What is the true definition of traditional martial arts.

Wai Jia: The Kung Fu Forum Kung Fu Forum
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When Training in true traditional martial art you are training your body, mind and spirt. It’s not just about learning how to fight.

Some of us want to learn alot more than how beat people up.

It only re-enforces the stereotype of ignorant and close-minded tma artists when I see things like these spit out by some holier-than thou guy who thinks the traditional arts have the market cornered on character development.

Sorry buddy, but there isn’t a single virtue that is taught in kung fu that can’t be taught in a dozen other activities including MMA.

It’s probably hard for a guy like you to imagine as you’re so caught up in uniforms, rank, politics, advancement, and other trappings.. typical of people who don’t really want to actually fight and become amazing fighters they just want to look and act the part.. Let’s do another form! **** yeah!

Instead of talking about character development MMA guys just do it.

Conditioning until you puke and then wiping it off your face and you keep going.
Sparring a guy 3x as skilled as you day in and day out but you don’t ever quit because you know that if he screws up you’re going to own him. and someday you will. Getting up at 5 in the morning to run hills before you grab a shower and go to work 8 hours and then attend 3 hours of class at night because to be the best you have to train at least 2x a day. Training thru an injury that would have most people lying on their couch because you know a team is depending on you. Eating “food” like your on a desert island to make weight for a fight and being constantly hungry and the only people in the world who understand you are a family of hard-core bad-asses who just got done bouncing your head off their knee.

Character is forged.

Please don’t make me pull up one of at least a hundred or so news stories over the last year involving a tma instructor doing something illegal, immoral, despicable, unthinkable etc..

Yeah the MMA’s have got a few bad apples, but we sure as hell don’t put up the false front of moral superiority that TMA do.

Luckily I know that most tma guys know this and wouldn’t dare say such stupid stuff, but everyonce in a while some nailhead pops up and you’ve got to pound them back down with the hammer..

42

Just felt like adding in my 2 cents

Just feel like adding in my 2 cents.

I started out in a TMA at the age of 16 (January 1994). I trained with a guy for a couple years. His lineage was messy, but he could fight. Unfortunately I was catching him at a time when his body was breaking down and class was going from rough & tumble to more health oriented. He still talked a good game and was very opinionated on who he knew he could beat. Unfortunately, spending most of my time with him, i picked up that bad habit as well- nasty, nasty habit. Still, I managed to pick up a TON in 2 years of 6 or 7 days a week training with that guy.

After getting stuck at a college I never wanted to go to; I finally found my way to another kung fu school. This time the lineage was nice and clean, masters all over the place with big names, people stoppin by the mo gwoon who I’d seen in magazines. Learned some forms, lost confidence in my skill, and spent more time worrying about politics & meditation than sparring or realistic training. Lasted there a year and a half before it was time to go back to school.

This time at school a sport fighter showed up. In my last few months before graduation I picked up a lot with him. He was open and friendly; a breath of fresh air - it was all about refining stuff for use and using it.

After graduation I moved back east. This time a good traditional school with a good name. Learned a lot of lion dance and tradition. Had a lot of fun; especially at first. After a while the tournament game seemed the priority and politics took some of the fun away. I still wasn’t really fighting, or allowed to fight, but i was getting close enough to smell what I was missing.

I decided that the competition side of things was in my blood. That’s what I was really in it for all these years. I jumped into sanshou, which lead to boxing and muay thai.

Sometimes I miss the lion dancing & the forms but I don’t feel they’re necessary for fighting.

The reason I gave the whole “this is your life” thing is coz i’ve been on both sides of this argument.

I used to get on these websites and argue on the side of the staunchly “traditional”. I had faith in the old masters and the current sifus. I believed in the “longer gestation, higher end quality” view point.

These days, I don’t think i quite fall into the “traditional bashing” sport crowd yet, but I’m definitely not on the other side of the fence any longer.

I felt if my Sifu ever told me i was “ready” to enter a freefighting competition, that I would do it, and I would win- because I trained with good names in good stuff that came from the source. It took me years (and 3 schools) to realize that I’d never be able to fight. I’d never be “ready”. Coz it wasn’t in the sifu’s best interest to get me “ready”.

I learned that Traditional was about 3 things: forms, fighting, and lion dance. Of course the fighting only means “fighting where other kung fu people can see it” so it really just meant “continuous” tournament sparring.

