most effective martial arts style

[jwhitesensei]

The usefulness of the style depends on the skills of the practitioner, not purely on the art itself.

I agree. It's not the martial art but the martial artist

[Tant01]

I'm reminded of the words of Gunji Koizumi

"The efficiency of the art depends on the skilful application of theoretical knowledge developed upon the experience of centuries".

[treelizard]

I vote for kickboxing.

[FatOldDude]

greetings everybody!
my names cos and i m from germany,
i decided to learn a combat style, but i cannot decide which style i want to learn, the dessicion is between shaolin kung-fu, tae kwon do, kickboxing and jeet kun do. so i want to know which style is the most efective in serios streetfight situtions, would be very glad if theres somebody who knows different styles can tell me,
peace!

Ahh, the age old question - source of ENDLESS debate. What follows is my opinion, and is based on my observations of being a fan and practitioner of various arts for the last 14 years.

The short answer is that there is no "best" style for streetfighting. It is very subjective - my OPINION is that classical styles have almost no value in a real streetfight, unless your opponent is completely unskilled, then any style will work. Also, they take way too long to become proficient. So, I would say stay away from TKD and Shaolin Kung Fu.

JKD is only popular because of Bruce Lee, and it basically says to take whatever works from every style. IMO, it's not as much a style as a philosophy, but in fairness I have very little experience with it. However, I would be skeptical of anyone claiming lineage back to Bruce Lee in the style.

Of the choices you mention, I would say that kickboxing is the best - it trains fitness and full contact sparring - you learn to get hit and not freak out. Any style that has you dressing in a traditional costume, doing forms, and punching air is a useless waste of time if you want to learn to streetfight, IMO.

The TRUTH that most instructors will NEVER tell you is that most people get into this or that martial art with the illusion of learning self defense, but in reality it is just another hobby, like going to the gym. An experienced, physically fit streetfighter untrained in any formal art will usually beat the hell out of a formally trained martial artist - they just arent prepared for that style of fighting. Also, you need to learn realistic knife defenses - very common n streetfights, and most traditional art's defenses against knives are crap and assume the attacker is a half-paralyzed moron.

The questions you have to answer are:
- How strong and aerobically physically fit are you? All things being equal, the stronger and more fit guy wins in a streetfight.
- How long do you have to devote to getting "good" at whatever style you choose? For example, Aikido is an incredible, elegant, and effective art you can do all your life. The only downside is that it takes years to get proficient at. Krav Maga is designed to be quickly learned, but elegant it is not.

Hope this helps.

[jwhitesensei]

Ahh, the age old question - source of ENDLESS debate. What follows is my opinion, and is based on my observations of being a fan and practitioner of various arts for the last 14 years.

The short answer is that there is no "best" style for streetfighting. It is very subjective - my OPINION is that classical styles have almost no value in a real streetfight, unless your opponent is completely unskilled, then any style will work. Also, they take way too long to become proficient. So, I would say stay away from TKD and Shaolin Kung Fu.

JKD is only popular because of Bruce Lee, and it basically says to take whatever works from every style. IMO, it's not as much a style as a philosophy, but in fairness I have very little experience with it. However, I would be skeptical of anyone claiming lineage back to Bruce Lee in the style.

Of the choices you mention, I would say that kickboxing is the best - it trains fitness and full contact sparring - you learn to get hit and not freak out. Any style that has you dressing in a traditional costume, doing forms, and punching air is a useless waste of time if you want to learn to streetfight, IMO.

The TRUTH that most instructors will NEVER tell you is that most people get into this or that martial art with the illusion of learning self defense, but in reality it is just another hobby, like going to the gym. An experienced, physically fit streetfighter untrained in any formal art will usually beat the hell out of a formally trained martial artist - they just arent prepared for that style of fighting. Also, you need to learn realistic knife defenses - very common n streetfights, and most traditional art's defenses against knives are crap and assume the attacker is a half-paralyzed moron.

The questions you have to answer are:
- How strong and aerobically physically fit are you? All things being equal, the stronger and more fit guy wins in a streetfight.
- How long do you have to devote to getting "good" at whatever style you choose? For example, Aikido is an incredible, elegant, and effective art you can do all your life. The only downside is that it takes years to get proficient at. Krav Maga is designed to be quickly learned, but elegant it is not.

Hope this helps.

I apologize but I take exception to some of the statements in this post. If you think for one second that kickboxing is more effective than a traditional style of karate, then you've taken lessons from the wrong Sensei. And just what do you mean that I, as a Sensei, am pulling the wool over anyone's eyes and my style is not effective? And probably the most insulting thing of all is how can you call my style, my art, and my life a "hobby"?

