Martial Arts Experiences Discussion Thread

[James Y]

Thank you for posting, Mr. Janich.

Jim

[James Y]

“Let Me Set the Record Straight on Tiffany Trixtr”



I’d never heard of Tiffany Trixtr before this video came up, and I decided to check it out. But this is EXACTLY why, outside of this thread, I do not discuss martial arts. The “martial arts community” is one of, if not THE, most toxic environments, especially on YouTube and other social media. No one, no matter how good and legit they may be (except for maybe UFC fighters), can share anything without getting hit with barrages of insults by keyboard warriors. To be fair, a high percentage of the keyboard warriors probably don’t even train in anything besides opening Cheetos bags, but endlessly scroll YouTube looking to troll those who do.

I have posted about certain things I’ve disagreed with on certain videos, but I would never troll, or insult another martial artist online. Well, admittedly, I did make some Steven Seagal jokes here sometime back, so the above sentence is not entirely accurate. That said, I do believe that Seagal is a legit martial artist, whether I personally like him or not (I don't), and whether I like Aikido itself or not. I believe he is because a very legit martial artist (who was not an Aikido practitioner, BTW) who I personally used to communicate with, and who doesn’t mince words when it comes to real ability, once attended a Steven Seagal seminar many years ago in Chicago (IIRC), and he personally felt Seagal’s skill at Aikido. Didn’t mean to go on a Seagal rant, but that needed to be said.

I can only imagine the trolling this woman has received. Women martial artists on YouTube either get these weird simp responses, like “Oooohhhh, you are so beauuuuuutiful, my lovely” (which, in my imagination, they are cooing in a simpy male, high-pitched voice); or the women receive hateful comments by bitter men, who are clearly threatened by a woman who is most likely a far better martial artist, and in far better shape, than they are. As if every woman out there who is a strong, legit martial artist is some man-hater. Give me a break. When I was a teenage Kenpo student, one of the people who really helped me with developing a better defense in sparring was a highly experienced woman black belt who was physically small, and was VERY formidable. Yet she was also one of the most genuinely humble martial artists I ever trained with.

Don’t underestimate anyone.

Jim

[Naperville]

In a movie theater waiting for action thriller SHELTER to begin at 10:30pm on Sunday night.

EDIT: well, it was kind of boring. There was some action but the scenes were so dark I could not see what was going on half the time.

A top MI6 hand to hand combat expert from 10 years ago meets current best MI6 team and waxes all of them.

[James Y]

In a movie theater waiting for action thriller SHELTER to begin at 10:30pm on Sunday night.

EDIT: well, it was kind of boring. There was some action but the scenes were so dark I could not see what was going on half the time.

A top MI6 hand to hand combat expert from 10 years ago meets current best MI6 team and waxes all of them.

Glad everything was okay m, besides being a bit boring.

I never understood it when movies are shot so dark it's hard to see what's going on. Especially during action sequences. Maybe the action is so poorly done they have to hide it.

Jim

[Naperville]

In a movie theater waiting for action thriller SHELTER to begin at 10:30pm on Sunday night.

EDIT: well, it was kind of boring. There was some action but the scenes were so dark I could not see what was going on half the time.

A top MI6 hand to hand combat expert from 10 years ago meets current best MI6 team and waxes all of them.

Glad everything was okay m, besides being a bit boring.

I never understood it when movies are shot so dark it's hard to see what's going on. Especially during action sequences. Maybe the action is so poorly done they have to hide it.

Jim

We notice taking a month off of training. But here is a guy that took off a number of years, and sat in a wood shed doing nothing but drinking scotch...not even using the Internet or a TV, and he takes out the current best MI6.

It was a good yarn but hard to believe.

[James Y]

Ba Gua Palm Strikes



I had seen some of this man's videos over a decade ago. IMO, he's an excellent Ba Gua practitioner. He's really examined, broken down, and made the art effective with his own unique expression of it. He's gone beyond the rote learning that many "Kung Fu" people often become stuck in, and brought his art alive.

