So im thinking of adding in some karate to gain flexibility and fast strikes. Iv found a place that does it fairly cheap. £28 per month for once a week. However its only one hour lessons. Will I learn much with only one hour a week? Im not after a belt really as im doing muay thai twice a week. I know that in karate you dont spar or spend ages doing pressup/situps but one hour seams short.
"Karate" is such a broad term as to be almost meaningless in some ways. Most karate styles will spar, but rules will vary enormously, from full contact to none. Any sensei will want to teach you karate, so your time will be taken up with the totality of the art not just the bits you want, so if you're only doing it for flexibility and speed, I think you could achieve more in an hour of self directed training than by going to a karate class.
If you’re already doing two Muay Thai classes a week, I’d add something complimentary like wrestling or another grappling art. My guess is that karate could confuse your ‘Thai muscle memory’ but then I’ve never trained in karate.
Yeah, striking is like language, you can only really learn one whole one at a time. Grappling is like math. It's a universal language and you can interchange everything.
If you go over what you learned, on your own time, yes. If you of course have the time. A problem that I see, with some classes...is that the instructor, never leaves the student alone, they don't give the student much time with themselves, in order to figure stuff out. It is interesting as in my style, we expect them to go over the material on their own at home. I think that you will be fine.
It's better than no hours, and at that price it's a steal. As far as gains, you will spend a lot of time in stances and static drills and it'll bore you from a Thai boxing perspective. But, you've probably spent more on junk food in the last 30 days (I know I have), karate can be a decent workout, and learning new things is fun. It's your dime.
