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Karate Bunkai: Jion

One of the things I do a lot (probably too much) is watch martial arts videos on YouTube. I watch a lot of form tournament competitions, but I also really like to watch Karate bunkai videos.

Karate bunkai (or bunhae in Korean) means analysis or application. Bunkai partner drills involve using moves from a form to defend against an attacker.

I’d like for our students who read the blog, as well as whoever is interested, to take a look at this video. It is bunkai (bunhae in Korean) for the Shotokan-ryu Jion, and it is a very good video with useful information.

Then I have a few notes on Jion for those of us who are interested in and research forms lineage.

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Musings

Success through Visualization

With the upcoming tournament, many of my posts this month will be focused on preparing for competitions. Today we’ll take a look at one of the key ingredients of success: mental practice and visualization.

Visualization, or image training, is something many athletes (and other successful people) use to help them hone their mental focus, boost their confidence, and add to their performance. Image training aids your ability to believe in yourself and makes you more likely to perform for success.

Additionally, practicing for a competition  in your head may also help with performance/test/competition anxiety.

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General Musings

Can my black belt help get me into college?

Highly recommended reading for our high school students:

Can my black belt help get me into college?

I thought this was a great, informative article. It’s an interview with an admissions officer about how they view martial arts as an extracurricular activity on college applications. Like any activity on an application, it’s crucial that you provide details about yourself, your training, and what your focus is (and why that’s important to you), in order to showcase the strength of your character.

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Musings

Conscious Effort, Instinctive Response

“Cognitive Secret: It takes long-term, conscious effort to hone a skill before the brain assigns it to the cognitive unconscious.” –Wired for Story by Lisa Cron

Wired for Story was a book I read recently (Little-known fact about Sempai Yudanjanim C: she is an aspiring writer). It focuses on the relationship between brain science and writing stories based on brain science.

I found those words in one of the chapters, and was struck by how much it applies to martial arts training, not just writing.

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General Musings

Preparing for Your Next Tournament: 6 Tournament Prep Tips

Tournament prep tips–with the tournament coming up on March 30th, I’ve had a lot of students asking me what they can do to train and prepare for it. The most basic thing is to be in class as much as possible, so the instructors can help you get ready and give you specific tips.

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Clips Media

Style Highlight: Kalaripattayu

Today I have a video clip with related commentary for you. I spend a lot of time watching forms and training videos on Youtube, and there’s certainly a wealth of information to be found and shared. Hope you enjoy a little something different!

As always, *please* do not to attempt to imitate anything from this site, all of its pages, or from anything we link to/from.

This video showcases Kalaripayattu, an Indian martial art. What I like is that Kalaripayattu utilizes the attacker’s momentum against them in a very fluid manner. I can also see movements that are very similar to some of our Arnis techniques, which shows the probable influence of Kalaripayattu on the rest of southeast Asia.

A lot of people consider Chinese Kung Fu the beginning of martial arts, but in reality, there were all kinds of arts all over the world, including southeast Asia.

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Musings

Monday Musing: The Martial Artist Outside the Dojo

What does a martial artist look like outside the dojo?

This is my question for my youth students this week.

It may seem like it has an obvious answer, but it can sometimes be a challenge to get youth to translate from dojo to home. They know that focus and respect and trying your best is important while they’re in class, but what do those things mean when they argue with their siblings at home or are given a challenging assignment at school?

A true martial artist should look the same inside and outside the dojo.

Outside the dojo, the situations are different. You don’t have to bow to your mom or your boss, or perform forms in order to get an A in math class, but the attitude you should take towards those activities is the same.

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General Musings

Karate and Taekwondo for Kids: Just Another Sport?

Today, I’d like to take a look at what makes karate and taekwondo for kids different from other sports.

I played outdoor and indoor soccer for 5 years. The last 3 of those years, I also did martial arts. Ultimately, I quit soccer in favor of martial arts. I’ve now been doing martial arts for 13 years and have no intention of quitting. Looking back, there were a lot of reasons I quit soccer.

Aside from being fed up with team drama, my biggest reason for following the martial path was that in martial arts, my achievement was a direct result of how much effort and practice I put in. I was the only one who was responsible for the outcome. Effort and practice were choices that I had to make, and my most important opponent was myself.

Certainly, martial arts, as a fitness activity, utilize a very wide range of physical skills: a variety of muscle groups, balance, coordination, flexibility, speed, strength/power, precision, endurance and burst energy training. And you can’t put a price on self-defense skills and the confidence that comes with knowing you can protect yourself and others.

What really makes martial arts unique is our attention to character-building.

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Media

Arnis Seminar

Thanks to Sabumnim for teaching the Arnis seminar!

We spent a lot of time on empty hand drills in both the beginner and advanced seminars, so the photos mostly show our students practicing joint locks and control holds. Arnis is a self-defense oriented art, and anything you do with a stick also holds empty hand application, hence the focus on empty hand defense.

A few important points from the seminar:

-“It’s all the same.” If it works, it works. Wise words from the Professor (Master Remy Presas).

-There are good and bad martial artists, not good and bad martial arts. Different styles just have different things they focus on or prefer.

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Musings

Monday Memo: Purely Physical

My goal today is just to highlight some muscles that martial artists use a lot (and sometimes neglect to stretch/strengthen). There’s plenty of information on the web about how to stretch or strengthen any muscle you want, so I’m just going to highlight what we use them for.

Bottoms of the feet: The plantar fascia take a beating, not only from stepping, jumping, and kicking, but also from gripping the floor in your stances. Stretch or massage the muscles at the end of the day and you’ll be surprised at how much tension is released.

Achilles tendon: This tendon is used in walking, running, and jumping, and also to flex the foot into correct position for many kicks. It is also a common one for injury, so be sure to stretch it whenever you exercise.

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