Mixing/creating styles

Competition is an attempt to simulate, in a safer environment, what it is like to fight for your life. (Depending on the competition etc)

Not that I'm saying the way I train is any more realistic, just that I think the definition needs to be made clear otherwise we could start putting MMA fighters on par with soldiers who's job is actually to fight for their lives.


As to the OP, everyone fights differently so where is the line drawn between a change in style and just the way someone fights? There are only so many ways the human body can move so in every effective style, effective in terms of actual fighting and not winning pretty competitions etc, it is just a different viewpoint on the same moves, with slight variations.

Also MAP is quite practical with it's thoughts on martial arts so the whole religious, spiritual side of things is generally seen as just an extra that doesn't really add much in terms of fighting.

 

I have earned a blackbelt in TCMA, well three, and I agree with him on that point at least, and also saying its untrue that competition is separate from blacksash is incorrect, whilst sparring is a part of most tests it isnt the determining factor neither is your competition record tme in the art is the usual determining factor, the only chinese art i know that has a competition record as part of its belt requirement is chinese wrestling

PS when did you earn yuor blackbelt/sash?

 

WHAT THE HECK IS A TMA?!
chadz trains in wrestling among other things - the most traditional style in world. no belts in that. the only thing people care about there is whether you can fight.

I will be open - the idea of a "TMA" is silly an i'm belittling it.

 

As soon as you mention a colored belt you are no longer talking about TMA in anything other than a modern context anyway - "martial spirit" is thrown around so sloppily these days it means little....and in TMA's it becomes a pseudo shield against enquiry

I hold belts in TMA's and occasionally still teach them...but I teach them as martial arts and it is not for mass consumption. I have fought and tested many times and testing is more arduous physically, but nothing like as difficult

 

"Master basic grappling"? LOL :bang:

Did you really think today's MMA has "taken away the dangers" from going to ground? Sure... if you don't fight in PRIDE rules.

P.S. it's the PRIDE rules, not the current Unified rules of MMA, which is the closest approximate to streetfighting.

Of course, for a person to effectively MARKET himself, he must EMPHASIZE his strengths. Now, why does your scenario happen (aka the generational diminishing returns)? Simple: THEY DON'T TEST IT. Oh sure the master and probably his successor will, but the other students? Will they find the holes to defeat THEIR VERY OWN ART? Or will they be comfortable in their own little pond? Competition provides INCENTIVE to change and gain the upper hand. And guess what - the human body can only move in so many ways. What was old (the techniques taken out) is new again (they counter the recent popular techniques) ONLY IF there is competition. Without it there is only stagnation.

And your point? That it MMA doesn't take it to that point? Please tell us: aren't two men trying to KILL each other COMPETING to be the first one to make the kill and not be killed himself?

You will never know how it feels like to play in the NBA finals. However, you will have an INKLING if you competed in basketball. If you never played basketball, you'll never know.

And what is MARTIAL SPIRIT? What is the test for it to be TRUE? A black belt test?

Funny though, in many MA traditions, so-and-so "traveled the land and CHALLENGED many fighters". Or "they fought bandits". Or waged war. Where was the black belt test? Where was the black belt in the first place? :hat:

The word "SHOULD" - haaaahhh, the ideal. But not the REAL. First guy to incorporate the black belt: Jigoro Kano. How did they prove to be superior: taking all comers and dojo storming. Before him, who? What rules? Probably what we call NHB, which includes some of the PRIDE rules and ball shots.

The thing is, rulesets usually ARE for safety. However, the more incentive there is to fight, the more rules discarded for it. Just watch Bernard Hopkins. So please tell us: is hiding behind the safety of a restrictive ruleset a "test" of "Martial Spirit"?

What is needed to be put down WILL (not 'should') be put down. By whom? Nature. HOW? Simple: nature, by its nature (sorry for the confusion), is full of UNBRIDLED COMPETITION (and not restricted competition). It is only by CIVILIZATION that certain systems (aka martial styles) are shielded from nature's effects.

Why MMA? Simple: It's so overly generalized that it constitutes a RULE OF THUMB; something that works in many situations MOST of the time. Less effort for that ROI. It's like being in a survival situation and having a knife: it exponentially INCREASES your potential. Put too much restrictions in MMA, and it will suffer the same problems as sparring/competing TMA, only in lesser amounts.

