated to a fight but his / her nervous system is totally untrained for a fight -> Reflexes, knowing what to do, feeling for fight distance etc. all that has to be appropriately trained.

I think you totally overestimate muscle power in martial arts. You say lifting weights works on your fast twitch muscle fibers. Well is it really fast? The speed of a bench press or a squat is nothing compared to the speed of a punch... A truck has no chance against a Ferrari on a racing...

It's hard to give you an answer: you didn't tell how bad your injurury is. Are you still in severe pain (no martial art) or have you (fully) recovered (martial art is possible)? If I were you I would listen to the signals of my body: if it hurts don't do it, else that's fine. Herniated disks...

That's a sad story. Some trainers definitely don't deserve the respect they want. Yours obviously feels safe you're not gonna quit close to getting your black belt and he has been abusing it. You may try talking with your trainer but I think it's a lost cause: he cannot have overlooked that...

But trying to make something out of nothing isn't.

Double post

Hi, Thanks for the video. Interesting indeed but it triggers a few questions in my mind: - Are these shotokan katas? They don't seem familiar to me. - Did those MMA fighters learn those techniques from katas or is it just a coincidence that what they did in the ring was similar to a move in a...

I don't like katas or forms indeed. It's like signing up for a Spanish course and realizing they're teaching you Romanian. Questioning this they insist that they're teaching Spanish but even after a few years of "Spanish" you understand absolutely nothing when trying to speak with a spaniard...

Martial serves a fight / combat purpose Art has no purpose in itself, it's just supposed to be beautiful and please for itself Many techniques and much practice in shotokan is claimed to be martial but is completely pointless in a halfway realistic fight. You may say it is ******** but let's...

Believe me I have been to countless seminars with many different trainers and nearly all were waaaaay more artists than martialists. I was in 2 different dojos that had several trainers each and it was the same stuff. :wtf:

I sent to a shotokan karate dojo not beeing aware of the various styles. I wanted to practice some martial art. For a while I loved it because it made me fit, gave me self confidence, mentally woke me up, I got many friends and it was a very welcome experience for a nerd. My colleagues at the...

Hi, I can relate to Rick Franklin's in a way. I see 2 main reasons for that: - while tennis, basket ball, soccer etc. are definitely games confined to a playing field, martial arts aim at making you a better fighter and helping you out on the street kicking the bad guy's *** if need be...

@ Rick Franklin: interesting comparison. I must stress however that hard core martial arts have an advantage over light contact / choreographic arts: - in Muay Thai / MMA you can always put something to the test by trying it out in sparring / the ring (as long as you respect some basic rules...

Lack of flexibility in your muscles is certainly not the issue if you're just 5 inches away from the split. I am more than a foot away from the split and still I can kick at head level without pain in my joints. I remember having a similar problem a couple of years ago although not as...

When someone raises your leg to the side, do you pivot the standing foot? Do you tilt your pelvis? Otherwise it somehow does not make much sense, like "I can't raise my hands above shoulder level but still I can comb my hair"... Anyway, Muay Thai isn't taekwondo: flashy jump spin twist kicks or...

Performing a roundhouse kick against a bag is somehow easier than in the air because the bag stops your leg when hitting the target. In the air you have to stop - and reverse - the movement all by yourself. Kicking high does not require so much flexibility: people often mistake a lack of...