My fighting style

Hi, Believe me, I know what you mean as I've been practicing from a chair for almost 24 yrs. My main art is Tai Chi, but I didn't think it was enough because I couldn't do most of the footwork or kicks, so I learned "parts" of other arts like Wing Chun, Hsing I, some Jujitsu & Goju, most techniques I tried & discard, some I kept & amended. Gradually I began to fill in the blanks of my Tai Chi empty hand, but on learning the straight sword which was also an adaptive process, I was lucky enough to learn the fundamentals of Kali, which added much to the use of many weapons, so much so that now my sword form contains the use of any weapon at hand.

 

wonderful.

my friends work on a similar hypothesis of using a martial art more suited to your body type than adapting to an art physically difficult for you.

I being the lightest of us am the striker of the group using mobility to my utmost.

my other friend is quite overwieght and has bad knees cannot be as mobile as I has trained himself in a timing and holding his ground. he's more of a grappler.

my other friend is in the middle mass category has opted for waepons. It's more realistic for him than doing the kick combinations that I do. Yet we take pointers from each other and reveal how to counter act reach other.

you are in good company. Zatoichi's blindness never stoped him from sword fighting.

Keep it up sir more power to ya.

 

In my first year at college i had friend who was in a wheel chair and he was training in using Nunchukas and a Tonfa. he had been training a lot for about 18 months, and was learning fast.

 

As for the use of 'crippled' . . .

None of my students really care, as most of them are two-leggers, with all accompanying parts intact (as opposed to sold seperately). It was originally referred to as 'Broken Fist' and, before then, "Broke-a**-leg." No offense to anyone who has a 'bad leg.' I feel your pain. I have some cruel friends. No worries though, they felt my wrath. I've been trying to get a chinese-speaker to piece the terms togeather . . . perhaps "Broken Fist" or something like that. Any ideas? I'm not good with this name stuff!

Sorry I haven't been back in so long!!

Much of it. I've currently been working with kung-fu strikes focusing around the wrist, mainly to guard against people who attempt to disarm the cane user.

Most of the leverage work/locks/throws are either adapted Judo throws or modified from Masaaki Hatsumi's "Stick Fighting" book (a MUST HAVE). I've taken some from Hapkido, as well. However, many of my techniques are simply making use of the crook end of the cane . . . example:

1. Enemy stabs downward with right hand.
2. Defender hooks Knife-arm from the inside, and rotates the cane away from him (thus forcing the knife-arm to twist akwardly to the side)
3. Defender steps to the attacker's unarmed side, drawing the cane + trapped arm across the defenders body.
4. Knife can possibly lodge in the attacker's diaphragm or stomach.
5. uhhm . . . . Goodbye attacker.

I'm not so strong with strikes, though. Any input on this?

I'm not sure if any other style has done this, but I've been messing around with holding the cane like a tonfa, and practicing striking techniques using momentum as the primary force behind the attacks. A few chinese broadsword techniques have translated quite nicely in this carriage. I made a mess of my lifetime garunteed punching bag.

I've been wanting to get one of those edged teardrop canes from canemasters. Any opinions?

 

Striking

I've only been in martial arts for about 2 years, so believe me when I say I speak without much authority on the subject. I do however, have some humble input to add on your problem with a lack of striking power. In training in a traditional Goju-Ryu Dojo, we train strikes with power that always originates from the hips. Usually we stand san chin dachi (sp?) while striking, but it can easily be applied to a 50/50 weight stance (heikodachi). As long as your injured leg can hold a 50/50 weight distribution, I could recommend simply practicing a basic seiken zuki (sp?) or straight punch, with a snap of the hips to originate the power. For a straightforward "strike" I think that training a linear attack would be a wise idea.

Humbly,
Alex Snyder

 

Thanks for the input! That helped out a lot. It's obvious that I need to do some wrist conditioning. My strikes were a little unstable.

Today, I was sparring with a judo student in the park. He wanted to work on grappling, and I wanted to work on joint-locks, so it kinda evened out. I had specifically asked him to not try to throw me, mostly because of the fact that we were not on a mat, and my knee replacement cost me a quarter of a million dollars in insurance. I could buy two houses with that thing.

He began to do what would have been an Osoto Gari, with his right hand on my left sleeve, and left hand on my right lapel. I felt his (and my) weight shift as he had started to swing his left leg out to reap mine out from under
me.

I rolled my left arm over his right hand, over the 'weak spot' on the wrist, so he had to let go. Leaning foreward as best I could (he had stepped back, because he lost grip of my left hand), I twisted my left arm under his left arm (the one holding my right lapel) and grabbed him by the innerside of his wrist. From there, I stepped foreward with my left, pushed back and down on his arm, and reversed his Osoto Gari.

Victory!!

My surgeon would have killed me. Had he not stepped back though, that would have been it for me. However, aren't you only awarded a Waza Ari if you loose control of the arm, or don't hold onto it? I should really chalk that move up to pure chance, and his inexperience. Heh, but whatever.