All Wado Karate Forum

wadoka wrote:Someone emailed me outside of the forum and made a statement along the lines of Wado is a great art but useless for fighting. Seems apt to drop that in now.

Goes back to the purpose of karate. I started when I was 11, am now 44 and hope to be still training for a long long time still. Maybe that's when kata comes into its own then.

For the first part; opinions are like a*******s, everyone's got one.

For the second part, you reminded me of my opinion of golf.

Tim Shaw
Essex
UK

Lost my Internet for a bit there.

So, lets see.

There seem to be three points here I need to pick up on:

1 - kata is about more than fighting.

I agree. But, it is also about fighting. It is a blueprint, a text book, a list of ingredients all in a few practical packages. Isn't it?

2 - Wado doesn't make you a great fighter

I agree. Wado can make you a great fighter though. But most will choose the lessons that suit them and stop there. Or, like me be unable to apply them. (Maybe unfortunately a little of the first as well). I don't think the style is at fault. Just the practitioners.

3 - Kata has seemed unrelated to my ability to fight.

I think it is not necessary to study kata to become a very good fighter. But, there surely comes a point where you begin to seek further answers and tuition that will nudge your fighting past the glass ceiling it eventually reaches. Perhaps, If you choose to begin studying kata at that stage it will take a long time to get that insight.

...

Generally, I agree with the sentiment that all of this becomes irrelevant. The more you train well the less you seem to become interested in 'the fight' conversation. But, in the interest of sticking to the inspiration for starting the thread, I am not going to do my best to discourage the answer that 'wado is about more than fighting, so don't worry about it' .

I am sold on that. By some divine coincidence last night training was entirely dedicated to kata practise. It seems an awful lot of effort if it only has some vague and adequate gains. Is it just dogma we are blindly following?

Also, if it is just a teaching aid to pass on knowledge, why did the grandmaster practise it? Just so he could teach it?

Too many questions and not enough answers as always.

As in all these things I think it is useful to define your terms.
What we mean by ‘Wado’ should be fairly simple (or is it?)
What we mean by ‘fighting’ might be more problematic; particularly when you come at it from what Andy seems to be describing as fighting.

Try it this way:
Look at Wado as a fighting system; examine what the functional weapons are, coupled with the strategies taught and you realise that what is permitted in Shiai is fairly limited.

Take the Kihon Gumite for example. Just looking at the target areas, intentional or actual and also looking at the adaptations that have occurred to ensure that these can be practiced safely, and there’s a whole catalogue of nastiness which makes me feel queasy just thinking about it. A number of us here may have also had the privilege of working with Ohtsuka Sensei and looked at the extensions from Kihon Gumite; many of those also end in multiple broken bones; nearly had my rib cage crushed by one such technique. I also remember attending those classes with Suzuki Sensei where he revealed the ‘not to be practiced’ fighting techniques.

Generally speaking, for example, attacks to the knees or cervical spine are not things you can play with.

Obviously kata feeds into the practice of these techniques.

Tim Shaw
Essex
UK

We all have our own reasons for why we started karate and each have our own reasons for continuing to practice it. I find it interesting that it offers many different levels to different people, each able to take some of the building blocks and construct something that works for you.

I started Karate aged 12, because of the film The Karate Kid and that I was being bullied at school, the film introduced me to a whole new world I wanted to be part of. I had no idea of styles then, Karate was Karate. It happened to be a Wado club run by a guy called Noel Maggs.

If I knew what I know now and was choosing a style, I think it would be Kyokushin kai

andyb28 wrote:If I knew what I know now and was choosing a style, I think it would be Kyokushin kai

Do you know - I think you're right.

Tim Shaw
Essex
UK

I agree with Tim and at your age I reckon there is still time to change Andy...

oneya..

heh!

Then I can find a new forum, the balance is restored and the willow tree once again starts to bend with the wind?

Hey Reg,
I remember this story about Lord Palmerston.
He was schmoozing with the French ambassador, who said to Palmerstone, “Do you know, if I was not born a Frenchman I would want to be an Englishman”. And Palmerston’s reply was “And if I was not born an Englishman I would want to be an Englishman”.

I feel the same about Wado.

C'est la vie

Tim Shaw
Essex
UK

andyb28 wrote:heh!

Then I can find a new forum, the balance is restored and the willow tree once again starts to bend with the wind?

You will miss us too much.

Tim49 wrote:Palmerston’s reply was “And if I was not born an Englishman I would want to be an Englishman”.

I feel the same about Wado.

Nice one, Tim.

I think there are all sorts of arguments that can be made about the value of kata for learning how to defend oneself, generate power, move with connected structure, and fight (note, please, that while all of these things can complement each other, they are not by any means the same thing). I would agree, however, that obviously you don't need kata for any of that.

In fact, the whole debate about the utility of kata brings to mind Oscar Wilde's awesome "defense" of the utility of art. "All art is quite useless," he declared. Argument over and won. Tongue-partially-in-cheek, I would say that the same holds true for kata. If one tries to defend kata as necessary for anything, one is bound to lose the argument. It can be useful for any number of things, but it is necessary for none.

Here are some of the motivators for why I practice kata now:
1) Self/"spiritual"-development--that is, the search for "perfection" of character through the attempt to perfect movement. (As if I'll ever get there! lol.)
2) Exercise/fitness/strength/cardiovascular and aerobic health. Perhaps this is heresy, but one can practice kata repeatedly and with sufficient speed to meet this goal.
3) To quell general life anxiety--i.e. a kind of "moving meditation."
4) To stave off boredom.
5) To feel like I'm engaged in the "do" of Wado.

Nice thread, everyone.

Best,
Greg