I don’t think that what we now call “traditional training” gets you ready to fight. As much as “traditional” folks whine about politics, they love talking politics, and take them more seriously than anyone should. I honestly feel that when it comes to “traditional” the Thais got it more right than anyone else- sportify as much of your art as possible, make sure you pass the rest on for people to play with & use if they can, and to leave all political arguments to be resolved in the ring.

Too many people get caught in the cult of personality and the chinese recreationism stuff.

I back up what ST00 says. I used to hate his posts coz i thought he was close minded. Thes days i read them with a different understanding.

That’s not to say I don’t feel TCMA has it’s purpose, or that it couldn’t get better. I’m just saying that the way things stand now, it’s not the best place to learn how to fight.

I thoroughly expect to get flamed for this one; coz i know i woulda been flaming me 5 or 6 years ago.

43

[indent]Wow I must of hit a nerve. You must not like people with a different opinion then yours. If anything your the one that thinks your holyer than god. I’m just presenting a different point of view. If you want to think that I’m stupid go head it don’t bother me one bit. Just one more thing all I keep hearing is how good MMA is and bad traditional martial art. I think there both good. I just choose to study Kung Fu and I don’t think there any thing wrong with that. So I guess will have to agree to drsagree.[/indent] [indent]Well I also have been on both sides. I started out with Kempo karate the Ed Parker system but something was missing. So than I studied the Dan-te system of fighting and it was brutal. They had a ring in the middle of the school and all we did full contact sparring no pads. We learned grappling striking, and Posion Hand. I had the chance to learn the dan-te death charge. Something was still missing. So take Kung Fu now and I like it . It been somehting I always wanted do since I was a kid. I not trying tell any body what’s good or bad and I’m just to express my take on things. So that being said. Thanks for your input and you have a nice night.[/indent] [indent]SIGNING OFF NOBBY[/INDENT]

44

That’s not to say I don’t feel TCMA has it’s purpose, or that it couldn’t get better. I’m just saying that the way things stand now, it’s not the best place to learn how to fight.

Reply]
Hmmm, I think the issue is more that, few, if any TEACH traditionally. Today what is often Called traditional is a modern practice. The old traditional methods are not often seen in most TCMA schools. You get the forms, and conditioning, but in the old days they also did pretty much what the MMA guys do today. They just had 6-8 hour days in which to get it all done.

Today we practice a few hours in the evening, and that is just not enough time to realy dive into HUGE traditional arts that were meant to be practiced as a full time occupation.

Also, in the old days, I suspect the arts were much leaner too. Look at my style, by the Ming dynasty some lines of it had a single empty hand form that was like 1000 moves long (Shaolin’s branch). But originally it had just 32 methods, and that was it. Many styles today have over 100 forms, when they orginally had 3 (North Mantis for example)

My style was developed by a career miltary general. After a LIFETIME of warring, and practicing a variety of styles, he settles on 32 core methods. He basically studied all he could, from many sources, and then refined it all down to a small system that worked well for him under a large variety of conditions. Which is exactly what the MMA guys do today. Only he was doing it 1000+ years ago.

So from my view, you have some really old school styles out there, and they are great to develope a foundation and give you a large variety to chose from when devloping your own method, but the really ancient way is to test yourelf in battle, and really hold to what is keeping you alive and make it your own style.

The real question is not “Who is traditional,and who is not”. But more like who is just Preserving the technology for the future, and who is actually following the ancient path. Both paths are traditional.

Those who codify things into forms,are prserving the past, so everyone else has a database to live the ancient ways. BOTH are nessasary as everyone has a little bit different angle of understanding. One group focuses on one aspect of the art, the other the opposite, basically becasue no one has time to do it all.

45

David,

You are generally smarter than to try the “if you haven’t experienced it then you can’t comment on it,” argument. This is akin to saying “if you’ve never been in war, you have no right to comment on strategy/tactics etc.”

My points were only two and very simple:

  1. MMA is not “fast.” There is nothing fast about it. The only thing that might make it SEEM fast is that many people who train MMA are training to compete. This forces them to put in more training time than the “average” TMA person, who, we have all agreed, is typically not training to compete. The rate at which people get better is nothing more than a function of focus and time spent practicing properly. This is universal. The fast but not as good, slow but better in the end thing is a false distinction.

