Karate or Judo/BJJ

njd · White Belt

Hello everyone as you can see I;m new here.

I've been practicing Tang Soo Do for around 4years and am a 1st Dan. I'm 30.

I enjoy the martial art but get concerned sometimes when I think that my actual fighting technique is probably quite poor. We do very little in the way of sparring but lots of line work, forms and one step sparring etc. The instructors are fab and I have no complaints about the quality of the teaching. Maybe I'm wrong and other members say that I;m good but I'm sure that a tough cookie would probably kick my/most people in my class' butt without any training. Am I worrying too much and will I suprise myself if I ever need to use it?

I wonder if maybe changing to something like Judo/BJJ would be a better option as it's completely different and I think I'd quite like a go at grappling etc. I wonder if in reality they would be more usefull in a real lfe situation?

bassaiguy · Orange Belt

I benefited from training in Judo and a little free style grappling, but kept karate as my core art. For me that was a better path than totally switching. I'd rather be on feet in the street than wrapped up with a guy while his buddies put the boots to my head, but even the old masters saw the value in cross training. Funakoshi advocated Judo training for Shotokan karateka, Oyama studied Judo and added elements to the Kyokushin syllabus, Kano invited Funakoshi to teach karate at the Kodokan (Judo hq) and Gozo Shioda told his aikido students to study Judo after they had achieved shodan in his dojo.
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Wastelander · KF Sensei

I generally recommend to anyone practicing a striking art to also do some cross-training in a grappling art of some kind. For me, it was judo, and it has worked out very well for me. You said you enjoy your art, your training, and your instructors, so I don't see why you would need to completely drop it. I do think that a grappling art would benefit you, though, because you will learn valuable self defense skills and pressure test them against resisting opponents. Cross-training, while keeping Tang Soo Do as your core art, sounds like the best option, to me.
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Shorin-Ryu/Shinkoten Karate | 2010-Present: Yondan, Renshi | Sensei: Richard Poage (RIP), Jeff Allred (RIP)
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njd · White Belt

I can only spend 2 days per week training in a MA as I have lots of commitments. So realisticially I think I can only do the one. I'll give Judo a go firstly once a week and keep the TSD going and see what happens.

Would Judo be more effective in real world defence than Karate in your opinion?

sensei8 · KF Sensei

Both!! Both karate and judo would greatly compliment your building MA arsenal deeply. Either one by themselves do have the capability of being effective outside of ones dojo. However, effectiveness is a suggestive thing because ones abilities weigh heavily in deciding if effectiveness truly exists.

Imho.

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Wastelander · KF Sensei

njd · White Belt

it would be for self defence. where i live an awful lot of people are taking bjj. i worry that tang soo do is not as effective. i prob spend 10percent of tge time sparring. bjj or judo prob spend 70-80. thats a huge difference.

JusticeZero · Black Belt

njd · White Belt

'I had it noted by one person I dealt with who had trained a few things that the best combination he knew of arts was western Boxing with Judo, as they both used almost the exact same stances in most cases; as soon as it gets into the boxing clinch, you are in Judo's realm already in a proper Judo stance and position. Both of those arts are easy to find and affordable and have lots of contact and competition to test yourself with.'

That makes sense especially with the boxing. I'm sure that in general if someone trained in boxing and another in karate for the same amount of time that the boxer would most often win. They are more conditioned to take the knocks and also spend much more time actually fighting/sparring that most who do Karate. Do you agree?
As I said I;ve been training in TSD for around four years and wouldn't fancy coming up against a boxer with 4 years training!

JusticeZero · Black Belt

Maybe on the general case, mainly because of the emphasis on contact and fitness that you get in the usual Boxing gym, but Boxing is just as stylized as Karate, with unrealistic elements (huuuuge gloves that alter the tactics massively and don't condition the hands for striking) and there are Karate styles that do some serious amounts of knocking each other around the room. (*looks for Ev*)
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