Martial Arts Festival - Wayne Swietoslawski

I met Wayne at the MAF-UK the other week and I decided to blog about him as he is a genuine guy who is now applying himself to full time martial arts training and teaching.

Wayne has an impressive martial arts CV and as well as holding several black belts has trained throughout the world with outstanding martial artists but what really struck a chord with me was the tagline Wayne uses: Training for Life. Wayne trains all the time. And I mean ALL the time! So the phrase Training for Life covers the way he considers that training in the martial arts is his life but it also makes him (/us?) ready for life. Training helps us deal with life. This can be on a practical, physical level or an emotional or 'spiritual' level: it keeps us fit for life and hones our minds.

As soon as Wayne's site is up and live I'll post it here.

The first enemy

"It was a troublesome scramble...because I momentarily behaved like a bad tempered boy who is apoplectic with his toy-train. The straps were a fuddle, the engine was recalcitrant, and ...I ...noticed someone had altered the setting of the rudder bar. Ugh-urrr!

'Oh, Jesus , this is it, this is it-just time to get above...Where the hell!'

Momentarily I panicked, my mouth became so dry it seemed I had been licking thousands of stamps.

Then my thoughts raced with a hare's rhythm. Battle had commenced!"

Once Kenneth Hemingway had attacked some enemy bombers with his Hurricane in this, his first enemy engagement he, by his own admission, was quite calm: "my nervousness had gone".

When I read this story (taken from Wings Over Burma, 1944) about a fighter pilot in the Second World War who flew alongside the AVG I was intrigued by his pre-combat 'nerves' and it reminded me much of something I'd read by Geoff Thompson who wrote comprehensively about the fight or flight phenomenon. I was also interested in the clarity or calmness that this pilot achieved in the midst of combat.

In Thompson's book 'Dead or Alive' he identifies aspects of adrenaline in order to understand, to know what the body undergoes in stressful situations. This way we can better face it when it actually happens. There is a huge section on adrenal reactions and I'd recommend getting hold of the book. Besides if I reproduced it all here Geoff Thompson would kick my head in...

As a taster here is his list, some of which can be seen in the above story.

Adrenal reaction

- Pre fight shakes

- Dry mouth

- Voice quiver

- tunnel vision

- Sweaty palms

- Nausea

- Bowel loosening

- Adrenal deafness

- Time distortion

(edited list)

As Hannibal Lecter said in Red Dragon, "Yes, that's the fear. It takes time and experience to master it..."

The second idea relating to martial training that I was minded of was 'mushin no shin' or mind of no mind. This is the state of mind open to all senses without being transfixed by anything. this freedom from extraneous 'clutter' enables the warrior to act and react without hindrance. A calmness just like the hurricane pilot felt after his initial adrenaline squirts.

Andy Hug and the Axe kick

Checking out Mark's training blog and I came across a post about axe kicks. There was of particular note an interesting video dedicated to Andy Hug (1964-2000), a Swiss born kyokushinkai karateka who gained fame on the F1 circuit in Japan and the amazing sobriquet of 'The blue-eyed samurai'. Even more amazing as he had brown eyes.

His trade mark axe kicks are quite something to see.

It seems to me that the effectiveness of the axe kick depends on getting the leg up very quickly. It's a confusing kick to counter as often. As the foot whips up into the air the defender feels like maybe a crescent kick is coming not knowing that it's really going to come slamming downwards usually on the clavicle, or perhaps even the chin. As the defender it's hard to pick this one out. See at about 41 seconds in the above video the defender raises both his hands either side of his head but too late for hug's kick to raise and pop straight down between them. Wollop (in the vernacular). At 1 minute 15-same deal in slow motion. Kick shoots up fast, confuses 'uke' who's arms protect either side of his head. Shame Hug's foot is now travelling down chinwards. Eat foot.

Hug obviously trained hard and long on getting his kicks rapidly up very high. This makes the axe kick devestating but also check out his spinning crescent kicks and spinning round kicks- fast, furious and fatal...

As with all high kicks there is a risk of becoming unstable and vulnerable to counter, especially if you're striking with force- you don't want to bounce off at this point! But see the way Hug stays rock solid: no tottering, stumbling or chance for the opponent to counter. Of course this is a 'best of' video but check out his stats: W37 (KO22) ,L9, D1. This guy worked and trained hard, and got his high kicks up rapidly.

http://www.andyhug.com/

Was Elvis really any good at karate?

Really good artilce here: Was Elvis Presley a Paper Tiger? Did the King Get a Real Black Belt?

Thanks to John W Zimmer for pointing it out.

The above inspired by Dojorat and Dan Prager's comments...

Autumn Lightning - The Education of an American Samurai by Dave Lowry. A Book Review.

Autumn lightning details not only Dave Lowry's apprenticeship and learning process with the Japanese sword but also the lineage of the style he practices: Yagyu Shinkage ryu weaving the two themes together with relevant insights and inner thought processes. This book is compelling as it is a personal journey which reflects the ancient philosophies and practices upon which this particular ryu was founded giving two aspects to this bugeisha's lifelong journey.

Don't be misled into thinking this is simply a narrative of Lowry's day to day training nor a dry recounting of the ryu's inception and subsequent history! Lowry also works in a lot of feeling about traditional martial arts and underlying philosophies which for me, as a martial artist, help make sense of some of the more esoteric aspects of budo. Easily readable this book covers some interesting concepts such as the spiritual side of training, the hard physical obligation of training, mushin, musogi and much more. 159 pages long in my version and with a good writing style I reckon there's no reason not to make this part of your martial arts reference library.

