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Message started by Rat Man on Oct 16th, 2019 at 12:22am

Title: Some Random BS
Post by Rat Man on Oct 16th, 2019 at 12:22am
    This has little to do with anything but I thought I'd share it anyway.  When I was an older teenager I decided to take Karate lessons as many of you already know.  My instructor was John Korab, who was sort of a big deal in the Karate world.  He taught a system of street fighting he'd developed himself alongside of traditional Tae Kwon Do.  He was Joe Lewis's first instructor and buddies with Bruce Lee, just to name a few things.  I was such a little dumbass at the time I had no idea of his pedigree.  He was just a really cool Karate guy to me.
     Most dojos at the time were trying to be as Oriental as possible.  Though Korab learned his skills in Okinawa, he tried to make his school as un-Oriental as possible.  We didn't call him or any of the other instructors sensei.  He was just John.  Our school wasn't a dojo, it was a studio.  Hollering wasn't required when we threw kicks and punches.  No one made Bruce Lee noises. 
     The thing I appreciate most about Korab is that he was very concerned about our long term health.  Other than a Foot Sweep, which is taking your opponents ankle out from under him, we weren't allowed to do leg kicks to each other. Korab was worried about permanent damage to our knees.  We wore bag gloves when we punched the heavy bag.  We never broke bricks or boards with our hands or feet.  A friend of mine, Dave, who worked at Cable TV with me, went to a dojo where they did break bricks with their hands.  This basically made their hands useless for anything but breaking bricks.  When Dave was playing Poker he'd have to pass the deal every time because his hands were too knotted up and stiff to shuffle. I can only imagine how much his hands hurt these days.
    I was very fortunate to have stumbled on Korab.  I was stupid and gung ho back then.  If he had told me to break bricks or boards I would have.  At 65 everything still works and my arthritis is minimal, at least for now.  I am still mostly functional.  I am grateful to Korab and his concern for our long term health for this. 
   
    

Title: Re: Some Random BS
Post by Morphy on Oct 16th, 2019 at 12:50am
Sounds like the guy was waaaay ahead of his time. From the 70s and on through the 80s and 90s that heavily Asian traditional influence was big. It didn't really die down heavily until MMA became big and people realized a lot of it was just useless. Sounds like you lucked out.

Title: Re: Some Random BS
Post by Kick on Oct 16th, 2019 at 6:27am
I did about 7 years (I think 7) of Choi Kwang Do. It's a form of Tae Kwan Do but with some interesting changes. The main ones were no competitions and no full contact sparring for similar reasons as Ratman gave above. What's the point of beating the hell out of each other if you are then too injured to defend yourself and use the moves you've learnt? A lot of movements, rather than locking out your joints, are more fluid and you keep elbows and knees bent to reduce the strain. Not having full contact has it's downsides of course. We did do sparring but it's impossible to replicate a real fight in a controlled environment specifically because a fight is not a controlled environment.

I reached black belt and  I do think it was a very positive experience. Am I a badass that could take on anyone? Absolutely not. However, I learnt enough to get my confidence up and know a few techniques that could maybe get me out of trouble one day or at least show the other person that I'm not going to make it easy even if they do knock me down eventually.

I think the most important lesson though that was taught to me is that the best thing to do in a fight...

Is to run. If someone want's to hurt you, the best way to not get hurt is to not be in that person's general vicinity. Distance is the best defence. Where that isn't possible, you hurt that person enough so that you then can run away. This goes triply if the other person has a weapon. The other good lesson I learnt on that front (because we did do some simple disarming techniques if someone has a knife or baton) is that, if someone brings out a knife and you can't get away, you have to assume and make peace with the fact you are going to get cut. Knives are made to cut and they are very good at it. Hopefully, you can get out with a little cut but you might get out with a big cut or not get out at all. You have to stay focused on trying to control that knife as quickly and effectively as possible.

My instructor was (I think he still is in fact) a policeman working in Birmingham so he knows a little bit about knife crime. In fact, he was on duty in full riot gear a few years ago during the riots that spread through the UK. I might have told this story elsewhere but I'll tell it again, he showed us his helmet that had a deep dent and scratch across it where a brick hit him. This guy, incredibly strong, handshake that could crack bone, completely composed at all times, got a look in his eye and his voice started to catch as he told us what it was like during that riot. Fighting and violence is very unnatural to almost everyone and you just can't know how you are going to react in the moment. If you can, just run.

Bit rambling this comment but I find it an interesting subject and always want to bring up my experiences.

Title: Re: Some Random BS
Post by NooneOfConsequence on Oct 16th, 2019 at 9:05am
One of the reasons fighting sports are separated into weight classes is because... physics. I am over 6 feet tall and weigh 195 lbs. People don’t usually mess with me, but the challenge for me is that most of the time I have an extra 30lbs in the form of at least one if not two toddlers to worry about too. That makes both fighting and running away much more complicated. The best thing to do is pay attention to surroundings and try not to need to run by avoiding trouble early... when that’s an option. Maybe I should develop my own martial art where all the participants have to fight while holding a 30lb sack of flour :D

Title: Re: Some Random BS
Post by Rat Man on Oct 16th, 2019 at 3:35pm
    I agree totally, Kick.  The very best thing you can do in a fight is completely avoid it if possible.  The very first move Korab taught was what he called "The Walkaway."  He'd have someone come up to him and pretend to try and start something.  He'd make like he was going to break into some move then throw up his hands, say "I don't want to fight," then walk away.  Great move to learn. Fighting is only cool in the movies.  In real life someone ends up in the hospital and me in court. No thanks.
    We also never did full contact sparring.  It was always medium contact to the body and no (faked) contact the head.

Title: Re: Some Random BS
Post by Curious Aardvark on Oct 17th, 2019 at 6:44am
Couple of ways to avoid fights:
Do not get drunk or mix with drunk people.

Body language matters as much as anything.
When i was at college there was a spate of muggings. One of my mates actually got mugged 3 times.

I was a fairly nocturnal creature back then and used to go out looking for muggers.
Never found one. I guess they just used to see me coming and decide against it.
Used to have a mate who'd always wait in the student union till I walked back to the flats in stoke. He used to say it was because: 'I'm big and you look mean'.

Another of my mates had  avery short temper and used to play rugby to get rid of his aggro. His house mates were all scared of him, I used to go round and deliberately wind him up :-)
Went round there one day and he had a couple bandages on his hands.
Asked him how it happened and he went and got a stanley knife. Said he'd taken it off a mugger. 
Asked what happened to the mugger: 'I ran his head into a tree'.

Title: Re: Some Random BS
Post by NooneOfConsequence on Oct 17th, 2019 at 8:11am
https://cp-journal.com/leftofbang/

Title: Re: Some Random BS
Post by Rat Man on Oct 19th, 2019 at 8:37pm

NooneOfConsequence wrote on Oct 17th, 2019 at 8:11am:
https://cp-journal.com/leftofbang/

    Looks interesting.  I might try to find it the next time I'm at Barnes and Nobel. And I totally agree, c_a. God only knows how many fights were fueled by alcohol.

Title: Re: Some Random BS
Post by Rat Man on Nov 25th, 2019 at 8:32pm
A correction. I said we never did full contact sparring but that's not true.  Though not our main focus we also learned some boxing.  While boxing with the big gloves on we did go full contact.  Also we had body pads.  When someone was wearing the pads we could go full contact to the body.  Supposedly it wasn't possible to hurt someone with body shots while he was wearing the pads but I took out an instructor that way.  They were really mad at me for a few weeks. 

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