what is a good testing ground?

[cerebus]

Besides a good testing ground, you will need a teacher who can share his combat experience with you.

Student: Dear master, last night I did this and that and I lose. Can you tell me why?
Teacher: You made mistake on this and that. Go back to try this and that tonight and let me know the result tomorrow.

Yup! My instructor from Marin is coming down for this weekend's event and bringing a couple of his other students as well.

[Bhassler]

Please let us know how it goes!

[Tesshu]

Um, Tesshu, JAB didn't write that....I did.

Yep. Sorry for that, JAB. Of course I was referring to Chris' shitty training (not just kidding)

No offense meant, but I don't like sentences like yours above. You disrespect yourself and your teachers. You nullify everything you learned. Is that really so? Do these 6min weigh out 34 years of training? If yes - your training was useless. Rethink it.

If your training is not enough to test your skills - change your training.

[Areios]

i would defenetly add to traning to go to unfamiliar places to train and test you skills. Like going to grapple to a judo club from bjj where you don't know anybody. And it's still not like a tourney where both of you want to win. It gives you a great mental traning.

[gzregorz]

Um, Tesshu, JAB didn't write that....I did.

Yep. Sorry for that, JAB. Of course I was referring to Chris' shitty training (not just kidding)

No offense meant, but I don't like sentences like yours above. You disrespect yourself and your teachers. You nullify everything you learned. Is that really so? Do these 6min weigh out 34 years of training? If yes - your training was useless. Rethink it.

If your training is not enough to test your skills - change your training.

So Tesshu how many UFC champions have you taken on?

[Chris McKinley]

Tesshu,

With respect, come back and lecture me on how I've disrespected anyone, whether myself or my teachers, when you know me and have anywhere near the time spent "keepin' it real" that I have, simply for mentioning that I had a particularly insightful training moment once. As for testing it? ROFLMMFAO! Of all the guys on this board you could randomly pick to try and consdescend, WOW did you choose poorly.

I'm gonna assume that you're not really just a punk-ass bitch who just spoke above his pay grade, and that instead you're just kidding around and that we got off on the wrong foot. Tell ya what, save us both some time and take a look at my posting history. In the entire history of this forum, or on any IMA forum on the entire internet, if you can find a stronger voice for realism in combat training than mine, I'll be very surprised. You might also ask around about me if you think I'm all about shitty training and disrespecting my instructors.

[Simon]

I personally think if we are serious about studying martial arts as means to defend ourselves (and if not for defending ourselves should probably call it Chinese Yoga as it would be more accurate a description) then a form of testing is an ingredient that cannot be missed out. So often on here RSF talk about IMA like its some PHD of fighting and EMA, the highschool equivalent.
Yet more often than not when it comes down to the testing the so called high school education wins the day. Why? They fight, I dint want repeat what has been done to death but this is why I think anyone serious should at least expose themselves to different avenues of testing, a grappling competition, Amateur MMA event, local Muay Thai events then also you have the equivalent of Geoff Thompsons Animal days in many RBSD schools.

Just some thoughts....

[cloudz]

Personally, I fight in whatever full-contact events are available to me. From 2002 til 2007 I was a member of the Tang Shou Tao Association, one of the very few Chinese Internal Arts Associations to hold annual full-contact events (albeit closed to the public). In 2008 I fought in the USKSF International Lei Tai Championships. Since that time I've trained almost exclusively in the Cheng Man Ching Tai Chi I initially learned in the Tang Shou Tao, supplemented with training in "empty body" skills and Tai Chi free-fighting under one of my instructors in Marin County. Now I'm getting ready to fight a match (or two) at an event being held this weekend by a local biker club to test out how well developed my abilities in the extreme softness of Tai Chi and empty-body training are. Wish me luck!

Good luck Man!!

I'm doing something on Sunday - a push hands comp. Fixed and moving, wish me luck

[Tesshu]

Tesshu,

With respect, come back and lecture me on how I've disrespected anyone, whether myself or my teachers, when you know me and have anywhere near the time spent "keepin' it real" that I have, simply for mentioning that I had a particularly insightful training moment once. As for testing it? ROFLMMFAO! Of all the guys on this board you could randomly pick to try and consdescend, WOW did you choose poorly.