IMO, beyond a certain point, a martial artist has to really examine their art's practical applications beyond just doing routines and forms. Unless such a process occurs, the art is "dead." It's up to the practitioner to bring it to life through their own discoveries and experiences.

Jim

[James Y]

In a movie theater waiting for action thriller SHELTER to begin at 10:30pm on Sunday night.

EDIT: well, it was kind of boring. There was some action but the scenes were so dark I could not see what was going on half the time.

A top MI6 hand to hand combat expert from 10 years ago meets current best MI6 team and waxes all of them.

Glad everything was okay m, besides being a bit boring.

I never understood it when movies are shot so dark it's hard to see what's going on. Especially during action sequences. Maybe the action is so poorly done they have to hide it.

Jim

We notice taking a month off of training. But here is a guy that took off a number of years, and sat in a wood shed doing nothing but drinking scotch...not even using the Internet or a TV, and he takes out the current best MI6.

It was a good yarn but hard to believe.

Sounds like the Steven Seagal movie Hard to Kill. He gets put in a coma (for 7 years, if I remember correctly), then one day comes out of his coma, and is back to normal almost immediately.

Also recall the entire Kung Fu TV series. Aside from the flashbacks of his youth at the Shaolin Temple, he never trained. Yet Caine could still beat everybody in the wild west.

Jim

[Naperville]

In a movie theater waiting for action thriller SHELTER to begin at 10:30pm on Sunday night.

EDIT: well, it was kind of boring. There was some action but the scenes were so dark I could not see what was going on half the time.

A top MI6 hand to hand combat expert from 10 years ago meets current best MI6 team and waxes all of them.

Glad everything was okay m, besides being a bit boring.

I never understood it when movies are shot so dark it's hard to see what's going on. Especially during action sequences. Maybe the action is so poorly done they have to hide it.

Jim

We notice taking a month off of training. But here is a guy that took off a number of years, and sat in a wood shed doing nothing but drinking scotch...not even using the Internet or a TV, and he takes out the current best MI6.

It was a good yarn but hard to believe.

Sounds like the Steven Seagal movie Hard to Kill. He gets put in a coma (for 7 years, if I remember correctly), then one day comes out of his coma, and is back to normal almost immediately.

Also recall the entire Kung Fu TV series. Aside from the flashbacks of his youth at the Shaolin Temple, he never trained. Yet Caine could still beat everybody in the wild west.

Jim

He may have been practicing in his coma.



I never studied the wild west and I am not sure the movies capture it accurately.

Before WW I, boxers had their palms up. I think that it was a universal thing. Sometime after the US war with Spain over the Philippines, boxers palms faced down. Western movies that I have seen show palms down boxing style. Is it accurate?

A highly trained Shaolin Monk might be able to give everyone a decent beating before 1900. They knew weapons too.

[James Y]

Glad everything was okay m, besides being a bit boring.

I never understood it when movies are shot so dark it's hard to see what's going on. Especially during action sequences. Maybe the action is so poorly done they have to hide it.

Jim

We notice taking a month off of training. But here is a guy that took off a number of years, and sat in a wood shed doing nothing but drinking scotch...not even using the Internet or a TV, and he takes out the current best MI6.

It was a good yarn but hard to believe.

Sounds like the Steven Seagal movie Hard to Kill. He gets put in a coma (for 7 years, if I remember correctly), then one day comes out of his coma, and is back to normal almost immediately.

Also recall the entire Kung Fu TV series. Aside from the flashbacks of his youth at the Shaolin Temple, he never trained. Yet Caine could still beat everybody in the wild west.

Jim

He may have been practicing in his coma.



I never studied the wild west and I am not sure the movies capture it accurately.

Before WW I, boxers had their palms up. I think that it was a universal thing. Sometime after the US war with Spain over the Philippines, boxers palms faced down. Western movies that I have seen show palms down boxing style. Is it accurate?

A highly trained Shaolin Monk might be able to give everyone a decent beating before 1900. They knew weapons too.

I thought I heard or read somewhere that the hands low, palm up boxing guard was a carry-over from bare-knuckle boxing, because body punches were more prevalent due to the fragility of fists vs skulls. And that in the 1800s, they often fought for bunches of rounds (way more than 12 or 15). I'm not sure, but that makes sense.

