Carter Hargrave - In Search of the Ultimate Martial Art
It looks like since the beginning of time or at least the introduction
of the term Martial Art there have been endless comparisons of different
styles, systems and methodology in fighting and defense. Its all over
the place more than ever with the internet and multimedia. Ultimate
fighting and the like events where guys try to prove that their art is
superior, and most recently the entrance of a loose based form known as
MMA or Mixed Martial Arts which try to bring the most effective moves
together in a formless art.
If one thing is sure in the martial arts it is that things constantly
change at a very fast pace, and with this channge public opinion and
popularity come and goes. I have been in the martial arts for many years
so I will give you a run down in succession of what the most (by public
perception anyway) fearsome martial arts were and are.
1. Karate from Okinawa WWII
2. Judo back in the fifties to mid sixties (Think James Bond).
3. Tae Kwon Do in the seventies because there were so few Kung Fu
schools to take advantage of demand from the popularity of Bruce Lee and
David Carradine in "Kung Fu" - Marketing is a wonderful thing.
4. Aikido - we welcome Steven Seagal
5. Birth of the UFC and here comes Ju Jitsu as the dominator.
6. MMA - UFC type events now try multi arts instead of which art is
best. As any MA Instructor can tell you one on one Ju Jitsu has definite
advantage.
And there we are now. So you say I am missing a few, yes that is true so we will touch on those now.
Tae Bo - more of a fad and not a martial art it is exercise and a good workout.
Krav Maga - good self defense art but it was not widely available and
faded in popularity quickly as the public has martial art attention
deficit disorder.
In my life as a martial artist and then a martial art teacher I have
practiced many arts, some just to see what they are about, and others to
help me along my journey to find the ultimate fighting art. I have done
the various Kung Fu classes, the Kuk Sool classes, the Karate forms,
the Ju Jitsu, Kickboxing, all sorts of stick arts, knife arts, sword
arts, and firearm styles of combat shooting.
After all my searching I found that there in fact is not an ultimate
martial art and each one was good for maybe one thing only, and no art
is good for all things no matter what the brochure tells you. Each one
had a glaring weakness. Judo or way of gentle is excellent at throwing
but not good against a puncher. Boxing has great hand techniques, but
useless against the kicker. Karate is good depending on which system and
philosophy (defense or tournament) but is limited against a street
brawler. Aikido is great at using an attackers movements against them,
but useless against a skilled and balance oriented opponent. Ju Jitsu is
great for one on one defense and useless against several attackers if
it goes to the ground (nothing like an attackers buddy kicking you in
the head while your on-top of his friend). MMA is great for one on one
and cage, but almost useless against the street fighter or multiple jack
asses. So we must look further and know our own limitation and needs to
make the educated decision.
I did not find what I was looking for so I designed my own arts from my
experience of bleeding and broken bones and knowing first hand what
works and what does not. First I figured that tournament or ring work
was not my interest, so my main focus was on pure defense or street
fighting which usually means no rules and I get to go home no matter
what.
The systems that I teach now out of my seven black belts that I earned
are Jeet Kune Do the style of Bruce Lee that I learned from one the the
original Lee School students, and a new form of Kempo Karate that I
heavily modified to where it barely resembled anything in the Kempo or
Kenpo world today.
First I hate using the work expert but I am expert in the movements of
the body and how to streamline and align it to get the most speed and
power from any move. To do this I take the move I want then remove all
the un necessary steps, make sure there is no chambering or telegraph to
let anyone know what is going to happen to them, then tweak it to get
more and more power so that each strike caused the most energy delivery
and disruption of tissue and bone. I have used these methods with
professional fighters and increased their speed and power by an average
of 20% to 25% which is huge. Its a weird gift but its mine.
After years of searching I resigned myself to the fact that what I
longed for did not excist so I forged an art of my own, American Combat
Kempo. As for the name, well I am an American for sure, I wanted only
combat aspects so tournament play was out, and since my teaching lineage
traces back to the Saholin Temple in China it had to be Kempo (Chuan Fa
in Chinese).
In phase one I took the modified strikes that I was speaking of above
that were from standard Kempo or Kenpo along with Okinawan Karate,
melded them with Kung Fu strikes that I liked, developed new non passive
blocking (blocks are hard fast strikes) along with soft trapping
blocking for grappling work.
In phase two I took the best of Ju Jitsu from the original Ju Jitsu (
Aiki) and incorporated them to work along side the strikes and both
blocking methods.
In phase three we went all out on the traditional weapons of Okinawa and
modernized the procedures for real world fighting scenarios, along with
swords and edged weapon (knives) fighting from Philippino arts that I
modified for my needs. Then we went modern with all sorts of firearms in
the advanced Master levels. You can not be a true master unless you can
handle any and all weapons available to you, or thrust upon you.
So, am I saying that my art
is the ultimate fighting art? No, but it is for my needs and what I
designed it for. I have had others including agencies copy many aspects
of my system, and many use my moves in real combat so I know what I
teach is effective for the real world. Would it be effective in like a
UFC even thing? Yes we would win everything. Now if only they would just
throw out all those rules again so we could. Of course things are just
the way they should be ni that repect. My rule book? I think its written
on the back of a napkin somewhere. It says go home alive to your
family.