Tag Archives: black belt

What is the Criteria for an MMA Black Belt?

Newsletter 986

The Interesting Thing About Black Belts

I’ve written often about
what a black belt is,
what the requirements should be,
and so on.
Let me say some unpleasant things here.

I volunteered my time
at a local martial arts school.
One night I was sitting with a half dozen MMA instructors,
and the talk turned to black belts.
One fellow had 22 years experience,
but was not a black belt.
Had no plans for testing.
Was quite happy to be a lower belt.
The other fellows accepted this as normal,
but it really made me think.

The fellow had the qualifications,
he knew what he was doing,
but there was some sort of mystique
concerning the longer you wait the better you are.

I asked one of the fellows later
about his promotion to black belt.
He said he had studied for some 20 years,
and suddenly realized that he wasn’t going to get any better.
Oh, he would get smarter,
pick up a few more sly tricks,
but he was now descending,
his body getting older
faster than he could learn.
So he went to the school owner
and told him that he wasn’t getting any better
so he better get his black belt while he was still any good.
He was given his black belt.

Now,
I’ve given you the data,
and maybe you’ve read some of my writing
about a black belt being ‘expert,’
so what does all this tell you?

To me it says that there is too much emphasis
placed on winning,
and not enough on structuring MMA
so that people can be properly evaluated.
That in the MMA (and this includes many brands of Jujitsu)
people are more concerned with who they can beat,
rather than mastering the distinct body of knowledge
that MMA is.
And this is what makes MMA a sport rather than an art.

Look,
being a sport is not bad.
It just sounds bad here because
it is coming through the filter of Al Case
who promotes art as best.

But,
really,
it is all up to you.

Interestingly,
I approached the head of the school I was volunteering at.
I suggested we categorize techniques,
make it easier to teach,
make the body of knowledge succinct and precise
so that we would better teach it.
He agreed,
and it actually fit into his plans for the school,
but every time we started to do something
he found an excuse,
disappeared,
changed the complexion of our meetings,
and so on.

As a sports man
he was unable to become an artist.
And here’s the funny thing,
he had trained in many of the classical arts,
he knew where I was coming from,
even agreed that I was right,
but at heart,
in the core of him,
he was a believer that might makes right,
that beating people up
was more important than teaching them methods
that would create distinct methods resulting in art,
the ability to classify ability,
and so on.

Simply,
it was more important to win a tournament,
than to do an art.

Well,
I’ll leave you fellows and gals
to figure out the worth of what I have said here.

In the meantime,
one of the most exact studies I have done
on what ranking and abililties are
was in the Outlaw Karate book.

Here is the Amazon page for it…

OUTLAW KARATE

There is a complete art in it,
complete with tests,
but see if you agree with how I analyze belt rankings.

Have a great work out!

Al

What Training Beyond Black Belt Should Really Be

Beyond Black Belt…

Beyond Black means in any martial art, as you will see in this article.

When a person is beyond black belt it means he is ready for advanced training.

In Karate, and similar martial arts, the training is more advanced forms.

beyond black belt martial arts

What lies beyond Black Belt?


But these more advanced forms don’t always mean much. The movements are sometimes so esoteric that they aren’t workable, and they don’t seem to make only marginal advanced energy capability in the body of the student.

This holds true for just about every Martial Art, from Karate to Aikido to Taekwondo to…whatever.

So the real reason for these advanced but same old same old forms are that they afford the practitioner the means to ‘polish’ his art. To get better at…the basics.

To get better at the basics means that they become smoother, more intuitive, more usable.

And, there are other qualities to be appreciated here: calmness of mind, a certain type of wisdom, some sixth sense abilities (if you lucked out and got in a good system, very rare) and so on.

When I found myself in the position of teaching people beyond black belt I decided to do things differently. I began teaching whole arts for each level after black belt.

I might teach a Shaolin style to second black black belt, a pa kua style to 3rd black, and so on.

This gave me tremendous leeway in what I teach. I was actually able to shift programs around like shuffling cards, and fit the programs and specific martial arts much better to individual students, and yet still maintain a distinct discipline and structure in my classes.

Furthermore, the polishing consideration was not neglected, but rather enhanced. Basics are basics, from art to art, and there is little difference. Thus, not only was the student working on basics, but he was getting different viewpoints of basics, which helped him understand them in depth.

The truth of the matter is that this method allows me to teach more than art, but a viewpoint of art, a perspective that is not able to be taught in normal classes.

It is a matter of how much knowledge you can impart, not art, but quality of knowledge, and the ability to import more knowledge…at a glance.

What was really pleasant for me is that I often run into these old students, and they’ll say they learned some new art, and I’ll ask them about it, and they’ll say something like, ‘Oh, I got together with so and so and we traded systems.’

Traded systems. Just like people did before everything went commercial. As in trading Pa Kua for Tai Chi. Or Shaolin for Karate. As it says in various accounts of martial artists, especially those who created their own systems.