Jim

[James Y]

BJJ Has a Predator Problem (and Nobody's Talking About It)



He speaks 100% truth. And it applies to ALL martial arts.

Jim

[James Y]

Understanding the Use of Force Dial



Jim

[Naperville]

We notice taking a month off of training. But here is a guy that took off a number of years, and sat in a wood shed doing nothing but drinking scotch...not even using the Internet or a TV, and he takes out the current best MI6.

It was a good yarn but hard to believe.

Sounds like the Steven Seagal movie Hard to Kill. He gets put in a coma (for 7 years, if I remember correctly), then one day comes out of his coma, and is back to normal almost immediately.

Also recall the entire Kung Fu TV series. Aside from the flashbacks of his youth at the Shaolin Temple, he never trained. Yet Caine could still beat everybody in the wild west.

Jim

He may have been practicing in his coma.



I never studied the wild west and I am not sure the movies capture it accurately.

Before WW I, boxers had their palms up. I think that it was a universal thing. Sometime after the US war with Spain over the Philippines, boxers palms faced down. Western movies that I have seen show palms down boxing style. Is it accurate?

A highly trained Shaolin Monk might be able to give everyone a decent beating before 1900. They knew weapons too.

I thought I heard or read somewhere that the hands low, palm up boxing guard was a carry-over from bare-knuckle boxing, because body punches were more prevalent due to the fragility of fists vs skulls. And that in the 1800s, they often fought for bunches of rounds (way more than 12 or 15). I'm not sure, but that makes sense.

Jim

That is probably why, they concentrated strikes to the abdomen. And YES, some fights went 50+ rounds!

According to the Google snippet below, maybe some of the Cowboy-Western movies are accurate.

After the Spanish American War and WW I, hand to hand combat changed dramatically. Trench warfare, poisonous gas, everything was being used.

Google says:
The "palm down" punching style in boxing did not occur due to the Spanish-American War (1898). While popular martial arts "folk history" sometimes claims that American soldiers learned Filipino Martial Arts (FMA) during that conflict and brought it back, there is no solid evidence to support this.
Instead, the evolution of palm-down punching was driven by changes in boxing regulations, the introduction of gloves, and the transition away from bare-knuckle fighting.

Key Facts Regarding Palm-Down Boxing Techniques:
Historical Precedent: Palm-down (horizontal) hooks were introduced and popularized as early as the late 18th century (roughly 1750–1800) by Broughton's rules, long before the Spanish-American War.

Bare-Knuckle Fighting: In the 19th century, bare-knuckle fighters often used a palm-down technique to strike with the bottom three knuckles, which was safer for their hands than hitting with the top two knuckles.

The Role of Gloves: The transition to the modern "vertical fist" hook (palm in) occurred in the 20th century because it was more compatible with padded gloves and helped prevent wrist injuries during high-volume punching.

Myth Origin: The idea that the Spanish-American War (1898) brought these techniques to Western boxing is likely a misunderstanding, as "palm down" techniques were already well-documented in English and American boxing manuals from the 1880s.

Therefore, the shift in hand position was a result of technical evolution within Western boxing, not a direct influence of the Philippine insurrection or the war itself.

[Naperville]

This is a story about lifting, but I thought others may like it.

https://www.espn.com/espn/story/_/id/47 ... l-aj-brown

[James Y]

How Cults Infected a Martial Art



This has long been a problem in martial arts in general. Back in the '80s, there were a lot of martial arts teachers from Korea who ran schools like cults. Clearly, the teachers who did that were inspired by the Reverend Sun Myung-Moon and his Unification Church, and they viewed their students as their own "Moonies." Just out of curiosity, I once visited a local school run by a Korean who actually sat in his own carved throne in his office. He also seemed to demand that his students worship him like a god. This was back in 1983 or so. That school is long-gone from here. I heard that he still teaches (or still has a school) in L.A. If he's still alive, I would imagine that he would be retired by now.

