For the past year or so, my training has been focused primarily on rate-of-force development (ROFD) (translation: more power) for the sake of competitive success in Germany in September. However, I've come to the point that making the trip out to the Ippon Cup is not feasible, and is highly unlikely to actually happen. With this in mind, I've been beginning to wonder if my focus has been in the wrong place, or at the very least misguided.
There's nothing wrong with the competitive aspects of karate, I enjoy it thoroughly (within some federations, anyway, others are questionable), but it's not the be-all-end-all goal for my karate. My karate has always been about becoming better at karate. Many people espouse the "dojo-kun" to be the primary purpose of karate training, and while this sounds noble in essence, personally I just find those people to sound holier-than-thou. The dojo-kun is all well and good, it's a list of strong character traits that all people, karate-ka and otherwise, should aspire too. At the same time, however, you can learn most if not all of these traits through many different activities. Rob Redmond of 24FightingChickens likes to bring up baseball as his activity of choice that can "teach" these activities, and in many ways, I'd say baseball is more effective.
Regardless, my karate is my karate, I want it to be effective but I also want it to be aesthetically pleasing. This has nothing to do with desiring to be a kata champion or tournament kumite champion, I want to create effective, destructive technique. So my focus in the gym remains the same, I'm utilizing heavy bi-lateral lifting protocols to increase my ROFD, but not to increase speed in a game of tag. I want speed that translates into power.
This post is beginning to ramble, but I guess long and the short is that I'm worrying more about good, clean, effective karate.
There's nothing wrong with the competitive aspects of karate, I enjoy it thoroughly (within some federations, anyway, others are questionable), but it's not the be-all-end-all goal for my karate. My karate has always been about becoming better at karate. Many people espouse the "dojo-kun" to be the primary purpose of karate training, and while this sounds noble in essence, personally I just find those people to sound holier-than-thou. The dojo-kun is all well and good, it's a list of strong character traits that all people, karate-ka and otherwise, should aspire too. At the same time, however, you can learn most if not all of these traits through many different activities. Rob Redmond of 24FightingChickens likes to bring up baseball as his activity of choice that can "teach" these activities, and in many ways, I'd say baseball is more effective.
Regardless, my karate is my karate, I want it to be effective but I also want it to be aesthetically pleasing. This has nothing to do with desiring to be a kata champion or tournament kumite champion, I want to create effective, destructive technique. So my focus in the gym remains the same, I'm utilizing heavy bi-lateral lifting protocols to increase my ROFD, but not to increase speed in a game of tag. I want speed that translates into power.
This post is beginning to ramble, but I guess long and the short is that I'm worrying more about good, clean, effective karate.
