Martial Vitality

This week I attended several extended training sessions offered by Trident Martial Arts . One of the sessions included Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu-styled grappling, with a focus on extracting elements for combatives situations. It sounded like I needed a BJJ gi. The last time I wore anything like that was my sophomore year at the Air Force Academy, when I took a judo class for one of my physical education requirements. I turned to online vendors with a very clear mission: buy a gi that was of decent quality, and was as plain and white as possible. I had read about the "plain white gi" requirement in several articles. Basically, when visiting another school, you don't want to be an advertisement for your home school. Now, I don't train BJJ at my home school, but I still didn't want my gi to look like the inside of a MMA octagon. Therefore, I searched for plain white gis. I bought the  Your Jiu Jitsu Gear Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Uniform White with FREE BJJ White Belt pictured ...

I'll admit it. Last week I checked out what sorts of shoes the guys in my Krav Maga classes were wearing. I prefer to wear sneakers when training, because I wear orthotics. I also don't walk barefoot on the street, so I like to train in shoes. I didn't always practice martial arts in shoes, but at this point in my career I prefer to wear them. For the last seven months I wore black Nike Air Monarch IV cross-training shoes. These worked pretty well, but they suffered a few drawbacks, especially weight and undue contact with mats. I primarily chose them because they were sold in wide sizes, they were black, and they were cross-trainers. Last week I decided to take a closer look at the shoes the instructors were wearing. That primarily means you, Sam and Chris. I noticed these two high-ranking gentlemen were wearing wrestling shoes. I hadn't wrestled since high school gym class, and certainly not in special shoes. However, I decided to do some research and buy a pair. The...

Have you ever broken a board? If you practice a Karate or Tae Kwon Do-related system, I assume the answer is yes. So what's the point, especially for kids? In this post, part of my series on martial arts business practices, I will share why board breaking might be a tool for attracting and motivating younger martial artists, and perhaps even their families. Several of the  Martial Arts SuperShow (MASS) speakers talked about the power of board breaking, especially for kids. At the time of the show, I had little experience with the kids version of the exercise. I had only broken boards as an adult during my year in military intelligence school, when I studied Tae Kwon Do. I remembered thinking it was a fun exercise, and that I needed to pay close attention to placement and punching or kicking "past the board." So how could this be useful for kids? The MASS business consultants discussed board breaking in several contexts. First, they offered four benefits for kids who bre...