So with everything I’ve written you might get the false conclusion that I don’t see any value in Eastern martial arts such as karate, taekwondo, and the like and think boxing is superior in all ways but this is not true at all. My biggest issue is simply with the way that most Eastern martial arts are unfortunately taught in the West and the lack of full contact sparring (as opposed to point sparring, don’t get me wrong that’s great but no replacement for real sparring). And overall if a kid/guy wants to learn to actually fight (keep word being actually) that he’s better off going to the average boxing gym over the average Eastern martial arts gym (for the sake of the discussion we’ll omit grappling for now). I think I’ve written an article about this but never published it (will look through and see if I can get it up now). However with all of this being said there is a big problem that I have with the average boxing gym.
And the “funny” part is it’s kind of the opposite problem that I have with the average karate dojo. If each martial art took from the other on these few points both would be much better. Boxing would attract higher quality prospects and be able to gain a lot of what it’s lost and karate and the like wouldn’t be the laughing stock of the martial arts world (don’t get wrong plenty of tough karate guys out there it’s just for every one of them you have 10 Sensei donuts and 5 “black belts” who’d get dropped by a guy who’s spent 3 months in a boxing gym). And it revolved around something I value very highly, full contact sparring.
Sparring – The Greatest & Worst Developer Ever
Technique is great and so crucial. Working out is essential after all you need to be conditioned to fight to your full ability. Mitts and bags are great and something that every fighter should use to sharpen their skills. And of course shadowboxing and kata work are great for really drilling down those techniques. Going slow motion of a unresisting opponent is great for getting the general idea of a movement and how it’s supposed to work. However none of it (and I mean none of it) is a replacement for full contact sparring. But with that being said there is a right way and a wrong way to do full contact sparring. And it’s this wrong way of doing it that puts so many otherwise good fighters off of boxing. So boxing gyms do get it right in that they have full contact sparring and often a whole hell of a lot of it. However here’s the biggest issue that I see and had I been smarter might have turned me off of it.
And that is sending a beginner who’s had a few months of training under his belt into the ring for full speed full contact sparring and having him get his lights beaten out (and occasionally something more serious). We’ve all seen it before. The advanced guy wanting to show off by either smacking the beginner around or the beginner getting pissed and start swing wildly while he gets tagged left and right, and so on and so forth. It soon becomes an unfair brawl. And no one learns anything from it. And a lot of kids (the smart ones at least) don’t want to keep getting back to get head trauma every week. They think it’s about toughness when it’s actually about skill and learning.
Full Contact Is Essential For Ultimate Development But…
Not something beginners should just be thrown into without guidance. Throwing someone to the wolves doesn’t prove their tough or have what it takes and is no way to teach the skill of boxing or any martial art in general. Boxing more so than any other martial art I’ve trained in has a macho attachment to it, where everyone in the gym just tries to beat each others heads off. Not always and usually have some good guys who stuck around for whatever reason but far too often it turns into the neighborhood slug fest (this could also have to do with many boxing gyms being non-profits run from community centers and the like as opposed to a small business like most dojos). So again full contact sparring is a most and something that is critical to developing real combat ability and being actually able to fight (and if this is of no concern to you why the heck are you doing a martial art? Weight training and cardio will give you a far better workout). But it’s not something to dive head first into.
So with boxing the problem I see is throwing guys in there without a clue and getting them pounded whereas with many other Eastern martial arts it’s not doing enough full contact sparring. Overall you do need to go some time without sparring and as a matter of fact (maybe I’m wrong here) but your first couple of months doing a martial art you’d actually be a worse fighter than before. Only because you start to think. A guy with one month of martial art training who’s going to think for that split second is going to often get beat by that exact same guy had he not done any training and just reacted “naturally”. But after a short (depending on your definition) period of time in striking slow sparring should start and eventually after a couple months (or so) led up to full contact sparring where the real skills are developed. Grappling things are a little different and you can jump in much sooner but striking’s a bit different. And this isn’t to say full contact sparring needs to be done every day or should be done every day but it should be a constant part of training, not once a month.
Conclusion
And this will change depending on the person. I’ve never trained a pro and am not pro myself so maybe they’d be different but what I’m talking about here is the average person going to the average gym with average abilities to get the most “fighting ability” out of his chosen martial art whatever that may be. My main points being if you’re practicing a martial art but not doing real sparring you’ll fall to pieces when you actually have to call on those abilities and my second point being with that being said sparring is something that you have to be smart about otherwise it works against you. And as always I’m speaking from my limited experience what I’ve seen I do not nor ever will know everything but this is my two cents on the subject.
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-Charles Sledge
