Most
martial arts dojos in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis/St. Paul)
area either emphasize competition/sparring, or offer “traditional”
training. Competition/sparring, to the unknowledgeable,
often appear to offer a measure of quality. This why many business-oriented
studios emphasize it – It helps sales and makes students
feel like they are learning and doing well. While sparring can
be a useful training tool for higher ranked students under the
right circumstances, emphasis on it, and particularly using
sparring competition as a goal of training, has many negative
effects which severely limit training quality. Part
of what karate training does is teach the body a way to react
that is not built-in, or innate. Sparring competition, instead
of cultivating a highly effective, non-innate way to react in
a self-defense situation, accentuates less effective, mostly
innate skills and develops downright dangerous habits for self-defense.
These include training only to react when ready, concentrating
on only a single opponent, and relying only on punching and
kicking or only on grappling depending on the martial arts style.
Further, holding competition as the goal often results in teachers,
students and the style itself not looking out for, or even harming,
the long-term health of the students.
Our
style has a direct lineage and heritage that dates back
several hundred years, and has been developed by masters
who used it to defend themselves against individuals and
groups, armed and unarmed...
At East-West Karate, we do not
train for competition or for sparring (although sparring is
used occasionally in our high rank training). We instead
train in a living martial art (Yamashita-Ha Kobayashi Shorin-Ryu)
that has been developed with three purposes in mind: Self-Defense,
Longevity/Health, and Life Improvement. Our style has a direct
lineage and heritage that dates back several hundred years,
and has been developed by masters who used it to defend themselves
against individuals and groups, armed and unarmed, and who lived
well into their 80’s and beyond. This art has been passed
down from master to master, generation to generation,
Our
art encompasses much more than how to “win”
at sparring, and benefits from generations more knowledge
than one particular individual who has won a “World
Championship”
with each subsequent master
adding to the knowledge of the former masters. Our art encompasses
much more than how to “win” at sparring, and benefits
from generations more knowledge than one particular individual
who has won a “World Championship”. Our art contains
and emphasizes those things needed to protect and improve your
life, passed down by those who have personally benefited from
the same things and led long, fruitful lives.
Most
martial arts dojos in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis/St. Paul)
area either emphasize competition/sparring, or offer “traditional”
training. Competition/sparring, to the unknowledgeable,
often appear to offer a measure of quality. This why many business-oriented
studios emphasize it – It helps sales and makes students
feel like they are learning and doing well. While sparring can
be a useful training tool for higher ranked students under the
right circumstances, emphasis on it, and particularly using
sparring competition as a goal of training, has many negative
effects which severely limit training quality. Part
of what karate training does is teach the body a way to react
that is not built-in, or innate. Sparring competition, instead
of cultivating a highly effective, non-innate way to react in
a self-defense situation, accentuates less effective, mostly
innate skills and develops downright dangerous habits for self-defense.
These include training only to react when ready, concentrating
on only a single opponent, and relying only on punching and
kicking or only on grappling depending on the martial arts style.
Further, holding competition as the goal often results in teachers,
students and the style itself not looking out for, or even harming,
the long-term health of the students. 
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