Martial Arts - Which Style Is Best?

By Tom Fredrick

B>Martial Arts - Which Style is Best?

This is the single, most asked question I get asked via emailand in person. My answer is always: "what are you trying toachieve and what style interests you"? The answers to thatquestion is what I begin to formulate my response to address."It's all good", is an expression I hear around martial artstraining halls, seminars, tournaments and elsewhere. It doesn'twork for me. I have seen too many bastardized styles based onother systems, combinations of systems, and just plain B.S."home made", "smoke and mirrors" styles where the ChiefInstructor was a Green Belt (in reality) and put his salesman'sskills, together with his limited understanding of a crediblestyle, and then promptly awards himself a 10th Dan and makes upa laughable name for it. These are always a major hoot but our"good manners" prevent us from laughing, since the unwittingstudents love and believe in their Grandmaster "O SenseiB.S.er". They are not to blame.

Quite honestly, the choice of a martial arts system is adaunting task. If you want to hook up with practitioners whowill be able to instruct you in techniques, train your body, andspeak into your life - you want to be sure. I believe that thestudent lends himself more readily to certain styles more thanothers. Stocky, stiff jointed types would probably hate Tae KwonDo, but a flexible, lanky, body type might excel at it. Thestocky, less flexible type might do better with Shotokan or anOkinawan martial art, which don't focus on aerial spinning



kicksbut rather, deliberate and punishing punches and kicks, on alower line. I had an old Shorin Ryu (Okinawan karate) teacherwho was tough as nails, but couldn't kick any higher than yourwaist. He used to mention that he didn't need to kick higher, tokick you in the face. He'd always laughingly say "I'll kick youin the stomach and when you bend over, then I'll kick you in thehead". Strange, but oh how true!

My recommendations are to DO YOUR HOMEWORK, you will want tostay for a few years or maybe longer, so go to several schools.Make these schools a good cross section of martial arts. Checkout a few styles of Karate, a few Kung Fu, some grapplingschools, and whatever else that may be available in your area.All will let you observe the class and give you access to theSensei (head instructor) of the school. Most will offer somekind of "sign up" special, like a month free or a few freeclasses. This gives you a great opportunity to see what you willbe doing, meet the teacher, assess the skills of the studentsattending, and help you decide if you want to invest a lot oftime and energy (never mind the monthly fees) at this traininghall. If you can line up about 6 or more schools of differentmartial arts styles, with different focuses and faithfully checkthem all out - WITHOUT JOINING - you will have a pretty solididea of which one best suits your physical structure, yourattitude, and your goals. Choose thoughtfully and carefully,because if you aren't having fun in your martial arts classes,as in anything, you will soon fall by the wayside - frustrated!Better to just go out and buy one of the high power stunbatons on the market and crack open a brew, than spend ayear in a martial arts style that you are not suited for.

Good luck in your pursuit of the unattainable Grasshoppers -choose well!

About the author:Tom Fredrick is an accomplished martial arts practitioner withover 30 yrs. of active training and teaching Okinawan Karate,Yang Tai Chi Chuan, and Escrima. He served in the USMC, and hasalso worked in law enforcement, undercover airport security, andas a personal bodyguard.