Claims about MMA

[MysticNinjaJay]

No, the Iron Palmer does parlor trick breaking. If he tried to actually fight for real, he would be just as likely to break his hand as the boxer.

If so then surely you know the secret behind the alleged trick.

I have yet to see the guy who breaks things in demos be able to step out back and strike through a brick wall in the alley outside.

A brick wall is a bit different from a stack of bricks. And a little thing called vandalism would make it unlikely to ever see such a video.

Maybe an iron palm prationer could strike a brick wall that has been contructed for their demo.

Now I'm not saying there is no chance that people can fake the ability to break bricks. You could form the brick out of a brittle substance that resembles a solid brick and is easy to destroy.

But don't you think that a controlled experiment broadcast in a documentary by a reputed scientific organization like National Geographic has some credibility?

Surely Rickson Gracie would not participate in a show that presented parlor tricks as authentic martial arts skill.

LOL... more rip-off brainwashing of students.

Possibly. He did perform a technique on the host of the documentary, or maybe he is just a liar. Ofcourse if Dim Mak were legit you could do it on anyone not just students.

[Notintheface]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lpRk...watch_response

This does not look like San Da now does it? This guy is headed in the right direction.

You need to remeber that *Traditional* Chinese martial arts were about fighting. If you truely teach traditionally, the TCMA will have the same experiance against resisting opponents as the MMA. It's only the modern CMA that are not training right.

This is a falsehood. When I was in New York all those years ago I was able to train under Sifus who still think kung fu works that way they teach it. I am talking about teacher Lueng Shum's age. They still think that what they teach is viable.

By vertical do you mean in the air? Because downward is also a vertical strike. They can generate the energy horizontally as they did with the ice and massive brick stack (yes I know he used his body weight there).

sorry I meant horizontal a strike.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA7_HW48NGo
Yet again spacer and the people holding the bricks allows for the absorption of momentum to be absorbed more readily by the bricks. I'm not saying that the kick is not strong but it is not everyone makes it out to be.

[Knifefighter]

If so then surely you know the secret behind the alleged trick.

There are all kinds of tricks- spacers, scoring, special bricks... heck, there are even re-useable breaking boards.

And a little thing called vandalism would make it unlikely to ever see such a video.

Has nothing to do with vandalism and everthing to do with the fact that they can't do it.

[Royal Dragon]

On the Dim Mak, the guy has super hard conditioned figers. What he was doing was a lightning fast, high percussion finger poke, with fingers that have been highly condtioned so they can really penetrate. It even says so on the show.

The reason why it looks like such a light touch is because his fingers are more spearing into the opponents by depressing the skin in a good inch, than a thunderous, pounding punch that will resonate loudly to the audience.

If you really look at that footage, he's hitting his student with his finger tips as hard as someone else would a good punch to the gut.

No magic there, just actions hidden by sheer speed of application, and insane levels of finger conditioning.

[Knifefighter]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA7_HW48NGo
Yet again spacer and the people holding the bricks allows for the absorption of momentum to be absorbed more readily by the bricks. I'm not saying that the kick is not strong but it is not everyone makes it out to be.

Not to mention the fact that those bricks are made to be broken. Notice how they crumble when they break.

Go to your local building supply store and buy a brick used for construction. Break it with a sledge hammer and it will not crumble like that. It will break into about two big chunks.

[Knifefighter]

On the Dim Mak, the guy has super hard conditioned figers. What he was doing was a lightning fast, high percussion finger poke, with fingers that have been highly condtioned so they can really penetrate. It even says so on the show.

The reason why it looks like such a light touch is because his fingers are more spearing into the opponents by depressing the skin in a good inch, than a thunderous, pounding punch that will resonate loudly to the audience.

If you really look at that footage, he's hitting his student with his finger tips as hard as someone else would a good punch to the gut.

No magic there, just actions hidden by sheer speed of application, and insane levels of finger conditioning.

Cough... bullsh!t... cough.

That's exactly the kind of thinking that makes CMA a laughingstock.

[n00854180t]

There are all kinds of tricks- spacers, scoring, special bricks... heck, there are even re-useable breaking boards.

Has nothing to do with vandalism and everthing to do with the fact that they can't do it.

Bricks are quite a bit denser than concrete as well. A proper brick wall can withstand stupid amounts of force (I was watching some sort of Discovery documentary in which they launched a 2x4 at a brick wall at hurricane speeds (also they did some tests at unrealistic speeds, such as 100-200mph). It completely bounced from the wall, where other types of siding and the like were penetrated completely. Of course, the force involved in a strike is quite a bit different, but the mortar would pose quite a problem I think. It would be interesting to see someone try it though). Taken alone without mortar, however, one may be able to break bricks due to their brittleness.

Boards are kind of meh, in my opinion. A mere anecdotal experience of mine as a kid: I was with a friend at his TKD class, and we decided to see if I could pull off a board break without any skill or training. It was actually fairly easy to break one for me as a 10 yo (open palm). However, the force necessary increases probably non-linearly as more are added (spacers of course change the dynamics of it). I think the boards were also designed to be easier than your average building material would be, though.

Obviously though I realize the above doesn't mean much of anything.

[Royal Dragon]

This is a falsehood. When I was in New York all those years ago I was able to train under Sifus who still think kung fu works that way they teach it. I am talking about teacher Lueng Shum's age. They still think that what they teach is viable.

