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Recently Ive been involved in several kata discussions, mainly involving Karateka. Trying not to steal threads I invited a few of them to the JKD forum to defend there stance on the issue. Since they have failed to do so then I will bring the conversation to them myself.

My first jab at it is that I dont think that kata are useful for anything other repetition of technique in which case there are far more valuable ways to do this. Also I believe that the mystery should be left out of it. There is too much interpretation for the student. Self defense should be taught in a more direct manner so that the benifits of such training can be yeilded quickly by the student.

Its just a jab. Ive got more. I want to remind everyone before the topic takes off, dont get personal. Lets have a intelligent discussion on the issue.

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Round one, Fight!


"My first jab at it is that I dont think that kata are useful for anything other repetition of technique in which case there are far more valuable ways to do this."

That, in my opinon, is one of the main focuses of kata.

You do the technique over and over until its a reflex, like in my isshinryu sesian kata, the first movments goes as follows:

Left food forward, left side block, right punch, your right punch falls immeditaly into a side block, shoulder height, fist distance from your ribs, striking/blocking with the first two knuckles.

Doing the kata, you practice that technique a good deal.

While sparring, I've devolped the muscle memory to be able to step in, block, counter attack, and come back to a block. With as many times as I've practiced this motion, I have an extreamly high success rate when I need to perform it.

Kata keeps your techniques crisp, and teaches you how to flow from one technique to another.


If I may, what other methods do you perferr to hone technique?

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Repetition is a huge part of any art. You gotta practice right? My thoughts are that kata arent neccessarily the fastest or best way to learn this.

You said "While SPARRING Ive developed the muscle memory..." Ah, but sparring is far from kata. And I believe that sparring is where the majority of the focus should be. And drilling. Drilling and shadow boxing to learn the proper mechanics then sparring to fine tune them and learning how to get them to work for you. Kata doesnt teach you to adjust your techniques to suit different angles of the opponents attack. You have one place to go in kata to be performed "correctly" but in all reality, there are multiple angles for all techniques that can be considered "correct"

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Repetition is a huge part of any art. You gotta practice right? My thoughts are that kata arent neccessarily the fastest or best way to learn this.

You said "While SPARRING Ive developed the muscle memory..." Ah, but sparring is far from kata. And I believe that sparring is where the majority of the focus should be. And drilling. Drilling and shadow boxing to learn the proper mechanics then sparring to fine tune them and learning how to get them to work for you. Kata doesnt teach you to adjust your techniques to suit different angles of the opponents attack. You have one place to go in kata to be performed "correctly" but in all reality, there are multiple angles for all techniques that can be considered "correct"

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what I meant was "While I am sparring, I still have the muscle memory from doing kata" My mistake.


As far as the focus of training being on sparring, I once thought that too, however I realized that if you spar without having worked on technique, you will get sloppy, and have sloppy technique.

"Drilling and shadow boxing to learn the proper mechanics then sparring to fine tune them and learning how to get them to work for you. Kata doesnt teach you to adjust your techniques to suit different angles of the opponents attack."

How is kata any different from shadow boxing? or doing a drill, I'm assuming, on a bag/pad?

Also, in my katas we change angles quite often, and do blocks/attacks from different angles all the time, its a very big part of the majority of my katas.

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Yes if you spar without drilling, bag work or shadow boxing then your sparring will be sloppy. However, those tools are used. And used to replace Kata.

How is kata different from shadow boxing? Well, shadow boxing is freeform. The footwork is not fixed. The attacks and defensive movements are not fixed. As for drilling take the focus pads for a moment. Lets say you want to work on and isolate your jab. Now you can do this in kata. Or you can work on the pad. Jabbing for it as it moves at different speeds and angles. Learning how to adjust it as necessary to hit your target. At the end of the training who is going to have a better jab? The guy practicing against no resistance, aiming at the same imaginary target or the guy who has resistance in his training? The guy who works to land his jabs will essentially have a better jab. This carries over for all techniques.

As for changing angles in kata, you dont see it much. Why would you when you've been given one "correct" way to do the kata? Now the angle may change due to the footwork changing. However, thats not the same as the technique itself being adjusted.