What is the best form of martial arts for self defence and why?
Would also like to know of where I can go to learn the martial art that you suggest - considering I live in London?
I live in Putney and work in near the West End - so the closer the better really :)
Answers:
Forget that crap about instructors that have learned from training in the far east. what a load of bullsh!t.
Krav Maga is great, if you get good instruction.
Aikido is a joke. If you choose that you better be good at another human defense mechanism. running. it has no practical street self defense. practise for practise sake, but dont believe the Steven Seagal movies, they are choreographed. yes it is aikido, but sculpted for the audience. I tried it for 4 months and did not feel safe thinking about using what I saw on the street. I was a bouncer in town and control & restraint was better. sure, 4 months isnt long enough to master anything, but you have to use your common sense folks, and smell defeat before the battle. why train for decades to master it when you can learn something else that CAN help you. like muay thai
Muay Thai is an awesome and extremely effective Martial Art, fitness, skill, power, viscious, simplistic enough to understand. try that.
TKD is too limited. Korean propoganda
Traditional Martial Arts fail to provide the street protection and skills of the age we live in. life has changed since japan/ china 300 years ago.
Bruce Lee, was a philosopher of martial science, not a majic bullet of fighting. great understanding of fighting, but overstated. understanding his ideas is better than trying to follow him. his whole belief was to create your own theme in fighting, a no- style of bits and pieces of everything you study. not just one thing.
what we need is adaptable systems, systems that upgrade and change to suit the auidence.
most of the people here are full of crap. dont listen to them. in fact, dont even listen to me, go out and try them, and tell me what happens when you need to protect yourself. a kick to the head is worthless outside of trying to score points, but a kick through the knees drops the best of them.
go combat orientation, like Krav Maga, or CQC. or anything that challenges you to assess it, to whether it is suitable for your needs. there is crap in all styles, or systems, just filter it down and get what works for you.
American karate
For pure defense and little attack, I'd go with Aikido. Its purely defensive. If you want a pragmatic style thats equal in attack and defense, try Krav Maga- its the Israeli martial art.
Krav maga is gaining respect for its real world applications
Running away screaming always works for me.
jujistju it has been proved on telivison reason being is it combines ranged attacks grapples instantanious death etc and is lightning fast the SAS are trained in jujistju as hand to hand combat
Karate -
You can disable an opponent from a distance with kicks vs. Judo which requires more close up encounters. Boxing is OK but usually you wont have time to put those darn gloves on.
Krav Maga, Thai boxing, or Brazilian jujutsu, in this order.
First, you need to know the environment it will be used and the intended purpose of learning one.
What you will be looking at is self defense/street fighting scenario where no bar holds and anything goes. You primary concern is to remove yourself from a situation of threat to relative safety as fast as you can, preferably without fighting in ideal situation.
Therefore, FORGET all about martial arts of karate, tae kwon do, aikido and any of the 'do' and so on. There are called 'arts' for a reason. They look good and you look good in them, but have you ever seen anyone one fights in real fight using one, such as any of the ultimate fighting programs. NO, because they are completely useless in real fight. If you ever watch Pride or Ultimate Fighting, EVERYONE uses a combination of variant of Muay Thai( Thai boxing) and Brazilian jujutsu. They are professional fighter fighting in realistic street fight scenarios, they choose this style for a reason.
NO ONE uses any of the martial arts for the obvious reason - they just don't work in real fight. First, there are moves you have to be very very very proficient via many many many practices. Even after that, those moves require you to move into certain positions of body and extremities and then execute moves at a certain sequence; they take time to do so and your enemy most likely already delivered a fatal blow before you even begin.
In street fight, your ONLY goal, if it comes down to fighting, is to deliver maximum, preferably fatal or incapacitating, blow in the least amount of time. Krav maga does exactly that, so does Thai boxing. Brazilian jujutsu is more ground fighting, but has a lot of elements of that. What makes krav maga ideal is that it is pretty much common sense, instinctual of make a person would do. There are no moves, each technique is a swift, highly economical( meaning or complex, time consuming) blow for a particular attack. They don't usually teach military Krav Maga, but the civilian version taught in schools is more than sufficient.
www.kravmaga.com, there is an international directory of certified training centers.