And about earning a black belt in a TMA: go to a mcdojo. It's still technically TMA, right? What's special about earning a black belt then? On the other hand, knocking out someone who's knocked out people before and KNOWS that you want to KO him so bad and he's watching, waiting, and also WANTING to stop you and KO you in return; ain't that special?

One is easy to get, due to our current culture (read: TRADITION). One is hard to obtain since the beginning of time, up to now, and probably will continue to be for so long.

 

Because the blackbelt has no quality control in most styles. Success in MMA doesnt rely on you paying for your 12 year old to receive a belt or being good friends with someone. you either win or you dont.
the fact is that the people who compete in MMA by larrge do come from TMAs and realise that the belt really doesnt represent much if you cant cover your own butt

 

The first point needs correction on my part. It FEELS like you're fighting for your life. A few people have actually died. Enson Inuoe has talked about warrior spirit, and Rickson pretty much lived it.

Black belt is a modern concept, just over a hundred years old. Absolutely nothing to do with anything other than the level you can use techniques and apply them in training.

I train in Muay Thai, BJJ, wrestling and judo.Two of those are older than some styles of karate, and Muay Thai is about as traditional as it gets (and is older than every Japanese and Chinese art, save perhaps Sumo and Wrestling. No belts, so I couldn't tell you.

 

The bolded portion is the mentality of the fighters from 1993, not those who are competing today. Apparently the tricks that people fell for in 1993 are still attracting true believers.

 

On a neuro-endocrine level, I'm not sure how different going to war and going to fight in MMA would be. My guess is that your brain hits a peak where it can't get into a more excited state. I guess a comparable…comparison would be between jumping off of a bridge and bungee jumping off a bridge. Although you know the cord is there and it's a fundamentally different activity, I'd be interested in seeing how different the actual neurophysiology is. Testing this with people is probably unethical, so I guess I'm going to have to chuck some hamsters off a cliff.



Excuse me won't you?

 

Yes, it's not a death match. But it can be a struggle for your life. See the SHOULDER dislocation of the Korean Zombie. He had no good means of defending himself after that, but the fight still went on UNTIL THE REF STOPPED IT BELATEDLY. Unlike in boxing, where you can take a breather by dropping to your knees, in MMA it's either you're pregnant or not pregnant; you can't be half-pregnant. See the old fights of Shogun Rua in PRIDE, how he brutalized his opponents by STOMPING on them. Not AT (a teep aka push kick), ON (as in lying on the ground). Most deaths in unarmed street conflict usually results from head trauma secondary to blunt impact by a planet. In some MMA events it's the VENUE itself that offers the safeguard. Place the exact scenario in another setting then it's a lethal force encounter equal to Zimmerman.

There I disagree. Rickson ISN'T a warrior. And I don't know if Enson Inoue knows someone who is a warrior well enough to talk about it.

HAVE THEY BEEN TO WAR? :thinking:

Do they know someone who went to war well enough?

Just like you can't separate space, the fireman from fire, the seaman from the sea, the mountaineer from the mountain, the carpenter from wood, the musician from music; you can't separate the warrior from WAR.

So I ask again: Have they been to war?

"You don't call yourself an astronaut UNTIL after you go up there (to space)!" - Astronaut Gus Grissom as quoted in the book 'The Right Stuff'

 

In MMA you know WHERE the enemy is, but not WHEN will he attack. In modern war, you probably won't have that luxury. Especially in the night, when you can't hear your teammates, anxiety can rise through the roof. The anticipation can kill you (figuratively and literally; and your team included too, if you aren't careful). Source: a Philippine Army Scout Ranger who acted as consultant that our hard-butt son-of-bosses JROTC/CAT commandant brought in.

P.S. to get the scout ranger tab, you will be sent to Mindanao for a "live exercise"; it's a graduation requirement. Training under him was the closest I got to war, aside from paintball games.

 

If the rules were death matches: the techniqueswoulsnt differ.
If they allowed weapons then we would get DbMA which is a derivative of MMA

 

Yeah, I understand that war and MMA are different, but that still doesn't speak to a physiological stress response.

Edit: Are you saying that soldiers literally just drop dead from anticipating a fight? Literally, anticipation kills them?

 

Haha wow, this post wasn't ever meant for this discussion but very interesting

 

No one can controll or predict the random tangents a conversation will journey through on an Internet forum

 

Lol no of course not and don't mean to try.