The first Arms Culture Association Sparring Competition

[Lance Chan]

We provided the sparring equipment and video recording service to the event. Here's the report of the competition. The winner received a Chinese made katana as a prize sponsored by the organizer.

http://www.rsw.com.hk/activities.htm#competition


Worth noticing was Tom's video. He's a sword and buckler and a rapier player, but chose the former weapon combination to fight in the competition as a VIP. He only got 1 life point, and no further progression into the competition. Yet he whooped ass of every opponent. See the WMA power. I think he did a better job to spearhead WMA's proficiency in the competition than I could ever do.



BTW, I wasn't allowed to fight in the competition but you can see part of my demo fight with Kie Brooks at the end of his video.

[Matthew_Anderson]

Life points? Sounds like they set this up as a handicap system of some sort but it still sounds pretty LARPish and weird to me. Was any grappling/disarming, etc, allowed? Was any type of weapon allowed? How come your boy Tom couldn't adavnce and win the tournament? Part of me likes the competitive aspects of events like this but they never seem to be done in a realistic, martially sound way without lots of weird rules. BTW, I would have to run away and spend the rest of my life as a hermit if I were beaten by a Tai Chi instructor

[Eric Dohner]

BTW, I would have to run away and spend the rest of my life as a hermit if I were beaten by a Tai Chi instructor Wink

Forgive a quick off-topic diversion...

I once took a couple of years of Tai Chi (empty-handed, no weapons). While I'm not an expert by any means, and there was no sparring involved, many of the principles seemed quite sound, and the instructor could generally explain them in Western terms of leverage. I think I actually learned more about body mechanics in that class than I ever did in two years of karate.

I have a sneaking suspicion that Tai Chi or the other "internal" arts would be viciously effective if they were utilized with combat in mind, but again, I'm no expert.

[Matthew_Anderson]

BTW, I would have to run away and spend the rest of my life as a hermit if I were beaten by a Tai Chi instructor Wink

Forgive a quick off-topic diversion...

I once took a couple of years of Tai Chi (empty-handed, no weapons). While I'm not an expert by any means, and there was no sparring involved, many of the principles seemed quite sound, and the instructor could generally explain them in Western terms of leverage. I think I actually learned more about body mechanics in that class than I ever did in two years of karate.

I have a sneaking suspicion that Tai Chi or the other "internal" arts would be viciously effective if they were utilized with combat in mind, but again, I'm no expert.

I'd put my money on the fighter who does hard contact sparring on a regular basis over any "internal" art practitioner, no matter how much he knew about "body mechanics".

[Eric Dohner]

BTW, I would have to run away and spend the rest of my life as a hermit if I were beaten by a Tai Chi instructor Wink

I have a sneaking suspicion that Tai Chi or the other "internal" arts would be viciously effective if they were utilized with combat in mind, but again, I'm no expert.

I'd put my money on the fighter who does hard contact sparring on a regular basis over any "internal" art practitioner, no matter how much he knew about "body mechanics".

"With combat in mind" was meant to imply contact sparring.

[Lance Chan]

The life points mean only how many hits it take to kick the one out of the fight. It doesn't mean you can hit continuously and deduct all the points that way like you play in LARP though. After each hit, both parties were separated and start again in new position as in normal sparring practice until one side has expired his chances.

Tom is too good for the competition and he wasn't allowed to advance above the division fights. It was agreed beforehand.

Grappling and disarming are allowed. Due to space limitation, weapons being too long are not allowed but otherwise there were no style limitation.

Life points? Sounds like they set this up as a handicap system of some sort but it still sounds pretty LARPish and weird to me. Was any grappling/disarming, etc, allowed? Was any type of weapon allowed? How come your boy Tom couldn't adavnce and win the tournament? Part of me likes the competitive aspects of events like this but they never seem to be done in a realistic, martially sound way without lots of weird rules. BTW, I would have to run away and spend the rest of my life as a hermit if I were beaten by a Tai Chi instructor

[Aaron Pynenberg]

"Tom's too good to be in the competition"- yes, that sounds fair, the guy who is most skilled should not get the trophy-makes perfect sense to me?????

[Lance Chan]

The competition was organized for the members of Arms Culture Association, which Tom isn't one. In fact, it was organized because several members of the association thought

1. RSW was not safe enough for full contact combat. Full contact combat can't make friends. There are no way to simulate full contact weaponary combat in the world.

2. They thought if Kie Brooks had been hitting me in our previous sparring practice according to the Taichi's special way (to neck, to groin, to armpits...), I would have been killed already.

3. If one "fajing", RSW can kill too.

The head of the association is my personal friend and he made the competition with an aim to convince those members for me. I brought Tom there as a VIP to show what a proficient fighter in WMA style would fight like to open up their minds. With the issues I had with some of the members, I was also "banned" from joining the competition.

However, I did fight the champion Kie Brooks after the prize-giving ceremony to demonstrate how well the German style longsword would fare.

And it is indeed someone who practiced in hard contact sparring won the fight because Kie is one of our regular fighters.... just in a different style.

"Tom's too good to be in the competition"- yes, that sounds fair, the guy who is most skilled should not get the trophy-makes perfect sense to me?????

[Aaron Pynenberg]

I guess these issues bring to mind why we should stay out of "Organized competitions", these issues you mention, they seem really very trivial-

"full contact combat" -I have never heard of such a term, maybe it's a translation thing but this would imply, punching, kicking etc...I have seen none of that in the videos, does this comp allow that?

-"full contact combat can't make friends"-oh, I disagree maybe when you are not fighting for a Katana it can, I have had several hard bouts with guys that i consider very good freinds even though the limits of our conact were very short- it can tear down barriers, egos, falsities etc very quickly.

It's funny but what it is it about a "Competition" or "Tourney" that brings out all these rules and conditions....oh ya that's right because we all want to be No.1, it's just natural.

This is why it's important that we keep doing what we in ARMA do, and allow the rest to do their thing, your skills with the sword, your journey, not where do you rank, can you beat everyone and win the katana...??

[Corey Roberts]

What is a life point? And how can you whoop ass on your opponents and not progress I'm confused.

[Lance Chan]

First of all, this competition were organized mainly for the association's members, who are not experienced in weaponry sparring. The life points mean how many rounds you have to win to win the fight. Each time you hit him, he lost one life point. Then separate to start another round. You win after you take all his life points or lose after you lose all of yours.

There were some slots left open by "no-show" competitors and we put in VIP into the slot, but they are not allowed to progress even if they win all the fight in the division fights because they totally outclassed the others, which the latter was the main target of this competition.

Again, this is not an "OPEN" competition but a competition aimed for the members of the association with an agenda to let the newbies tries what's it like in weaponry sparring.

What is a life point? And how can you whoop ass on your opponents and not progress I'm confused.