Monday, May 11, 2009

You karate junkies

Our own Steve White met Goju-Ryu karate master Chuck Merriman over the weekend. Mr. Merriman is one of the best-known karate practitioners in the US. Steve called me immediately afterward because he was excited, telling me that when he told him who he trained with, Hanshi Merriman knew exactly who I was, where I was from and where I now live. Mr. Merriman is known as one of the most knowledgeable karate instructors in the world. One facet is the bunkai of kata, the interpretation and application of the movements. They have an ongoing research project into it and the website here is worth a look if you are interested in such things.

Why would you be? If you like forms, its interesting to se how they apply their movements. If you want to be able to competently judge forms at tournaments, it's handy. And if you run into one of them, you'd like to know what they might do (to you). There's a clip on the home page that shows some applications that look very Kenpo-like. Not a surprise because high level karate works like Kenpo in many instances. http://www.tairabunkai.com/

1 comment:

Jim said...

Wow, that was really cool! Thanks for sharing, Mr Wedlake! - Jim Peacock