How skilled are you in martial arts?

In any kind of martial art really

Do you use weapons? If so, which ones do you use?

If you use lightsabers as a weapon do you use standard ones, shoto blades, double bladed lightsabers, lightsaber pikes, curved hilt ect. If you use single blades, do you dual wield?

What sort of hand to hand combat martial arts do you use? Karate, Judo, ect.

Also as a bonus, who is the best martial artist/lightsaber duelist in the forums?

I practiced Tae Kwon Do as a teenager, then Jeet Kune Do in my 20's. More recently I started practicing with a staff and escrima sticks.

I've never been in a fight though, so all of that is rather irrelevant.

Yabuturtle wrote: In any kind of martial art really

Do you use weapons? If so, which ones do you use?

Lightsaber (shocker, I know), but I'm also pretty handy with a butterfly knife and quarterstaff.

Yabuturtle wrote: If you use lightsabers as a weapon do you use standard ones, shoto blades, double bladed lightsabers, lightsaber pikes, curved hilt ect. If you use single blades, do you dual wield?

Currently only single, but I'm very capable with two (I have a practise synthetic sword I use for dual wielding practise). I do, however, intend to master all variants in my effort to claim the title of Jedi Battlemaster.

Yabuturtle wrote: What sort of hand to hand combat martial arts do you use? Karate, Judo, ect.

Hand to hand... hmm.. I've done quite a bit of work in Aikido and kickboxing, as well as grappling techniques from HEMA (plays well into my lightsaber style).

Yabuturtle wrote: Also as a bonus, who is the best martial artist/lightsaber duelist in the forums?

:whistle: oh... I dunnooooo.

I was ranked top five in the US in Division I NCAA Wrestling at 285 pounds (130 kilos). I never weighed more than 220 at my heaviest, however. My team needed me up there when our heavyweight destroyed his knee and we had no backup for him - and I just sorta stayed there. I always wondered how I would've fared at 197 pounds (89 kilos).

After my collegiate career, I fought MMA semi-professionally a few times in Tijuana while I was waiting to join the Army. I won all those, but picked up a nasty infection on my knee that landed me in the hospital after my last one. After my stay there, I decided to hang up trips south of the border.

I've tried to continue to synthesizing styles into what I began learning through wrestling as a wee lad in Oklahoma. I fought and won the Modern Army Combatives School tournament at Fort Benning, Georgia, and turned down a spot on the Army's team to pursue a career in Special Forces. Since then, I've really tried to become a student of the firearm - pistol, carbine, long rifle. That includes not only marksmanship, but close quarters battle and weapons retention. Additionally, just as there are different ways to employ firearms tactics based on need, I have really grown to appreciate how different systems are designed for specific purposes. Some are sport, some are lethal, and others are purely survival. As with weapons, each technical tool is useful and appropriate based on your situation.

That's a question that's hard to answer. Good is a moving target as the people against whom I should compare myself are also continuing to improve.

But I grew up boxing, moved to karate in college (kicks are useful), and I've done some aikido and shaolin kung fu and... Yeah, basically if it's a fighting art, I'll probably give it a shot and I'll probably incorporate parts of it into my own empty hand style if it's not complete nonsense.

Training wise these days, I've been studying an old school Japanese sword art for several years now. I'm there because they are literally the best martial arts school I'd ever seen. I'm there three days a week, and I do at least some solo training the other four. (How much varies, but there is always some.)

Lightsaber-wise, I've got a plain blue blade. Make of that what you will.

Interesting topic.


Do you use weapons? If so, which ones do you use?

I practise Kali (San Miguel) and Wing Chun (William Cheung System). I am trained to handle knives, sticks, long poles, butterfly swords, nunchaku and balisong.

If you use lightsabers as a weapon do you use standard ones, shoto blades, double bladed lightsabers, lightsaber pikes, curved hilt ect. If you use single blades, do you dual wield?
Depends. When i practise Kali I love to have 2 sticks but I can also use a stick and a knive, so i will say a lightsaber and a shoto..

What sort of hand to hand combat martial arts do you use? Karate, Judo, ect.
Boxing, Wing Chun, Panantukan.

I started off with karate, then over the years added: tae kwon do, jiu jitsu, renshinkan-ryu ninjutsu, kenpo, shuri-te, muay thai, maharlika kuntaw, escrima, arnis, jeet kun do, and wing chun....anytime we moved i studied a new style and did so with obsessive drive...i can literally use anything as a weapon....even a simple sheet of paper, largely because of how i choose to define what a weapon is....i got into martial arts when i was 8 because i was constantly bullied...i was in 3-4 fights a day, 5 days a week, every week of school for my first 3 years of school, so i'm very experienced in both getting my ass kicked and kicking it myself...admittedly i lost a lot more fights before i started getting good at martial arts than after...and once bullies began to learn i got in fewer and fewer fights...in 1996, my shuri-te sensei was the coach for the american team going to compete in greece, i was on that team and had to withdraw because of going to bootcamp...by that point i had a reputation among the blackbelts for punching above my weight...as they put it i "punched like a mule kick"....and only weighed 132lbs...while overseas i was trained with a katana by someone that was the only student of his sensei (whom was a retired japanese ww2 officer)...making me only the 2nd non japanese to learn this family style....which incidentally closely resembles iaido...

Not very?

I practice Tai Chi (spell it however the heck you like) and fencing.

If it comes to combat, I'm better at 500m than I am up close.

There's a few other things I can do, but none of them are much use in a fair fight. ( "Well, that's not much incentive for me to fight fair then, is it?")

When it comes to unexpected confrontation.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCDIYvFmgW8

I am a little above novice.

I practice Tae Kwon Do and hold dark green right now. I also practice Koryo Gumdo (Korean Sword) (Red/Black). As I was growing up, some wrestling,spent a lot of time boxing with my older brother an his friends (so, getting my butt beat by bigger guys 5 years older). A little street brawling in my late teens at punk concerts, a little with thugs over some business and more bar fights than I would like to admit when I was drinking in my 20s. I have fought a few legit Tae Kwon Do and Koryo tournaments. I have stayed about 5'9" 160 lbs since I was 16, always been quick not power so much. So, far 5-0 unarmed 1 KO, 7-0 armed, 3 fight extra round wins.

I practical with a Katana, I "can" use a staff, skilled with a knife and a decent marksman (I used to work as a trainer for a security company,but a different type of martial art).

I have worked in some older boxing techniques, some Akido and Tae Kwon Do in tournaments. In the pretty shameful drunken brawls I used a lot of boxing and dodging sometimes got myself some fierce beating sometimes the other way.

I have my sharp Katana, a few dulled swords, a ton of bokens, a short spear and a staff. I have my Black handle white blade light saber I practice with sometimes.

I fight more practical so measuring how good is kinda pointless unless we were trying to kill each other.

I am still coming for Ari......he just jumped the big pond so the hunt is taking a little longer

For ten years I have been fencing with an epee. Three times participated in international tournaments. For twelve years I have been practicing artistic fencing (with an epee, a sword, a pole, a saber).