Is it really the person not the style?

[BeeBrian]

If not then is it actually that some styles could be more effective? If so, then why do people learn martial arts if they could do just as well with their own method?

Tradition and loyalty.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

The way I look at it is this..

Suppose I practice the most effective martial art on the planet - Superduper Ryu Jutsu, which has been scientifically designed to be 99.99% efficient in street fighting application.

Suppose you, on the other hand, practice Lameass Do, an art created by selecting the stupidest and least effective techniques from every other art and stitching them together without regard for coherent principles. Based on careful holodeck simulations, we can tell that Lameass Do is only 10% efficient in a street fight.

Clearly then, in a real fight I should defeat you every time, right?

Not so fast. What I forgot to mention is that you really, really love Lameass Do, and as a result you train your butt off every day of the week. I, on the other hand don't really care that much about Superduper Ryu. I only attend the school because it was the closest one to my house and I never train more than two days a week. My art might be 10 times as efficient, but you train 20 times harder. When we clash, you win.

Unfair comparison, some might say. What if you were the one putting your dedicated work ethic into mastering Superduper Ryu? Wouldn't you be that much more badass? Possibly, but here's the catch - you tried Superduper Ryu and you didn't enjoy it. Since you didn't enjoy it, you didn't practice it that much. It wasn't until you switched over to Lameass Do that you became a training monster.

That's why I always tell potential martial arts students to find something they love practicing rather than worrying about which is the deadliest art.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

Don't know why there are 2 threads for this subject.

If your style doesn't emphasize on "choke", "flying knee", "single leg", or ..., will that prevent you from putting those tools into your toolbox? Where will you be able to obtain those tools? You may have to look outside of your style. Since you will be responsibility to bring those useful tools into your own toolbox, it's the person (yourself) that's important and not the style.

 

[Tez3]

In the earliest days of UFC and Kickboxing, There wasnt one dominant striking style. BJJ did far better back then because nobody knew what it was. Now people are familiar and know how to defend against the common BJJ moves you see and its even.

No, BJJ did well because the early UFC was designed to showcase it. The UFC is a business, look up it's history. UFC is not MMA.

I think you might have people who will also dispute the TKD being used on the battlefield thing too, you might have to look up TKD history too.

 

[drop bear]

I wouldnt necessarily say that some styles are more effective. Remember, Traditional TKD or what became later TKD, was used on the battlefield in Korea when Japan invaded. But now there are many more sport schools. They don't claim to be anything else usually, thats a picture painted by the less informed. But theres still Traditional TKD guys who are doing a lot of full contact SD work. But still, many people who only see sport TKD will assume its useless.

Styles came to existence because of different needs, methodologies, situations, body styles, purpose, and many other reasons. Theres never really been one central most effective style or system in hundreds of years. In terms of SD or even sport, multiple styles gives you more options in finding what works best for your personally.

Even then, many martial arts are combinations of or piggybacked into creation off of other martial arts. Essentially, ever cross training martial artist develops their own method.

In the earliest days of UFC and Kickboxing, There wasnt one dominant striking style. BJJ did far better back then because nobody knew what it was. Now people are familiar and know how to defend against the common BJJ moves you see and its even.

The focus of your school makes a difference moreso than a style, but the ability to apply whatever knowledge and skills youve learned falls on you.

You are still going to train within a structure that is going to be varying degrees of good and bad.

I could start a school of crapjitsufu. And train honestly in my shed beating the crap out of my students. But that does not mean what i am doing is technically correct. It just means it is better than the few guys i can towel up.

i can towel up noobs with some pretty silly stuff

 

[qwerty]

Don't know why there are 2 threads for this subject.

If your style doesn't emphasize on "choke", "flying knee", "single leg", or ..., will that prevent you from putting those tools into your toolbox? Where will you be able to obtain those tools? You may have to look outside of your style. Since you will be responsibility to bring those useful tools into your own toolbox, it's the person (yourself) that's important and not the style.

I have no ideas how the other thread was made.... Clicked post once came up twice...

 

[Drose427]

No, BJJ did well because the early UFC was designed to showcase it. The UFC is a business, look up it's history. UFC is not MMA.

I think you might have people who will also dispute the TKD being used on the battlefield thing too, you might have to look up TKD history too.

TKD is a blanket term. When the name came to be the 9 kwans were all very different martial arts. Where they came from were a mixture of Korean and Japanese martial arts, as when japan invaded soldiers werent allowed to train in Korean arts. While the term TKD wasnt given until after the occupation, the styles that become TKD were used. Obviously the "punched clean through his chest!" anecdotes are bogus, but thats how the amalgamation that later became called TKD came to be popular.

 

[Cirdan]

TKD is a blanket term. When the name came to be the 9 kwans were all very different martial arts. Where they came from were a mixture of Korean and Japanese martial arts, as when japan invaded soldiers werent allowed to train in Korean arts. While the term TKD wasnt given until after the occupation, the styles that become TKD were used. Obviously the "punched clean through his chest!" anecdotes are bogus, but thats how the amalgamation that later became called TKD came to be popular.

More like they filed the serial numbers off Shotokan

 

[Mephisto]

I wouldnt necessarily say that some styles are more effective. Remember, Traditional TKD or what became later TKD, was used on the battlefield in Korea when Japan invaded. But now there are many more sport schools. They don't claim to be anything else usually, thats a picture painted by the less informed. But theres still Traditional TKD guys who are doing a lot of full contact SD work. But still, many people who only see sport TKD will assume its useless.

Styles came to existence because of different needs, methodologies, situations, body styles, purpose, and many other reasons. Theres never really been one central most effective style or system in hundreds of years. In terms of SD or even sport, multiple styles gives you more options in finding what works best for your personally.

