Does aikido work against other MA's?

Discussion in 'Aikido' started by Hazmatac, Nov 24, 2013.

  1. pseudo

    pseudo Padawan

    Gawd, your such a downer matt, let them have their delusions. No your absolutely right, Aikido training is not realistic combat training, but I don't think the techniques in aikido can't be effectively used in a fight if trained that way. I can't wait to hit my shodan, first thing im going to do is grab my friend, throw some gloves and head gear on him, then tell him try to hit me ( he's been boxing for 3 years and would love nothing more then to hit me). I'll do this until I manage to pull something off or get knocked out. Then I'm going to hit my judo club and do the same. I can not accept that someone would create an art that is almost useless in martial term, their must be a way in attaining some form of success. Especially considering we have all heard of O'sensei using it with success, I've also heard stories of Noro, Tamaura, and Toshiro, surely they can't All be lies.
     
  2. LemonSloth

    LemonSloth Laugh and grow fat!

  3. Pretty In Pink

    Pretty In Pink Moved on MAP 2017 Gold Award

    Wow, there was some harsh truths in there.
     
  4. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    Why wait to hit your shodan? Why not do it now?
    What is it about the art that you have to wait until you reach a certain grade before you feel comfortable enough to actual;ly try it out against a friend?

    As for stories well there are stories about the founders and senior students of a lot of martial arts being serious fighters, the founder of bagua was apparently one of the best fighters of his generation, his top 4 students were the best as well, one of them Yin fu was chosen to be the bodyguard the Empress Dowager when she was escaping trouble so must have been a bad man. Still you would be hard pressed to find anyone in the west who can fight their way out of a paper bag with that art now so what does that actually mean?

    There is normally no proof of these stories and lets be honest a lot of them are embellished and cant really be considered 100% truthful. But if we accept that the founder of aikido and his top students could fight with the art, then what does that mean?
    Either those people were already hard men and tough fighters and could have made anything work, or they trained a different way than people do now, or faced a different kind of opponent as to what you will face either way personally id be more worried about if the club I train at could produce and has produced people who can fight with the art im training, rather than what someone 60 years ago could do with it
     
  5. LemonSloth

    LemonSloth Laugh and grow fat!

    I do believe many of Morihei Ueshiba's senior students (himself included) had MA backgrounds from different styles before they started Aikido/before Aikido developed. There's even some schools of thought that suggest you should have a black belt (or the equivalent experience, if that means anything at all) in a different art before trying Aikido.

    In that case I apologise and retract my statement. And then lol at the ninja wannabes comment. Which is unfortunately true.

    But do you not think that while certain styles carry many similarities, there is going to be some natural variation between clubs and instructors?

    No, we're not talking about climbing in the ring, which would have been an ideal situation. A lot of the guys who practised Aikido came from a previous/current boxing or karate background and were looking for something different. One of the senior instructors (who had a couple of decades of karate under his belt) was absolutely adamant that if you weren't striking properly, you couldn't practice Aikido and whenever he taught, a large chunk of the class would be focused on making sure you were actually striking like you meant it, rather than "walking forward with your arm extended" as you see in a lot of Youtube land. On some rare occasions, our jiyu waza would basically turn into randori as well depending on who took the classes.

    It's not perfect by any measure, but it's more than I've seen from a lot of classes.

    I guess it depends on the person viewing it then.
     
  6. gapjumper

    gapjumper Intentionally left blank

    Or all 3?

    Can any art really turn you into a mean fighter if: you have never been in a fight, don't have the "heart" for fighting.

    Also if these are absent, will people really have the ability or drive to train in a really serious manner?

    Alot of people these days don't necessarily want to become great fighters. They join arts for many reasons. To then hold these people up as examples of an art not working in real fighting is a little naive, or just agenda sniping.

    .
     
    Last edited: Apr 15, 2014
  7. icefield

    icefield Valued Member

    in the absence of anyone else to hold up as good examples of the art being used in fighting who are we meant to judge the arts effectiveness by then?? Lots of people take thai boxing for fun and while never fight, the same with judo but examples of people using those two arts against other fighting styles can be found to judge those arts.

    what seems naive is saying look this art will work because the founder was a great fighter even though no examples of the art working against a trained fighter in the past 10years can be posted on a thread that's over 40 pages long
     
  8. gapjumper

    gapjumper Intentionally left blank

    Yeah..... that wasn't aimed at you personally. Anyways.

    But yes, it is naive, or worse, to say it must work only because of some guy who lived ages ago could fight.

    I was only commenting on the part I quoted. I wasn't saying that Aikido does or doesn't work, just that some arts attract certain people, with certain goals and often certain outlooks.
     
    Last edited: Apr 15, 2014
  9. robin101

    robin101 Working the always shift.

    Im fond of the saying "Any martial art works, if the situation is right for it and the person who is doing it can ACTUALLY do it" But it makes sense to focus most of your time on what will PROBABLY work for you. Not all of your time, because you never know, but most of the time anyway.
     
  10. OwlMAtt

    OwlMAtt Armed and Scrupulous

    :D
    Oh, absolutely, but I've never seen what I would call "realistic" or "practical" aikido. I don't think it exists.
    Every time I hear about a tough aikidoist with realistic skills, it turns out to be someone who spars and who has extensive experience in martial arts other than aikido.
     
  11. pseudo

    pseudo Padawan

    In regards to my time frame. It's just that a time frame which I figured I'll have a sufficient amount of experience to start attempting these techniques against different styles. You never know. I may try at an earlier date but that's just goal I've set my self. Something to aim for.

    Your right, those stories are probably not 100% true but even lies have truth to them. That's another good question, in terms of all traditional martial arts. What has changed? Why were they functional back then but no longer today? If your serious about the art you practice shouldn't it be your job to find out? Just my 2 c
     
  12. Hannibal

    Hannibal Cry HAVOC and let slip the Dogs of War!!! Supporter

    Training method - that's it

    I have said it many, many times but Ueshiba's training hall was called "Hell Dojo" because of the arduous training
     
  13. 8limbs38112

    8limbs38112 Valued Member

    so Hannibal. I am curious. What would you consider to be appropriate training methods for an aikido place..........training methods that would make the art effective for the practitioner.
     
  14. Hannibal

    Hannibal Cry HAVOC and let slip the Dogs of War!!! Supporter

    Have people try an smoke you as hard as they can
     
  15. 8limbs38112

    8limbs38112 Valued Member

    Yeah that's what I thought.
     
  16. yorukage

    yorukage Valued Member

    Aikido can work, it also depends on your instructor. I've seen some Aikido guys do some pretty hard core stuff when working only with high level students. At the same time, many Aikido guys don't teach that way, perhaps because it goes against the principles Ueshiba instituted? Or they just aren't that good?
     
  17. aikiwolfie

    aikiwolfie ... Supporter

    Ueshiba had no problem with hard training. Even in his old age. Neither did any of his students. Even Koichi Tohei insisted young men should train hard.
     
  18. aikiMac

    aikiMac aikido + boxing = very good Moderator Supporter

    It's because they aren't that good. I've been in classes with the scary people. (It's a crying shame that they're such a tiny minority.)
     
  19. pseudo

    pseudo Padawan

    Who are the scary people? Or are you just being waggish? (Word of the day?)
     
  20. LemonSloth

    LemonSloth Laugh and grow fat!

    Waggish is a word?
     

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