The nonsense some of you guys have posted about these fights is why senior martial artists and instructors don't do more tournaments.
When two people fight there is a winner and a loser. Losing a fight against someone better doesn't mean you can't fight. Winning doesn't mean that you can teach.
Funakoshi understood fighting and how to use karate to do it. We know this because of his writing: some of the details he added were not things someone without that experience could have added.
That he lost a fight as an old man to a younger stronger karateka after only teaching others for years, doesn't really tell us anything.
And as for the kung fu masters, aside from the lack of boxing guard (the defining factor of effective fighting for many mma junkieso who critique others) they look no worse than Chuck Liddell did when striking. Again you are.looking at people who have probably not fought in years from a time when protective gear was rare. What do you expect, a Donnie Yen scene?
I never said Funakoshi lost because he couldn't fight.
Your response here is clearly insinuating that I did say or imply that.
My contention is both could fight, but one was a superior fighter to the other. Funakoshi's methods and Motobu's method of training when Motobu was a young man led to very different Karateka.
I would venture to say even if they were the exact same age I would put 10000 yen on Mutobu every time.
As for as the age difference.. it was two years. It was not an unfair fight with regard to age difference.
Funakoshi Gichin (1868 – 1957) and
Motobu Choki (1870-1944)
This puts both men in their early 50s. like between 50-53.
It is folly to assume 50 year olds don't have what it takes to fight, because they are not young men, and cannot fight like a young man.
I know some incredibly dangerous 50 year olds, that I would prefer never to get into a fight with.
I once briefly met a very deadly man who is now 79. This man was already a martial artist before he trained under Bruce Lee for a very long time. This is a man, who I would not even raise my voice in anger with. Not because I respect him. (and I do) but because I would prefer to not take a chance in having the taste knocked out of my mouth.
Motobu Choki had just defeated a Russian boxer in a "all takers, bar none" fight ring which helped put Okinawan Karate into the mainland Japanese awareness. It didn't help matters that Kingu Magazine chose to "incorrectly" Illustrate the fight using the image of Funakoshi instead of Motobu.
Which only served to escalate tensions between the two.
As for your statement: "
That he lost a fight as an old man to a younger stronger karateka after only teaching others for years, doesn't really tell us anything."
We can clearly see it doesn't apply here.
