I am in search of a street-effective martial art. I am a tiny person at 5’4" 120lbs, but I’m very quick and in good shape. I want to have self confidence and be able to defend myself should I ever get in a confrontation. I want a martial art that focuses mainly on hand techniques with kicking second. Due to my local area (Burlington, VT) my choices are very limited, but here they are:
Villari’s Self Defense. I studied here a year ago up to a yellow-belt, but I stopped due to other conflicts. I now don’t know whether to go back because as I look back I don’t know what I took out of it.
TKD. There are two schools near me, but I’ve heard TKD is very kick heavy and I feel at only 5’4" I should concentrate on hand techniques more. Plus I feel kicks are unpractical on the street.
Kung Fu. There is a local Kung Fu Academy that teaches a variation of Wah Lum Praying Mantis (the sifu did study it) and Northern Shaolin Kung Fu. Does this sound fishy at all? Would these styles be what I’m looking for?
Now I know that teacher matters a lot, but as a beginner I can’t really distinguish good from bad. So, with all this in mind, what are your thoughts on what I should do? Any suggestions/comments/recommendations would be greatly appreciated.
“It is better to be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt”
Hmmmmm…obviously you’ll find lots of Chinese Martial Arts fans here…hehehehe I guess they’ll all advise you to go for the Wha Lum school…At least that’s what I would advise you
Go to the schools and see what they do. If it’s too “traditional” with a lot of focus on forms and less on building confidence in a confrontation, then don’t continue.
Another question: do the beginners get any self-defense applications / confidence building? Or are only the senior students sparring and stuff? To me, even the beginners should get s-d applications and learning how to handle things on the street.
Alot of it depends on the instructor: my current WT instructor spends a lot of time focusing on self-defense and handling confrontation whereas my old instructor focused more on forms and technical aspects of the techniques.
Obviously I’m sticking with my current instructor.
buy yourself a gun, get a ccw permit, and make regular visits to the local gun range. - this is sometimes known as ‘glock-fu’.
in mere minutes, you can learn to defeat mike tyson, gordon liu, jackie chan, jet li, bruce lee, and keanneu reaves, at the same time.
(ok, maybe not keanneau reaves…)
Why would you say that I am insane? I wouldn’t say that I’ve lost my mind simply because I’ve heard the voices and seen the godless things moving in the woods. If anything, I think more clearly now than ever before. - Ash
I have a Black Belt in TKD, and in Kempo,and others. You will be happier with the Kempo or the Kung Fu because they will offer more information for years, TKD is effective if tought properly but limited in information, I enjoy learning and expanding on my information.
Many TKD schools are teaching BJJ to suppliment TKD, but it doesnt flow with TKD, you go from one extreme to another, far away fighting to grappling, Also how complete is an art if they have to add another to round it off?
If you decide to add another art to your knowledge a few years down the road you will find that Kempo or most Kung Fu styles will flow into other styles. I took up Ju jitsu well after being a black belt and it complimented what I had perfectly.
Go with the school that has an instructor you click with, both decisions will be fine, and how effective it is is up to you, you get back what you put out.
To be honest with you, you would never want to tangle with someone who outweighed you by 100 lbs or more. So I’d say BJJ is out. Your art should concentrate on quickly incapacitating your opponent, and escaping.
While Bruce Lee was able to generate fierce internal power at his size (I think he weighed no more than 160), that kind of dedication is out of the reach of most Americans.
So my advice, being someone who once weighed 120 lbs (at 6 feet tall at that!), would be a throwing art like Aikido, maybe combined with a pressure point striking art - in case a big dude does get his hands on you. I would also concentrate on gaining 10 pounds (I’m assuming you’re a dude, if not, sorry!) and getting incredibly defined with it. This alone may provide a visual deterent to someone who might want to f*ck with you on GP. Good Luck!
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“I’ll be too busy lookin’ good!”
I think that BJJ complements any stand up art. Your right about the TKD BJJ combo and missing a range or two in that mix. I think youd have to add Kenpo or Judo to TKD and BJJ to make it more well rounded.
if you can i recommend you try out wing chun… it was developed for a small person to defend themselves aggressively against a much larger stronger enemy – it uses lots of simple direct hand techniques and low powerful kicks.
I agree Johnnybut now your bringing in way to much just to round off TKD. I dont mean to say its a poor art, and I have met some great fighters in it, but it does leave a lot of holes in fighting, not to mention that in TKD you need to fit the art rather than have the art fit to you.
Really, there is no most “street effective” martial art. Find a school that has classes you enjoy and use them to sharpen your mind and body. You must experiment to find what works best for you.
Many of the techniques in Aikido, the style I study, definately place the shorter person at an advantage. I’m sure there are other arts that do the same.
You also have to decide what your overall mentality about self defense is, and how you would like to develop yourself. Martial arts are created around philosophies or concepts. Since you cannot evaulated technique due to lack of experience, perhaps that is the best place to start.
Xingi sounds good for your build, maybe Wing Chun too. Xingi is into very fast confrontations and moving into your opponent to fight close. I take it you do not want to try to fight on the outside based on your size. Too bad. You are small and you have to take shots inside, but you’ll get killed on the outside!
Xingi is also very simple and devestating, so less to think about, more easy to apply. I think Wing Chun is similar is some respects?
Just some thoughts from a beginner who has read a bunch
