I’m curious if some here have trained in some unusual martial arts. Was it in the 80s or 90s? Was it something like SAFTA? Any experiences you can share?
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i’m a 4th dan bb in rex kwan do
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A friend of mine took Wing Chung lessons from a legit old, senior citizen Asian man. The “classes” consisted of my one friend (NOBODY else) doing a whole lot of horse stance in the old man’s front yard (the gym) while the old man watched him from inside of his house, through the living room window.
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Nunchuckujutsu
Lasted about 1 1/2 total hours and gave them as a gift to a younger cousin.
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I did Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu for about 15 years. Somebody put a finger in my butt.
Pretty Wacky
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Trained with some Kali fellas for a few sessions. Practice was basically a stick being thrown between you and your opponent and them saying “FIGHT”
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We called that hockey.
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Breakdancing
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I studied Choy Li Fut from a guy who owned ed a restaurant, I payed for the lessons cleaning the restaurant. It was 2 years of horse stance training and forms. Attended a ninja seminar and years of Jeet kune Do. It makes me appreciate boxing and wrestling.
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Shen Kwon Do
i did a semester of aikido which was pretty fun but god damn did those kids drink the kool-aid
this was in the very early 00’s but they’d go online and download the goofy old videos of Morihei Ueshiba’s 85lb ass throwing dudes across the room and circle jerk to them
i did some systema which was definitely grade a bullshit but the “free sparring” at that school was all out fighting and i got a lot of really good experience with dudes trying to knock my fucking block off
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I haven’t trained in anything too strange or esoteric.
As a lifelong martial arts enthusiast & combat sports professional, I don’t think I have many holes in my game. But after I was promoted to black belt in Kajukenbo Kempo, I gave some thought to opening my own hybrid boxing/kickboxing gym/combatives training center. It would have been both a gym for fighters, but also offer classes in real world combat/self defense.
So, I figured I’d get some more credentials to put up alongside my pro boxing license, my certificate from the NYSAC & my black belts in kickboxing & Kajukenbo. And what caught my eye was a 3-day weekend in Alexandria, Virginia with Mike Lee Kanarek & members of his team. It was for advanced martial artists who wanted to go through 3 days of intense training in Kanarek’s Haganah fighting system. And at the end we’d be certified as an associate in the system.
It sounded like a cool thing to experience & I wanted that certificate on my wall.
So I went & it turned out to be pretty cool.
I didn’t learn much about fighting that I didn’t already know, but what I did learn was worth the cost of the weekend.
As for my gym/combatives training center, I had a site picked out & came close to getting up & running, but a business loan fell through & I lost the site & I started looking for others & lost my enthusiasm somewhere along the way. So, it never happened.
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Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
I find it weird to wrestle in-between another man’s legs.
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TKD
I would buy wood from them, they would hold it and I would hit it. I also had to learn “forms” like a dance routine of strikes that an old Korean man would watch to see if I did correctly before getting a new belt. Sparring was fun though.
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I knew a guy from Texas in the Army who had trained in something called Shen Chuan. Rolled and sparred with him a few times but didn’t really train it. He said he learned it from the guy who invented it that also wrote like serial killer and mystery books. Weird stuff but the guy said his teacher was in the martial arts hall of fame.
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I did that one many years. It’s so common that people don’t realize how wacky it is. I remember all those defenses we learned in case someone grabs us. People would just stand there and let me counter and throw them on the ground…hehe
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At least you can count in Korean.
Hona, duel, set, net, tasuit, yasuit, ilgop, yoduel
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