Mumsnet Martial Artists

[RubberDuck]

The runners have their thread, thought it would be nice to have a thread for the Mumsnet MAers - surely I'm not the only one?

As an intro - my martial art of choice is a blend of Wing Chun and have been practising it for just over a year now. Would love to have the space (and the money) for a wooden training dummy, but looks like I'll have to hold fire for now.

There seems to be a shortage of message boards for women in martial arts - would be interested in sharing experiences (and injuries, heh) with others out there.

We have a sensei like that. His current thing is sit-ups - sit-ups in the warmup, sit-ups for every mistake we make (eg not enough effort, thumping our feet down etc) and situps at the end of class. At least he does them too, and doesn't just watch us and laugh.

Mind you, my all-time most hated exercise is what I call 'standy-upp sitty-downy thingies'. I'm sure there's a better/more technical name but I can't remember it. You do the exercise with a partner. They sit on the floor with their legs out, you wedge your feet under their thighs. They grip the backs of your calves. Then you have to lie down, back on the floor, before swooping up to standing, then back down to sitting and then lying again. For some reason these flippin' things defeat me every time- unless I'm partnered with one particular man, who pulls me effortlessly up by my calves, making me look good with virtually no effort on my part.

Can't quite visualise those, Shodan. What muscles do they work?

And it was such a descriptive description too, Butterbur! .

Erm let's see :- stomach and thighs mostly, I guess. Good for balance, too, I suppose. If you imagine a full sit-up, then extend it by standing up at the end of each sit-up, that's more or less it.

Mostly it seems to provide sensei with some amusement. (sighs)

Well I think I've done enough sit ups by now to be able to stand up on my own!

Abs of steel!

Yes yes, I have the abs of steel. I have the strong thigh muscles too. And indeed, left to my own devices I can stand up perfectly well all by myself.

Which is why I can't understand why these things beat me!

Yup, chin ups with a bar.

I started out not being able to do a single chin up - could barely lift myself one inch off the floor. Managed to build it up to around 29 chin ups (again totalled between 5 sets) before inconveniently needing my appendix taken out so I'm having to build it up again!

I do at least enjoy doing them though, even when I'm defeated.

Jealous of your abs of steel - see aforementioned appendectomy

Five months ago now, and still slowly building myself back up to where I was before...

You can do chin ups?

I may have abs of steel, but I have arms of cooked spaghetti!

Ah, now that's one thing Wing Chun was good for - having to have good upper body strength. Now, I can't kick for shit

bumping.

I'm back at kickboxing after 5 years of slog with babies & toddlers. Managed to spar last night, I was pretty girly (never been a good fighter just for the sake of it) but didn't get pummelled.

I was told to stop hitting the focus pads too hard .

Slight movement problems today, can't laugh and stairs are tricky.

Nice to see this thread revived. Congratulations Meglet. Pad work is great for stress!

I am grading for 2nd kyu (brown belt with one white stripe) in shotokan karate a few weeks.

Ooo this has been revived, fantastic :)

I've found a couple of great female-centric blogs that I'm enjoying at the moment which others here might enjoy:

Stumptuous which is more of a fitness/weights/strength training resource for women. Very very good and scientifically sound.

Modern Athena a great blog centred around women fighters & weight lifters.

And more of a general cross-discipline martial arts blog and podcast:

Martial Secrets

I can see where I'm going to be wasting my time today, Rubberduck.

Are you still doing Krav Magar? how's it going?

I'm really enjoying it :) I've taken the pace right down - I'd got so stressed in my previous club that it had really sucked all enjoyment out of it.

I've realised I'm not in a race to collect gradings, and I'd rather take my time and get the basics solid. Have had some brilliant seminars as well where you get to focus on a particular situation (knife attack, nightclub, legal aspects etc) for several hours.

I tell you what though, I'm really having to up my cardio fitness to keep up!

I find that with karate too. In fact last summer I took up running - something I never thought I'd be inspired to do, and now run about 20k a week. I found to my surprise that most of the senior grades had done something similar as they got higher up. It always seemed to be just me struggling with fitness.