In self-defense class, they teach you that one of the most powerful weapons is your voice. Other than that, I think muay thai is the best. It's pratical, and "real-life" I guess.
A shogun with a bull bar. Sorts the men out from the boys does that.
Without doubt something called:
Hapkido or Hapkiyoosool
.This is the Korean version of the circular defensive art called Aikido which is reknowned for using a person's energy or strength against him/herself.
The best teacher of Hapkido, Chang, currently resides in Korea while one of his best students, a 6th degree American black belt - Master Jeff Allen - teaches in Fort Lauderdale Florida.
Your primary goal should be to assess the teacher of whatever art you choose.
I suggest you take a look at this website to see videos of Jeff Allen in Action and then compare his style and teaching to any dojo you enter.
Hapkido: http://www.hapkiyoosool.com/video.htm.
Remember, your chosen martial art should have a teacher who has studied in the far east.
You should also realize this truth: 90% of all martial arts instructors out there are out to make money. Be very selective.
Hope this helps
J
There is No "best" Martial Art, because no Martial Art is better than another.
The only difference between two fighters trained in different disciplines of Martial Arts, is whichever one trained to perfect their techniques on a regular basis, and/or has the best strategy to win.
My suggestion to you, is to find out in your local phonebook what schools are local to you, find out if they have a trial time (like a week or two to try the class out) and find out which one's interest you the most. then find out the background of the school, like how long the school's been there, how long the instructor has been there, how long the instructor's been teaching, do they know (studied it) their Martial Arts discipline well? do they know the history of where it came from.
concerns about how quick you'll get a blackbelt or how many tournaments you'll win or trophies you'll garner is of no consequence be cause these are the least needed aspects of ANY Martial Art.
Find a good school, train often and perfect your techniques, and be consistent with it.
good luck
Jeet Kune Do The Way Of The Intersepting Fist ! Why ? It Worked For Bruce Lee , And He Was The Baddest Mother Fooker Of All Time ! So all you thumbs down people saying bruce lee wasnt a bad mother fooker then? You dont know what your talking / writing about then !!!
I have done Tae Kwon Do ("Korean karate") and Aikido ("Steven Seagal") - Tae Kwon Do best for fitness training and useful self defence techniques can be learned to a useful level quite quickly.
Aikido takes much longer to become good at as it is all about technique not strength. (No longer training due to injury).
Aikido (the art of unarmed combat for Samurai developed over a feudal civil war of about 1000 years (if you weren't any good you didn't live long enough to teach anyone else!)) is far better as a self defence martial art than Tae Kwon Do if you have the patience to learn it.
If you want sparring, tournaments and to be the Karate kid then do Tae Kwon Do, Karate etc.
Don't know your area, go to web Aikido and Tae Kwon Do have their own various governing bodies which will list classes.
http://www.furyu.com/onlinearticles/best.
This site has some common sense answers to your question. Please read it.
Don't know where you'd learn it, don't even know if it's a martial art - but I'm pretty sure it is. Sumo!
Would you mess with a Sumo?
a m16 assault rifle on full automatic,lets lock and load and rock and roll.come and get it motherforkers
Martial arts can be classified into 2 broad categories:
Striking: Tae Kwon Do. Karate, Shaolin boxing
Good: Can handle multiple attackers, can engage at long range, enables you to be pro active when necessary.
Not so good: Ground, hard to control an attacker without inflicting serious injury.
Grappling: Hapkido, Judo, etc.
Good: effective in close, good on the ground, can control an attacker without inflicting serious injury.
Not so Good: Not good at long range, You must wait for the attacker to make the 1st move. Not effective against multiple attackers.
Look for a traditional rather than modern or sport school. In a traditional school, toy will learn not only how to fight, but when & when not to fight.
Avoid schools with jitsu in the name, they are all about fighting, no philisophy, no respect, no self discipline. Getting trained in that manner is like having a gun loaded & cocked with no safety.
Read this, it should help:
http://www.bullshido.net/modules.php?nam.