I'm not surprised at all that this cult mentality has infected BJJ. IMO, BJJ has become like every other martial art that its practitioners once derided.

A little off-topic personal observation about modern speech patterns: I've noticed a lot of young BJJ practitioners seem to have difficulty saying "Jiu-Jitsu," or "Jujitsu." Many seem to just say "Jitsu," or "Jwitsu" (sic), like this gentleman. I've even heard some people call BJJ "Jits." Many young people nowadays have such a hurried (or lazy) manner of speaking that they shorten or blend their words together. Faster speech patterns are fine, as long as words are properly spoken. It's just a little weird to me that so many BJJ practitioners seem unwilling or unable to actually say Jiu-Jitsu/Jujitsu. You never hear Aiki-Jujutsu practitioners calling their art "Aiyoo," or Judoka calling Judo "Jude," or Taekwondo people calling their art "Tike."

Jim

[Naperville]

How Cults Infected a Martial Art



This has long been a problem in martial arts in general. Back in the '80s, there were a lot of martial arts teachers from Korea who ran schools like cults. Clearly, the teachers who did that were inspired by the Reverend Sun Myung-Moon and his Unification Church, and they viewed their students as their own "Moonies." Just out of curiosity, I once visited a local school run by a Korean who actually sat in his own carved throne in his office. He also seemed to demand that his students worship him like a god. This was back in 1983 or so. That school is long-gone from here. I heard that he still teaches (or still has a school) in L.A. If he's still alive, I would imagine that he would be retired by now.

I'm not surprised at all that this cult mentality has infected BJJ. IMO, BJJ has become like every other martial art that its practitioners once derided.

A little off-topic personal observation about modern speech patterns: I've noticed a lot of young BJJ practitioners seem to have difficulty saying "Jiu-Jitsu," or "Jujitsu." Many seem to just say "Jitsu," or "Jwitsu" (sic), like this gentleman. I've even heard some people call BJJ "Jits." Many young people nowadays have such a hurried (or lazy) manner of speaking that they shorten or blend their words together. Faster speech patterns are fine, as long as words are properly spoken. It's just a little weird to me that so many BJJ practitioners seem unwilling or unable to actually say Jiu-Jitsu/Jujitsu. You never hear Aiki-Jujutsu practitioners calling their art "Aiyoo," or Judoka calling Judo "Jude," or Taekwondo people calling their art "Tike."

Jim

I definitely was in a cult when I was in Chung Mo Quan. They didn't control their members that well. I know that a lot of people quit, they could not hack the training, and I know of an entire family that left town to get away from it all.

They mixed a lot of martial arts attributes into the art they taught: extremely hard physical conditioning and sparring to toughen everyone up, mental conditioning, katas, and of course an unnamed Korean or Japanese style "Karate" or "Tae Kwon Do" -like art. Several martial arts schools that I have been in say they are founded on techniques from several masters or grandmasters. That is pretty normal.

Chung Mo Quan was a financial scam tied around a decent 1970's basic martial art. They made everyone sign one or more contracts so that they would have to be there 5x a week for a year or more, and the fees just kept going up and up! They did not want you there for one hour per day, they wanted you there 2 to 4 hours per day. If you were serious about martial arts, you joined, and it's all anyone interested in martial arts talked about in high school. "Did you know so and so is in Chung Mo Quan now?" "Yea, his whole family is in it!"

They had instructors living in John C Kim housing bought with the funds paid at the schools and it was considered an honor to clean the homes and dojo.

They did have a weird sort of language that they used. They spoke in English, but the pronunciations were different and it was funny because these were local folks using strange pronunciations.

I do not recall ever bowing in to any photos, but they were there. We did bow in to the US and Korean flags, which I thought was weird, because I could not figure out if they were Korean or not.

I knew a guy in high school that was a well known wrestler, and won several titles in the state of Illinois in his weight division, and he became a regional instructor in Chung Mo Quan.

My brother and I knew a guy (and he came over to our home to teach us martial arts) who's whole family left Chung Mo Quan and they sold their home and joined the US Navy to get away from it all. Chung Mo Quan sent teams of high ranking students and instructors to their home to get them back at school.

