Basic Karate Moves

Recently a Shotokan Karateka for 11 years and Tae Kwon Do practitioner for 7 years wrote to me with many interesting issues on basic Karate moves with reference to the views presented in this website. I'll cut and paste excerpts (in blue color) from his mail and share my perspective on it here.

Let me start by saying firstly this website was started by me in 2003 to express and share whatever I've learned (rightly or wrongly). Martial arts are something that ought to be experienced, not read about, talked about or debated.

Over the years, many things have evolved so naturally some of the views here can be considered outdated as I, my coaches, training partners and gym changed and evolved too.

With this in mind, I'll try to explain and perhaps reconcile some of the views presented by this Shotokan Karateka, especially those on basic Karate moves.

You say "Shotokan Karate uses Gedan barai, age uke, soto uke, uchi uke, shuto uke primarily asblocks and deflections."

I respectfully submit that at the lower levels of shotokan you are correct, however as one progresses from shodan, many varied applications of these blocking techniques (similar to the ones mentioned in kissai kai) are in fact taught in many traditional shotokan circles.

In many cases, there are blocks, throws and strikes contained within the basic blocks taught at the junior level. For example, when I attained the green belt level, my sensei introduced new shuto uke applications for counteroffense striking and offsetting your opponents balance.

My view is that training should be "complete" from the very beginning. Even if the student is unable to perform a certain technique, we should at least explain the principles behind it all. So for us, basic Karate moves should cover everything - blocks, strikes, locks, throws, chokes, grappling whatever.

That means we don't tell you to use gedan barai to block for the first year then tell you to use it to strike the second year. Perhaps it's just a way of coaching, but personally I prefer a simple and direct approach - the lesser the layers, the more effective the skills can be honed.

So a Kissaki student here will be taught everything regarding a technique and just need to spend time improving it (speed, timing, power) along with awareness of the Rules of Combat (read the book by Vince Morris). They become like free Karate moves, to be used in a variety of ways depending on the situations and your intent.

Any sensei who said, "ahhh, you learn that after 3rd Dan" is doing a disservice to himself and his students, especially those who have been training for some time.

Please forgive my tone but martial arts are not any mystical skills that are so complicated it takes years to understand. It might take you years to perfect it, but certainly not years to understand it. So we teach techniques that can be understood, learned and applied easily. After all, how much processing can our brain do under duress or fear?

"Additionally you make a general statement about karate that "All those typical Karate blocks you've been taught likely won't work in a real fight. If you've been training in the way most Karate styles are, you would be hit while drawing your hand back to chamber a block, it's simply too slow."
I would rewrite your second sentence to say "If your karate instruction was poor and you were not taught the importance of timing, form and the many varied applications of the basic blocking techniques, you would be hit.....;"

The problem is not the karate style per say but the instruction. Gedan Barai, as you know, contains a wealth of other techniques some blocks, some strikes, some throws. If gedan barai is taught as "low block" and it should always be done full chamber for EVERY low attack, that is a reflection on poor instruction. The actual karate style did not teach this philosophy (except maybe to elementary school children).

At the higher levels, we were taught to adapt gedan barai to the situation, so not every single gedan barai needs to be chambered and have the perfect "kata" form. This perfect form was initially drilled into us to teach us underlying principles such as balance, timing and power generation; with these principles we were then later able to learn the learn the close combat self defense applications of gedan barai much easier.

IF IT HAS A LOW CHANCE OF WORKING, WHY TRAIN ON IT?

I would agree that poor or misunderstood instruction is one of the main factor causing many to fail in executing basic Karate moves properly, whether for sports or in self defense. But that is not my point in the page on Karate blocks. My view is it's better to use gedan barai to strike than to block.

Kissaki Karate signature blocks are Mawashi uke and Kanku no kamae, not as many variety as one would imagine. We found that once full contact sparring is introduced, most of us cannot use the "traditional Karate" blocks (gedan barai, age uke, soto uke, uchi uke, shuto uke) as effectively as we want to, especially if the opponent is not another Karateka who fights similarly.

The benchmark for us nowadays is to test every techniques with full contact sparring, NHB style if possible. Even if you manage to block a strike with gedan barai, you may unknowingly expose your head or upper torso for another strike from your opponent. Boxers, Muay Thai and BJJ fighters like my coach Adam Kayoom know this very well, and sometimes combos are done to open up areas for more strikes, the final KO punch or to gain a takedown and submission.

I sincerely encourage Karatekas to spar often not just to improve their skills but to discover what works or doesn't work for them individually. Of course it doesn't mean you cannot use these basic Karate moves (gedan barai, age uke, soto uke, uchi uke, shuto uke) as blocks.

Individual attributes and quality of instruction count too so if they work for you, then it's all good. It's not an exact science but we are concern about the probabilities. If it probably won't work as a block for many of us, why train on it? There are Karatekas who insist a powerful gyaku zuki is all one need to win fights. Well, if one is young, big, fit, fast and strong one might be right.

