Kenpo Factions

[ProfessorKenpo]

Originally posted by satans.barber



I tell you what I hate......Squatting Sacrifice!

I have tried to see the merits of this, but it's just crap isn't it!? You expose yourself sooo badly on the leg grabbing bit, especially since no majot strikes have gone in yet, I can't see how it ever came to be.

Ah well, I'm someone out there must like it!

Ian.

You're not getting the correct exposure to the art you should be, but that's your choice, I used to have the same problem when I trained with another instructor. Your attitude appears detrimental to your learning as well from what I'm reading.


Have a great Kenpo day

Clyde

 

[Seig]

Originally posted by satans.barber



I tell you what I hate......Squatting Sacrifice!

I have tried to see the merits of this, but it's just crap isn't it!? You expose yourself sooo badly on the leg grabbing bit, especially since no majot strikes have gone in yet, I can't see how it ever came to be.

Ah well, I'm someone out there must like it!

Ian.

How can you call this crap? This technique is around most arts that I have studied in one form or another. When you drop your elbows onto the forearms, you should be aiming for the radial nerves, this in turn will cause them to loosen their grip at the worst and to flail their arms at best. Either way, as you twist the foot, they should not be able to fall properly, causing further injury. As you twist the foot, you can be damaging the foot, the ankle, the knee and the hip. What can be bad about that? As you shift forward, a slight foot push drag can stike the testicles. As you grab the wrist and pull up it places reverse curvature of the spine which makes the stomp all the more devastating. Have you thought about "Marriage of Gravity" while doing the stomp?

 

[kenpo3631]

These are my observations and not to be taken as the end all be all to the techniques by any means...:asian:

Leaping Crane- I personally see the raking leap to one leg as a bad move. I mean your leaping as the guy is punching at you. Would you not get more power by merely slipping the punch with a parry and a push drag? You would still be on terra firma and have the ability to side kick the leg if the opportunity was still available, if it wasn't then your still in a good position to fight.

There is merit in your statement. with a solid base you can really blast someone. However there is more than meets the eye to "Leaping Crane".

Leaping Crane demonstrates the idea that when you cross your centerline you need to take something with it, meaning as you pull your hand across your body you need to strike something along the way...(no wasted motion). Think about it. You can easily leap out of the way and not do the knuckle rake. In that same move you are loading your weapon for the back knuckle strike to the kidney. Remember you "block to cock", although you are not blocking in this case your are still cocking your weapon. The one leg stance also cocks the leg for the delivery of the side kick. You are introduced to working your opponents centerline from behind your opponent. You are also showing how to strike to the different height zones - Middle, Low, High...later you see this technique vary to go High, Middle, Low, etc.

On any of the combination techniques in third brown, why would you want to do a front cross over? Even if the stance change is fast, your still gonna be unstable throughout the transition. Would a push drag or a shuffle not close the gap just as quickly? I can't say that I've ever seen a boxer or NHB fighter ever try a crossover to close the gap unless it was followed by a side kick or a back kick.

The key to remember is that shuffles are inserted where and when needed. When doing Circling Fans the technique calls for a front cross over. This move allows you to 1.) close the gap between you and the opponents (if the kick drives him back), 2.) It allows you to advance into your opponent without having to open your centerline to you opponent, 3.) allows you to utilize horizontal back up mass without shifting into a forward bow. when emerging out of the cross over you are lining your knee for the strike to the groin, you are also using you leg as a track to thread the knee into your opponents groin. Boxers don't do cross over stances to my knowledge and and as you also stated the NHB fighter follows the cross over with a kick...see above

Capturing the Storm, Obstructing the Storm, etc..... Anything that uses an upward cross block to stop someone from pile driving a beer bottle or club of some fashion into my head. Some of the club attacks I've seen are tremendously fast, not the ones by kenpo or filipino guys, but the ones from the non-trained guys I can con into working out with me. Besides most seem to want to travel on a diagonal plane like their throwing a baseball. When something has that much velocity wouldn't you want to deflect and divert, or seek some zone of sanctuary (eye of the storm)? Not try to absorb all the force with your wrists, even if your fast enough to get your hands up, if your timing or aim is slightly off then the club breaks your hands and your face.