They did turn out some pretty solid basic martial artists. I cannot speak to advanced students because I was never one. They did teach weapons, all sorts of weapons.

[James Y]

How Cults Infected a Martial Art



This has long been a problem in martial arts in general. Back in the '80s, there were a lot of martial arts teachers from Korea who ran schools like cults. Clearly, the teachers who did that were inspired by the Reverend Sun Myung-Moon and his Unification Church, and they viewed their students as their own "Moonies." Just out of curiosity, I once visited a local school run by a Korean who actually sat in his own carved throne in his office. He also seemed to demand that his students worship him like a god. This was back in 1983 or so. That school is long-gone from here. I heard that he still teaches (or still has a school) in L.A. If he's still alive, I would imagine that he would be retired by now.

I'm not surprised at all that this cult mentality has infected BJJ. IMO, BJJ has become like every other martial art that its practitioners once derided.

A little off-topic personal observation about modern speech patterns: I've noticed a lot of young BJJ practitioners seem to have difficulty saying "Jiu-Jitsu," or "Jujitsu." Many seem to just say "Jitsu," or "Jwitsu" (sic), like this gentleman. I've even heard some people call BJJ "Jits." Many young people nowadays have such a hurried (or lazy) manner of speaking that they shorten or blend their words together. Faster speech patterns are fine, as long as words are properly spoken. It's just a little weird to me that so many BJJ practitioners seem unwilling or unable to actually say Jiu-Jitsu/Jujitsu. You never hear Aiki-Jujutsu practitioners calling their art "Aiyoo," or Judoka calling Judo "Jude," or Taekwondo people calling their art "Tike."

Jim

I definitely was in a cult when I was in Chung Mo Quan. They didn't control their members that well. I know that a lot of people quit, they could not hack the training, and I know of an entire family that left town to get away from it all.

They mixed a lot of martial arts attributes into the art they taught: extremely hard physical conditioning and sparring to toughen everyone up, mental conditioning, katas, and of course an unnamed Korean or Japanese style "Karate" or "Tae Kwon Do" -like art. Several martial arts schools that I have been in say they are founded on techniques from several masters or grandmasters. That is pretty normal.

Chung Mo Quan was a financial scam tied around a decent 1970's basic martial art. They made everyone sign one or more contracts so that they would have to be there 5x a week for a year or more, and the fees just kept going up and up! They did not want you there for one hour per day, they wanted you there 2 to 4 hours per day. If you were serious about martial arts, you joined, and it's all anyone interested in martial arts talked about in high school. "Did you know so and so is in Chung Mo Quan now?" "Yea, his whole family is in it!"

They had instructors living in John C Kim housing bought with the funds paid at the schools and it was considered an honor to clean the homes and dojo.

They did have a weird sort of language that they used. They spoke in English, but the pronunciations were different and it was funny because these were local folks using strange pronunciations.

I do not recall ever bowing in to any photos, but they were there. We did bow in to the US and Korean flags, which I thought was weird, because I could not figure out if they were Korean or not.

I knew a guy in high school that was a well known wrestler, and won several titles in the state of Illinois in his weight division, and he became a regional instructor in Chung Mo Quan.

My brother and I knew a guy (and he came over to our home to teach us martial arts) who's whole family left Chung Mo Quan and they sold their home and joined the US Navy to get away from it all. Chung Mo Quan sent teams of high ranking students and instructors to their home to get them back at school.

They did turn out some pretty solid basic martial artists. I cannot speak to advanced students because I was never one. They did teach weapons, all sorts of weapons.

I read a book about Chung Moo Quan many years ago. It talked about that it was a cult, and (IRRC), the legal issues of John C. Kim, etc. He is definitely Korean. Kim is one of, if not the, most common of Korean surnames. I think he also started another cult (or renamed it) called Oom Yung Doe, or something like that.

Many people are very vulnerable to falling into cults, or cult-like behavior. You can see it many other things outside of martial arts. It's all over the place.

Luckily, none of the schools I ever trained at were cultish, even the ones that were more hardcore.

Jim

[Naperville]

How Cults Infected a Martial Art



This has long been a problem in martial arts in general. Back in the '80s, there were a lot of martial arts teachers from Korea who ran schools like cults. Clearly, the teachers who did that were inspired by the Reverend Sun Myung-Moon and his Unification Church, and they viewed their students as their own "Moonies." Just out of curiosity, I once visited a local school run by a Korean who actually sat in his own carved throne in his office. He also seemed to demand that his students worship him like a god. This was back in 1983 or so. That school is long-gone from here. I heard that he still teaches (or still has a school) in L.A. If he's still alive, I would imagine that he would be retired by now.

I'm not surprised at all that this cult mentality has infected BJJ. IMO, BJJ has become like every other martial art that its practitioners once derided.

A little off-topic personal observation about modern speech patterns: I've noticed a lot of young BJJ practitioners seem to have difficulty saying "Jiu-Jitsu," or "Jujitsu." Many seem to just say "Jitsu," or "Jwitsu" (sic), like this gentleman. I've even heard some people call BJJ "Jits." Many young people nowadays have such a hurried (or lazy) manner of speaking that they shorten or blend their words together. Faster speech patterns are fine, as long as words are properly spoken. It's just a little weird to me that so many BJJ practitioners seem unwilling or unable to actually say Jiu-Jitsu/Jujitsu. You never hear Aiki-Jujutsu practitioners calling their art "Aiyoo," or Judoka calling Judo "Jude," or Taekwondo people calling their art "Tike."

Jim

I definitely was in a cult when I was in Chung Mo Quan. They didn't control their members that well. I know that a lot of people quit, they could not hack the training, and I know of an entire family that left town to get away from it all.

They mixed a lot of martial arts attributes into the art they taught: extremely hard physical conditioning and sparring to toughen everyone up, mental conditioning, katas, and of course an unnamed Korean or Japanese style "Karate" or "Tae Kwon Do" -like art. Several martial arts schools that I have been in say they are founded on techniques from several masters or grandmasters. That is pretty normal.

Chung Mo Quan was a financial scam tied around a decent 1970's basic martial art. They made everyone sign one or more contracts so that they would have to be there 5x a week for a year or more, and the fees just kept going up and up! They did not want you there for one hour per day, they wanted you there 2 to 4 hours per day. If you were serious about martial arts, you joined, and it's all anyone interested in martial arts talked about in high school. "Did you know so and so is in Chung Mo Quan now?" "Yea, his whole family is in it!"

They had instructors living in John C Kim housing bought with the funds paid at the schools and it was considered an honor to clean the homes and dojo.

They did have a weird sort of language that they used. They spoke in English, but the pronunciations were different and it was funny because these were local folks using strange pronunciations.

I do not recall ever bowing in to any photos, but they were there. We did bow in to the US and Korean flags, which I thought was weird, because I could not figure out if they were Korean or not.

I knew a guy in high school that was a well known wrestler, and won several titles in the state of Illinois in his weight division, and he became a regional instructor in Chung Mo Quan.

My brother and I knew a guy (and he came over to our home to teach us martial arts) who's whole family left Chung Mo Quan and they sold their home and joined the US Navy to get away from it all. Chung Mo Quan sent teams of high ranking students and instructors to their home to get them back at school.

They did turn out some pretty solid basic martial artists. I cannot speak to advanced students because I was never one. They did teach weapons, all sorts of weapons.

I read a book about Chung Moo Quan many years ago. It talked about that it was a cult, and (IRRC), the legal issues of John C. Kim, etc. He is definitely Korean. Kim is one of, if not the, most common of Korean surnames. I think he also started another cult (or renamed it) called Oom Yung Doe, or something like that.

Many people are very vulnerable to falling into cults, or cult-like behavior. You can see it many other things outside of martial arts. It's all over the place.

Luckily, none of the schools I ever trained at were cultish, even the ones that were more hardcore.

Jim

Thank you for the reply!

Somewhere in the boxes that have not yet been unpacked I have the book you speak of on Chung Mo Quan. I am sure that the book details more dirt. I never read the book, I just wanted it. I was at college when the Feds brought down John C Kim. I never set foot inside an Oom Yung Doe studio.

When my brother sold our 2-Flat in Chicago, he wiped out all of my personal history on martial arts, training photographs, signed books, and my Chung Mo Quan (and other) uniforms and belts....all of my clothes, college texts, framed degrees.

I still managed to have plenty of garbage to lug around when I moved. Hahahahaha! I am going to get rid of 50% of this stuff and get a 1br next year if I can. Who needs all of this garbage. I'll reduce my monthly costs by $500.

For sure many sports are cults or cliques.

[James Y]

"The Most Dangerous Kung Fu Style, Only Found in China"

Very interesting.



Jim

[SpyderEdgeForever]

Has anyone with skill equal to Bruce Lee at his peak come along since then or not?

[James Y]

Has anyone with skill equal to Bruce Lee at his peak come along since then or not?

Who knows. Do I think that Bruce Lee was the best martial artist that ever lived? No.

Why? Because it's a big world out there.

For example, Miyamoto Musashi engaged in more than 60 duels with both real swords and wooden swords; and of course, never lost any of the duels that were to the death, from ages 13 to 29. Bruce Lee never fought any duels to the death. And while I'm sure that if Musashi at his peak, unarmed, faced a peak Bruce Lee unarned, Musashi probably would not have won. But the fact remains that Musashi used his sword skills to actually kill some of his opponents in real sword duels. Bruce Lee never killed anyone. Not that killing someone makes anyone great. But Musashi's capabilities and willingness to go all the way when necessary were tested in real life-and-death confrontations; Bruce Lee's skills were never tested to that extreme level.

Musashi is only one example.

It's also possible/probable that the late American Karate champion and American-style kickboxing pioneer Joe Lewis could have beaten Bruce Lee in a real fight, but who knows.

Many people think that Chuck Norris could have beaten Bruce Lee for real, but I don't know about that. Maybe, maybe not. MANY people, especially younger people, think that Chuck would have destroyed Bruce in a real fight, but I question that. They say that Chuck was so much bigger than Bruce, and that he was a professional fighter.

I greatly respect Chuck Norris. However, he was a Karate tournament fighter. He was paid some money as a part of an American Karate team that traveled and competed for awhile. But he was never what people nowadays think of as a professional fighter: meaning a professional kickboxer, MMA fighter, etc. Chuck retired from active Karate competition around 1974, before American kickboxing (AKA full-contact Karate) became common around the mid-'70s. He was a great Karate fighter. But if it were anybody else, they would be looked down on by today's MMA fanboys. But because he's Chuck Norris, and because of the "Chuck Norris Facts" jokes in books and online, people have elevated him to god-like status, as if the jokes are somehow actually true. It's a very weird phenomenon.

Also, I've seen Chuck Norris in person, when he was filming an outdoor scene for a movie that was shot not too far from my house in 1994. He was about my same height and weight at the time; around 5' 9" tall (5' 10" in shoes), and maybe 170 pounds or so. If Bruce Lee was 5' 6" or 5' 7", maybe 140 pounds, Chuck had a size and weight advantage, but that doesn't automatically mean that the smaller guy would lose in an all-out street fight. Chuck Norris wasn't a large man, and Bruce Lee wasn't a midget.

And while I deeply respect Bruce Lee, I am not a Bruce Lee worshipper. He was a great martial artist with a very analytical mind, combined with almost unreal natural athletic talent for martial arts. But I believe there are many martial artists out there who have skills equal to or better than Bruce Lee at his peak, in terms of actual fighting ability. There are real beasts out there right now. Some of them are well-known, but most of them are not famous, and never will be. That's why I always say, "Don't Underestimate Anyone."

But do I think that raw physical and analytical talent for martial arts like Bruce Lee had is a common occurrence? NOPE, NOT AT ALL. I'm not talking about Bruce Lee, the movie actor and character; I'm talking about his real-life talents. And anybody who would say that Bruce Lee sucked is ignorant.

Jim