Master Alex Campbell

Taido (躰道)

Nathan Teodoro brought my attention to Taido on the convocation of combat arts (a cool martial arts networking and discussion site) and I thought I'd post a video or two of this quite spectacular style of karate which uses lots of spinning and jumping techniques making for interesting jissen (or randori).

Interestingly the founder, Shukumine, wanted to update karate with more flexible and less 'linear' movement.

Check out the result here...

Taido blog here.

What remains...

"Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten."

B.F. Skinner

This makes me think of Picasso-somebody who mastered the rules, then forgot them.

Most people think of Picasso's paintings as being of the abstract or cubist variety. His politically charged and poignant Bombing of Guernica is a fine example of his analytical and cubist style which he, along with Georges Braque, pioneered and for which he is well known. What some people fail to understand is that in his early life he was an exquisite realistic painter, mostly leaning towards neo-classicism which was popular at the time. At the age of 15 he painted the incredibly life-like 'First Communion' (1895/96) which prompted his own father (and teacher) to give his son his own palette and brushes and vow never to paint again! 

Although Picasso may be known for his fantastic and innovative cubist work and possibly later in his life for his whacky neo-expressionist work it can't be forgotten that this guy was an innovator and art pioneer who had gone through the process of learning the rules-mastering them even so as to be able to (at a very early age) create paintings with almost photographic detail and then pushed through those rules, burning them up forming new styles, new adventures in art.

Sound familiar? It should. Martial artists do similar things. Learn the rules-practice hard and do the basics well. Then get your black belt. It's after this we can start pushing boundaries, looking at other styles (if that's what takes your fancy) or just looking deeper into your own style and making it your own. We might not end up being a Martial Arts Picasso but at the very least we should, just like him, learn the basics thoroughly in order to master them. It's then that our true journey of discovery begins. (See also this article about black belt being merely the introduction...)

Hilarious

Why oh why...?

The art of war

I visited Duxford Imperial war museum today with my daughter. It was a beautiful clear skied day with a strong wind which cooled us as we walked from hanger to hanger. Whilst in the incredible Norman Foster built American Hanger I was minded of the amazing price young men paid for my freedom during the Second World War. The hell some of them went through. I remember watching a documentary about the making of Saving Private Ryan when Tom Hanks paraphrased Spielberg by stating that we all know war is hell, but that war films never really portrayed this, always erring on the heroic and 'glamorous' side of army life. Well Spielberg certainly changed the war film genre as we know it huh?

But I digress somewhat. My main point was that as I saw memorials I wondered about the art of war, and realised that martial art means literally that. "relating to, or characteristic of war, soldiers, or the military life" (Collins). Further investigation sees the term coming from the Roman god Mars (god of war). Having recently read a story about a spitfire pilot who had (during the war) shot down a Dornier and watched the crew bale out only to realise, in horror, that one of the crew's parachutes had become entangled in the tail structure, I wondered whether martial arts as I practice would have helped this military man? Surely they aren't related. And less so these days with more precise and modern weaponry...

I can see how a martial code and training in a fighting school may have helped hundreds of year ago. Saxon soldiers stood on Senlac hill (picture above with the Abbey of Battle in the background) holding shields in the famous 'wall' as well as their heavy battle axes holding off a strong horse-mounted Norman foe in 1066. I'm sure that both these protagonists would have needed schooling in the arts of war. William of Poitiers said, "It was a strange kind of battle, one side attacking with all mobility, the other withstanding, as though rooted to the soil". Different martial philosophies being tested in battle. Surely this is martial art-kicking and punching and hacking limbs in a mortal struggle to annihilate the enemy?

Can I really develop a sense of what it's like to be at war and use this in my daily life? For example Zanshin is an element of modern training which we aspire to, but I'll never acquire the level of total awareness that this guy did: Terry L. Bryan was in a K-9 unit serving deep in the jungle with just his rifle and his dog. After spending so much time in the jungle and listening outwardly and inwardly theybecame so attuned to the senses of the jungle they could smell people who were out of sight and even be able to judge whether they were Asiatic or American. Read his amazing story here on Fighting Arts.

No, I don't think I'm cut out to be a soldier, but I am a martial artist: someone who uses combat tools and strategies to appraise his own life: not only in a metaphysical way but a bodily one too. My studies help me in my daily life either by working through a situation clearly in my mind or being focused on the moment in order to do something truly well, or even just to sit correctly aligning my spine and muscles as I sit and type a blog.

Some schools of martial arts insist that theirs is still a way of killing and I don't think we should lose sight of this heritage as it clearly lays out our techniques for combat and immobilisation but I like to take elements of these strange (almost archaic) fighting or war arts into my daily life as it's clear I am no soldier. Warriors do however have warrior codes such as 'Noblesse oblige'. a code which helps the warrior lead their lives in society as well as martial times.

These codes can also help us set out clear goals in our lives.

Happy training in your chosen art.

Joe Hyams dies at 85

"Joe Hyams, a former Hollywood columnist and bestselling author of books ranging from biographies of Humphrey Bogart and James Dean to a popular tome on Eastern philosophy, has died. He was 85.

"Besides his reputation as a Hollywood chronicler, Hyams also was known as an icon in the martial arts community.

"Hyams, who studied martial arts for more than 50 years, was the author of the 1979 book "Zen In the Martial Arts."

http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-hyams12-2008nov12,0,6624967.story