Able to trade a whole system because they have been trained not to do a million punches, but to do a million punches while absorbing several martial arts systems.

And it gets really interesting for me when I get around these old students, they’ll be talking about things like shifting the tan tien while making a kung fu kick work in a karate style, or retaining power without dropping their weight, or some other oddity that it took me decades to figure out, but they are doing in a couple of years…and they have a whole lifetime to go places I dream about.

Lucky guys.

But, that’s okay. When I give up this body I’ll get a new one and find one of these guys to teach me.

Oh, and I would be remiss if I didn’t let you know that the reason I am able to teach lots of martial arts beyond black belt is because of this Matrixing Technology I developed…it’s at Monster Martial Arts.

The Truth About Martial Arts Belt Ranking

Martial Arts Belt Ranking Made Understandable!

Martial Arts Belt Ranking does tend to be a little…strange. There are so many levels, and what does a black belt mean, what is a master, and so on. In this article I will tell you where the various levels of rank came from, and what they actually mean.

Martial Arts Belt Ranking came from Japan, where it was originally used in swimming classes.

blind justice

Martial Arts like Karate and Judo picked up on them because it made it easier to arrange the karate class, or judo class, and teach it.

Before then people would join a martial arts school and there were junior students and senior students, and the point was to get your Teaching certificate.

Some people didn’t want to go that far in the martial arts, but the serious students did. After all, why do something half way? And, of course, a person who knew enough to teach would certain have sufficient self defense skills to protect himself.

In 1967 I joined a Kenpo Karate school, and the belt ranks were eight to Black Belt, and then eight after one had achieved Dan ranking.

The colors were: white, orange, purple, blue, green, three stages of brown, and black. First Dans usually just put a tip, or a strip of white on the end of the obi for each advanced dan ranking.

Later, 1969, I jointed a classical Karate school, and here was where I experienced martial arts belt ranking as it was meant to be. Sort of.

There were three ranks to Black. These were white, green, and brown. But, to be honest, these had been subdivided into an eight and eight system.

The theory (one of the more predominant theories, I should say), was that one started as a white belt, like an unwritten piece of paper. Then one experienced the green of spring, became worn, like autumn, and finally entered winter.

This was an interesting sort of mythos. There was a logic to it, and it did describe the growing process, sort of.

But, what I noticed as the years rolled by was this: Martial Arts belt ranking doesn’t matter to people who have been in the martial arts for a while.

Yes, they are important, if only to spur the beginning student on. And, one should take pride in an achievement. It takes a lot of work, a lot of stick-to-ivity, to progress through the martial arts belt ranking systems.

But the real measure here is whether a person makes it to teacher.

Why do things half way, eh?

And that is the truth about Martial Arts belt ranking.

Here’s a great article on reality martial arts belt ranking. You can get started on Learning Martial Arts right here.

The Truth About Martial Arts Belt Ranking

Martial Arts Belt Ranking Made Understandable!

Martial Arts Belt Ranking does tend to be a little…strange. There are so many colored belts, what does a black belt mean, what is a master, and so on. In this article i will tell you where belt ranks came from, and what they actually mean.

Martial Arts Belt Ranking came from Japan, where it was originally used in swimming classes.

blind justice

Martial Arts like Karate and Judo picked up on them because it made it easier to arrange the karate class, or judo class, and teach it.

Before then people would join a martial arts school and there were junior students and senior students, and the point was to get your Teaching certificate.

Some people didn’t want to go that far, but the serious students did. After all, why do something half way? And, of course, a person who knew enough to teach would certain have sufficient self defense skills to protect himself.

In 1967 I joined a Kenpo Karate school, and the belt ranks were eight to Black Belt, and then eight after one had achieved Dan ranking, which is what a Black Belt is.

The colors were: white, orange, purple, blue, green, three stages of brown, and black. Black belts usually just put a tip, or a strip of white on the end of the belt for each advanced dan ranking.

Later, 1969, I jointed a classical school, and here was where I experienced martial arts belt ranking as it was meant to be. Sort of.

There were three belt ranks to Black Belt. These were white, green, and brown. But, to be honest, these had been subdivided into an eight and eight system.

The theory (one of the more predominant theories, I should say), was that one started as a white belt, like an unwritten piece of paper. Then one experienced the green of spring, became worn, like autumn, and finally entered winter.

This was an interesting sort of mythos. There was a logic to it, and it did describe the growing process, sort of.

But, what I noticed as the years rolled by was this: Martial Arts belt ranking doesn’t matter to people who have been in the martial arts for a while.

Yes, they are important, if only to spur the beginning student on. And, one should take pride in an achievement. It takes a lot of work, a lot of stick-to-ivity, to progress through the martial arts belt ranking systems.

But the real measure here is whether a person makes it to teacher.

Why do things half way, eh?

And that is the truth about Martial Arts belt ranking.

Here’s a great article on reality martial arts belt ranking. You can get started on Learning Martial Arts right here.