Competition is a large part of the martial arts community. It is a way to see how your skills fair against that of others of the similar skill level. competition helps a student to learn a great deal about he or she is advancing and learning. In a tournament competitors are placed into separate groups by their gender, belt rank, and their age. From their they compete in a bracket style setting in where the one who defeats all of his opponents is given the awards of first place. In each match there is no score limit, but their are restrictions on time which can vary between the different tournaments.
When we compete in a tournament we are instructed and trained to use terminology that that helps communicate to the person who is competing without alerting the opponent. Some schools can get very creative with the way they do this, but our school uses numbers and number along with other commonly known phrases.
For example a 1 is a front kick to the body. And batter up means that the coach wants his competitor to attack the body twice and the head once. this form of communication masks the competitor and coaches intentions from that of the opponent. Our instructors spend time putting together this sort of code that each student is expected to know and when that student is capable of coaching they are expected to teach it to those below them. Tournaments can be very fast paced and exciting, but there always dangers involved in competing.
When we compete in a tournament we are instructed and trained to use terminology that that helps communicate to the person who is competing without alerting the opponent. Some schools can get very creative with the way they do this, but our school uses numbers and number along with other commonly known phrases.
For example a 1 is a front kick to the body. And batter up means that the coach wants his competitor to attack the body twice and the head once. this form of communication masks the competitor and coaches intentions from that of the opponent. Our instructors spend time putting together this sort of code that each student is expected to know and when that student is capable of coaching they are expected to teach it to those below them. Tournaments can be very fast paced and exciting, but there always dangers involved in competing.
There are a lot of fun and entertaining sides to learning martial arts, but it is important not to forget that the reason for this community is to teach self defense. There are situations that may require a person to not only defend himself but maybe those around him. Now even if one achieves the rank of black belt, that person is not immune to danger. The reality is this, hope for the best but prepare for the worst. This is a basic tenant taught within the community. A student within this community is expected to be able to defend himself against a variety of weapons to prevent harm or even death. while we hope that one never has to use this, it is still very important to realize what you are learning and why.
The picture above is an example of a basic knife defense technique in which the defender is unarmed. Now even though the offender has a knife the defender is able to block the weapon and strike the attacker. Each technique that a student learns is useful in a variety of situation. The first things a student is taught is the most important part because each technique builds off of another. The basics are what the body learns to do as muscle memory rather than having to think about the action. At the advanced level the student is expected to start gaining the ability to use more advanced techniques as muscle memory. The complexity of a technique only leaves room for error unless it is done enough times to where it is done without thought.