Enhance your Karate training with the new and improved….or older and traditional….way of Karate

Everywhere I turn these days I am inundated by “new Ideas” or “old ways” of training that you need to be doing or you should be teaching. I have had people come to me about learning the “old ways” or reminding me that Karate changes and we need to keep up. Some are subtle like “hey did you see the way that this instructor is modifying the art to be more effective” or “this instructor teaches exactly the way that Funakoshi intended and taught”. Its hard as a student to understand the difference between innovation and traditional training and which is better!

The way I see it is that Karate is a lot like the phenomenon of Diets in north America! Every month you get the newest, best and most scientific way of eating that will change the way people live and exist. In Karate however its much more dramatic and often violent!  You hear of an instructor how made changes to the traditionally used curriculum and talking to his supporters its life altering and if you don’t follow suite then your Karate is somehow inferior to the “new Karate”.  As far as Diets go, when I started noticing that they were even a thing in the 90’s I saw the “HIGH CARB/LOW FAT” diet that swore that athletes should eat as much pasta, bread and veggies as they could consume....fast forwards to the “HIGH PROTEIN/LOW Carb”Diet that changed to the recent Keto focused diets of “Super high fat/super low Carb” style diets.

The reason I compare the Diet trends to the Karate trends is because of that word…..Trends! I have been in Karate long enough to know what is good and what is bad Karate. I can watch a Kata being performed and know if the person doing it is a traditional Karate person or a sport person, I can watch two people doing Kumite and point out the style they come from and if they are more modern or traditional.  Before I get started I want to be clear here. ALL Karate training has benefits and even the EVIL Sport Karate can and does have some redeeming qualities that you cannot ignore, and old style hard nosed Karate also has its benefits. What I am looking at are the extreme trends the fads that come into Karate training specifically and some people have sworn are the “future of Karate training” .  Here is a hint…they…are not!

Karate has change so much since the 80’s and 70’s when I started, not only are we not wearing bell bottoms to the Dojo but the actual training has changed. When I started my instructor was told “NO WEIGHTS” from his instructor and we never ever did weight training, we did more “Functional training” and lots of Karate training. Over time we began incorporating “modern” training like weights and running and the got into plyometrics and TABATA recently. Conditioning in the past was 10,000 kicks and punches done in a single class. We were macho and if you did not like the break neck training and harsh beatings you got in class….the door was that way!  We were a tad nuts but we were tough!  Now the students would all walk out if we did 500 front kicks or such each class…we need to entertain as much as we teach. But that’s not what I am talking about, I am talking about content and approach……

The latest things in training are all high tech, new age sport sciences and it’s a complete if not total abandonment of the old ways!  The new way is to go high tec! Gone are the old canvas style Gis, now people wear floppy white PJ’s made from silky materials and lord help you if you wear a heavy weight gi, they are lighter than your pajamas and have special venting, smooth but ribbed patterns to help with movement during kumite and look…..LIMP to me. I have seen the new Adidas Gi on several people. I was told it’s the latest tech in training hear…and to me…they hurt my soul!  The hand pads, Shin pads, chest protectors are also new to me and “newfangled” by definition. In the old days we used a mouth guard…when we needed to and a small set of hand pads. Now they may as well dip the students into foam so they are protected.  The outcome….people hit each other more often and harder thinking its okay. In the old days we never did this because we KNEW it hurt!

Training has changed in a lot of ways to. Some of the new fangled training includes using things like and agility ladder, medicine balls, Running parachutes, Rubber tubes, gym timers ext and so forth. ALL of these are great, but they tend to take away from things like Kihon and Kata training!  People who spend more than 10% of their training time on conditioning drills or foot work drills end up taking that away from their core training! You can see the new fangled instructors too, they call themselves “Coach” not “Sensei” and they refuse to bow or do anything Karate like. Some teach in running suits and refuse to put on a gi, hell some don’t even own a Gi! The other point is that style seems to be taking a back door to the training. Meaning people who train in Goju are teaching Shotokan students or Uechi athletes are working out with Wado coaches. Its crazy!

The other side of the coin is those that are avoiding the scientific breakthroughs all together and are adopting a “ANCIENT TRAINING” concept to all their classes. This normally includes some antiquated training equipment, going over Kata in a “More traditional” way than others and stating that their old “Hardnosed” training and abandoning any form of scientific advancements in training.  Those are the clubs you see in dingy and beat down locations with stone weights, makiwaras lining the walls and hard woods beaten till they were smooth with the weight and sweat of years of training. The whole place smells like a locker room and often harsh cleaning chemicals. The club’s members all have thick ankles, knuckles that are rounded and covered in calloused thick pads. The classes are 1 hour of Kata, drills for an hour and the most brutal kumite you can imagine. The instructors tend to be really gruff and traditional, they avoid anything new and they push for ONLY the old ways! Growth and development or adaptability is unheard of and in fact it is not just frowned upon but down right banned!

