An interesting vid of a Russian TKD guy competing very well under Kudo/Daido Juku rules. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfvJy21-fCQ"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfvJy21-fCQ[/ame] Mitch
What a wonderful extension on the back kick at 2:30 and the reverse turn spinning hook kick early in the first round nearly brought a tear to my eye and he nearly landed the step up back kick. I wanna throw my gear on now. Thanks Mitch.
That vid just made me go and watch some more modern Kudo vids. What jumps out to me is that it seems it you take knockdown karate and add in face punches, it morphs back into shotokan in terms of the timing and distancing.
Nah, just watch some kyokushin vids (stand 1 foot apart, hammer body hooks into opponent.) then some kudo vids (stand 4 feet apart, outside face punching range, retreat to said distance after attack. Ranged punches and kicks used to close distance). What do you disagree about?
kyokushin fight: |-----------| -----|| -----|_ shotokan fight: |------------| ------|----| ----|-------| ----|----| |-----------| ----|-----| |---------_ :evil:
I totally agree with this and I think it is an excellent observation. In most knock down karate the elimination of the face punch turns it into a war of attrition. It is very hard to keep the person off of you without the face punch. You don't see lots of elusive footwork. Don't get me wrong, btw, the knockdown karate types are very tough and when they have a multiple man kumite you can only watch in amazement. But when you see Kudo vs Kyokushin the distancing difference is very obvious. Thanks for this post, btw, Mitch. I suspected this guy had a TKD background because of his kicks, but it was only a suspicion. SPX and I had a discussion about whether the guys had started in Kudo, or if many of them were adapting a background in something else.
Maybe! But when it moves to "normal" distance, it doesn't look like boxing or MT, it looks like karate.
Like the old saying goes, "It's not the style, it's the fighter," or something along those lines. Got to say, those were some sweet kicks. Unorthodox, but totally up my alley.
Another highlight reel of the same guy under different rulesets. [ame="http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=wXvKHfil4pI"]http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=wXvKHfil4pI[/ame] Mitch
Those back kicks were beautiful. Did I mention I love back kicks? Moosey, that had too many roundhouse kicks and turning kicks, and not enough reverse punches, to look like Shotokan to me. As Mitch said, it looked like TKD to me
Maybe, then, my idea of "normal distance fighting" or "generic trained fighting" is modeled on shotokan because it's what I'm familiar with. Yes, the kicking techniques that guy used were very TKD, but his opponent looked very 'karate' as do many of the other kudo videos I've just watched (although, in the older kudo vids, you see a lot more boxing-ish handwork). Anyhow, I guess this is off-topic. Sorry, Mitch. Just intended to be a throw-away observation.
That's interesting, I'd just been watching the guy in white, not the guy in blue. The blue guy definitely seemed more Shotokan-y than the guy in white, favoring reverse punches and wider stances. I can see where you're coming from with his fight style (the little we saw of it between him getting kicked clear out of the ring).
I was quite impressed with that to be honest, admittedly I don't know much about the types of competition outside of the mma world. Some impressive leg techniques there, and nice to see hands being used as well Though, Khalev did look like he was getting a little full of himself 'twards the end....
Don't apologize. It is a good observation. I do not think Khalev's skills would translate as well to Kyokushin or Enshin because of the distancing things you mentioned. There are times in the full matches where his opponents try to close the distance to a 'war of attrition' and he drives them back with face punches. That strategy wouldn't work in other forms of knockdown karate. You should see the full matches. Clearly his opponent is very frustrated and Khalev encourages him to get more and more frustrated with his antics. But it was a good strategy because the guy starts making more and more mistakes to the point where he is almost bum rushing. I showed some of these matches to guys who are more MMA oriented (grappling base) and they loved it. They were like, "This should be the stand up art in the Olympics. I'd watch this..." Technically there is some grappling also allowed in Kudo. So you should check them out. You'll enjoy it.
