[quote]Sifu wrote:
That video is just something I came across looking through youtube so I don’t know a whole lot about the style or the man in the video. Sure there is a certain impractical aspect to the throwing demo portion.
However look at how he carries out his technique. He flips his uke like a ragdoll but you don’t see him staggering around off balance afterwards. There is a real economy to his movements. That shows technique and skill.
[/quote]
Well, I never said the guy wasn’t good at what he does. He certainly is proficient and skilled at performing those techniques in that context. My question was more so whether what he does translates to actual live combat. Simply from watching that video it is impossible to tell.
Once again, he’s good at what he does. If Wukey had stated that he wanted to learn about energy development or structural principles then that guy would probably be a good person to learn from. But, from a purely conditioning standpoint, he doesn’t seem to offer much.
Let me clarify what I mean by “rehearsed”. What I mean is that the uke is performing attacks (and the sensei is performing techniques) that both have practiced hundreds (if not thousands) of times (probably not only with each other, but in total). There is no broken rythm, the attacker is grossly telegraphing his techniques (many of which are unrealistic), he is not resisting the teacher at all (in fact is probably actually going with the techniques), and he probably pretty much knows what techniques the sensei is going to perform based on the attack that he feeds.
Once again, it demonstrates the sensei’s ability to perform techniques under these conditions (and once again he is quite good at it), but that doesn’t mean crap about his ability to do them against a fully resisting, free fighting opponent in real time.
Well, like I said in an earlier post, I don’t think there is any teacher out there who you can’t learn something from. But, if my main reason for training was self defense/fighting skill, then would I really want to wade through all kinds of impractical training just to find that one piece of useful information? I wouldn’t, maybe you would.
Now, if we were talking about someone who already has a strong base, then I think that’s a different story.
[quote]
Also you can gain a lot from ippon kumite. For real world self defense, the ability to handle the opening shot from an enprepared postition, is more important than free fighting where you start off with a safe distance in an on guard position.
Fighting doesn’t prove much about a teachers ability to teach. [/quote]
True. Being able to sense and defend against the initial attack is extremely important. That said, many traditional arts practice defending against unrealistic/unpractical attacks, and don’t ever graduate to having the attacker throw random attacks, at random rythms, with full force (actually trying to land the attack). Some do.
I’m not sure I would say that it’s “more” important though. How do you really say that something is “more” important, when in reality both are important. Sure, most fights begin from conversational distance, and usually the physical part of the fight is initiated with a surprise attack. But, people don’t always fight fair either. What if you deal with the initial guy and then one (or more) of his friends decide to join in. Well, now you’re not going to be able to ambush the guy(s) and are basically at the same point you would be in at the beginning of an MMA match.
Also, I agree with you about fighting not necessarily proving that the teacher can teach the material. But, I’d still rather be training somewhere where I’ll get a chance to learn from experience (in a relatively safe environment) than to learn from someone who never tests their techniques (so how the heck do they/I know they work?).
