Does anyone have any experiance with Capoeira? Good points, bad points? Is it effective in the street? I read on Cyberkwoon that they really don’t use there hands for attacks, just there legs and feet. Thanks for any information. I know it’s not a Chinese MA but I’m still interested.
It’s pretty.
And you’ll get in good shape.
Other than that, I don’t know.
Many people I have talked to warn against the cult like nature of study groups in this art.
You’ve been warned :).
Other wise, it is supposedly a combat art disguised as dance (combat arts were against the law during it’s creation).
The do partnered dancing/sprring to music, all standing in a circle. Lots of handstands and low leg attacks, but also plenty of high kicking. I understand that many of their hand movements are actually knifefighting manuvers.
hmmm, interesting, thanks shaolinboxer. Dancing is really something I’m not great at. Dance sparring sounds interesting as well. Doesn’t sound to realistic for a combat situation, but I’m not sure, i haven’t seen them do it in real life. Has anyone ever heard of a Capoeira guy who could really fight? Thanks everyone
Mestre Hulk a Capoeira stylist beat Amaury Bitteti a BJJ stylist by knockout in a match held in Brazil.
Badger
A friend of mine practices, and set up the first group to practice in this area. There is some handwork, but it is predominantly legs. He’s a decent fighter, but he has a kung fu and judo background, so its hard to attribute it to style. However, it is a tremendous workout.
There are specific songs to “spar” to, and its very interesting to watch. My friend has a tape of two maestres going at it, and it was definitely an unfreindly match between the two(one was roughing up the other’s students). Judging from that match, I’d say the high-level practitioners can fight that way.
Keep in mind, there was a time that mostly criminals practiced capioera, and there’s still a lot of shady characters involved. My friend put up a big sum of money to host a particular maestre here, and the guy came over, sponged off my friend in every way possible, told people that if anyone ever beat him in the circle, he’d knife them later, and later raped a 15 year old student at another location. In defense of good maestres, a group of maestres got together and explained to that guy that if they saw him again, he would be toast.
On the flip side, there’s another group that practices here now who are perfectly nice, though not all that fight oriented. I believe there’s two or three groups practicing in the area presently.
I used to do capoeria to cross train with my kungfu. It is an effective style, it’s purpose is to not look like it’s effective. The style uses some very unorthidox movements and footwork, any experienced fighter knows how hard it is to fight someone who is unorthidox. I played in Brasil for about 2 weeks and saw some challenge type matches good stuff. Somthing to keep in mind is that generally the young students do allot of flashy technique, most of the older practitioners I have seen in Brasil use allot less flashy stuff. Interupting the other players timing and stuff.
Try these links out:
Thanks for all the responces everyone, deffinatly some good stuff to think about. How would you say it would go with another kung fu style, like wing chun or something like that? Your pretty much in constant movment, right? You spar in circles? Does it have any similarities with Bagua?
"How would you say it would go with another kung fu style, like wing chun or something like that?’
Capoeira… I saw some dancing around and sparring surounded by people chanting… just stuff I saw at some demenstration. Asfar as i can tell though, WC and Capoeira are nothing alike. And if you were to add capoeira into your WC training you would only hurt your WC.
Besides, what would be the point? Do you feel your WC isn’t a complete system on its own? Maybe you would be better of cross training in brake dancing, and then you could fill the gap in WC, it’s lack of dancing and singing, it would finally become a complete system.
Just like with any other art, it varies. There is handwork in capoeira, in fighting, elbows and such. The players back in the day were kept in shackles, so they couldn’t really punch, but they have an arsenal of elbow forearm and shoulder strikes. Don’t let all of the dance like moves fool you. H9ow many people say the same thing about kung fu? Do you think that kung fu is just dance? Just something to think about…
SevenStar, I don’t think capoeira is just a dance. If a capoeira player were to start cross training in WC that might hurt his capoeira skills aswell. It’s just that Wing Chun is so diffrent from that style(unless there’s some deeper meaning that I didn’t catch from the 2 min I saw of it), alot(if not all) of the movments I saw were just completly oposite of many WC princples and theorys, I just don’t think they would mesh well together…
My bad, I wasn’t talking to you specifically. There are alot of people that think it’s merely dancing. I was talking to everyone that thinks so.
“but they have an arsenal of elbow forearm and shoulder strikes.”
They sure do. If I was to compare capeoria to some kind of kungfu I’d say it’s probally most like monkey style in principle. Capoeria uses deceptive movement to gain the advantage on the opponent. Unless you do capoeria yourself it is very hard to catch the rythem of their movement. Before I did some training in capoeria I tried to spar against a capoerista who was training capoeria under my sifu. I though the same thing allot of people do, it’s all for show, it’s a dance etc. When I tried to sparr though it was an eye opener to the usefullness of deception and unorthidox techniques. Capoeristas pride themselves on being tricky.
Allot of the stuff you see in the Hoda(circle they fight in) like handstands etc. are part of the “game”. Not only sparring goes on in the Hoda but they also challenge each other to feats of strength. They also have stick and machetty fighting. In my sifu’s capoeria class he taught us how to fight with razors between our toes. Very cool stuff.
Ì feel that a lot of what i would like to say has already been said.
Even though i do Xingyi, taichi and some Gatkha my primary art is capoeira.
I have been forced to use my skills on the street and have had many sparring matches with other styles of MA.
Capoeira is very different from other forms of MA in that it has many purposes, one of the most important was that it helped oppressed people to gain pride and strength and faith in themselves.
In my wiew this and other non combat aspects is very important if one wants to learn capoeira.
That being said capoeira contains many really effective techniques that can be used for self defence.
Its really different from group to group what their emphasis in training are.
But most groups are cool, the “cult” groups are very rare, in my opinion they are more often found in other forms of MA.
About the fighting with chain thing, i dont really belive this, how would the slaves work wearing chains?
Oh just forgot…in the old days ALL expressions of african arts was unlawfull so hiding capoeira as a dance would just get you arrested for dancing…
Also, if you watch the movie “Band of the Hand” you will come to find that there is good and bad in Capoeria, also, Eddie from Tekken does this style very well. 
After studying in shaolin kung fu for bout 2 years me and a few friends dicided to cross train in capoeira (mainly after seeing ‘only the strong’) and have been learning it on and off for pat 2 years.I can say that i know sum capoeristas who can whip b utt, alot of the kicks are circular and generate a lot of power as they are whipped around. But the main strength of capoeira is diception u never know wott they are going 2 do i remmember when i first started and spared against a capoerista using kung fu and couldnt get near him- there are moves can be intiated even when in handstands or while in the air. Overall capoeira will increase your fitness and strenght (1/2 hour of handstands is murder) and is fun, if uve never been in a ‘hoda’ ur missing out man
“Maybe you would be better of cross training in brake dancing, and then you could fill the gap in WC, it’s lack of dancing and singing, it would finally become a complete system.”
Hehe, I think your on to something there:)
Thanks everyone, everything said gives me a lot to think about. From what I hear it deffinatly wouldn’t mix well with WC, for a lot of reasons. However I think I understand the art a little better. Interesting that it could be incorperated into Shaolin MA. Low Stances, generating power from your base, etc. Capoeira incorperates constant movement to trick your opponent, correct? I’ll have to visit the school and see how it looks. I think I’m still more interested in the therories and tecniques in Wing Chun.
they don’t work while wearing chains, unless the chains are on their feet. they can’t dance while working either. training was done at the end of the day.