Well I think you should endeavor to see the Dog Brothers stick fighting tapes, or ask Guro Al McLuckie work with you with the sticks or simply work with Huk. If you don't think Kenpo and Philipino stick fighters don't move tremendously fast... I too agree with you about stepping to a zone of sanctuary and or divert and deflect the force of the strike. If you look at the club techniques they all step to a zone of sanctuary... from what I have been shown you do not absorb the full force of the strike...I guess it all depends on who is showing you the techniques. Maybe you should analyze and question the methods in which your instructor performs the technique.:asian:

 

[rmcrobertson]

Just to back up the last poster, I'd add that I think some of these questions come out of very one-dimensional ideas about how techniques work, and about how learning a martial arts progresses. They leave out the possibility of multiple applications--and worse than that, they overlook the way most of us learn martial arts. In other words, the techs--and their applications--aren't teaching just one thing, working on just one level.

Or to put the same thing in the form of a question: is there special merit to the kenpo system, insofar as learning is concerned?

 

[eternalwhitebelt]

Kenpo 3631 and Mr. Robertson hit the nail on the head. The jist of it is in the WHY. Higher order thinking skills, i.e. synthesis, and evaluation, should be attempted to be taught. Most people are on the rote memory stage of techs., that is why there is so much arguing over this is how it is "supposed" to go and this is how "we" do it. The underlying principals and concepts are the true meat. I have a fondness for instructors who teach this way. They could care less what move you did as long as you are est. a base, checking zones, using power principals, moving with economy of motion, not getting in your own way, and so on, and so on. Unfortunatly these kinds of instructors are rare, I usually find people only want to learn new moves and not why certain moves work, and certain moves work better, and certain moves work best.

 

[Goldendragon7]

"Two things you need to give your students .....Roots and Wings."

They need a strong base to start with, complete with all the "Kenpo Tools" and numerous methods and directions of research to continue to discover and relate. The student must then be guided to understand and "explore" the numerous applications and variations beyond the original base, which then opens many doors to understand the "usage" (such as timing, environmental adjustments, range adjustments, position or maneuver adjustments, weapon changes, target changes, etc....) of the material vs. just the "learning or acquisition" of the material.

Then, the ability to realize that the "established material" was taught for the essentials which was then internalized only to used extemporaneously in a real crisis.

X amount of time needs to be used to "Learn" the material then X amount of time needs to be used to "Work" and understand the material.

:asian:

 

[Kenpo Yahoo]

Thank you Kenpo3631, I appreciate the response.

Leaping Crane demonstrates the idea that when you cross your centerline you need to take something with it, meaning as you pull your hand across your body you need to strike something along the way...(no wasted motion). Think about it. You can easily leap out of the way and not do the knuckle rake. In that same move you are loading your weapon for the back knuckle strike to the kidney. Remember you "block to cock", although you are not blocking in this case your are still cocking your weapon. The one leg stance also cocks the leg for the delivery of the side kick. You are introduced to working your opponents centerline from behind your opponent. You are also showing how to strike to the different height zones - Middle, Low, High...later you see this technique vary to go High, Middle, Low, etc.

I agree that centerline control and economy of motion are important aspects. My concern with leaping crane isn't that there is a knuckle rake as you cross your center line, but that you were doing this while you are leaping to one leg. My question was why don't we just slip the punch and do a side kick if the target is still there? Doesn't jumping to one leg leave you incredibly unstable? 100% of your mass is traveling to a single structural support while you are avoiding a strike and delivering one of your own.

Well I think you should endeavor to see the Dog Brothers stick fighting tapes, or ask Guro Al McLuckie work with you with the sticks or simply work with Huk. If you don't think Kenpo and Philipino stick fighters don't move tremendously fast...

I have no doubt that Philipino stick fighters and trained kenpoists can move a stick. What I said in my post was that I had some friends of mine, who are untrained, swing a rubber club at my head as hard and fast as they could. When I did this drill I told them to hold the club about chest level about where someone might hold a beer bottle if they were gonna swing it, and without any announcement they should try to hit me in the head. Every time I threw up my hands for the cross block, they cracked me right in head. I found that I had more success diverting, similiar to Raining Lance or Evading the Storm, or by seeking an inner zone of sanctuary (like in eye of the storm). If a normal, untrained, guy could land a just about everytime then I figured a stick fighter would have no problem doing it. At least that's the point I was trying to make.

