Personal Project - Judo VS Karate

Have you ever wondered out of the Martial Arts available to learn which one is the most effective? Well I've got some answers for the martial arts: Karate and Judo, one of the most popular martial arts. In this blog report I will include the history of both Judo and Karate and some interviews! At the end I will give a summary of what I think is the most effective.

The road to Judo
Kano Jigorom was born in 1860 to a good Japanese family, when he was a boy he was small, weak, and bullied. He started learning Jujutsu at 17 years old. But it was very difficult to find a teacher that would teach him. When he was 18 years old he went to study literature, but he still continue his martial effort. Eventually he was referred to Hachinosuke Fukuda, Master of the style “Tenjin Shinyo”-Rye. Few months later after Kano joined Fukuda’s school, Fukuda became ill, and died. Kano, became another “Tenjin Shinyo-Rye” teacher, Masatomo Iso. Through hard work, Kano got the rank of “Master”, and became Assistant Instructor at 21 years old, shortly after Iso also became ill, and died. Kano, wanting to learn a new style, became a student of Tsunetoshi Likubo, of “Kito Rye”. By this time Kano was creating new techniques. Wanting to expand the Principle of “Kito Rye” and “Tenjin Shinyo Ryu”, Kano created an improved Jujitsu, based on sound scientific principles, with focus on development of the body, mind, and character of young men in addition to development of martial prowess.

The creation of Karate
Legend has it, that about a thousand years ago, as far as 5th Century BC, a Buddhist Monk named Bodhidharma, travelling from India to China, arrived at Shaolin-si (A small forest temple). There he taught Buddhism, and also set exercises to strengthen the mind and body, exercises that started Shaolin Temple boxing. Bodhidharma teachings later became the basis of the majority of Chinese martial arts.
Okinawa, a group of small islands under Japan, had created a type of Martial Art that involved no weapons, because there were weapon bans in various points of their history. This martial art was called “Te” meaning hand. “Te” was improved later by information brought by merchants and nobles, as Okinawa was a trade center for Japan, China, Thailand and others.
In 1917 Gichin Funakishi performed the first “Te” public demonstration, and impressed a lot of Japanese people, including the Crown-Prince Hirohito. In 1922, Dr. Jogo Kano, founder of the Japanese art Judo, invited Funakishi to Japan to teach “Te”.

Judo Interviews

Robert Katz interview

Q. How difficult is it to learn Judo?
A. Quite simple. From 5 year olds to 80 year olds, from able bodied to blind athletes.

Q. How powerful is Judo?
A. It can be a very intense and expolive sport with throws being executed in fractions of a second and immediate transition to groundwork (grappling) with submission techniques like armlocks and strangles for competitors aged 16 years and over. Fitness, strength and speed are very important training factors.

Q. How fast is Judo(The speed of striking a throw)?
A. Extremely fast. Pulling the opponent off balance, entering the throw, executing to landing can occur in fractions of a second.

Q. How does Judo effect the mind and body?
A. It's like a physical game of chess where you work from your own actions and the actions and reactions of your opponent. You create opportunities and can counter most techniques and you practice a family of techniques which work so well together the opponent doesn't know which one is being used and your throw is immediate and effective. It is a great physical and mental release and has a wide appeal to all types of people and cultures around the world.

Q. Overall, how effective do you think Judo is?
A. Within the rules (no punching, kicking, not being too defensive in getting a grip on your opponent's jack or allowing him or her to get a grip on your jacket, etc) it is amazingly effective. At the higher levels, it could be used in self-defence situations but because it is a competitive Olympic sport, the emphasis is on competing within the rules of the sport and devleoping good sportspeople with a healthy outlook to life. It is taxing both physically and mentally and requires a great deal of dedication for succesful competition results. The armlock s and stranges are very real and in competition, if you don't submit when one of these techniques is applid, you can be strangled unconsciousor dislocate an elbow from the armlock.

Dave Cordery interview

Q. How difficult is it to learn Judo?
A. Judo is easy to learn but takes much practice to master.

Q. How powerful is Judo?
A. Judo is a system of mental and physical training so the power of learning judo rests in the training that the body and mind receives as a person learns judo.

Q. How fast is Judo(The speed of striking a throw)?
A. Judo is in the majority a grappling sport, therefore there is limited striking moves. Applying a judo technique requires skill speed and power in that order.

Q. How does Judo effect the mind and body?
A. Judo trains the mind to seek excellence and the body to provide maximim benefit through efficiency of effort.

Q. How dangerous do you think learning Judo is?
A. Recent American research has found judo to be the safest contact sport there is!

Q. Overall, how effective do you think Judo is?
A. I have found judo to be one of the most effective martial arts for self defence.

"Everybody has difficulty with Judo; it's not an easy thing to do. But it's not a sport that relies on sight very much, it's more about feel and movement, like wrestling," it's a sport where a blind person can compete equally with someone sighted, which is rare. It gives the blind students a chance to feel capable and confident." - Neil Ohlenkamp

Karate Interviews

McCallum Shihan Interview

Q. How difficult is it to learn Karate?
A. As far as I am concerned you never really learn Karate its an ongoing study I have been training for over 40 years and I learn something more all the time!!!!

Q. How powerful is Karate?
A. It depends on the practitioner like for my age and also having had a stroke I am considered to be very strong, I an 18 months of 80.

Q. How fast is Karate(The speed of striking a move)?
A. If you have trained hard and often you become very fast.

Q. How does Karate effect the mind and body?
A. I consider three things:
Control of the mind.
Control of your body.
Control of your breathing.

Q. Whats the danger of learning Karate?
A. Not many injuries as we have a good warm up.
As it is full contact you do not trust your partner to pull his/her kicks and punches so you learn to block properly. I got more injuries in no contact and light contact.

Q. Overall, how effective do you think Karate is?
A. In the hands of someone who has done the training he/she can be very effective.

Sigrid Larsen Interview
Q. How difficult is it to learn Karate?
A. You have to go out your comfort zone.

Q. How powerful is Karate?
A. On a scale of 1 to 10 I'd give it a 5.

Q. How fast is Karate(The speed of striking a move)?
A. It gets faster all the time, if you compare it to Judo its probaly faster.

Q. How does Karate effect your mind and body?
A. It makes you more fitter and gives you self control!

Q. How dangerous is it to learn Karate?
A. If you don't warm up you might pull a muscle.

Q. Overall, how effective do you think Karate is?
A. I think its really really cool!'

I always teach my students that no one is unbeatable there is always somebody out there who is bigger,stronger, and better trained. - McCallum Shihan

Summery

Karate is a kicking punching martial art and Judo is a grappling and throwing martial art where "size matters not!" Karate can do more damage and more pain then Judo but in Judo you can do armlocks and chokes. Overall, I reckon Karate is more effective then Judo if you learn full contact, because full contacts teaches you more defensive blocks and attacks.

Keywords

Judo, Karate, Judo clubs, Karate Clubs,

Websites used

http://www.youtube.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/karate
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/judo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judo_technique
http://www.neokarate.net
http://www.judoinfo.com/blind1.htm