Why This ? Why That ?

**Ronin** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 9:05am

Why ?

Why have you chosen the system(s) you are currently doing, and/or why did you chose the ones you have done?

Currently I have experience in:
Hung gar / Wing chun / Taiji ( Chen)
Kyokushin / okinanwan goju karate
Kodokan Judo
Boxing
ITF Taekwon-do
Yoshinkan Aikido
Yagyu shinkage / Tenshin Shoden Katori shinto kenjutsu
Muay Thai
SCARS.

The reasons ?
I started with kung fu ( hung gar and WC were taught in the same school) because of those cool kung fu movies and Bruce Lee.
I went to Karate (Kyokushin / Okinawana Goju)& Boxing because I was attracted to all the sparring that was lacking at the kung fu school I had been at.
Judo was part of the curriculum there and I enjoyed all the trowing and ground fighting ( it was also less painful on my teenage body than karate and boxing).
I tried my feet at Taekwon-do because I wanted to improve my kicking ( still have a wicked spinning back and hook kick).
As the “aikido craze” started, I tried my hands at wearing a hakama and Yoshinkan Aikido, why? Steven Seagal looked SO COOL !!! ( I came away with a much better understanding of body positioning and leverage). Kenjutsu just flowed naturally from Aikido and, no other art makes you understand the importance of “first hit” and of “every hit is dangerous”, than kenjutsu.
Muay Thai I learnt while in the military, and my elbows and knees improved dramatically.
From the military, SCARS was a natural choice to explore as I went through the “reality” phase of my Martial Arts career.
Then came Chen Taiji and my desire to see what IS TAIJI ???

Now, I take the best that ALL those systems had to offer, I concentrate on what is best for ME based on not only my experience in the MA, but also my time in the military, bouncing and protection industry.

If I was to chose ONE system the influenced me more than any other, it would have to be a tie between Kyokushin and Judo.
If I have to chose a system that I enjoy practising more than any other, Kenjutsu.
Were any of them a WASTE of time ?
NO !!!
All had something to teach, and I happened to be smart enough to be able to learn.
Just lucky I guess.

**Antagony** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 9:31am

Shaolin-Do Kung Fu - My roommate invited me to go there with him and I already had an interest in the martial arts.

Japanese Jujutsu - I wanted to try a traditional Japanese martial art. (You'll be able to read a lot more about my experience here very soon.)

GJJ & Muay Thai - Studying these now at my current school. Why? Sparringsparringsparringsparringsparringsparringsp arringsparringsparringandpain. It's great.

**danjo** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 9:42am

Shotokan Karate
"Shaolin" Kempo Karate
Brazilian Jiujitsu

Shotokan: because it was the only MA taught where I lived in 1979 and a friend was taking it. I liked the Chuck Norris, who was big in the movies at the time. Stayed on until 1984 to my 3rd Kyu Brown belt then moved.

Smatterings of a bunch of other stuff. Nothing worth mentioning from 1985 to 2002. Never found anything that I wanted to stick with and/or didn't have the time.

"Shaolin" Kempo: Very little to do with Shaolin. Took this for one year mainly because I was unaware that there were better places to train until I had been doing it for a few months. It was like Shotokan-light with a bunch of added bullshit techniques and theories. McDojo hardcore.

BJJ: I went here because of the reputation. I was not disappointed.

**danjo** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 9:43am

message strangely duplicated and therefore deleted.

**Matt W.** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 9:46am

Started in Hapkido/TSD as a kid. Went back to it again in High School because a friend went to that school. Switched out of it not long after and went to an independent ITF style TKD school because, after comparing, I liked the atmosphere there better. Stayed with ITF style TKD off and on for years until I eventually got my 1st dan. Since college I had also been dabbling off and on in Medieval swordplay, mostly German longsword.

When I decided to get back into MA about a year and a half ago, I started doing some research. Believe it or not, the training I had done in medieval MA had taught me a lot about the importance of hard sparring and realistic training. So I soon found myself on rec.martial-arts reading the posts of one Mr. Bill Mahoney, aka Gichoke, aka Strong Machine. What he said made sence. So I started looking at the evidence... early UFC's, GiA, all kinds of fight vids, etc. It was through some of those fight vids that I found bullshido. Next step was to try it, which I did. Did BJJ for a coupla months. Loved it. Just couldn't afford it. So, now believing in the sport training method, and also loving grappling, I started wrestling at a local amatuer club (virtually for free). I've been doing that for about a year now. I've also been lifting pretty regularly for a year now too, as I also came to believe in developing physical attributes apart from learning techniques.

Currently, I'm looking forward to returning to wrestling after a bit of a summer lay-off. I'll also be starting RBSD soon... I mean REAL "RBSD", which actually is defensive tactics training for Law Enforcement. ;)

Matt

KhorneliusPraxx · Posted On: 7/26/2004 9:53am

Early last year I was applying to be a city cop and the officer in charge of hand-to-hand training and physical fitness told me that the most important MA for police work was Judo. I was all set to start the Judo class when I was told by the State of Indiana that I was to old to be a cop. I could only afford more than one class (time more than money) and I didn't need the Judo for my non-existent law enforcement career, I could switch to what ever class I wanted. I of course chose Jun Fan Gung Fu so I could be a Bruce Lee Nutrider that Djimbe can make fun of. :)

**PizDoff** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 9:57am

My two (or so) main arts:

Wing Chun (Good lineage!): I went to this one school, one that my parents would pay for, and suggested to me as one of my cousins was there already. I saw Wushu, people dancing around with low stances and bullshit like that. No. I saw Tai Chi, too many old people. So, what the hell I'll go with Wing Chun as I had never heard of that before. My instructor later told me about Bruce Lee and lineage and I didn't see how that stuff applied to me.

