I don’t like two things about Shotokan sparring.
Both of them are outcomes of the rules of sparring, and the way those rules are enforced.
In theory, there is supposed to be no contact, or light contact, in the punches. And traditional Shotokan schools use little in the way of protective equipment, because Sensei Funakoshi tried that approach and discarded it (mind you, he had leather and horsehair to work with; material technology has come light-years since his experiments. He discarded protective equipment because it was so heavy and bulky that it interfered with correct technique in sparring, so he, and Sensei Nakayama, simply adopted a no-contact rule).
On the other hand, I’ve seen matches in the finals at international competitions where competitors were knocked flat as pancakes by punches that sure looked like intentional full power shots to yours truly. And the punchers in those cases were awarded a full point.
I have a bit of trouble with that. Perhaps there should be a different sort of Shotokan competition, where full-on contact would be the actual rule, rather than something that was sometimes rewarded by judges and referees, and sometimes not.
There’s another thing that bothers me because, even though it makes perfect sense under the current rules of sparring, because it makes sparring a much less effective preparation for actual fighting.
It’s the dreaded “turn-away”; you’ve seen it. Somebody will come in sparring hard, finish his attack combination, and then quickly turn his back on his opponent to deny the opponent a legit target for a counterattack.
The only problem, of course, is that if you practice Shotokan attack runs and then immediately turn your back in a real fight, the bad guy will play a Gene Krupa drum solo on the back of your head, which is a perfectly good target on the street, if not during a sparring match with referees.
Now, I’m not a senior officer of any official or unofficial Shotokan Organization; but it would sure make sense to me if there were a rule about contact that was enforced consistently; I don’t care what the rule is, but if it’s a sport, it probably ought to have actual rules that are consistently enforced, you know?
Either get everybody to agree that when they step onto the floor that full-contact shots to the face are fair game, or not. Simple, neh?
Note that Mas Oyama schools are perfectly happy with full contact kicks to the head, but not full contact punches. And the Oyama boys are happy to play with full contact shots most places other than the head. So it’s not as though full contact is impossible in any context.
And western boxing, a pretty darn good martial art itself, allows full contact shots. So we know that it’s possible to design rules that permit full contact shots to the face and head, with appropriate protective equipment.
Or with no protective equipment; old-style bare knuckle boxing was a mixed martial art that included punches to the head and face and body, as hard as you could manage, and throws! On the other hand, afterward the participants looked like they’d been in, you know, a fistfight!
My personal vote is that we start wearing fully protective headgear and make some contact permitted, as opposed to wearing no protective headgear and making full contact sometime rewarded, and sometimes punished.
I’m only ranting about this issue because it would make too darn much sense to have a set of consistently enforced rules about contact, you know?
And it would make even more sense if there were a rule preventing intentional turning away as a way of preventing counterattacks in matches in Shotokan Tournaments. Because it’s really, seriously dumb for any set of rules in a martial art to encourage what would be suicidal behavior if it happened during a real slugfest on the street.