Krav Maga: Probably one of the most effective theoretical based systems I've come across next to Combat sambo. Also the techniques are damn near IMPOSSIBLE to train effectivly without hurting your partner seriously.
BJJ schools around the world are represented by a bunch of newbie snot nose punks. Two type of guys come out of these gyms. The guys that learn decent technique because they put their ego aside establish a good level of respect for one another and learn and the bastards who develop a bully mentality and never get past their own ego. There's nothing wrong with pride until the pride gets in the way of true learning. I saw over a dozen BJJ fighters go into matches against 'inferior' styles because they saw Royce Gracie do it in the UFC. Unfortunately most of those guys forgot they were doing a sport and the Gracies had been accepting challenges for decades before the UFC came around, their style was designed in neutralizing the mono stylistic stand up fighter who believed they couldn't be taken down. The guys that get mired into the BJJ is all you need to know get caught up into the same downfalls as all the other systems that eventually failed due to their inability to change. The minute you don't fear and give respect to another style is the day you're going to leave yourself open to defeat.
Aikido is an artful form of evasion, that's all this is. Don't get me wrong I love some of this stuff but if you like most of the aspects and want to learn how to defend yourself, find an Aikijujitsu school that does some level of sparring and leave this crap to the ball room dancers.
Check out all the schools in your area. Choose the one that is the highest quality. Do not put too much focus on the style.
Tip:
Never pay for rank testing and never sign a contract.
I personally think that akido is a very good defensive martial art although there is not alot of offensive techniques in it it is very good for the basic person and will if nothing elese make you feel more confident in your self and get you in better physical health.
you should check out cyberkwoon.com its a forum on akido and other arts and then there is martial arts planet.com they are based out of london and seem to be pretty good.
Good luck.
Krav Maga, Muay Thai, and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. End of story.
All the people who are saying Karate and Tae Kwon Do, etc..when you learn these arts you don't truly spar! You do point sparring and practice against the air.
In KM, MT, and BJJ, in every single class you do real sparring, and not to mention all 3 of these arts are extremely relevant and useful today.
The Karate "HHHIIIIIIYYYAAAA!" stuff is a waste of your time and money and gives you a total false sense of security.
okinawa kempo, teaches multiple ways of defending yourself and it is fun to learn
It depends. In most bar fights for example the place is too packed to throw a proper kick and so leg techniques are pretty useless. In such a case I would prefer Wing Chun which is mostly hand techniques or simply boxing.
If you have space then the leck is a powerful weapon but beware as the leg is easily caught and before you know it you are on the ground which is where grappling comes into its own.
Krav Maga - long answers hack me off - hope this helps
taichi
IMHO the Jeet Kune Do concepts of fighting works because they are purely conceptual. Finding a good teacher is another problem as many JKD instructors favour systematic drills and pad work over the concepts. These should aid your training, not become the training. Big difference.
Primary targets are eyes and groin, which can be trained with a box/groin guard and welding goggles. JKD is all about effective combat, towards the later stages of development Bruce Lee simplified his own Jun Fan kung fu system and was interested in how fighting works.
He recognised that JKD was just a name and he knew JKD would be exploited in the future but many people have the same attitude like Bruce Lee had. Geoff Thompson being one of them.
Find a club that practises sparring because this will help you no end with distance and timing. We train street fighting only and everything we do is based on urban survival. Psychological tactics are vital too, not many clubs train this.
Also make sure your sparring partner breaks the rules and comes at you in unconventional ways. Being overwhelmed by an unpredictable opponent in a safe environment will help you apply yourself physically. Trust me you'll learn quickly and in a good club it's only your pride that gets hurt!
I have trained this way for many years and have had a few situations on the street where it has worked. I knew my distance and could find the openings instantly (keep your hands up and don't move into your opponents striking distance, let him come to you). A street opponent usually precedes an attack with certain displays of emotion and body language. A good teacher will help you recognise the signs.
And if I haven't made it apparent enough, spar, spar and spar again.
i would say karate cause they teach you how to defend and attack if needed, i am not sure where in london they teach i would not know as i am not from round there if you check your local papers it should tell you where there are karate meetings and the times
i'm not exactly sure which is the best but i think that Tae Kwon Do is good for me.
