Whats the 'best' karate style?

[beth3041]

light contact point sparring, with a little more contact allowed at black belt

[Thai Bri]

Well, I supose there's Goju Ryu...... and there's Goju Ryu.

[beth3041]

Originally posted by Thai Bri
Well, I supose there's Goju Ryu...... and there's Goju Ryu.

whats the difference? didn't you just type the same thing twice?

[Thai Bri]

The Goju Ryu I know of contains brutal strikes - Knife hands to the throat, fingers to the eyes, knees to the groin and stomps to the knees. Etc. Goju Ryu Karate Ka conditioned hteir hands and bodies to take punishment, and spent many hours facing the Makiwara.

It shunned specialising in flicky kicky competition crap because it was one of the few styles that realised that semi contact was the way to ineffectiveness for Karate.

And there is the Goju Ryu you know.

[beth3041]

thanks for clearing up what you meant...i understand what you were saying now.

[beth3041]

my style is a little more on the american side of Goju so it is a little different...there are a lot of traditional aspects to my training, but we compete a lot too.

[Thai Bri]

I read an article many years ago about a guy who went to Okinawa to train with Morieo Higaonna. The training looked tough, but Hoganno let himself down a bit by purposefully getting the student to batter his hands to a pulp on the makiwara, instead of building him up gradually. He boasted how it was good to give him something to take home (i.e. damaged hands). But I still respect the guy.

Theres some kind of dispute in the Goju world at the moment about Higaonna's lineage or something. Not taken too much of an interest though. Can you enlighten me?

[kengar]

I read an article many years ago about a guy who went to Okinawa to train with Morieo Higaonna. The training looked tough, but Hoganno let himself down a bit by purposefully getting the student to batter his hands to a pulp on the makiwara,

That could have been a tactic to make sure the person didn't come back. Shimabuku did about the same thing with a gang member who came to his dojo. He knew he couldn't refuse, because of the risk to his family, so he made sure that the training would be hard for the thug to want to return. Could be about he same thing, don't know.

[Thai Bri]

Could be, but I don't think so. Higaonna welcomed the guy into his house, and had him over again. They were pretty friendly. I just think he was being machismo at the other guys expense.

This Higaonna could really fight though. A guy called Gary Spiers (now unfortunately deceased) was a New Zealander working in the UK as a bouncer. He's had hundreds of fights, often outnumbered and out gunned. But he fought through and never gave up until the others made a run for it. He had lots of experience wrestling, and didn't really rate Karate. But he did rate Higannoa, and got the present of a collapsed nose via Higaonnas knee. He called him "the Boss".

[Toudiyama[NL]]

what's best depends on your wishes
Wado as a fightingstyle on itself is useless but as a base for other arts, it can't be beat, it will teach you the possibilities and impossibilties fo your body, it will teach you the proper distancing,

Kyokushin is a hardline style, blocks are made the hard way , no sliding blocks there ( wado does have those)
Competition is meant to train your fighting spirit, it isn't bad to lose but it is to give up
Ashihara, Seido and Enshin, can be seen as ofshoots of Kyokushin
Where Kyokushin still has the old forms, Ashihara created new fighting forms that look the same with or without oponent

Shotokan is Shotokan and is THE style that lost most of the effectiveness

Goju is a powerfull style which stresses powertraining and breathing excercises

Shito can be seen as inbetween Wado and Goju, fastness of the Wado ( considered the fastest karatestyle by other stylist like Terry McNeal in the UK)


Depending on your build one style might fit you better than the other, kyokushin is very well suited for bigger people

Wado does suit the smaller people better ( but I'm 90+ kg and 1.86 meter )


And this are just a few of the 50+ styles from Japan and Okinawa ( Okinawa is the irthplace of Karate)
Not to mention all the other styles developed outside of Asia

Because non of us knows all the styles, we are not in a position to judge it, just as others aren't in a position to call karate crap ( which they like so much overhere)


I do want to ask people to answer the questions, again peole felt they had to say it is crap and that boxing would be better, why? it isn't what was asked
If I ask you what MA do you like, you don't answer Football do you

[Jitsu]

Kempo or Goju

[Ox Lion]

Thanks for that Toudiyama, the question i really should have asked shoulda been about the comparison and differences about the styles, it's interesting to know. You're right about shito/shukokai because it's fast but slighty slower than wado but it IS more powerful.

What exactly is KEMPO?

[Toudiyama[NL]]

Kempo, like Karate is a bit of a generic term, it means fist way
Some styles of Okinawa still use it in their name

Problem with trying to explain what Kempo is, is the variaty of it
For instance, here in Holland we have something called Shaolin Kempo, which has roots in Karate, Kuntao and some Kung fu, there were 2 factions that looked alike but were developed individualy but this again from the same roots, they came together and recently Shoalin Kempo was Split again, not in the old factions, but one faction started incorporating more chinese Kung fu into it

In the US there is Also Shaolin Kempo but that is different from ours.

There is Kosho Kempo from which American Kenpo came
There's Shorinji Kempo from Doshin Sho
and list goes on and on

One thin about Wado (my main style) it uses sliding block, combined block/punches some grappling subtle but effective hip use.
It compared to Thai boxing as fencing to broadswordfighting
actually we have a fronthandpuch that can be traced to back kenjitsu were you launch yourself forewards and jab almost as if trusting a samurai sword to the throat
we rotate the fist at the last moment of the movement so a couple of inches before the target, at this moment the power is generated, therefore Wado looks like a less powerfull style, it isn't it uses less power but because we use it more effeciantly the end result stayes the same

[darrianation]

I have a black belt in wado and am doing shotokan right now, I also have trained in shito and they are all very similar. I did uechi for a short while (more along the lines of Goju) and it was completely different. If I was to choose from the styles I've studied I would choose Wado because of emphases on using body mechanics and foot work to make people miss you. Plus the joint locks (standing) and throws make it a little better well rounded (but still no ground fighting).

I do here allot about how good kyokushin karate is and these guys do very well in things like K1 and other full contact events. From what I here kyokushin is the hardest of the styles and they train pretty hard core.

[Toudiyama[NL]]

Originally posted by darrianation
I have a black belt in wado and am doing shotokan right now, I also have trained in shito and they are all very similar. I did uechi for a short while (more along the lines of Goju) and it was completely different. If I was to choose from the styles I've studied I would choose Wado because of emphases on using body mechanics and foot work to make people miss you. Plus the joint locks (standing) and throws make it a little better well rounded (but still no ground fighting).

I do here allot about how good kyokushin karate is and these guys do very well in things like K1 and other full contact events. From what I here kyokushin is the hardest of the styles and they train pretty hard core.

No groundfighting in Wado but kneeled fighting sequences (Idori Waza)
Also because of the use and knowledge of bodymechanics, you can easely do other arts using Wado as the base

Kyokushin, Ohyama karate, Seido, Ashihara and Enshin are all related styles ( direct or indirect offshoots of Kyokushin) and know for their hard style competition/sparring