Reply]
It's 2007...even back then, even if you studied under them when you were like 5, and are 80 now, you would be at the tail most end of the real authentic fight generation.

Back then (1930's) you had real fighters who were switching to the forms heavy curriculems for the $$$$ they could make. If you can honestly tell me you came up between 1900, and 1928 THEN I'd believe you got exposed to the real stuff. But if you tell me you learned this "Back in the day" when "Back in the Day" meant 1965, the you learned form second generation forms masters.

Today, we are now more like 4th or even 5th generation since that whole malarky started.

So, if you learned from the Masters of the 1960's, well look at it this way, THIER teacher's Teacher were the fighters. They switched to the heavy forms platform, so thier students got trained that way. As the generations passed, when they went on to teach your teacher, they thought that was the traditional way, because they never saw the older fight oriented training systems, so YOUR teacher just passed that on to you because he's now too many generations removed from when it was taught right, and since he learned heavy forms, and HIS his teacher learned heavy forms and so on, well now YOU are learning heavy forms because NO ONE dares question "Why" they are being taught the way they are.

By the time you got into the picture the masters have been just following a long for so long that they just didn't know that they didn't know any better.

The problem goes back to when the REAL fighters started teaching to the general public. They wanted to intentionally drag out the training proccess as long as possible to keep students as long as possible to guarentee thier income streem. Selling form, apon form, apon form was the way to do this...and BS'ng thier students into thinking Forms made fighters is *HOW* they did it.

What is considred TCMA today was INTENTIONALLY engineered to be as inefficient as possible without being completely ineffective.

The Big lie has been perpetrated for 3-4 generations now, and we are only NOW figureing it out. Those of us who understand the real history of TCMA need to get back to basics, or the arts are going to die...if they haven't already. We either start teaching this stuff as it was meant to be taught, or the future crop of students is going to go to MMA for it.

[AmanuJRY]

...

Evidence that dim mak is BS...

They tried it on an MMA group down the street....nothing.

[Royal Dragon]

As for teaching this stuff right.

I think an eye should be kept on historical preservation of the key sets. To do this, but still churn out the results I think it's best to teach the forms as the last step.

You can make them the requirements for teachers certs., or maybe teach how to fight well with every technique in the form, and ONLY teach the actual choreography of it at the end of a level when the student has proven he can fight well with the forms contents.

If we don't do this, given the advent of mass printing, and DVD's, I think the ancient sets could become lost to time as modern technology pretty much replaces them.

[Royal Dragon]

Cough... bullsh!t... cough.

That's exactly the kind of thinking that makes CMA a laughingstock.

Reply]
Knifie, I have been hit by guys with this type of finger conditioning. It would knock the wind out of you and take the fight out of you just as easily as a good upper cut to the gut will.

There is no mystry or BS to it, it's basically simple physics.

[Royal Dragon]

Knifie,
Since I know you don't know anyone with sufficent finger conditioning to demo on you, lets set up a simulation of the phenominon shall we?

Try this, take a broom handle, and have some one jab you in the ribs with the end of it really hard and really fast....tell me how that goes.

Next, try haveing them do it the side of your neck.

Or better yet, go full on with a guy who has a Yawarra in his hand and let him try to jabb you in a soft spot really hard while you are rolling. Then you can see how it feels to have something that is simulating an overly conditioned finger jambed into a weak area while you are fighting.

[Knifefighter]

Knifie,
Since I know you don't know anyone with sufficent finger conditioning to demo on you, lets set up a simulation of the phenominon shall we?

Try this, take a broom handle, and have some one jab you in the ribs with the end of it really hard and really fast....tell me how that goes.

Next, try haveing them do it the side of your neck.

Or better yet, go full on with a guy who has a Yawarra in his hand and let him try to jabb you in a soft spot really hard while you are rolling. Then you can see how it feels to have something that is simulating an overly conditioned finger jambed into a weak area while you are fighting.

LOL at getting jabbed with a broom handle. I've been doing NHB stick fighting in open venues against all comers for years. I don't need to play with a broom handle to know what is up.

Look up the Dog Brothers stick fang choke. You don't get much more damaging penetration into the neck without killing someone than that.

[Notintheface]

tail most end of the real authentic fight generation

Lol and so that begs the question if I don't know then how do you know the opposite?

If you can honestly tell me you came up between 1900, and 1928 THEN I'd believe you got exposed to the real stuff

Ok I understand where you are coming from now and no I am not that old. I also do not assume to comment on fighters or technique I have not seen. I do not hold them up as examples because like any tall tale things get embellished. If you are speaking about fighters so removed from our generations there is no proof of their skill beyond tales.

[AmanuJRY]

Actual bricks vary from 7 to 105 MPa (depending on materials used), regular concrete is at about 10 to 40 MPa, high strength concrete is 40 MPa and above.

That's compressive strength measured in Pascal units ( 1 Pascal unit = 1 newton meter squared). 1 Pa = 6 894.76 Psi....how hard do you think a punch is???

The 'bricks' used in breaking events are generally concrete cinder blocks which probably fall below 7 MPa as they are quite brittle in comparison to concrete alone or red brick.

Scoring causes the block to break at a specific point ( instead of where the block is weak), masons use this concept to break blocks and not have to use a saw.

Spacers allow the momentum of the strike to continue through to the next block, along with scoring so the block breaks in the middle.

Like any magic trick showmanship is key.

On a side note, ancient greek pankratists used to break granite slabs (allegedly), granite compression strength is at about 15-20K psi.