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I live in Putney and work in near the West End - so the closer the better really :)
Answers:
Forget that crap about instructors that have learned from training in the far east. what a load of bullsh!t.
Krav Maga is great, if you get good instruction.
Aikido is a joke. If you choose that you better be good at another human defense mechanism. running. it has no practical street self defense. practise for practise sake, but dont believe the Steven Seagal movies, they are choreographed. yes it is aikido, but sculpted for the audience. I tried it for 4 months and did not feel safe thinking about using what I saw on the street. I was a bouncer in town and control & restraint was better. sure, 4 months isnt long enough to master anything, but you have to use your common sense folks, and smell defeat before the battle. why train for decades to master it when you can learn something else that CAN help you. like muay thai
Muay Thai is an awesome and extremely effective Martial Art, fitness, skill, power, viscious, simplistic enough to understand. try that.
TKD is too limited. Korean propoganda
Traditional Martial Arts fail to provide the street protection and skills of the age we live in. life has changed since japan/ china 300 years ago.
Bruce Lee, was a philosopher of martial science, not a majic bullet of fighting. great understanding of fighting, but overstated. understanding his ideas is better than trying to follow him. his whole belief was to create your own theme in fighting, a no- style of bits and pieces of everything you study. not just one thing.
what we need is adaptable systems, systems that upgrade and change to suit the auidence.
most of the people here are full of crap. dont listen to them. in fact, dont even listen to me, go out and try them, and tell me what happens when you need to protect yourself. a kick to the head is worthless outside of trying to score points, but a kick through the knees drops the best of them.
go combat orientation, like Krav Maga, or CQC. or anything that challenges you to assess it, to whether it is suitable for your needs. there is crap in all styles, or systems, just filter it down and get what works for you.
American karate
For pure defense and little attack, I'd go with Aikido. Its purely defensive. If you want a pragmatic style thats equal in attack and defense, try Krav Maga- its the Israeli martial art.
Krav maga is gaining respect for its real world applications
Running away screaming always works for me.
jujistju it has been proved on telivison reason being is it combines ranged attacks grapples instantanious death etc and is lightning fast the SAS are trained in jujistju as hand to hand combat
Karate -
You can disable an opponent from a distance with kicks vs. Judo which requires more close up encounters. Boxing is OK but usually you wont have time to put those darn gloves on.
Krav Maga, Thai boxing, or Brazilian jujutsu, in this order.
First, you need to know the environment it will be used and the intended purpose of learning one.
What you will be looking at is self defense/street fighting scenario where no bar holds and anything goes. You primary concern is to remove yourself from a situation of threat to relative safety as fast as you can, preferably without fighting in ideal situation.
Therefore, FORGET all about martial arts of karate, tae kwon do, aikido and any of the 'do' and so on. There are called 'arts' for a reason. They look good and you look good in them, but have you ever seen anyone one fights in real fight using one, such as any of the ultimate fighting programs. NO, because they are completely useless in real fight. If you ever watch Pride or Ultimate Fighting, EVERYONE uses a combination of variant of Muay Thai( Thai boxing) and Brazilian jujutsu. They are professional fighter fighting in realistic street fight scenarios, they choose this style for a reason.
NO ONE uses any of the martial arts for the obvious reason - they just don't work in real fight. First, there are moves you have to be very very very proficient via many many many practices. Even after that, those moves require you to move into certain positions of body and extremities and then execute moves at a certain sequence; they take time to do so and your enemy most likely already delivered a fatal blow before you even begin.
In street fight, your ONLY goal, if it comes down to fighting, is to deliver maximum, preferably fatal or incapacitating, blow in the least amount of time. Krav maga does exactly that, so does Thai boxing. Brazilian jujutsu is more ground fighting, but has a lot of elements of that. What makes krav maga ideal is that it is pretty much common sense, instinctual of make a person would do. There are no moves, each technique is a swift, highly economical( meaning or complex, time consuming) blow for a particular attack. They don't usually teach military Krav Maga, but the civilian version taught in schools is more than sufficient.
www.kravmaga.com, there is an international directory of certified training centers.
