Can I ask all those who have trained in Philipio stick arts:

How much contact was there in your system? Did you work mostly on drills, or did you do a lot of sparring? If so, was it with or without pads?

I remember a debate about full contact martial arts and escrima came up. One side of the arguement was that full contact sparring in escrima was good as it taught in a "live" manner.

The argument against was that full contact in stick arts didn't offer as much benefit as people might think, as a lot of material might be difficult to do due to the padded gloves often used in such fencing.

Any thoughts?