Aikido has a lot to it and have done some cross training in it. I once heard someone say you shouldn’t do Aikido until you have a black belt in another art and I think there’s truth to it. Aikido is very philosophical and is gradually becoming more of an internal art like Tai Chi. There are still a few schools that spar but I would be careful with them especially any school that says they’ll teach you Steven Seagal stuff. Krav Maga is a mixed bag. The techniques can work but there are a lot of non reputable schools. Also as others noted without sparring it’s hard to actually use those techniques but at the same time Krav Maga techniques like mangling people’s groins and gouging eyes can’t really be practiced.
This, Krav Maga is a meme at this point and solely lives off its badass military reputation. I gave my thoughts earlier in this thread and agree with Judoka, Krav Maga mostly is a scam and dojos trick you into it with the military and TV crap, talking about the efficiency and deadly points. If you want to learn something purely for self-defense and don't need the traditional aspect and style, MMA tops everything, as it's made for efficient fighting in various situations and teaches all aspects if you are down for it (grappling, striking, kicking, footwork etc). In the end, heavy sparring at a dojo is a total must if you really want to be prepared and know your limits, there are way too many styles and dojos that do no contact lessons and make ppl think they are far better than they in reality are. Boxing, Jiu-jitsu and JKD are other effective styles you can go for.
What kind of dojo lets you do a black belt within three years, dang. These belt factories are sadly very common, especially in the USA it seems.
Ok, thanks YT. I may try MMA. My buddy wants me to join his MMA gym anyway. I just don't want my pretty face smashed in too bad.
One that trained multiple Olympians, all of whom were in my classes plus or minus a few years of me. Remember the story where one bowed out at nationals so her injured friend who she felt was the superior fighter could go to Olympics in her stead? Yeah, those were two of them. I watched them spar all the time. I sparred with several of them myself. Now that that's been cleared up, I'll explain the system as I remember it. We tested every two months. White -> yellow -> orange -> green -> red -> brown -> black, with stripes on each belt along the way. I never failed a test. I think black stripe to black took about 3x longer to prepare for. My Korean 9th-degree grand master set up the system; I'm not questioning it. My problem was that I didn't stick with it and pursue higher degrees of black belt. I partially blame my parents for not encouraging me to keep going. I was too young to know what to do with my time and how to set my priorities, but I think that's where it would have gotten really interesting if I'd stayed with it. And my brain would have caught up shortly to understand that if I hadn't chosen to leave.
It seems it produced a lot of accomplished athletes then, so I guess I'm wrong. How often did u practice per week and did u feel the quick belt progress ppl made was in accordance to their actual skills progressing that quickly within a very short amount of years? Maybe it's that the European standards are different, but here you'd only really see adults with a black belt in martial arts, no matter how good they are, as a black belt should represent a certain amount of mastery of the martial art and your body/spirit (that kids can't really achieve on a high level yet due to their still weak physique etc).
Any CF members recommend a dojo for beginners? How much is it? Anywhere in southwest Houston/Sugar Land?
Just to elaborate on my salient point here. I took kendo my 5th year in college. It was a school club. It was less organized than a full-on school, but they were legitimate classes taught by experienced students with actual ranks, and I learned a lot. I was not a natural at it by any means. However, I understood that quickly and really tried to figure out and understand what was going on. I bought the correct gear, practiced on my own, tried to think about what I was told to do and how I was not achieving that, did my own research, and even disassembled and maintained my gear. I just grasped the bigger and smaller things better. The damn shame is that that was my last year at the school, and I had to move 14 hours away back home to Houston at the end of it. I loved the people in that group. They were friends and teachers simultaneously. I miss those guys, and I regret the potential of what I could have done with it if I hadn't had to leave.
I got defensive, and you can probably see the personal reasons why throughout my post. I'm not big on subtext. I have my personal regrets, and I have my pride. It also just hurts, because I recently learned that one of those Olympians I mentioned, the daughter of our grand master, recently passed away. She was only a few years older than me. And her friend who she gave up her spot to had a real rough life after the Olympics. The Chronicle did a story on them a few months ago. However, I also don't necessarily disagree with your points. I don't quite understand the nature of martial arts over here. If I had to guess, I'd say it's some hybrid system of implementation borrowing from where they came from--Korea, Japan, China, etc--and where they're situated, in my case, the U.S. No doubt kids have historically trained in all of these arts in their places of origin. I think that mentality of teaching children persists over here. However, I don't think the mentality of training your whole life in one thing to reach that level of mastery you mention exists over here in the same way it does in the East. And I can't say one philosophy is better than the other, nor can I generalize about all dojos in all the different arts over here. I'm just spitballing. And every student's experience is going to be different; I'm by no means the definitive example of anything. I had a good time in TKD with some great teachers, both Korean and American. I respected all of them, and they held me to high standards regardless of my age. Bringing it back around to the OP's topic, one of my favorites was a 40-ish-yr-old guy who was a brown belt when I first entered.
Three years is possible but a real grind to learn all your forms/ etc. especially for a little kid -- about 5 years is typical for TKD. There is a fee for belt tests in addition to monthly dues so even good schools push those tests -- every class will have some high level belt students who have stuck with it forever but don't actually have any real fighting skill.
Oh okay, that explains it. Here in Germany it takes 10+ years at least to become black belt in most serious schools, the average in the Karate association I was in was probably around 15 years or longer, so you'd mostly have 25+yr olds as black belts. The teachers really made sure you had everything down to the point and that you were mature enough for the responsibility.
There is quite a bit of variance between associations as well as the individual schools and how strict they are with testing. My class didn't give kids under 15 black belts -- they could get a junior black belt I believe but I don't recall any young children with anything higher than a blue or purple belt and kids that high were rare. The dojang I went to was really strict which I'm sure prevented less skilled students from advancing. I stopped taking belt tests after about 1.5 years I thought learning the forms and some of the other traditional things was pretty silly especially the extra charge in addition to my dues. I just liked hitting the bags and sparring -- the rest I didn't have any desire to waste time on.
Samurai: Hereditary military nobility. So no schools that teach bloodlines. Ninja: You just don't see them.