[Guest]

JKD is only popular because of Bruce Lee, and it basically says to take whatever works from every style. IMO, it's not as much a style as a philosophy, but in fairness I have very little experience with it. However, I would be skeptical of anyone claiming lineage back to Bruce Lee in the style.

In previous generations I would agree that Bruce Lee was the motivation to find JKD, however times are moving on. I found JKD when I saw a video of Paul Vunak, then later Dan Inosanto. I didn’t understand the Bruce Lee connection until later on, because he wasn’t part of my generation. Secondly, although there are numerous “ideals” that attract people into a martial art, an individual will only stay if the training is up to scratch. All of the people I know in JKD stuck around not because of a Bruce Lee adoration, but because they really value the training.

The concept of JKD is not to take whatever works from every style, that’s a common misconception. It looks for the essence of a given art that fits the common thread of what you are trying to achieve. For example, the essence of Muay Thai and Savate hold common threads that compliment each other very well in a certain range. However picking the best bits from Shotokan and Hung Gar and trying to shove them together isn’t JKD. There are governing principles that will dictate the efficiency of your selection criteria.

Of all martial arts, JKD is probably the easiest to trace genuine lineage. Stemming from only the late 50’s to the early 70’s, and holding a plethora of history and documentation, it is very simple to identify the first generation students and certified instructors under Bruce Lee. People may disagree on what should be taught, and what should and shouldn’t be expanded upon, but those who were there can be clearly identified with only a small amount of careful research.

[Durete]

Meh people rape Bruce's name for whatever goal(mostly economical) they choose too.
check how many people so called "learned from bruce" or "knew what he thought" or just read the book and opened an "JKD school" without understanding the last page of the book(as Bruce's wife says in his book ^^


It's an formless form, by giving it an name you make it an form allready and thus degenerating it to something that it's not.

aka take from whatever style what you can use and create your own, personal style. JKD was only created for Bruce Lee himself, sure he thaught students how to fight, but he taught em by letting them find what works for them. he didn't teach them what he did. so how can there be an so called lineage? if his students taught it right, each part will be an total different style, made for that person only.

what I do to create my own style is to learn as much as I can and put them in my muscular memory,
for instance at this moment I go to an karate school(shotokan style) sure it's pure sports, but I get to learn some technique's, than lookup on internet how the technique's where performed origionally in the fighting art Karate.(instead of punch in the belly punch in the solar plexus, instead of hitting, giving it an knee, instead of punching the throat and moving back punch it than turn it into an choke. etc etc etc) and practise thatwith an partner outside the school that practises also an total different style.

also I try to learn form different DVD's Wing Chun aswell as the basics of 2 other fighting style's.(sure it can never replace an real teacher. but hey it's the best I got. no wing chun school is closeby that doesn't just teach some lame form of kickboxing under the name of wing chun.)

that together with a small amount of boxing experience, some streetfights and a few years of Judo makes me quite capable of most fights that I'll meet.

[Tant01]

Isn't that precious...

... I go to an karate school(shotokan style) sure it's pure sports, but I get to learn some technique's, than lookup on internet how the technique's where performed origionally in the fighting art Karate.(instead of punch in the belly punch in the solar plexus, instead of hitting, giving it an knee, instead of punching the throat and moving back punch it than turn it into an choke. etc etc etc) and practise thatwith an partner outside the school that practises also an total different style.

also I try to learn form different DVD's Wing Chun aswell as the basics of 2 other fighting style's.(sure it can never replace an real teacher. but hey it's the best I got. no wing chun school is closeby that doesn't just teach some lame form of kickboxing under the name of wing chun.)

that together with a small amount of boxing experience, some streetfights and a few years of Judo makes me quite capable of most fights that I'll meet.

Good for you....

Perhaps one day you'll be a great master...

[Guest]

It's an formless form, by giving it an name you make it an form allready and thus degenerating it to something that it's not.

aka take from whatever style what you can use and create your own, personal style. JKD was only created for Bruce Lee himself, sure he thaught students how to fight, but he taught em by letting them find what works for them. he didn't teach them what he did. so how can there be an so called lineage? if his students taught it right, each part will be an total different style, made for that person only.

JKD is full of contradiction.

Bruce Lee named the art “Jeet Kune Do” in 1967, so if he is so against naming things why did he bother? If its such a “formless form” which should not be named, why did he change all of his lesson plans, stationary, marketing collateral and student certificates to read Jeet Kune Do? Why did he grade his students in Jeet Kune Do if it was a nameless, formless form developed only for him? Why did he certify Dan Inosanto as an Instructor in Jeet Kune Do if it was only for him? And why did he leave lesson plans, notes and curriculums from 1967 to 1972 in Jeet Kune Do for the students to learn at the Chinatown school?