In self-defense class, they teach you that one of the most powerful weapons is your voice. Other than that, I think muay thai is the best. It's pratical, and "real-life" I guess.
A shogun with a bull bar. Sorts the men out from the boys does that.
Without doubt something called:
Hapkido or Hapkiyoosool
.This is the Korean version of the circular defensive art called Aikido which is reknowned for using a person's energy or strength against him/herself.
The best teacher of Hapkido, Chang, currently resides in Korea while one of his best students, a 6th degree American black belt - Master Jeff Allen - teaches in Fort Lauderdale Florida.
Your primary goal should be to assess the teacher of whatever art you choose.
I suggest you take a look at this website to see videos of Jeff Allen in Action and then compare his style and teaching to any dojo you enter.
Hapkido: http://www.hapkiyoosool.com/video.htm.
Remember, your chosen martial art should have a teacher who has studied in the far east.
You should also realize this truth: 90% of all martial arts instructors out there are out to make money. Be very selective.
Hope this helps
J
There is No "best" Martial Art, because no Martial Art is better than another.
The only difference between two fighters trained in different disciplines of Martial Arts, is whichever one trained to perfect their techniques on a regular basis, and/or has the best strategy to win.
My suggestion to you, is to find out in your local phonebook what schools are local to you, find out if they have a trial time (like a week or two to try the class out) and find out which one's interest you the most. then find out the background of the school, like how long the school's been there, how long the instructor has been there, how long the instructor's been teaching, do they know (studied it) their Martial Arts discipline well? do they know the history of where it came from.
concerns about how quick you'll get a blackbelt or how many tournaments you'll win or trophies you'll garner is of no consequence be cause these are the least needed aspects of ANY Martial Art.
Find a good school, train often and perfect your techniques, and be consistent with it.
good luck
Jeet Kune Do The Way Of The Intersepting Fist ! Why ? It Worked For Bruce Lee , And He Was The Baddest Mother Fooker Of All Time ! So all you thumbs down people saying bruce lee wasnt a bad mother fooker then? You dont know what your talking / writing about then !!!
I have done Tae Kwon Do ("Korean karate") and Aikido ("Steven Seagal") - Tae Kwon Do best for fitness training and useful self defence techniques can be learned to a useful level quite quickly.
Aikido takes much longer to become good at as it is all about technique not strength. (No longer training due to injury).
Aikido (the art of unarmed combat for Samurai developed over a feudal civil war of about 1000 years (if you weren't any good you didn't live long enough to teach anyone else!)) is far better as a self defence martial art than Tae Kwon Do if you have the patience to learn it.
If you want sparring, tournaments and to be the Karate kid then do Tae Kwon Do, Karate etc.
Don't know your area, go to web Aikido and Tae Kwon Do have their own various governing bodies which will list classes.
http://www.furyu.com/onlinearticles/best.
This site has some common sense answers to your question. Please read it.
Don't know where you'd learn it, don't even know if it's a martial art - but I'm pretty sure it is. Sumo!
Would you mess with a Sumo?
a m16 assault rifle on full automatic,lets lock and load and rock and roll.come and get it motherforkers
Martial arts can be classified into 2 broad categories:
Striking: Tae Kwon Do. Karate, Shaolin boxing
Good: Can handle multiple attackers, can engage at long range, enables you to be pro active when necessary.
Not so good: Ground, hard to control an attacker without inflicting serious injury.
Grappling: Hapkido, Judo, etc.
Good: effective in close, good on the ground, can control an attacker without inflicting serious injury.
Not so Good: Not good at long range, You must wait for the attacker to make the 1st move. Not effective against multiple attackers.
Look for a traditional rather than modern or sport school. In a traditional school, toy will learn not only how to fight, but when & when not to fight.
Avoid schools with jitsu in the name, they are all about fighting, no philisophy, no respect, no self discipline. Getting trained in that manner is like having a gun loaded & cocked with no safety.
Read this, it should help:
http://www.bullshido.net/modules.php?nam.
Krav Maga: Probably one of the most effective theoretical based systems I've come across next to Combat sambo. Also the techniques are damn near IMPOSSIBLE to train effectivly without hurting your partner seriously.
