What Type of Martial Art Should I Choose?
So you’ve made the choice you want to learn martial arts but with so many types of martial arts and everyone saying their’s is the best you find yourself lost. Depending on your reasons for getting into martial arts you may be lost when it comes to choosing a style. The first thing you need to ask yourself is why do you want to learn martial arts. Are you looking to get into the arts for self-defense, for competition, to get into movies, for well being and health, to look cool, do you want to look like Jet Li? This will affect what martial art you should learn. You can obviously learn multiple styles but at first, you’re going to want to concentrate on one.
Whatever your reasons with the number of schools and styles now available there will be one to suit your needs. There are styles for competition, for self-defense, the main ones they use in movies, for weapons and many other things. But don’t forget to see what’s local to you. There is no point doing tons of research and setting your heart on a style only to find out the nearest class is a 2-hour drive away. Check prices too, believe me, some charge a small fortune and are only really in it for the money.
For Self-Defense
If you are looking to get into martial arts purely for defending yourself on the street then a super flashy style is not really the way to go. Not saying they don’t work, every style really can work with the right amount of practice but what’s the point if you gotta be a black belt 5-6 years down the line to successfully use it in a real-life situation with a lot of pointless stuff learned in-between?
Styles such as Kickboxing, Muay Thai and Sanda will give you good stand up game. With regular sparring sessions, you will gain in confidence. If you can take on a trained fighter in sparring then whats Mr drunk out his mind starting trouble guy gonna do that you can’t handle?
Of course, Mr drunk guy could be armed, have his friends with him so what do you do? Styles such as Krav Maga and Systema cater for this. I studied a style called Urban Krav Maga which had very little striking but was for defense against a knife attack, bat attacks, getting grabbed around the neck from behind etc. The main principles were to disarm, immobilize and get away. The techniques I learned even from the first lesson can straight away be put to use with enough practice. Pair that with a Taekwondo class I used to go where for the first few months I was doing patterns and basic punches/kicks.
There are also styles such as street Wing Chun and street Aikido. These styles have been adapted for the street because the traditional stuff many consider useless.
Of course, then you have Brazilian Jiu Jitsu which many consider the ultimate art to learn. In my opinion true and false. As I said for competition or one on one in say a cage match it’s an absolute must but on the street do you really wanna be rolling around in the gutter trying to get the guy in an armbar while his mate takes turns to goal kick your head?
My personal recommendation would be to learn a good stand up game with effective punches and kicks such as Kickboxing or then supplement that with some Krav Maga and BJJ. whether you want to do Muay Thai and Systema, maybe even some knife fighting is up to you.
For Competition
Depending on what type of competition you looking for saying you’re looking to enter Kickboxing competitions then it’s a no-brainer, you gotta learn Kickboxing.
But let’s say it’s for cage fighting. You wanna get in the MMA scene (mixed martial arts).
As stated previously Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is a must. You won’t get far without it, everyone has a ground game and you don’t get much better than BJJ. Rather than take my word for it check out this site for all your questions and answers on BJJ. An amateur wrestling background is also good. You will find a lot of American MMA fighters that come from a wrestling background. Much the same as picking a martial art for the street you will need a good stand up style and ground style so Kickboxing or Muay Thai combined with BJJ should cover everything. But it doesn’t hurt to supplement these with others.
You get specific MMA classes now designed for cage fighting that cover stand up and ground game with ground and pound. Are they more effective than say someone that has trained specifically in a kickboxing class and BJJ class is up for debate.
Every practitioner from every style will argue they style can work and for most parts of it can. But they seem to fail to see that their style alone is not good enough anymore. Royce Gracie back in the day put BJJ on the map and won multiple UFC competitions with just BJJ. It’s not the case anymore, it’s not enough. If he were to enter today he would lose because everyone now has a ground game combined with a great standing game.
Bruce Lee which many consider the father of MMA saw this and started training in Judo and submission styles.
For The Movies, Health, And Fitness, To Look Cool
All styles will help with your health and fitness. They will help with posture, mobility, fitness, and stress. They have even been proven to be therapy for chronic pain some people experience. If your looking to get into movies and generally look cool. There are mnay types of martial arts the movies, sometimes even a hybrid of different styles but the best bet would be a form of Kung Fu. I specifically train Shaolin Kung Fu and we learn weapons such as Staff, sword, and even the chain whip. The forms we learn look cool and combined with the gymnastics stuff such as wall flips, front flips, and B-twists it all looks pretty spectacular. Of course, this all takes years of practice. And dont be expecting to put this stuff into practical use say in a real life fight. It’s purely for show.
But in saying that, one thing I overlooked when first starting was the amount effective stuff that would work in real life situations. I originally wanted to learn Shaolin Kung Fu because I loved the old school movies and thought it looked awesome, I just wished I could do it.
But I found myself learning Sanda/Sanshou which was a huge aspect of Shaolin Kung Fu. With Sanda/Sanshou you learn takedowns, takedown defense, choke holds, bag work, head movement, sparring, and even a good ole wrestle every now and then. Combine that with the general self-defense techniques of Shaolin Kung Fu such as throws, joint locks and Dim Mak, it seems a pretty complete system. By the way, Dim Mak is not like the movies i.e. the touch of death where you punch someone and their heart blows up. As I stated in my Dim Mak article It’s basically grabbing peoples tendons in their arms, neck or where ever and giving them a good yank. It hurts, really but even the teacher said there will only be like 5% of situations where you could actually use it.
So is it a complete system, kinda but it would take years to learn everything to an extent, you can pick to only go to the Sanda classes or Kung Fu classes but if you wanted to learn everything you would be going class like 5-6 days a week. Every Shaolin teacher I’ve had mainly British have gone to China for years to study out there beforehand. For competition, learning forms and weapons probably wouldnt be the best use of your time.
In Conclusion
In deciding what type of martial art you should learn the first thing you need to do is decide why you want to get into the arts, no point doing something your going to hate. Next, pick a martial arts style style that suits what you want, do you want to be able to knock someone out with one punch or be able to break their arm or just show off to your mates by Karate chopping a brick.
The last thing is find a class, checks whats local to you. Visit some first maybe ask if you can just watch a class first or do a free lesson, most schools offer their first class for free. Don’t forget you can always change but once you find one you like be committed, you not gonna get far by only going once a week of taking months off. Don’t look at it as a chore. Look on it as an exciting hobby you want to do, practice makes perfect. Rememeber, martial arts is a lifestyle. If you just use it as a fitness class thats fair enough but beyond that, it’s a lifestyle and good luck in the style of martial art you choose to learn.