Even then, many martial arts are combinations of or piggybacked into creation off of other martial arts. Essentially, ever cross training martial artist develops their own method.

In the earliest days of UFC and Kickboxing, There wasnt one dominant striking style. BJJ did far better back then because nobody knew what it was. Now people are familiar and know how to defend against the common BJJ moves you see and its even.

The focus of your school makes a difference moreso than a style, but the ability to apply whatever knowledge and skills youve learned falls on you.

Tkd in the battlefield? Cite a reference please. Some of the precursors to tkd maybe, but I doubt anyone was doing 540 kicks or any fancy high kicks against guys with swords and spears.

 

[Shai Hulud]

More like they filed the serial numbers off Shotokan

You broke the code!

 

[Danny T]

No, BJJ did well because the early UFC was designed to showcase it. The UFC is a business, look up it's history. UFC is not MMA.

Yeap. In thhe first few UFCs all of the participants were hand picked. Chosen because of their particular fighting styles and were a tournament style format not a single match format of today. In the first UFC the only person the Gracie's were concerned about was Ken Shamrock because of his high school, professional and Pancrase wrestling background. Shamrock accepted the UFC fight even though he had just fought 4 days prior in Japan and fought without rest and suffering with jet lag. Gracie won the first 2 UFC's pulled in the 3rd (could not continue) because he was beat up so badly. Then time limits were put into place and other rules were added to make the UFC more 'acceptable' to sell to the general public. To Make $$$. The first few were strikers vs BJJ, as wrestler strikers began to get in BJJ was tested and Gracie quit after fighting to a draw in the 5th UFC. However BJJ/GJJ took off as the style to know.
Today the UFC is all about selling tickets they don't care about the best fighter competing against the best it is about who will sell the most.

 

[Drose427]

Tkd in the battlefield? Cite a reference please. Some of the precursors to tkd maybe, but I doubt anyone was doing 540 kicks or any fancy high kicks against guys with swords and spears.

Well when TKD was given that general label nobody was fighting with swords and spears....

 

[Drose427]

More like they filed the serial numbers off Shotokan

Hey not all! My TSD school took from Goju Ryu

 

[Drose427]

Tkd in the battlefield? Cite a reference please. Some of the precursors to tkd maybe, but I doubt anyone was doing 540 kicks or any fancy high kicks against guys with swords and spears.

Also, a lot of Traditional TKD schools barely even teach that kick. It was very much a sport creation. Before the sport, TKD was just a general label for styles that come from Korean Martial Artists training in Japanese martial arts and blending the two. TKD is far more than the sport you see on TV or internet.

 

[Tez3]

Well when TKD was given that general label nobody was fighting with swords and spears....

so the Koreans were using TKD against machine guns, tanks etc?

 

[Drose427]

so the Koreans were using TKD against machine guns, tanks etc?

According to the articles and soldiers, in trenches!

Wherever they used it, what became labeled as TKD after the occupation was popularized in the military by soldiers seeing it in action before the civilian market.

 

[Tony Dismukes]

No, BJJ did well because the early UFC was designed to showcase it. The UFC is a business, look up it's history. UFC is not MMA.

BJJ did equally well in all the other early MMA promotions that were not founded by members of the Gracie family. (Pride, World Combat Championship, Extreme Fighting Championship, etc)

Probably the biggest factor in that early success was that the Gracie family had decades of experience fighting practitioners of other martial arts, but most representatives of other arts did not have experience fighting BJJ. It took time, experience, observation, and experimentation to find the weaknesses of BJJ in an MMA environment.

 

[Tez3]

According to the articles and soldiers, in trenches!

Wherever they used it, what became labeled as TKD after the occupation was popularized in the military by soldiers seeing it in action before the civilian market.

Really? show me proof please.

BJJ did equally well in all the other early MMA promotions that were not founded by members of the Gracie family. (Pride, World Combat Championship, Extreme Fighting Championship, etc)

Probably the biggest factor in that early success was that the Gracie family had decades of experience fighting practitioners of other martial arts, but most representatives of other arts did not have experience fighting BJJ. It took time, experience, observation, and experimentation to find the weaknesses of BJJ in an MMA environment.

True but the poster specifically said UFC so I was answering that, I suspect that it's a case of the poster thinking the UFC and MMA is the same thing.

 

[Drose427]

Really? show me proof please.





True but the poster specifically said UFC so I was answering that, I suspect that it's a case of the poster thinking the UFC and MMA is the same thing.

Nam Tae Hi met General Choi after using what would later be named TKD on the battlefield in Korea in the 1950s. Obviously not spear handing through a mans chest, but popularizing it enough. He later did a lot of demos that helped it become popular civilian side.

Alex Gillis did a lot of interviewing and research for his book, he even has videos of some of the interviews on his youtube page.

Until sport TKD became popular, it was a completely different monster.

 

[Danny T]

BJJ did equally well in all the other early MMA promotions that were not founded by members of the Gracie family. (Pride, World Combat Championship, Extreme Fighting Championship, etc)

Probably the biggest factor in that early success was that the Gracie family had decades of experience fighting practitioners of other martial arts, but most representatives of other arts did not have experience fighting BJJ. It took time, experience, observation, and experimentation to find the weaknesses of BJJ in an MMA environment.

Yes they did.
I agree with they had more experience and though BJJ continues to be a force as style in MMA at the highest levels there are more wrestlers at the top in MMA than BJJers.

It is also true that both are now using aspects of each other and will continue to do so. In the mma world Wrestling is not just Wrestling nor is BJJ just BJJ.

In the BJJ world though having come from Judo many BJJ clubs/gyms have added Judo and Wrestling programs to their curriculums.