But the regular guys and girls who are of average size and strength will have a hard time making it workable. Would a girl outweighed by 100 pounds dispatch her rapist by a reverse punch alone? These are the views put forward by Vince Morris Shihan, founder of Kissaki Kai Karate. That's why individual attributes are important, and Karate instructors should take this into account when teaching their students.

We are not so concern with the precise form (or movements) of kata as compared to the bunkai (applications) of a particular kata. A person attributes need to be taken into account when learning from kata.

Or (I'll probably be crucified for saying this) you can skip kata and just focus on kihon (basic Karate moves) only, we found less that is more in the case of kata practice.

How you train is more important than what you learn. This is where aliveness comes in, and why martial arts that train it's students in an "alive" manner, such as Western Boxing, Muay Thai and BJJ, are more effective than many oriental or exotic martial arts, both in the ring or on the street.

Kyokushin Karate with it's emphasis on sparring and conditioning is another excellent example of training with aliveness. In general, aliveness means training with moving resisting uncooperative opponents,, resulting in skills that actually work when you need them. The photo at the beginning of this article shows Kissaki Karate's Kanku no kamae - crashing the line to block most wild haymakers. The defender's forearm is likely to hit the attacker's neck/shoulder on the way in.

Not much precision or timing is required for this gross motor movement. This effective block/strike is similar to Tony Blauer's SPEAR. Think of Kanku Dai opening move, notice the similarity?

I respectfully disagree with two other statements; the first is that "speed is the most important attribute in blocking".

Timing is just as important as speed and in many cases timing can beat speed. I believe good karate instruction emphasizes the physical as well as pschological aspects of combat. It also drills the karateka on the scientific principles of combat such as timing and explosion (i.e. principles taught in the kata), this is what is primarily lacking in US karate instruction.

Well said. Another way to look at it is speed and timing are both sides of the same coin. You can't have one without the other, ie. you train to develop both simultaneously.

My good buddy, Alex Thomson, a KUGB Karateka for over 30 years, made a smooth transition to Kissaki Kai and the speed he learned from "traditional" Shotokan Karate made the techniques he picked up from Kissaki Karate so much more devastating.

He's able to distract, stun, setup for power strikes or lock you at lightning speed. When blocking, even if your timing is off, chances are you'll be able to reduce or deflect some of the damage from your opponent's strike if you move faster than him.

Since action (attacker) always beat reaction (defender), speed is the only balancing factor for this drawback. Explosive power comes from sudden burst of speed. Any free Karate moves from this burst of speed will be almost impossible to stop by an unprepared person.

Imagine if in the process of blocking, you also strike the person, eg. using your forearm. Now imagine doing this with sudden burst of speed - bam! Such is the approach and techniques of Kissaki Kai Karate.

The second statement I disagree with states that "Shotokan Karate has any kicks to the body and head.".

The majority of kicks in shotokan kata are supposed to be low or to the body. Please check the history and also examine the techniques the old shotokan masters practiced and taught. Many schools do the high kicks now for show as they are competing with the "flashiness" of TKD techniques for students (i.e. money).

Almost all kicks in shotokan self defense techniques are low or to the body. I do allow my students to kick to the head and practice high kicks, however this is not the emphasis. The emphasis is for them to have options, being able to kick low, mid and high is always better than low and mid only.

This sensei already answered himself in this instance. We are concern with what the majority do today, and the majority of Shotokan Karatekas do many high kicks nowadays.

Doesn't matter what history tells us. We take history as a guide and try to improve on it, that's why today we have electricity and telephone. We only focus on basic Karate moves that have high probability of working, and train on these selected few - less is more and keep it simple are 2 sayings the come to mind.

So if it's well-known that very few people can win a fight with just high kicks, why bother to spend time training them. There are so many more effective Karate moves to learn out there. Having many options can sometimes confused the mind, especially when it's under duress or fear, slowing down reaction time.

This is why many law enforcement agencies or the military always train in only a few direct but devastating moves. Another point is why so many no holds barred fights or street fights caught on videos showed only few fighting moves; such as the wild haymakers, hooks, clinching, tackles, takedowns, grappling but relatively few kicks - because they work most of the time, and they are natural human instinctive moves.

Shotokan is so immensely popular that many instructors ignore the myriad of self defense bunkai and have watered down shotokan to a series of blocks and punches possibly for student retention, just plain ignorance or worse...laziness.

I think your commentary should emphasize the fact that over commercialization and poor instruction have led to significant misinterpretation of the many karate art forms and especially the role of bunkai.

There are many of modern shotokan practitioners (eg. Ian Abernathy) who are reviving and popularizing the traditional interpretations of the shotokan karate techniques by thoroughly examining the history and the culture in which the art form first evolved.

In a nutshell, I agreed with this good sensei. In fact, Kissaki Kai Karate (and Kissaki Defensive Tactics Academy in Malaysia - KDTA) was formed as a direct result of the need to teach effective fighting techniques by "going back to the root", discarding low probability techniques and training with aliveness.

And yes indeed, there are good Karate masters like Ian Abernathy and Geoff Thompson who emphasize reality-based training using basic Karate moves for self defense. This is what we valued most: effectiveness over traditions or what the majority do.

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