  2. If anybody is basing their perceptions of skill later on in life off of the disparity between old competitors and old-noncompetitors, it’s bad logic. Put a full contact competition circuit with medium to high participation into any “TMA,” and watch the old cripples flood in.

46

This stuff boggles my mind. Why is MMA considered non traditional? Just because it mixes traditional sport muay thai with traditional Brazillian JiuJitsu, or traditional greco roman wrestling with traditional boxing, or traditional karate/gung fu with traditional BJJ/Sambo/etc? People have been blending martial arts since the beginning. I adore MMA and it’s athletic focus. How it allows grapplers and stand up fighters to test their mettle against one another in a reasonably safe context. But there’s still a huge divide between a Lidell and a Nog. MMA’ist are not perfectly ****genized fighting machines anymore than TCMA’ist are throat striking internal organ exploding killers. Most are grapplers with so so stand up, or stand up guys with so so grappling. Comparing your average martial artist, MMA or otherwise, to a Silva or Saku is every bit as ridiculous as comparing random kids in a boxing gym to Floyd Mayweather. Get real. MMA did not prove traditional training methods to be worthless. That doesn’t even make sense. What it did was prove that there was a dimension of fighting that most martial artist were unfamiliar with. The ground. I think that’s great, as it can only lead to further improvement. But honestly alot of the attitudes expressed when discussing this stuff is no different than the attitudes of those following the Karate craze of the 60’s, or the Ninja craze of the 80’s. The whole “This style is in the spotlight now, so it’s obviously the best thing ever.”

All of this battle of the buzz word ‘Alive’ Vs ‘Dead’ stuff. My God. Any good training program involves elements of both. Nobody spars all of the time, that’s absurd. Nor do you always have a training partner or heavy bag with you when you want to work body mechanics or whatever. Hell forms/shadowboxing/etc. If fighting is your goal then training forms exclusively(does anybody anywhere actually do this?) is even more absurd. In my opinion, this is just a false dillema spawned by either ego or capital concerns. Not logic. If you hit a heavy bag, you probably aren’t hitting too differently from how Joe Louis or Marciano hit it. That’s tradition. If you’re rolling BJJ you’re rolling in almost a hundred years of tradition. If you’re off somewhere swinging a broadsword or Escrima stick around, you’re probably playing tradition too. If you fight full contact, like, welcome to planet earth. Until you start flying or breathing underwater, nothing is going to change too much. Various traditions will continue to merge as they always have. People are so steeped in tradition that they don’t even realize it. Tradition is something that’s handed down from one generation to the next. And usually with additions. Tradition is not Dogma.

And I have to say, a Mixed Martial Artist isn’t any one thing anymore than a classical MA is any one thing. Sometimes the difference is as simple as two years of groundfighting, or a year of boxing. Someone kind of implied that MMA get up and run at 5am. DO all MMAist do this? Hellllll no. But it only stands to reason that someone training as a Pro or Semi Pro athlete will probably train harder than a “hobbyist”. :rolleyes:

47

This stuff boggles my mind. Why is MMA considered non traditional?

MMA is a recent development and is not traditional. Modern MMA training has been evolving only over the last 30 years or so, starting in Brazil, moving to the US and Japan in the early 90’s and then to the rest of the world.

Traditional MA’s do not focus on all of the aspects that MMA does. MMA combines standing kicks and punches, clinch work, takedowns, and ground work into a comprehensive whole. It also utilizes protective gear and other techniques that allow for hard sparring against resisting opponents in each of these areas without having an unreasonable amount of injuries. “Traditional” martial arts, while sometimes doing some of the things MMA does, have never combined everything the way the modern MMA does.

In training with no rules, I was meaning that we are pulling those punches, etc, right before contact, it is no secret to hit hard from any angle, and so we train to hit hard for that angle but don’t make contact during our training

Pulling punches = TMA.
Punching hard with minimal protective equipment = MMA

When Training in true traditional martial art you are training your body, mind and spirt. It’s not just about learning how to fight. Kung Fu teaches you how to be a better person in general and not just how to be a better fighter

Adding spiritual aspects = TMA
Focusing 99.9% of effort on what works for fighting = MMA

I believe in the concept of forms being set patterns that improve footwork, motor skills, application and set ups, and are an essential part of the martial arts training regiment.