I have listened to Guro Dan talk at length about the differentiation between the physical material that Bruce Lee taught, and the concepts and philosophies he encouraged for each individual. The personal conclusion I have drawn is that Bruce Lee never stood still, and literally on a daily basis he was changing his perception of what his art was. I think his students tried as best as they could to keep up and understand the direction being given to them, but it was tough. You also have to remember that for the last few years of his life Bruce Lee was rarely present to guide his students as he was in South East Asia working on his movies. Much of his instruction to Guro Inosanto and the other senior students was via long distance phone calls, letters, or the occasional visit to the Institute.

Just pick up any JKD book, and literally from page to page you will read concepts that totally contradict each other, which makes it very confusing. People often refer to JKD as a riddle, I don’t actually think it is, I just think that too many questions were unanswered or the answers to those questions changed on a daily basis. So I think when people write things like “it’s a formless form” that’s just a creative way of saying you know what mate, I don’t know, I’m just as confused as you are.

[Durete]

JKD is full of contradiction.

Bruce Lee named the art “Jeet Kune Do” in 1967, so if he is so against naming things why did he bother? If its such a “formless form” which should not be named, why did he change all of his lesson plans, stationary, marketing collateral and student certificates to read Jeet Kune Do?

Why he bothered to name it is explained in his book.

Why did he grade his students in Jeet Kune Do if it was a nameless, formless form developed only for him? Why did he certify Dan Inosanto as an Instructor in Jeet Kune Do if it was only for him? And why did he leave lesson plans, notes and curriculums from 1967 to 1972 in Jeet Kune Do for the students to learn at the Chinatown school?

He also explains how he teaches his students.
he doesn't teach his owns style to them, he taught em several technique's they COULD use and for them to pick out wich worked for them.

I have listened to Guro Dan talk at length about the differentiation between the physical material that Bruce Lee taught, and the concepts and philosophies he encouraged for each individual. The personal conclusion I have drawn is that Bruce Lee never stood still,

True, once you stand still you stop improving

and literally on a daily basis he was changing his perception of what his art was. I think his students tried as best as they could to keep up and understand the direction being given to them, but it was tough.

I don't think he was changing his perception of his art, but adding new things too it and cutting old things away.
this is also written in his book.

You also have to remember that for the last few years of his life Bruce Lee was rarely present to guide his students as he was in South East Asia working on his movies. Much of his instruction to Guro Inosanto and the other senior students was via long distance phone calls, letters, or the occasional visit to the Institute.

Just pick up any JKD book, and literally from page to page you will read concepts that totally contradict each other, which makes it very confusing. People often refer to JKD as a riddle, I don’t actually think it is, I just think that too many questions were unanswered or the answers to those questions changed on a daily basis. So I think when people write things like “it’s a formless form” that’s just a creative way of saying you know what mate, I don’t know, I’m just as confused as you are.

The pages of his book do not contradict eachother, but show you how he thought about things.
again it is not an how-to-book (as written by both Dan inosoto and his wife Linda Lee. but an book that showed how he thought about his art.

It could be seen as confusing, but that book was intended to bring up questions in the reader.(read in the first 2 pages) also it where lose knots that they binded together since some pages where totally blank or only filled in with short notes.
Bruce also didn't want to produce this book. (reason given in the book was to prevent fake schools that call themselves JKD schools, people that try to get some money out of his name by teaching stuff where they only heard the bell ring but nothing more.
well look around ya, I think this pretty much has happened.)

after his dead Dan Inosoto and Linda Lee decided to publish it anyway.

As the book says "The name is just an name, how can you refer to something that has no name?"
Bruce's JKD was based on Wing Chun, several other kung fu styles, western boxing and fencing.
another man's "JKD" can be based on muay thai, boxing and BJJ for instance.

[Guest]

Well, certainly sounds like you have read the book.

[Tant01]

Things to do. Verbage

There's a word for it... Can you say "CULT" ICON.

And the saga continues into the next generations...

It's "just" fighting...

[Durete]

Well, certainly sounds like you have read the book.

Heh any video or book that looks interesting I will read and take out of it what is usefull for me
Even if I will get only 1 thing out an whole book. it's worth the time spend.

Besides I'm interested in different Idea's and how different people see the world aswell as the fighting art so it's allways worth the time spend :>

[Heroic Wolf]

I think you should go with kickboxing (as long as its a kickboxing school with sparring and not cardiokickboxing, which is good for fitness but not good for combat) but maintain a jeet kune do approach as you go through your martial arts life.

[kingoftheforest]

Whoops

posted in wrong thread.