Tag Archives: kenpo

Your Martial Art Doesn’t Work, and the Hells Angel Threw Me Through a Wall

Does Your Martial Art Work?

outlaw karateI had studied Chinese Kenpo Karate for two years. I was an instructor, and I had written the training manual for my school.Then I ran into a Hells Angel.

The story actually started when the restaurant I was working at hired a geeky looking kid. I didn’t like him much, but then one day I saw him kick a wall. The wall shook like the 1906 earthquake, and I knew that he knew something I didn’t.

So I got to know him, and he said he studied Kang Duk Won Korean Karate. He said he didn’t know it well, which I found hard to believe because I had seen him kick a wall harder than a donkey kicks a pervert. He said, however, that his brother knew a lot more than him, and let’s go talk to him.

So that night, I think it was a Tuesday, we went down to a house in Sunnyvale to meet his brother. As we pulled up Alex said to me, “I should probably tell you that my brother is a Hells Angel.” I blinked, but, naive me, heck…I knew Kenpo, right?

His brother was a couple inches under six feet, a little shorter than me, but he had the outlaw look in his eyes. We talked martial arts for a while, and then he boldly stated, “Your Martial Art doesn’t work.” Then he wrapped two of the gnarliest fists I had ever seen into my shirt front and told me to work my first technique on him.

I began to move. I held his fists in place with one hand and brought my forearm up to break his elbows, I struck his wrists with my nerve paralyzing downward chop, and when I went to chop him in the neck he tossed me through a wall. Yes he did…all the way through the wall.

He laughed and helped me up, and then he told me to grab his shirt front. I did, and he showed me the self defense technique from his martial arts school. He reached over and punched me in the chest so hard that…that’s right, I went right through the wall again.

This is a true story, and being tossed through a wall twice changed my life, definitely changed the way I was learning martial arts, and prompted me down the road to other martial arts and how to really make them work. I spent over a half dozen years at the Kang Duk Won Korean Karate school, worked alongside all manner of people, including hells angels and other outlaw bikers. Included in my education was why a martial art doesn’t work.

Amreican Karate

The Golden Awareness of Hard Core Karate

Don't be a Weakling! Learn Karate Online!


I was stopped at a traffic light today, and the guy in front of me, with his right turn light on, wouldn’t turn. Just sat there, waiting for green. And I was struck by how hard core karate makes you more aware.
This person was probably from a different country, didn’t speak the language, didn’t fully understand traffic and the laws we use to navigate our streets with. And, hate to say it, didn’t understand common sense.
So they sat there, victim to a red glow, totally stopped in life, watching time, and life, pass them by.
Now, why don’t we get stopped if we study Karate, or taekwondo or kenpo or aikido or any of the various martial arts out there?
Because if you stop you get hit.
Now that is a lesson, isn’t it?
If you don’t move somebody tags you, point! And you realize that if it was ‘real life’ you would be dead. Or, at the least, unconscious and broke.
Now, here is the funny viewpoint of this: our streets are filling up with unconscious people, spending half their lives waiting at traffic lights, picking their nose and glad to be in ‘Murica.
Oh, lord, save me from the huddled masses.
Can anybody spell zombie out there?
Well, if you’re a martial artist, if you study the forms and technqiues of freestyle of kenpo or taekwondo, of Wing Chun or Mantis, of drunken fist or monkey style kung fu, then you know what I mean.
And, if you don’t, if you just go to school/work/welfare, then you are going to be one of the hopeless ones, sitting at stop lights, wondering why the mailman is late, wondering why you keep stepping in that brown stuff on the lawn. You are going to be the zombie, the victim, the guy with his finger up his nose at the traffic light.
You know, that’s why I started my website. There are just too many stupid people, too many wannabe zombies out there, graduating from school and standing in the breadline, all stopped up and nowhere to go. I figured if i could get a few to take a few free lessons at my site, maybe they would get more, maybe they would get excited and head for a dojo somewhere, maybe they’d do something…anything! Anyway, if you are a zombie in training, head on over to Learn Karate Online and get a free karate lesson. I mean, I don’t mean to be rude, but…take that finger out of your nose and get your butt in gear! There’s a life out there, and it is just waiting for you to wake up.

Win #30–Hands on Transmission of True Karate Possible Over Time and Distance

The key to learning True Karate has previously been through what I call a hands on transmission of data. That is, you have to share the art by having physical contact with the teacher, by learning the forms and techniques through direct instruction. The really neat thing is that I’ve been able to break this ‘barrier.’ Read this win.

“You are a master. You have opened me up to things that I have never thought of before.” KFM

And I thank KFM for his kind words. The truth of the matter is that the art is learned by physical doing. If somebody does the forms–but knows the correct data–then the form will reveal the art to him. This is such a simple but astounding truth, and it leads to this conclusion: I’ve helped KYM, gave him a few pointers, but he opened the door himself. Once he saw the correct data, the true art could not be denied him. That’s just the way the martial arts, and truth, work.

Here’s a vid snip of the good old Iron Horse (Tekki).

Have a great day, and good skill with your seeking of the True Karate.

Go here if you want a free book on True Karate, and see if what I am saying about a hands on transmission of data is possible.