How many of you TMA types spar in your school or outside for that matter? whats the format?
ok, i’ll bite
In school:
depending on level of student anywhere from 1/4 speed/power to controlled full speed power.
all contact to knees, elbows, throat, eyes, ears, and most other joints must never leave perm damage.
throws, takedowns, sweeps to finishes on the ground.
sometimes pads sometimes not
(what zee 'ell are you trying to stir up???)
weapon sparring is some sort of wire masked hard helmet and whatever the person thinks is the best option for grip/padding on the stick or staff.
still trying to find someone to sword spar with me and my 1/4" thick, flat edge aluminum broadsword:D I duct taped a rubber cane tip to the end but still no one wants to play:( How am I ever going to become a master swordsman…do forms all day???
Out of school: whatever is mutually agreed upon.
hehe, I knew you would be the first to step up 
Oso, actually I am not trying to stir up anything, I just have a sincere interest. Beyond all the smack talk on these forums, in truth I have been to a few TMA schools and the only one who did any real good hard sparring was my old karate school, and that was of course point sparring, although we took it ****her then that sometimes.
I understand that sparring leaves the potential for injury but as a martial artist I guess that is something I am willing to accept. Like any sort of physicaly demanding sport or skill, injury is always a risk. So beyond that, why is it not that many TMA people out there appear to be passing on sparring.
Some of them have some light sparring “drills” like Wing Chuns chi sao, but I have yet to walk into a TMA school and see anything beyond that.
I have to assume that since my experience is limited I am just missing the schools that do spar, so I figured I would ask here and see what other peoples experiences are.
We sparr lots.
Our format is normaly just put on gloves and do what u want till u are told to stop.
Just recently my teacher has started most guys sparring in a very small area (about 4 foot by 9) with the rules being that if u step out of the area you lose and fighting stops.
We started doing this for many reasons but the main 2 being that you can not just run away when your oponent wants to attack and that if you are getting hit way to much (as was happening in unlimitted sparring for our beginners) you can just take 1-2 steps back to acknolage yoiur beten and the hitting stops.
It also makes it more important to get past the imidiate punching range and clinch/grappel.
I cant really speak for anyone else, but we spar anywhere from 1 step, 1/2 speed drills all the way up to 10 minutes straight, anything goes, where the guys sparring get to take it wherever they want. I am suprised to hear that most kung fu schools DONT do that..but I am sure its fairly nasty on the liability side…A major side effect of sparring often and like that is injury. And most of the students that have been at my school 5 years or more have some sort of broken bone, dislocated joint, or several scars to show off, as well as respect for all body types and weights of fighters for that reason 
Who else spars..I want to hear more!
I sparred at a Kenpo Karate school this weekend. I wore cup, mouthpiece, and fingerless (Century) gloves. You set your own pace and level of contact. If it’s too hard say something, not hard enough say something. I did a couple of controlled kicks to the knee while closing the gap a couple of times. I think there was only 1 knee thrown. When I visited for the 1st time, there was a kid who tried to shoot in and his opponent stopped him with a sort of sprawl. They were up against a wall as well. I also saw a couple of sweeps that day. I think they have a variety of stylists there - mantis,WC,kickboxing,Thai. Not sure if I’ve seen any grapplers but they teach BJJ at the school.
I think combined with the liability is paying for insurance. I know a popular MMA school here locally does sparring but “officially” they do not because insurance is too expensive.
What sort of insurance do u guys in the states normaly get?
I got my insurance though the BCCMA just because I had to have their insurance for their comps. For 20 pounds u get 80 pounds per week off work due to injury and almost total protection against claims from any one u hurt as lond as its BCCMA member to member.
I let it lapse now and as we dont have much of a claimant culture over here as yet I have not really thought about getting any more.
Yep..especially if you dont use safety gear. We sort of stress NOT wearing gloves, cup, or even mouthpieces, so that you raise your confidence level by learning to protect those things or use them smartly under less than full contact, and eventually the guys kick it up to semi or sometimes full contact with no gear. Its a slow process, but very effective when it comes to fruition
It’s a necessity here in the states. I am not sure exactly what it runs but it is probably different from state to state.
I run it slow in the beginning as well. liability is one issue. a big one. also, I just havn’t gotten anyone who’s really shown that that’s what they want. I have one brown sash of mine from my old town that still comes down and we will go at it pretty hard. I’ve actually had one quit from watching us even though I tried to explain that my brown was, well a brown, and had been at it for almost 4 years.
it’s been said before that not everyone is in it for the banging, that’s ok. If I have someone who is good at the forms I teach them then I will showcase them as needed for forms and someone else for sparring. Right now I got a guy who I can point to and use as an example of good stance training and chi kung training, but that’s about it…for now.
I guess I don’t get why one would join a martial arts school, see them fighting and then quit…
No gloves full contact would be fun to watch.
We spar, do take downs, no standing locks allowed tho…
I guess I don’t get why one would join a martial arts school, see them fighting and then quit…
that public misperception I guess. Sadly, in my class, this visiting brown is the only chance I get to open it up a little, he doesn’t mind getting hit and has gotten to the point that I don’t give him any openings. So, most people only see the 1/4 contact stuff that my yellows are doing now and think that’s all cool and stuff and even though I tell them that it will be incrementally tougher, they don’t have any tactile representation of it yet.
and now the one student I’ve had for almost the entire 2 years I’ve been here is gone to the navy.
We are restarting our “fight class” right now. I’m not exactly sure what direction shirfu wants to bring this. All I know as of now, there are only two of us in this class, we are starting with a lot of two man drills, and working those directly into the sparring. We are trying to bring as much of our “style” into it as possible at our respective levels. I’m thinking we’ll be using shin pads, foot gear, don’t know what gloves we’ll use yet, cups, and mouth pieces. Most likely some head gear. I’ll post more on this “new” class as we get more time in. I’m trying to go sans shou rules with this, but we’ll see what my teacher decides.
NP, that sounds cool.
I was getting way bored w/ no sparring so I started going to this karate school and taking their jujitsu class. I’m having fun and only wish the class was longer. We’ve got cups, mouthpieces and the cloth hand protectors and will go from 3-7 on a 1-10 scale with 10 being all out.
When sparring starts in when schools lose the most students. can’t remember where I read that.
Ha. You’d be suprised by how many people get a little freaked by PUSH HANDS. It’s ridiculous.
I’m scared of push hands.
a buddy of mine in town has trained exactly the same amount of time as I have. He’s focused more on tai chi than I have by a long shot and if we push then I’m on my azz a whole lot. We match pretty evenly in regular sparring though.
What’s so scary about push hands?