Originally posted by saek san
Let’s ask ourselves, how can we promote CMA and continue the tradition of growth and development?
Thought this question deserved its own thread.
First off… Id have to say people need to be a little more open about styles, less secretive about all their “deadly techniques”.
How about fighting tournemants. TMA is getting a bad name in some areas because they can’t seem to hold their own in competition and like it or not, that is a venue that is paid attention to. If you can see it work in the ring, then you know it can work in real life.
oh yeah, and get rid of any art ending in “do” and starting with “shaolin”
Sounds like a plan. And we can get rid of styles that cant decide on one name.
:rolleyes:
Yeah, apparently kung fuers tend to get whooped in tourneys… 
If they even compete… Fact of the matter is, tournament shape is generally phenominal. Tip top. The point is to win, and you have to be the best, so you try harder. A lot of kfers seem to just do it for health, and due to the lesser popularity of the art, there just arent that many people into it that seem to be interested in tournament fighting… And a lot of KFers seem to be under the misconception that grappling is useless… Shortly after making this assertion they get mopped by a grappler… Ground game is necessary to be a well rounded fighter. You dont have to be a master, but you gotta at least learn and train enough to get back off the ground…
Getting rid of the end all be all myth would help a lot of arts out…
Too many think they are the shiznit, when in fact they are built out of the same principles as most others. Promoting cma should be a lot easier as it can encompass a whole family, we try to get parents into our tai chi or kung fu program while having there kids in the kids program.. brings back a little bit of the family aspect found in cma…
Theres actually quite a few families training at my kwoon, and it does kinda make it nice 
Which school do you train at NP?
SD - I also find a lot of kungfu guys train for “self-defense” reasons or for aesthetic reasons. I rarely run into KF guys who want to compete and are willing to train just that hard to do it. It doesn’t mean they aren’t out there but they are few and far between.
“I also find a lot of kungfu guys train for “self-defense””
And most of these people still train unrealisticly.
Shen chuan guan… spirit boxing school
Body in Balance…
Originally posted by norther practitioner
Promoting cma should be a lot easier as it can encompass a whole family, we try to get parents into our tai chi or kung fu program while having there kids in the kids program.. brings back a little bit of the family aspect found in cma…
I strongly feel this is the ticket. I believe this is superior to tournament competetion successes. Yes, when the Gracies were dominating the UFC you had a lot of people flocking to their schools. But you are limiting your demographics to 16-30 y/o males. This is a much smaller percentage of the population. Other age groups are not going to be interested in this type of fighting. I think we could learn a few things from all the TKD schools out there. I don’t think calling them McDojos is a 100% negative thing. McDonalds has the most succesful franchise in the world. The reason for this, they have a proven system that maximizes profit and efficiency. If we can pattern our schools off of proven success principles we can not only make more money for ourselves but also expose more people to the martial arts. Our schools need more ‘tai chi for seniors’ classes. We need to offer free qualified instructrion in rape prevention. And even though at times I hate teaching kids, MA classes geared for kids. I’d like to have a school that you can start in when you are 5 and stay with for the remainder of your life.
Please note: My praise of a ‘mcdojo’ system does not include treating students like numbers or only seeing them as profit. The ‘family’ aspect has to be there. It just doesn’t hurt if some good business principles are there as well.
shaolin do, exactly. Part of the reason I took up some sportive type training and am taking it on more seriously now, is because in almost all the TMA schools I have been to or visited, chi sau is the closest I have ever got to sparring! TMA schools just don’t do it anymore and I don’t get it.
We spar in SD, its just generally softer contact(until bb, even then never really “full contact”, and honestly, a lot of the people just fight. Dont really try and use techniques, so often that it really makes me happy when I see people actually using what they have learned.
Exactly why Im really looking forward to the SC guys getting back together here.. from what I understand they like to pound the crap out of each other.
“We need to offer free qualified instructrion in rape prevention.”
Im strongly contemplating teaching something along these lines for the spring semester at UTSA… Been asking around, and lots and lots of college age women are REALLY interested in something like this, geared towards women, and not cardio kick boxing cr@p.
Not to say you’re not qualified, but I’ve seen a few schools offer ‘rape prevention’ when they were not even close to being qualified. Heck .. I’ve taught a couple classes like that myself. Now that I’m a little wiser I wish I had someone else to have done that. I could teach a woman how to defend themselves in these situations, but not in the week they gave me to teach. I would want at least a year with them. I teach ‘how to fight’ effectivly after years of training. I don’t teach how to fight off an aggressor twice your size with only a week of 2 hour classes. I don’t understand a woman’s psyche (hehe that’s an understatement), when they are confronted with these situations. It’s easy for me to tell a woman to react in a situation like this when their minds may be locking up on them. I would prefer someone to teach that knows how to maximize their time to teach the most effective, easiest remembered techniques possible.
I suppose building or promoting TCMA is somehwat subjective since some of it will relegate to the argument of fighting. I believe in the fighting aspect more than not. Schools just need to get out there and fight using theories and techniques of the systems they study (though not solely if opportunities present themselves otherwise). i think heavy promotion of San Shou and Open Lei Tai or MMA fights and parallel promotion or explanation by proponents of its ties to TCMA are what is needed. Although more than a few here have less than positive thoughts towards someone like Sifu David Ross, his and his classmates’ efforts are what is needed for TCMA schools to progress back to what most of us have been told are the standards of our practices. One of the biggest selling points by any school is the promotion of its champions, especially its fighting champions, even Tai Chi, Bagua, and Xing Yi tout the fighting prowesses of treasured masters. I doubt my Sifu would ever let any student open a school without full contact or proven fight experience.
Wow, I think I might actually agree with you meecer…lol
Such the truth in way too many situations.
So basically, our only chance to legitimize kung fu is though tournaments?
NP- Didnt even see that school in the phone book… After the visit Im kinda debating moving up there…
SD, we will be in the next edition… we just opened the new school last month. Lakewood is a nice area too… There are a few good schools in town, some very good mma and bjj guys, some good cma, and some other good tma schools, however there are plenty of mcdojo style schools here too… good scenes, etc…
Who said it wasn’t legit… lol
If you are looking for street cred. go train for fighting that way specificly..
I’m thinking more in line with the fact that most cma schools are smallish, a lot of sifus have a tougher time marketing and keeping students than jma and kma… Is it the nature of the beast, or is it its handler?
Maybe a little of both?
Have you heard/know anything of the wu-tang school there?
I know theres only 15 students and a test required to enroll…
That doesnt really mean too much tho
I guess it just depends on what you mean by legitimize, what do you mean?
Have you heard/know anything of the wu-tang school there?
No, I know of an internal school a few blocks from mine, beccas school, my school, wahlum school, sd school, no wu-tang school, where did you get info for them?
I didn’t know we weren’t legit, or are you talking about in the sporting arenas ala ufc, k1, pride, etc…