The majority of karate schools, today, fall into two camps, both of which are almost entirely creations of Post-WW2 Japan:
- Budo Karate – The focus is primarily on health and personal development through physical training, as well as the preservation of styles exactly as they were taught by the instructor, without any alteration or evolution
- Sport Karate – The focus is on aesthetic performance of solo kata and training to win sparring matches that follow very specific popular rulesets, and alterations or evolution within the styles are accepted if they improve competitive performance
That said, there is a third camp that has been growing in popularity:
- Practical/Neoclassical Karate – The focus is on returning to karate’s roots as an effective style for self-defense, law enforcement, and security work, using the classical kata as templates for combative methods that fit those contexts, with alterations or evolution being encouraged if they improve students’ ability to perform these methods under pressure
I honestly don’t think I need to go into much detail on how the first two train, because they are so popular; they almost exclusively follow a 3K approach of Kihon, Kata, and Kumite, which are very loosely connected, if at all. Practical or neoclassical karate’s goal is twofold. On the one hand, we want to train our students to be able to effectively defend themselves and others, as well as be combatively effective in the realms of law enforcement and security, if that’s appropriate for the student. On the other hand, we’re trying to preserve the art as it was intended to be prior to Itosu introducing it to the school system and people like Funakoshi popularizing the Budo version of the art.
Since the classical/koryu kata were developed as templates to record, train, and reinforce combative movements and structures that were meant to be applied in self-defense, law enforcement, and security work, those are where we get our curriculum. We have a wide array of example applications that exist across many different styles, as well as examples that were documented by various masters in the early 1900s, and we know the overarching concepts and principles that were used (meotode, muchimidi, chinkuchi, tuidi, chibudi, etc.). Combine that with the various writings we have regarding how to interpret the kata, and we can derive a vast array of combative applications and drills from those kata to teach to our students. The benefit of this approach is that, because the kata are templates, we have nearly infinite possibilities to explore in variations of those templates.
Now, once we have contextually-appropriate applications, we have to train them in a manner that develops the skills necessary to actually use them. This means we drill them in isolation, then incorporate them into platform drills (things like kakie, parry-pass, block-pass-check/hubud lubud, etc.), then work them in flow drills to develop awareness for failure cascades, then work them into a variety of sparring methods (kakedameshi, bully sparring, MMA-style sparring, etc.), then into scenario role-play exercises where we replicate real-life self-defense situations and practice de-escalation, escape and evasion, and direct combatives with opponents reacting and resisting appropriately. Through all of this, we also reinforce the techniques through bagwork, padwork, and makiwara training, as well as trying to improve the strength and conditioning of our students through hojo undo (supplementary exercise), both using traditional tools like chi-ishi (power stones/stone mallets) and ishi-sashi (stone locks/kettlebells), but also modern tools like dumbbells and barbells. The practice of solo kata remains, but it is meant for students to train when they don’t have a partner available so that they have a physical practice to combine with visualization of the drills they have worked with partners. This reinforces the structures and movement patterns at full speed, with full power, and through full range of motion, without concern for injuring a partner.
When going through the “drill breaking” process, as well as various sparring methods, it’s very common for students to “discover” applications on their own. They generally don’t realize it, though, so I like to do some debriefing after such sessions, pointing out where they used techniques that fit other parts of the kata, or other kata, entirely. Periodically, I do like to challenge students to come up with their own applications and show them to me in class, but when I do that depends on the student–when they are able to pick up WHY a technique is an application for a given posture or movement, without me explaining it, they’re typically ready to start their own bunkai process.
I use multiple sparring rulesets–selecting one is inherently limiting, and I don’t see that as being beneficial. These fall into two categories, for me; symmetrical and asymmetrical.
Symmetrical:
- Kickboxing style sparring
- Hands-only
- Grappling randori (standing, ground, or both)
- MMA style sparring
- Kakedameshi (sticky hands sparring that allows for just about all techniques from kata)
- Clinch sparring
Asymmetrical:
- Hand techniques vs leg techniques
- Grappler vs striker
- All-in vs. limited techniques (for example, one person can fight with everything they know, while the other is limited specifically to takedowns, or joint locks, or leg kicks, etc.)
- “Bully Sparring” (defender vs. bully who applies constant pressure and just keeps punching no matter what)
- Self-defense scenario sparring (roleplay between defender and possible assailants that can be de-escalated or devolve into fighting)
- Multiple attacker sparring using any of the above methods
- “Plus One Factor” sparring (opponent has a weapon, usually initially hidden) using any of the above methods.
I find that the methods of kata work very well, provided your sparring methods are putting you into situations where those methods fit. The thing to remember is that most kata applications are meant for you to be fighting within arm’s reach, so if you’re doing long range kickboxing sparring, you’re going to have a hard time pressure testing those techniques. If the sparring you’re doing forces you to fight at close range, though, you have a wide array of options available, and many of them are unorthodox enough that you can surprise people who train in other arts, which is pretty fun.
There are, of course, some concessions that have to be made for safety, here and there, but I just see that as an added challenge. Wearing safety goggles or face shields to be able to spar with eye pokes at speed, otherwise you have to adjust to touching the forehead, or pushing beneath the cheekbones to safely replace those techniques. Light contact to the head to reduce instances of TBI means that you won’t always get authentic reactions from your partners when you hit them. Attacks to the joints would normally be done quickly and violently to cause damage, but we have to do them slow enough for our partner to move with them or tap out, which means they’re more likely to slip free. Attacks to the throat or ears need to be replaced with touches and careful grabs, again meaning that you may not get authentic reactions from your partners. All of these things can be done to make sparring with dangerous techniques safer, and help you develop the ability to actually use those techniques under pressure.