Theory that forms training is an aspect of training = TMA
Theory that forms plays almost no role in training = MMA

I think this comes from the fact that not everything in TCMA is directly for fighting. There’s an entertainment/artistic aspect to some forms and movements. I think that even some instructors don’t get this and incorrectly try to teach movements that are for aesthetic value as self-defense movements. So obviously, outsiders will see these so called self-defense movements as impractical and many movements are.

Teaching “artistic” movements = TMA
Throwing out “artistic” movements and using only functional ones = MMA

Well I also have been on both sides. I started out with Kempo karate the Ed Parker system but something was missing. So than I studied the Dan-te system of fighting and it was brutal.

These are not MMA training.

If the MMA method is different in that it spars full contact, then its actually more traditional than what passes for traditional today.

That is only one of the aspects of MMA training. It is all of the variables of MMA training that make it different from traditional training. The sum of the whole ends up being more that the sum of the individual components.

And I have to say, a Mixed Martial Artist isn’t any one thing anymore than a classical MA is any one thing. Sometimes the difference is as simple as two years of groundfighting, or a year of boxing. Someone kind of implied that MMA get up and run at 5am. DO all MMAist do this?

No, but most MMA guys will train punches, kicks, clinch, takedowns, and groundwork. They will also spar hard against resisting opponents in each of these areas and will utilize protective equipment to minimize training injuries.

All of this battle of the buzz word ‘Alive’ Vs ‘Dead’ stuff. My God.

Alive also means training and sparring in each area that may occur in the fight (outside range, clinch, takedowns, ground work). Leave out any one of those areas and you are not training in an alive manner.

A truly traditional martial arts trains in many of the same manners that MMA fighters train, excellent physical condtioning, hard contact sparring, throws and groundwork,

TMA’s have “traditionally” left at least one of these areas out of the equation. For example, hard and continuous training on the ground was unheard of in TMA’s before BJJ and MMA were introduced to the world outside of Brazil.

48

I’m not sure what you guys are talking about but ground fighting teck. are a part of kung fu training. In my sytem we call it dei saat (ground cruelty) or dei tong (from the ground up. Styles like dai sing peck gwa moon ( monkey style focus on floor fighting. Mongolian wrestling, and just about every kung fu system focuses on china Joint locking Tech. You can say styles like ying jow pai are like jiu jitsu in that respect. sui jow like judo and stlyles like tai chi or bat gwa are like akido.

greencloud.net

49

(Dear lord, I can’t believe I’m about to post and get involved in this mess)

There are, simply put, no “new techniques”… EVERYTHING you see in the ring or the cage you can find in tradtional martial art (TMA)

The fundamental difference is that the so called “MMA” people train those techniques realistically and many TMA do not

TMA as it is practiced today is also filled with utterly useless clap trap, primiarily a result of 1) lots of spare time on their hands since they don’t fight and 2) a desire to sell “cool stuff” to unsuspecting rubes

Other fundamental differences between so called TMA and so called MMA

Most TMA people view their method and their lineage as religion. They do not change what they do, they do not look outside it. Frequently I’ve heard people say “oh, that technique? We don’t do that, it isn’t part of our system”

MMA people don’t care if it is “part of their system”… they are more of the “use what works” sort of crowd..

A TMA person might sneer at me for using a Jiujitsu style arm bar, I’ll just laugh because I don’t care, I use what will work, don’t care if it wasn’t part of the system 150 years ago

TMA also tend to be clan-ish. They train with their class mates, they view outsiders as enemies.

Most MMA welcome the opportunity to work out with other people…

Most TMA attitudes have groundings in historical context… but people need to realize that this is 2006… not 1906

50

MMA is cool

I think MMA is cool because they don’t guard their groin or their head at all.

So if I ever fight an MMA guy that gives me an instant advantage. They go for a takedown, box their ears or break their neck. They try to put me into guard, just punch or knee their groin.

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I feel for you . Really, I do. And can live with your description.

Although, I would like to strip the word “Traditional” from what is called TMA today.

52

TMA today is not really TMA. What is TMA today? In most Chinese circles it is wushu and fancy dancing along with some sparring, sanda or san shou. In karate/TKD circles it is forms + sparring that is basic punching and kicking.

It is not usually about getting into knife fights in some back alley, which is what it used to be about.

So most TMA today I call ‘Traditional Modernized Arts’. Or ‘Tacky Modernized Arts’, in the case of the people who go to tournaments and do speed kata and stuff.

