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Post by lordunagi on Aug 27, 2013 23:00:17 GMT -5
Is it me or does anyone else feel that sparring without punching to the face is really stupid?
I feel that a style like kyokushin fits this category. They can boast all they want about doing bare knuckles and having head punching techniques and elbows and knees that they never use while sparring. But underneath all that hardcoreness is missing the most important piece of the puzzle in broad daylight. "But we kick to the head." NOT ENOUGH. Assuming that punching to the head is going to be as easy as punching to the body could not be more wrong. At least not against another trained opponent. Sparring like that breeds such BAD HABITS. There's a lot more strategy to hitting the most vital target. But the ultimate truth is that punching the face is pretty much the most important part of anything that involves hurting another human. Even an untrained person would naturally aim at the most readily available target to put someone's lights out.
Take a vote and share your comments below.
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Chino
Yellow Belt
Posts: 59
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Post by Chino on Aug 27, 2013 23:13:58 GMT -5
True, it's not only what humans do but animals always go for the head if they can reach it.
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KyKarateka
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Kyokushin & Judo
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Post by KyKarateka on Aug 28, 2013 2:17:59 GMT -5
Most Kyokushin Dojos do train to punch to the head in the dojo but not in competition. Though some Kyokushin dojos are also heavily sport orientated and docus mainly on competition as well.
I like to tell people that Knockdown Karate doesn't have face punches, however Kyokushin does.
Kyokushin also has elbows and knees. Knees to the head are legal under knockdown rules I believe.
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odee
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Kyokushin 10 years - Brazilian Jujitsu 3 years - Muay Thai 2 years.
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Post by odee on Aug 28, 2013 7:11:03 GMT -5
If that's the only kind of sparring you do then yes. But that's my answer to practicing any single sparring method. If fighting ability is your goal then variety is your friend. As KyKarateka pointed out most Kyokushin schools have punches to the face and sparring formats beside Knockdown such as Kickboxing, Muay Thai rules and Open Judo-ish rules that put high emphasis on sweeps. Knockdown is just the flagship rule-set because the whole bare-knuckle business makes it stand out as unusual. KyKarateka knees to the head are perfectly legal in Knockdown - youtube Kenji Midori, the Little Giant, knees to the head were kind of his thing, same logic as a kick to the head 'You wear something like that you deserve it'. Here's an interesting fact though, in old school bare-knuckle boxing punches to the face were few and far between because when you don't have protection like gloves or wrappings the risk of breaking your hands is far higher. I wish I had a statistic to make that sound more official and convincing but it's true. Walk into any Boxing gym and you'll see just how much effort those guys put into protecting their hands, just about every Boxer knows somebody who had to give up training and a very promising Boxing future because he busted his hand on some @sshole's head in a bar-room brawl.
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KyKarateka
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Kyokushin & Judo
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Post by KyKarateka on Aug 28, 2013 8:09:43 GMT -5
Odee a lot of people say boxers would get messed up on the street because of the lack of protection. I have to disagree on that, just look at the article in the modern section. Boxer's can potentially damage their hands but if they break their hand on someone's face it's probably still gonna hurt quite a bit on the other end.
Boxing also has a larger brain damage rate than MMA due to the fact they can nail each other in the head without fear of injury. Without the gloves you have to be really careful.
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odee
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Kyokushin 10 years - Brazilian Jujitsu 3 years - Muay Thai 2 years.
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Post by odee on Aug 28, 2013 16:40:28 GMT -5
Never said the @sshole got away scott-free I'd imagine if a Boxer hit someone hard enough to break his own hand he'd mess up their skull pretty well.
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Post by lordunagi on Aug 29, 2013 0:46:42 GMT -5
This is why I left kyokushin. There was too much politics. I went to an official IKO1 dojo and there was no face punches at all. They way they trained and sparred were pretty much all competition whether you're a competitor or not. No head punches. I wanted how I trained to be how I fight. I didn't like how I fought so it affected the training. I wasn't a big fan of kata or their self defense techniques either. Performing kihon from the most unused stances wasn't as integrating as I thought. Then I moved on to Muay Thai. It was so much more free-formed. I didn't realize how dangerously close I would stand in front of my opponents. Or how square my stance was (that's why I ate so many leg kicks so easily). I caught so many punches to the head since I was so use to sparring without headshots. The range of fighting is so different. IMO, Kyokushin with head punches is basically muay thai with a gi on. I figures that I might as well train in something where the most important target is the main focus. The head.
