This is part 2 of our episode with Mr. Tony Blauer. Please listen to part 1 first.
Monday, August 8, 2016
Episode 108 - Mr. Tony Blauer - Part 1
Mr. Tony Blauer is here to upset the apple cart a bit. Some will claim he's not a martial artist, but if you check our definition of a martial artist, you'll see that he certainly is. What Mr. Blauer has done exceptionally well throughout his career is look at martial arts, combat, and self-defense in a different way. He's not someone who will simply accept the words of another. That's not to say he's not respectful, but he challenges convention when he sees it to be appropriate. In a sense, he's a martial arts researcher.
What follows is our longest show yet. Mr. Blauer gave an incredible amount of his time and geared the conversation to our audience - traditional martial arts & martial artists. You may love this episode, which has been split into two parts, or you may hate it. Regardless, you're going to think about martial arts, your training, self-defense and more. Our intention in bringing you this episode is not to steer you to sign up for anything from anyone. (Disclosure: we have never, and will never, taken any financial incentives from guests for them coming on the show.) Our intention is that you listen, consider Mr. Blauer's words, and look at your life and your training.
For the clean version of this episode, please visit: http://www.whistlekickmartialartsradio.com/108-tony-blauer/
Today's featured whistlekick product is our sparring boots. With sizes from the smallest child to the biggest bigfoot, we have something for you. No toe strap, excellent reinforcement, and far better materials than what you're used to. These are the most durable, comfortable foam sparring boots you've ever used.
Thursday, August 4, 2016
Episode 107 - Fumio Demura (Profile)
Not long after moving the US Demura got a gig doing martial arts demonstrations at the Japanese Deer Park, a local attraction in California. The shows were different from martial arts demonstrations of the day, which showcased martial artists coming close but not making contact. Demura’s demonstrations featured people reacting to this near contact, making it look like a fight. While there were likely others offering demonstrations this way, these demos at the Deer Park were certainly popularized by Fumio Demura and he’s sometimes credited with developing the method.
He was the stunt double for Pat Morita, who played Miyagi, in the karate kid movies. It was Chuck Norris who introduced Demura to the production people for The Karate Kid. He was originally intended to be Miyagi, but he knew his English wasn’t good enough. From there he became the stunt double.
It’s hard to talk about Fumio Demura without mentioning the amazing movie from 2015, The Real Miyagi. What started as a crowdfunding project really turned into an amazing film. It’s a well-done documentary on the life of Shihan Demura and it’s available on Netflix as well as DVD. The cast is a who’s who of martial artists and martial arts actors, including Billy Blanks, Pat Johnson, Dolph Lundgren, Pat Morita, Christine Bannon Rodriguez, Steven Seagal, Bill Wallace, Michael Jai White and many more.
Monday, August 1, 2016
Episode 106 - Mr. Alex Gillis
Over the course of this show, we've had a few trends with mentions of movies & actors. But when it comes to books, there are only a few we've heard about consistently. Joe Hyams Zen in the Martial Arts, Miyamoto Musashi's The Book of Five Rings and Alex Gillis's A Killing Art. The first two authors have passed away, but Mr. Gillis is alive and well, so we invited him to come on the show.
You can learn a lot about Mr. Gillis from the way he wrote the book, and you can learn about the book from our conversation with the man. Thoughtful, thorough and dedicated are words that you can use to describe either.
For full show notes, please visit: http://www.whistlekickmartialartsradio.com/106-alex-gillis/
If you're a hat person, you need a whistlekick hat. There's really no other way to put it. We have a few different styles of both baseball cap-style hats as well as winter beanies. Check them out at the website, whistlekick.com.
Thursday, July 28, 2016
Episode 105 - Helping People Find the Right Martial Arts School
Lately, I’ve been noticing something that’s really starting to irritate me. Someone will mention their desire to explore martial arts, usually on social media. What comes back is a barrage of “my school is best” and “my art is best” posts.
Now, we’ve talked a lot about that but when we talk about it in the context of a potential martial artist, all we’re doing is turning them off from ever training. See, people don’t like to make bad decisions. And if multiple people that they respect offer contradictory opinions… they’re likely to make no choice.
And if you’ve been listening to the show for a while, you know that one of our goals here at whistlekick is to get more people to train. After all, martial artists make the world a better place.
So it really does all of us a disservice to answer that question – What martial art should I do – with such a direct answer. If you sold cars, houses or even cheese – would you even answer the question, what car, house or cheese should I get?
Of course not. You’d ask questions. In sales, they’re called qualifying questions. And guess what? If you’re even thinking of answering the question, you’re a sales person. And you have a duty to the person asking the question, the people you train with and the martial arts community as a whole to help them correctly.
Just as you shouldn’t teach at a martial arts school if you’re not willing to give your students the best instruction you can, you shouldn’t engage with someone on the question of what art to take.
Let’s now go through the questions you should be asking and how to handle this whole situation.
For full show notes, please visit: http://www.whistlekickmartialartsradio.com/105-find-martial-arts-school/
If you’re involved in a school that spars, chances are you’ve clashed shins with someone. Man, does that hurt. There are plenty of shin guards on the market, but ours are the only ones that are comfortable to wear, light-weight, double reinforced and actually shaped to fit your shin. When I’m at events I demo them by shin kicking door frames. Seriously, these things are great. You can learn more at whistlekick.com.
Monday, July 25, 2016
Episode 104 - Sensei Ashida Kim
Today's episode is with well-known martial artist and ninjitsu practitioner Sensei Ashida Kim. While I had heard his name before, I'll confess that I didn't know a lot about him. When a past guest suggested he would be someone good to speak with, I did a bit of research and found that this man's resume is pretty incredible. While much of the writings on the internet about Sensei Kim are very strongly opinionated - both in his favor and not - I was more concerned with his stories. As we always do on the show, we give our guests the opportunity to speak freely and talk about that which they want to. That's exactly what we did here - and it's a great episode.
Sensei Kim is a prolific author and has written a number of books still available. We discuss a few of them during the episode and you can learn more at his website, linked below.
Today's featured whistlekick product is our line of tee shirts. We have something for everyone, in a variety of styles and sizes. Check them out, and the rest of our martial arts sparring gear and apparel, at whistlekick.com
Thursday, July 21, 2016
Episode 103 - Muscle Memory
Muscle memory is when your body does something automatically. Muscles remember what to do by repeating something many times. Sometimes this is called motor learning. In martial arts, this is the ability to, say, throw a punch without thinking about all of the small things required - which knuckles to use, twisting the hand, the retracted hand, etc.
There's a bad side to motor learning - like when throwing a technique, someone throws it to the same place without thinking. Every time.
There are ways to expand muscle memory and not be locked in to only a few patterns. Practice things differently. Routine is the enemy. It’s not that we don’t want muscle memory, it’s that we don’t want it to limit us. Work different heights, different body placements, different combinations. Strange combinations. Different speeds. When you slow things down you can focus on the movements and make adjustments. That's something we should all be doing anyway.
Jeremy offers his favorite drill for combatting the negative effects of motor learning.
Today's featured product is our sweatpants.
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