BJJ schools around the world are represented by a bunch of newbie snot nose punks. Two type of guys come out of these gyms. The guys that learn decent technique because they put their ego aside establish a good level of respect for one another and learn and the bastards who develop a bully mentality and never get past their own ego. There's nothing wrong with pride until the pride gets in the way of true learning. I saw over a dozen BJJ fighters go into matches against 'inferior' styles because they saw Royce Gracie do it in the UFC. Unfortunately most of those guys forgot they were doing a sport and the Gracies had been accepting challenges for decades before the UFC came around, their style was designed in neutralizing the mono stylistic stand up fighter who believed they couldn't be taken down. The guys that get mired into the BJJ is all you need to know get caught up into the same downfalls as all the other systems that eventually failed due to their inability to change. The minute you don't fear and give respect to another style is the day you're going to leave yourself open to defeat.
Aikido is an artful form of evasion, that's all this is. Don't get me wrong I love some of this stuff but if you like most of the aspects and want to learn how to defend yourself, find an Aikijujitsu school that does some level of sparring and leave this crap to the ball room dancers.
Check out all the schools in your area. Choose the one that is the highest quality. Do not put too much focus on the style.
Tip:
Never pay for rank testing and never sign a contract.
I personally think that akido is a very good defensive martial art although there is not alot of offensive techniques in it it is very good for the basic person and will if nothing elese make you feel more confident in your self and get you in better physical health.
you should check out cyberkwoon.com its a forum on akido and other arts and then there is martial arts planet.com they are based out of london and seem to be pretty good.
Good luck.
Krav Maga, Muay Thai, and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. End of story.
All the people who are saying Karate and Tae Kwon Do, etc..when you learn these arts you don't truly spar! You do point sparring and practice against the air.
In KM, MT, and BJJ, in every single class you do real sparring, and not to mention all 3 of these arts are extremely relevant and useful today.
The Karate "HHHIIIIIIYYYAAAA!" stuff is a waste of your time and money and gives you a total false sense of security.
okinawa kempo, teaches multiple ways of defending yourself and it is fun to learn
It depends. In most bar fights for example the place is too packed to throw a proper kick and so leg techniques are pretty useless. In such a case I would prefer Wing Chun which is mostly hand techniques or simply boxing.
If you have space then the leck is a powerful weapon but beware as the leg is easily caught and before you know it you are on the ground which is where grappling comes into its own.
Krav Maga - long answers hack me off - hope this helps
taichi
IMHO the Jeet Kune Do concepts of fighting works because they are purely conceptual. Finding a good teacher is another problem as many JKD instructors favour systematic drills and pad work over the concepts. These should aid your training, not become the training. Big difference.
Primary targets are eyes and groin, which can be trained with a box/groin guard and welding goggles. JKD is all about effective combat, towards the later stages of development Bruce Lee simplified his own Jun Fan kung fu system and was interested in how fighting works.
He recognised that JKD was just a name and he knew JKD would be exploited in the future but many people have the same attitude like Bruce Lee had. Geoff Thompson being one of them.
Find a club that practises sparring because this will help you no end with distance and timing. We train street fighting only and everything we do is based on urban survival. Psychological tactics are vital too, not many clubs train this.
Also make sure your sparring partner breaks the rules and comes at you in unconventional ways. Being overwhelmed by an unpredictable opponent in a safe environment will help you apply yourself physically. Trust me you'll learn quickly and in a good club it's only your pride that gets hurt!
I have trained this way for many years and have had a few situations on the street where it has worked. I knew my distance and could find the openings instantly (keep your hands up and don't move into your opponents striking distance, let him come to you). A street opponent usually precedes an attack with certain displays of emotion and body language. A good teacher will help you recognise the signs.
And if I haven't made it apparent enough, spar, spar and spar again.
i would say karate cause they teach you how to defend and attack if needed, i am not sure where in london they teach i would not know as i am not from round there if you check your local papers it should tell you where there are karate meetings and the times
i'm not exactly sure which is the best but i think that Tae Kwon Do is good for me.
The answers post by the user, for information only, UKQnA.com does not guarantee the right.