Starting out - equipment?

[ChristineChurches]

Mr. Gunther -

I realize that you are new to our forum and therefore have no idea of the scope of experience encompassed by our membership. We all understand that injuries can come from the strangest of hits.

However, one must remember that you are not trying to club your training partner like a baby seal - you need him to take/give another beating the next time you meet. This is a problem I see with extensive use of padded weapons - people hit harder because they are thinking full contact, all out, when that is not necessary if one has technique.

Some people feel that the answer is to pad their body more; the problem with that is our ancestors trained for blossfechten without much protection. While I realize that our art was their life's work, I'm sure they had the same issues as we do with injury management and training.

My answer is learn how to use proper techniques and control - its amazing how many fewer injuries will occur.

[Timothy Gunther]

I don't use any protection when sparing...I am merely thinking of the safety of people newer to the art as being hit in pressure points especially near the armpit, inner thy, and pelvic joints with a wooden/hard weapon can cause extreme pain and in some cases unconsciousness, as I have seen it before and it took me forever to get the person back into sparing.

I don't know about you but I can feel a strike with a wooden weapon through padding rather well.

anyway I'll shut up now then.

[Stacy Clifford]

Yes, you can definitely still feel a good strong hit through padding, there's no denying that, but it still frequently makes the difference between a sore spot and a dark purple spot and is worth it for that on the places you get hit the hardest most of the time. As for the pressure point hits you described, they might be more common targets in the Asian arts you've done, but the defenses we learn tend to protect those areas pretty well and they are rarely hit. I've never seen anybody taken down for the rest of the day by a nerve strike of any kind, usually only for a few minutes. I've been thumped in the funny bone and the kidneys a couple of times, but the stun doesn't last that long. New members usually start off sparring with padded weapons for a little while until they learn control before sparring with wood. We are well aware than anything can happen in sparring, but our assessment of the risks and the odds is based on hundreds of members with thousands of hours of sparring experience specifically in our art based on our teachings, so we have a pretty good idea what is more likely to happen and how often. Our recommendations for protection are based on those experiences.

[NicholasBurris]

Thank you for the advice on sparring equipment everyone

I think I will buy a pair of padded weapons for sparring, I have some control from sport fencing but the techniques for genuine martial arts are different and I can't even say that about some of my potential sparring parters.

I'll also purchase a WI waster for pell practice, and construct my own pell...I've found an article on various types of pells with some ideas on how to construct them in the articles and essays section.