53

Perfect example of why MMA people think many TMA practitioners are clueless.

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Prior to the UFC’s being introduced into the US, what percentage of your training time did you spend training and sparring on the ground?

55

Pulling punches = TMA.
Punching hard with minimal protective equipment = MMA

Say what? What about boxing, kickboxing, bareknuckle competitions, the old full contact karate, street fights, and whatever else there is out there? MMA competitions are not even among the first to involve full contact striking. I specify competitions, because in day to day training MMA uses safety equipment and limited semi hard contact like everybody else.

Traditional MAs do not focus on all of the aspects that MMA does. MMA combines standing kicks and punches, clinch work, takedowns, and ground work into a comprehensive whole. It also utilizes protective gear and other techniques that allow for hard sparring against resisting opponents in each of these areas without having an unreasonable amount of injuries. Traditional martial arts, while sometimes doing some of the things MMA does, have never combined everything the way the modern MMA does.

I know what MMA is and includes, what I disagree with is the idea that it’s somehow completely non traditional. This is like a big game of semantics. You take a guy that has trained BJJ all of his life, and give him a year of Muay Thai, and he’s a MMA’ist. Like I said earlier, the only aspect that was missing before, was groundfighting. Fighters from various disciplines are adding it to their repetoire, but that’s not necessarily anti tradition. That wasn’t even a reality to most martial artist back in the day. Back then(say the 50’s) your odds of getting in a fight and being taken down and worked for a superior position were next to none. BJJ is the tradition that most people over here had no clue about, making it’s techniques strange and ridiculously difficult to counter.

But in America there are Martial Arts schools that have been using equipment for hard sparring for decades. They sparred in ranges they were likely to encoutner, or stuff that they knew existed. Sparring hard is nothing exclusive to MMA, and that does not free it from tradition. Another tradition(BJJ) has been added to the mix because the cultural and geographical borders have once again began to blur, but that’s always the way. This idea of TMA being argued sounds ridiculously negative/stereotypical to me. There are undoubtedly schools that train as mentioned, but that’s not all there is out there. Or maybe that’s just my view because I’ve never come across any cultish traditionalist outside of movies and the internet. But tradition isn’t limited to forms or chi or whatever the ****. It’s any training method that was handed down from the generation before you. It’s setting up hooks and crosses with jabs, or skipping rope, or roadwork, etc etc etc. To me, MMA is a modern blend of traditional styles.

Teaching artistic movements = TMA
Throwing out artistic movements and using only functional ones = MMA

Yeah, non artistic/non flashy techniques like this or this. :wink:

56

You will never hear a MMA stylist say that he and his training parnters never punch full forcel when training and/or competing. However, you will often hear that from TMA practitioners, as cited poster had stated.

This idea of TMA being argued sounds ridiculously negative/stereotypical to me. There are undoubtedly schools that train as mentioned, but that’s not all there is out there.

Watch any old clip of traditional CMA fighting and you will see it was nothing like modern MMA fighting.

57

Actualy alot I didn’t have to watch TV or wait for the latest craze to say ok it’s time to be realist and learn how to fight from the ground. then again I did have a jiu itsu backround and one of the first styles of kung fu I studied was monkey kung fu wich mostly focuses on ground fighting.

Not to mention I went to high school and like everyone else I was exposed to wrestling. As a martial artist it’s natural to evolve if your going to be any good.

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Martial Art versus Martial Sport

I found these definitions in a book - are they accurate?

[I]"Martial Art; A struggle against your own bad habits, laziness, sloth, etc. - developing self-discipline - over YOURSELF - may in fact lead to emotional and mental (and perhaps spiritual) discipline. A quiet and lonely path. Does not need to hurt other people to feel their lives have meaning. May not lead to anything - one doesn’t advertise to others or promote oneself, as this is a wasteful ego pursuit. It’s simply your own path in life - the pursuit of individual excellence.

Martial Sport; A struggle against others. For ego (or monetary) rewards. So…after a cage fight, you don’t go out and get drunk, have promiscous sex, hit people for no reason…right? May lead to…ummm…hospital bills, imprisonment and jail time…enemies, etc…oh yes, and pride, arrogance, etc."[/I]

Probably all BS anyway.