Yay. We're all back!

Good luck for your grading, Butterbur. Make sure you come back and let us know how you got on!

I know what you mean about the fitness thing. The last grading I did nearly killed me (over-dramatic ) and I realised if I'm going to pass 2nd dan I really need to do something. The problem is I hate cardio work... I need someone to bully me into it!

Still I've got...erm... a year and a half to worry about that. No problem.

On a more depressing note (well for me anyway. And the rest of our region!) my club has decided that we're being too rough with our sparring. They have dictated that all sparring is to be non-contact. Blocking should be gentle.

I have (as does my sensei) a problem with this. In our opinion changing the rules like this reduces karate to, basically, an exercise class, of the type you can take in any gym. It developed as a means to defend oneself against attack. Indeed, if you read the website, in the 'What is required to grade to next level' section, it says that a black belt should be able to defend themselves against most unarmed attacks.

Now, if you have never been on the receiving end of a punch or kick- how on earth are you going to be able to recover and respond to an attack? It's ludicrous.

Fortunately my sensei believes the same thing and within our region we have controlled contact sparring.

Anyway. Rant over.

Ugh, yes. I think contact sparring is really important - it's not always nice, but it's such an important part of training.

Re: cardio. I'm not a huge fan either, but my main issue with cardio is lung capacity (am asthmatic). My Krav instructor recommended kettlebell training and I have to say, after initial scepticism, it's really helping a lot. It's cardio/strength training all in one, stretches me a lot (to the point I'm gasping for air at the end ) and (once you've got the right weight) doesn't take up a huge load of time.

Our club seems to have done less sparring since I dislocated my finger in the autumn, trying to block a kick with it. Maybe all the senseis started thinking of their insurance, or maybe it's just coincidence.

When we had a club competition, the men got a bit carried away, and there were broken noses, black eyes, broken ribs, and broken feet. while I understand what you say about knowing what a punch feels like, I'm not sure I could take that sort of battering. It was supposed to be light contact too.

That seems an opposite extreme, Butterbur :(

Heya,

Lovely to find a thread about martial arts, I haven't had a chance to read it all through yet!
I did a bit of karate a few years ago, only up to a yellow belt before the club moved location and I couldn't go anymore.

I only just recently started Muay Thai (about a month ago) and really liking it so far! I have a personal trainer twice a week who I do boxing/weight training/cardio with who says my level of fitness is excellent.

Thanks rubberduck for the sumptuois website link, very interesting! I like BodyBuilding.com it also has a forum!

Looking forward to hearing about people's experiences on here :)

Welcome June - lovely to have you on the thread :)

I've heard a lot of wonderful things about Muay Thai so will be interested to hear how you get on!

I have to admit I'm considering getting a personal trainer next year- if I can find one who's prepared to bully me into doing what needs to be done!

Butterbur - ouchy! Funny though about your club seeming to do less sparring- I wonder if insurance companies in general have put their rates up for this kind of thing? I also remember our club competitions being more full-on but certainly they had softened by the one and only time I entered one! (I got a warning for 'pushing'. I didn't push. I was just more of an aggressive sparrer than my opponent!)

Muay Thai sounds good- make sure you keep us updated June!

I love having a personal trainer, and I'm just straight with them if I think the weight is not enough I tell them. (then I regret it because it's hard but hey, if you're paying for it it has got to be effective otherwise you're wasting your money!!)
I would advise you to try several trainers before you commit. Maybe three sessions per trainer and then move on to see what else there is on the market?

My excellent trainer is moving to greece (argh!) and I'm trying another one out for three weeks and then another one for three weeks.
I already think I want to train with the second one but he is on holiday so I think it is a great opportunity to try someone else out, you just never know.

I used to train with female trainer, this time round the circumstances made it that I trained with a male and I think it works better for me.

Hello there, anyone know of a good Wing Chun place or session around the Walthamstow area, London E17? I think from what I have read it's probably the best form of defense for kids.