At the time all I knew was that jujitsu was the older deadlier version of Judo. And several victories and more losses on teh STr33t...

Tai Chi: Well since I did WC, and there were TC guys over there at the same gym, why not cross train? Over Sifu encouraged us to do so as well. Some standup grappling and throwing, learned redirection of energy idea much more.

Japanese Jujitsu: Only 'good' thing availible on university campus. No MT, didn't want to be a ninja, aikidoist, karate wanker so at least I knew JJJ had some grappling. Found some nice BJJ guys to roll with afterwards for hours as well there.

**Stick** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 9:57am

I started in ATA TKD when I was 11, there was a club fair for us brats (this was in leavenworth) and the fight sports were wrestling and TKD. Being the enlightened little fucker that I was, I picked TKD.

Quite glad I did, that was pretty good school for a kid, lots of sparring, good hard sparring with multiples even. I fondly recall doing a 3 on 3 where before hand I told the two on my side to keep em busy and give me enough room to get a good running start, did a huge run jump side kick (I was so high I practically stepped on my targets neck more than I kicked it)- oh but enough of my childhood.

Several years of nothing.

Junior year of high school I finally joined the wrstling team, meant to my sophmore year but army insurance fucked up and I couldn't get my physical till it was too late. I joined up because I had friends on the team and I wanted to be in shape- damn did it work.

in 2000, when I came to OSU I joined the OSU TKD team (ITF forms with thuroughly nonTKD sparring), every Tuesday night there we do 30 minute sessions of grappling which I discovered was a lot of small circle tricks and brazilian jujitsu, in short order I joined the brazilian jujitsu club (2001 IIRC). I reamain with OSU TKD to this day.

Was witht he OSU BJJ club till it collapsed, out of the ashes came the MMA team, founding member, thanks much. Class is taught by one of the meaniest littlest guys I've ever met- and by "mean" I mean he's real nice its just that he could kill us all-, when anyone asks we tell 'em our basic mix is MT, BJJ, wrestling, and boxing. We take whatever we can get from our visitors.

Before leaving for Japan I did a few months of judo just to try it out, kind of liked it, really rule ridden for me and I knew I'd always like BJJ more. Anwho, did a few months of judo in Japan, but I fucked up academically and had to drop the extra curriculars or face deportation...... anywho....... I survived that, now I'm back.

right now I'm just working withthe MMA and TKD teams, I haven't run into any of the Judo boys in a while. I get more than enough mat time in each week now, hoping MMA coach will take me along on Saturday morning when he trains the Stillwater PD in hand to hand, good volunteer work and teaching exp.

Anywho, just love to share ^___^

**SamHarber** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 10:17am

I did Judo as a kid because my older brother was already going, so it was probably much easier for my parents if we were both in the same place at the same time.
When I was 21 or 22, I started doing Japanese Jujitsu with a friend because our ballroom dancing instructor was too ill to carry on teaching and we wanted something else to do on those nights. About three years into that, a tai chi class started running just before the jitsu class so I started going to that occasionally.
I took a break of a few years off before someone I knew asked why I didn't come down to his aikido class. It was on the way home from work so there was no good reason not to. I enjoyed it so carried on.
The aikido instructor also taught escrima on saturday mornings, so I gave that a go as well. Oddly enough, I really enjoyed hitting people with sticks.
One of the aikido students got his tai chi instructor to come down to our dojo once a month and he taught either Sun style tai chi or systema when he came down.
This year a re-evaluation of what I wanted out of martial arts made me quit everything apart from escrima and I signed up with an SBG gym for Vale Tudo and BJJ

You may notice that theres precious little reasoning given. Thats because I either can't remember it (had too many concussions in my life), or because I prefer to just try whatever is in front of me.

**Aesopian** · Posted On: 7/26/2004 10:18am

I had one class of TKD when I was 8. I was told I had a good "stance", then I never came back because I was a lazy child. I never really followed martial arts any more for the next 10 years.

DISCLAIMER: I'm a huge nerd.

This year though, I was browsing around Wizards.com, looking through the D&D art galleries, trying to find something interested to play next campaign. I happened across a Reaping Mauler which is one of the few grappler classes in D&D. I started studying the game rules for grappling (which happen to suck) and tried to find footage of a grappler actually fighting. Luckily, my dad happened to have a copy of The Smashing Machine so I watched that and was amazed by the MMA matches.

Looking for more info on MMA (which I didn't know was called MMA at the time), I happened upon Sherdog's highlight videos. I watched them a whole bunch and started reading the Sherdog forums. At this point I started buying UFC and Pride DVDs.

After watching all this fighting, I figured I'd better at least try to do some myself. I didn't know what martial arts anyone took, so I started reading around and I kept reading about GJJ/BJJ, wrestling, MT, and boxing mainly. At the time I was amazed none of TMA were successful, and that most people poo-poo'ed them. At the beginning of my research, I actually went a Goju-Ryu school and checked it out (it seemed "okay", but I wasn't into it). Checking my area for schools, all I could find at first were McDojos or boxing gyms, so I was going to take boxing.

But watching more and more MMA, I thought "I really need to learn whatever this grappling stuff is" and kept searching for something in my area. I happened to find that a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu blackbelt teaches in a building I've only driven past on the way to work for the last 2 years.

I showed up for a free class, got schooled (literally and figuratively) and I've been going ever since. I recently found out MT is taught on Thursday nights, so I'm going to start taking that too.

Interesting note, my instructor actually referred me to Bullshido. I think he asked me if I was a Bullshido keyboard warrior and I was like "WTF?" so he told me to check it out.

Also, aikido pwns orcs.