Cheers - AQ

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to knifefighter

[indent]I would to clear something up. The Dan-te system is like the MMA because the founder of the system was an expert at judo, jiu-jitsu, tai chi chuan, shaolin boxing, kempo, karate, Yawara, boxing and wrestling. additionally, he held a black belt in aikido and a masters certificate in kibo. His second in command had a 10th dan black(red) belt & gold sash of the "dan-te (deadly hands) system of fighting, 6th dan chuan fa kempo (kung fu), 5th dan yawara ryu jiu jitsu, 4th dan chung do kwan/ tae kwan do (korean karate) , Shorie goju (okinawan karate) as well as black belts in ju-te aikido/ bo-ki-bo, and Kodokan judo and when I was styuding there he was graci certified.[/indent] [indent] Count Dan-TE was the first, last and only person to win his title after the 1967 world fighting arts “Death Matches” (now illegal). Black Belt magazine, the worlds oldest self-defence magazine, in 1964 referred to Count Dan-TE as one of the top instructors in the world then went on to give him the largest personal write-up in their history in a two piece article in their april 1969 and july 1969 issuses.[/indent] [indent]On Sept. 1 , 1967 the Directive Committee of the World Federation of Fighting Arts declared Count Dan-Te the "worlds deadliest figthing master " in recognition of his having defeated the world’s foremost fistic and grappling arts masters in “no holds-barred” fighting matches. Count Dan-TE was never defeated tied or even injured in any of the full-contact, no holds barred matches he had against some of the world’s top experts’ and masters of street fighting, judo, karate, kung fu boxing, wrestling’ savate, tai chi chuan, aikido, jiu jitsu, dim mak or other of self-defence or fighting arts.I only studied there for a year but it was a great experience.[/indent] [indent]What the MMA is doing is nothing new. The reason I mentioned the different styles I’ve had studied and am curently studing was to let people know I wasn’t totally ignorant to the subject. I like MMA. I watch the UFC and PRIDE all the time and think there should be some form of full contact sparring in every school but I still think that martial arts have a little more to offer to students then just fighting. OH ST00 I’m like a crooked nail I don’t hammer in to place so easy. All you have a good night and again thanks for the input.[/indent] [indent]Signing off Nobby[/indent]

60

to knifefighter

[indent]I would to clear something up. The Dan-te system is like the MMA because the founder of the system was an expert at judo, jiu-jitsu, tai chi chuan, shaolin boxing, kempo, karate, Yawara, boxing and wrestling. additionally, he held a black belt in aikido and a masters certificate in kibo. His second in command had a 10th dan black(red) belt & gold sash of the "dan-te (deadly hands) system of fighting, 6th dan chuan fa kempo (kung fu), 5th dan yawara ryu jiu jitsu, 4th dan chung do kwan/ tae kwan do (korean karate) , Shorie goju (okinawan karate) as well as black belts in ju-te aikido/ bo-ki-bo, and Kodokan judo and when I was styuding there he was graci certified.[/indent] [indent] Count Dan-TE was the first, last and only person to win his title after the 1967 world fighting arts “Death Matches” (now illegal). Black Belt magazine, the worlds oldest self-defence magazine, in 1964 referred to Count Dan-TE as one of the top instructors in the world then went on to give him the largest personal write-up in their history in a two piece article in their april 1969 and july 1969 issuses.[/indent] [indent]On Sept. 1 , 1967 the Directive Committee of the World Federation of Fighting Arts declared Count Dan-Te the "worlds deadliest figthing master " in recognition of his having defeated the world’s foremost fistic and grappling arts masters in “no holds-barred” fighting matches. Count Dan-TE was never defeated tied or even injured in any of the full-contact, no holds barred matches he had against some of the world’s top experts’ and masters of street fighting, judo, karate, kung fu boxing, wrestling’ savate, tai chi chuan, aikido, jiu jitsu, dim mak or other of self-defence or fighting arts.I only studied there for a year but it was a great experience.[/indent] [indent]What the MMA is doing is nothing new. The reason I mentioned the different styles I’ve had studied and am curently studing was to let people know I wasn’t totally ignorant to the subject. I like MMA. I watch the UFC and PRIDE all the time and think there should be some form of full contact sparring in every school but I still think that martial arts have a little more to offer to students then just fighting. OH ST00 I’m like a crooked nail I don’t hammer in to place so easy. All you have a good night and again thanks for the input.[/indent] [indent]Signing off Nobby[/indent]