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odee
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Post by odee on Aug 29, 2013 7:10:20 GMT -5
My Kyokushin school admittedly was kind of oddball. It wasn't affiliated with any of the big organizations but we still got invites to all the tournaments and when I got my shodan I was registered and recognized by three of the organizations. I think it's a literal case of the head guys not liking each other but not wanting it to get in the way of the style, at least that's what I make of the Australian factions. I never got to look at the way things stand in Japan, only got one week to spend at the original dojo so I spent it all training. But yeah, I competed in Kickboxing, Knock-down, open martial arts tournaments for about eight different styles and met Kyokushin guys at every one of them, would have competed in MMA while I was still doing Kyokushin but my teacher just never had any contacts in that avenue. I never really had any head defense issues with my swap to Muay Thai, the clinch is my weakest area.
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Chino
Yellow Belt
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Post by Chino on Aug 29, 2013 9:30:25 GMT -5
Yeah I have never met anyone who broke there hand in a street fight..But nah sparring without face contact isn't a bad idea but you should do it with head contact also. Like in my school we always do it full contact with the face and as a result im not very good at setting up body shots.
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KyKarateka
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Kyokushin & Judo
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Post by KyKarateka on Aug 29, 2013 18:20:58 GMT -5
A lot of people don't realize how much a bare knuckle body shot actually hurts. An average person would have the wind knocked out of them. In street fights people go for the head trying to knock each other out but without formal training it's pretty rare to be honest. If you hit the torso repeatedly they will go down quickly.
The problem with no head contact is really the dropping of the hands that can be exploited by the most novice fighter. It's important to know what it feels like to be hit in the head but it's more important to know how to defend your head.
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Post by lordunagi on Aug 30, 2013 0:45:51 GMT -5
There was no need for head movement AT ALL in kyokushin. The focus was for you to keep moving forward no matter what while showing your "spirit." In a kickboxing/Muay Thai/mma/real life fight, this false sense of reality can put your lights out as well as that spirit. How Oyama tried to "keep it real" by keeping away the gloves as well as taking away face punches is just a bad idea in itself.
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odee
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Kyokushin 10 years - Brazilian Jujitsu 3 years - Muay Thai 2 years.
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Post by odee on Aug 30, 2013 0:58:51 GMT -5
So you never ducked away from head-kicks? I sure as hell did, still do. My teacher told me Oyama convinced his students to compete in anything they could enter, he followed the same belief with us...I wonder how many schools went insular like yours and only push bare-knuckle? That's honestly as bad as just Olympic Taekwondo. That really blows.
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KyKarateka
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Kyokushin & Judo
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Post by KyKarateka on Aug 30, 2013 13:29:57 GMT -5
Not necessarily, it depends on the situation. For example, if a fighter keeps backing up of course you keep pressing to apply pressure. Kyokushin isn't all about spirit, you adapt to win like any other martial art.
I've ducked tons of roundhouse kicks to the head. Sure I could've blocked them but it probably would've crippled my arm for the duration of the fight.
Also, the situation can be reversed for gloved users. Do they know what a bare knuckle body shot feels like?
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Chino
Yellow Belt
Posts: 59
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Post by Chino on Aug 31, 2013 4:38:36 GMT -5
I prefer to point my elbow at there kick so there shin or foot hits it. I'm an evil person indeed.
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Post by Johnnie on Aug 31, 2013 12:26:45 GMT -5
I think it's a good idea, no way I would ever risk my beautiful face being harmed in a mere sparring sesh. Screw that.
No but seriously I think it's a bad idea, unless you're training for something like pankration fights, I see no reason to spare without facial contact. You could also always wear head gear for sparring to minimize any damage that would've been dealt, not that I wear it though. Something about someone getting a solid punch to my face feels good. Kind of like an adrenaline rush in a way.
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