I personally have seen quite a few martial arts and know the history,philosophy and intended use for many of them and could even say I know more about martial arts than most teens. But from reading up, some personal experience and watching lots of “Fight Quest” and “Human Weapon”, my top 5 martial arts for use in a fight with ANYONE (yes,even an MMA ) or in a self defence situation (like they’re meant to be lol) are as follows:
1. Sanda/San Shou :
Yes this is a Shaolin-based martial art and I see it as very effective!
Lots of strikes, no redundant or fancy moves, hard physical conditioning and a fair amount of takedowns which SHOULD lead to grappling (which we don’t see in Sanda KICKBOXING matches).
Not to mention a lot of muscular endurance required as well as the employment of iron body training (hitting yourself with a metal/bats, breaking bricks, balancing on spears,etc.)
2. Jeet Kune Do
I haven’t studied or read up on Jeet Kune Do as such (even though I have the Bruce Lee book “The Tao of Jeet Kune Do” which I STILL haven’t got round to reading yet!!!)
Anyway, from what I have read and heard about Bruce Lee, he almost certainly studied:
Tai Chi (Lee Hoi Cheun), Wing Tchun (Yip Man/Wong Shun Leung) , Boxing (fighting Gary Elms) ,Fencing (Peter Lee) , JuJitsu (Wally Jay), Judo (Gene La Bell), Karate (Chuck Norris/Ed Parker)
and also did (no conclusive proof/backstory): Phillipine based wrestling, The Phillipine’s Kali/Eskrima, Greco Roman Wrestling, Muay Thai, Hapkido, Tae Kwon Do,Savate and some sort of kickboxing.
It’s funny how these martial arts go together!
Anyway,considering Bruce Lee: had incredible speed (proven by blurring cameras so they had to increase the frames per second in a shoot), did one inch punches, side kicks that sent people/heavier objects than him flying,did God-knows how much jogging, and had tremendous muscular endurance; it is safe to say his JKD SHOULD have high fitness standards or develop fitness alongside the arsenal of core techniques in its syllabus.
3. Hapkido
Enough said, develops flexibility and speed the most in the form of high kicks (like tae kwon do) but also includes throws and grappling.
4. Japanese Jiu Jitsu
In theory this is the perfect martial art-it was used to kill armoured Samurai on the battlefield with or without the use of weapons. It has weapons techniques, strikes and and emphasis on standing grappling,throws, and last resort ground-based grappling.
5. Kyokushinkai Karate
Karate demanding extreme cardio threshold,muscular endurance and pain threshold via kumite with limited padding and hits to the chest! Like Sanda/Shaolin Wushu it has iron body training. Not to mention I think it involves throws and some sort of grappling (not sure if it had ground grappling but it’s great nontheless!).
These are what I think are the best anyway-mainly from the research and their marketing AND the fact that “Fight Quest” and “Human Weapon” had an MMA and a soldier/athelete with fighting arts experience struggling to do any sparring with the masters!
What do you think? Write your top 5 or say why you do/do not agree with me.
Oh yeah-I myself work out in the gym and have been kickboxing for approximately 2 years (well, 3 in total but I had college or bodybuilding took priority some of the times so let’s take a year off of that lol)