Thanks for your insight

 

[satans.barber]

Originally posted by Seig


How can you call this crap? This technique is around most arts that I have studied in one form or another. When you drop your elbows onto the forearms, you should be aiming for the radial nerves, this in turn will cause them to loosen their grip at the worst and to flail their arms at best. Either way, as you twist the foot, they should not be able to fall properly, causing further injury. As you twist the foot, you can be damaging the foot, the ankle, the knee and the hip. What can be bad about that? As you shift forward, a slight foot push drag can stike the testicles. As you grab the wrist and pull up it places reverse curvature of the spine which makes the stomp all the more devastating. Have you thought about "Marriage of Gravity" while doing the stomp?

That's all very well until you consider the multitide of better alternatives, which get major strikes in faster and therefore, IMO, put you in a safrer position more quickly.

If someone attacks you, you move from a position of safety into a position of danger, now, my interpretation of kenpo is that you do some major damage as soon as possible, in order to minimise the time before you move back into relative safety again (when the personal has been effectively disabled). Whilst most of the techniqes manage this, I don't think Squatting Sacrrifice does.

Firstly, whilst the foot comes up easily enough when it's a bare foot on a polished wood floor, I think the friction between the tarmac in the street and a rubber boot sole would be such that it would be very hard to bend down and pull someone's foot out from under them. This problem applys to drag style sweeps outside as well, the foot almost seems to 'stick' to the floor.

If you do get them down, then I don't think they're going to lay there all placid as you try and turn them over with the foot, because apart from the impact of them falling down, there's still no major strikes gone in. With adrenalyn pumping though the body, I don't think the pain of this would be sufficient to stop the person kicking out at you as you've got hold of there foot, which is going to make i hard to do the end of the technique.

If you do manage to turn them, you've got the groin kick, which fair enough is your major strike, but it took some getting to. After that you're supposed to snap the spine and kill them, landing you with a lovely life sentence in gaol. I don't see the merits of practising that.

My personal opinion, if you like it then bully for you! I'm glas someone does.

If you ask me it looks like bad slapstick

Ian.

 

[ProfessorKenpo]

Originally posted by satans.barber



That's all very well until you consider the multitide of better alternatives, which get major strikes in faster and therefore, IMO, put you in a safrer position more quickly.

If someone attacks you, you move from a position of safety into a position of danger, now, my interpretation of kenpo is that you do some major damage as soon as possible, in order to minimise the time before you move back into relative safety again (when the personal has been effectively disabled). Whilst most of the techniqes manage this, I don't think Squatting Sacrrifice does.

Firstly, whilst the foot comes up easily enough when it's a bare foot on a polished wood floor, I think the friction between the tarmac in the street and a rubber boot sole would be such that it would be very hard to bend down and pull someone's foot out from under them. This problem applys to drag style sweeps outside as well, the foot almost seems to 'stick' to the floor.

If you do get them down, then I don't think they're going to lay there all placid as you try and turn them over with the foot, because apart from the impact of them falling down, there's still no major strikes gone in. With adrenalyn pumping though the body, I don't think the pain of this would be sufficient to stop the person kicking out at you as you've got hold of there foot, which is going to make i hard to do the end of the technique.

If you do manage to turn them, you've got the groin kick, which fair enough is your major strike, but it took some getting to. After that you're supposed to snap the spine and kill them, landing you with a lovely life sentence in gaol. I don't see the merits of practising that.

My personal opinion, if you like it then bully for you! I'm glas someone does.

If you ask me it looks like bad slapstick

Ian.

That's because whoever is showing you is not showing you the entire technique from what I'm reading. There's a knee snap and a hook kick to the head while you're flipping them over. I really wouldn't call it bad because you've learned it without effect. Your loss, you choose your own destiny and we've had this discussion before already. If you want GOOD KENPO, find a place that does it better and see if you like it. I'm sure you'll find it a worthwhile investment. I also gather from reading your posts you like the easy and short techniques anyhow, but that's because of your limited knowledge of the system and whoever is teaching you.

Have a great Kenpo day

Clyde

 

[Goldendragon7]

Originally posted by satans.barber
If you ask me it looks like bad slapstick
Ian.

I'm not....... but keep working, someday you'll get it.

 

[Seig]

Oh well, he's determined not to like it. I tried!:idunno: