I remember back in the old days, the 1960’s to around the end part of the 1980’s in the main, when going to a martial arts class involved learning the traditional aspects of the martial arts along with what many call these days practical street self defence and sparring with a training partner, (Freestyle), as an all intermixed event. In fact all three were regarded back then as just one thing.
The self defence part of the training did have 3 levels of difficulty but in the main when it came to taking a grading exam test each of these areas of combat training were viewed and treated as specific test disciplines collectively for a grading test. You could regard this situation in exactly the same way when performing a Kata, (Set Form), as being just one of the various test disciplines for a grading test. By the time you had reached the black belt level you would be of the required standard in all three areas of combat training along with various other test disciplines. These days however the self defence part of it all is now a separate item to how it was back then and freestyle sparring, now commonly called kickboxing, is now also an individual combat style, independent of other fighting styles, with a grading system all of its very own now. Back then kickboxing was only part of a training session in the martial arts. Being a black belt back in the ‘old days’ in one of the traditional martial arts included being a black belt in kickboxing by default as it was all part of the same thing. Today what was three disciplines within a single traditional martial art style or system has now become three looked upon areas of combat training that are now regarded as separate from each other. For a related article on this subject click >HERE< Comments are closed.
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