Some times you get the OLD training repackaged as NEW training as well. I once was told about this ancient training tool that you could buy online and have delivered to your home. It was a frame that was assembled and had two bars on it that you could drape bags filled with sand over. It was a modern makiwara.  Also, some people will call Katas by new names, or introduce old ideas as new. Its all repackaging tradition as new!

The other alternative is adding to the old ways….in a traditional and old way. What I mean by this is adding traditional looking Kata to the syllabus like Asai sensei did. Some new age groups will throw “Musical Kata” into the mix or they just simply make one up with acrobatics in it….this is not what I am talking about. Asai Sensei studied an art that was older than the Shotokan tradition he was taught, he then worked with the principles of both Shotokan and the older Crane art and crated the style he taught. Now this is fantastic from some points of view…HORRIFIC for others. Personally, I have always found them fascinating but only so much as they taught new ideas, not that I wanted to incorporate them into my training daily. Some of the New/Old Age groups will do this, even Kase Sensei’s students created new Kata out of some of the principles he taught and then incorporated them into their training. Honestly the addition of new kata leaves me dry. I have never ever said “I Know all 26 Shotokan Kata and don’t have to worry about being board”. I always find Kata to work on or things to build up and fix up. I don’t see value in adding 9-100 other Kata to my training when I have so much to work on with the original 26.

Then you have the WKF and the changes they make to traditional Karate. I am kinda sick of the old argument that the WKF is not changing Karate its just a sport rule set. Its also changing the style of Karate…or homogenizing it. You enter the WKF as a traditional (Add style her) and then start to train in the new system which first changes your kumite to be more Tae Kwon Do like. You start standing sideways and bouncing, then you keep your hands high up and throw fancy kicks that will put you off balance. You do 50% or more of your training on drills for speed and how to strike faster in ways that earn you more points, your defense changes from blocking and striking with precision to just slapping away at techniques. Then you find you are not throwing any kicks to waste level because….well its less points!  The Kumite changes start to add up and next thing you know your Gyaka zuki is replaced with a dash in Uraken and a long Oi zuki used only to feed your hook kick or round kick to the face. You don’t really focus on sweeps but you will do them if it can be followed by a technique that will garner points. Your movement set is fixed as a bounce with your legs almost straight and prsto changeo you look and move like TKD!  Oh, and the kata….

So you study and study and you get your purple belt, you only know up to Heian Godan actually and you then transition into “Sport training” or “High performance” training and your coach says “For you….Unsu…Cuz its fast and exciting and will garner points” and you set about studying the new DANCEMOVES because you will never understand the moves from your current point of view. You try your best to understand the Kata but you are basically put with a choreographer who teaches you how to look the part and you go for it. Your training is replaced with “Dance lessons” and you go through your competition years learning new routines but not learning the depth of the Katas.

The ranking also gets tossed as the rank belt is replaced with a Red and Blue belt that means basically what side of the ring you will be stationed at, hell your safety gear matches too!  But you come out of years of competition and someone hands you a Black belt and says “you did great, lots of medals, you get a black belt” yet you don’t understand anything outside of this new system of sport training and how to pass this on. You cant really defend yourself and you have never contemplated anything like the Dojo kun or learned the Kata Bunkai, and all your bouncy bouncy kumite is no good in real life on ice or uneven ground…but screw it that black belt is a beauty! The scary part is I know of at least two “Black belts” who earned their Dan ranking in KUMITE and don’t know a Kata at all! That’s new age!

Now, having said all that…There is NOTHING wrong with the way Karate is presented and trained in 99% of the clubs out there, this includes the WKF clubs. Its all in what you want out of Karate, having realistic goals and understandable focus. Each of us can decide what they want out of Karate. The fun thing about Karate is that it is for everyone! Training in Karate is varied, you have sports oriented clubs and members, traditionalists, weekend warriors, spiritualists, scientists, Leftists, conservatives, men and women, ditch diggers and doctors. Its for everyone and has some benefits for everyone. The only qualitative things that you need to understand are that Karate…..good Karate should have a syllabus that you stick to, be grounded in solid basics and needs to concern itself with the students, the individuals who are training and not be some kind of recruitment for a cult!

In the end Karate has changed, stayed the same, advanced, regressed and become something new and old again and again. It will continue to evolve, and devolve over time and those of us who train in it will continue to find things we like and even love in training.