I'm gonna assume that you're not really just a punk-ass bitch who just spoke above his pay grade, and that instead you're just kidding around and that we got off on the wrong foot. Tell ya what, save us both some time and take a look at my posting history. In the entire history of this forum, or on any IMA forum on the entire internet, if you can find a stronger voice for realism in combat training than mine, I'll be very surprised. You might also ask around about me if you think I'm all about shitty training and disrespecting my instructors.

Yep, er, wow, definetely wrong foot. I didn't want to offense you or anyone, surely.
If you say that those six minutes did teach you more than your previous 34 years of training, either the 6min were a revelation or the 34 years didn't teach you much or both. Right?

But I don't want to suggest anything more. My sentence about changing your training if it does not test you enough didn't go in your direction especially, but towards the original post.

And no, I am not a punk-ass bitch, heehee. I have about 20 years (which is 2/3rds of my life) of different MA "under my belt" so I can relate to what most people do and say around here.

[JAB]

If you are that old, with that much experience, you would think your manners would be better!
I can surely attest that the mere minutes on the competition floor equated to much better lessons across the board than HOURS on the dojo floor. If I need to explain it, you have never experienced it, which in turn makes my explanation completely without context to you.

Cheers
JAB

[everything]

those padded sumo competitions. and those padded joust each other off a platform competitions. your ima and ima with weapons skills should be tested there. and that will be more fun than judo, bjj, sanshou, or mma.

[cerebus]

Good luck Man!!

I'm doing something on Sunday - a push hands comp. Fixed and moving, wish me luck

Good luck to you too!

[meeks]

I thought rather than hijack the "fighting with fighting" thread this would be the logical next topic. What is a good arena/venue to test out some IMA. I'd really like to try out some cloud hands on an uncooperative opponent or see if all this bagua stuff can kick some ass. Is a san shou tournament the best option? All you guys that are saying yes you need to "fight" as part of studying and learning martial arts what do you do?

I've never seen the thrill in trying to see how good your bagua is by putting soccer balls on your hands and trying to kickbox with someone in a controlled environment with rules to protect each other. You want to see if you're any good? Get a job doing security inside a bar, or what I did, evening security at the fair in the summer. Walk around for 6 hours giving directions to patrons of the park, then spend the last 2 hours almost every night:
1 breaking up fights
2 catching thieves (stealing cash or prizes from the games)
3 chucking them out of the park (having to walk them using some pwnage hold on them for 5 minutes through the crowd to the gate)
4 preventing fights against yourself or ride operators/game operators from a-holes trying to start shit with them by (item 3 above)

that was some of the best practise I ever had. And I got paid $12 an hour to do this for 3 weeks every summer. Most of my fellow security guards were all off-duty sheriffs (cool guys) and prison guards (lazy SOBS stand around, preventing the guard rails from flying away by themselves) and they usually stood back and throw me into the stack.

seriously, the only way to truly test a bullet proof vest is to shoot real bullets at it. Not plastic ones, or ones that are rubber coated (san shou dao analogy).
go to a crummey bar or a crap area of town. If you feel you're not capable of that, then you already have a feel for the true answer.

I suck at kickboxing. I no longer box. I wrestle, throw, apprehend more than anything. So I don't find trying to force myself to kickbox with someone when I just want to make balloon animals out of him is a way of seeing if my bagua is any good.

[JAB]

While I agree security work is good for developing many things, if you are working at a respectable high end joint no striking (hell, even choking was frowned upon) is allowed. So you are very limited in what you can do technique wise. It always went to a wrestling / grappling range. Shit, look at that. Yet another example of why training BJJ is not realistic!

JAB

[meeks]

While I agree security work is good for developing many things, if you are working at a respectable high end joint no striking (hell, even choking was frowned upon) is allowed. So you are very limited in what you can do technique wise. It always went to a wrestling / grappling range. Shit, look at that. Yet another example of why training BJJ is not realistic!

JAB

if you are a kickboxer or simply an mma guy then YOU are limited in what you can do. Based on the way I was taught Cheng style it totally left things wide open. I think that if you feel the only response is to simply strike someone then your bagua needs work. Places like that won't even hire you if they get the impression that your training focuses on striking.